"I offered him a clean death." Cole's voice is flat, matter-of-fact, like he's delivering a mission report. "A blade. The chance to die with some dignity."
Seppuku.Late nights in his dorm room, his voice low and serious about honor.
"Let me guess. He refused."
"He chose to beg." His eyes are dark, unflinching. "So I gave him nothing."
The words should horrify me. The part of me that sits on a federal bench, that swore oaths, that has already bent those oaths for family. That part should be screaming. But the restof me, the part that remembers exactly how Adrian's hand felt around my throat, how his voice sounded when he promised no one would believe me. That part is glad.
"Good."
Cole goes still. Whatever he sees in my face, he doesn't flinch from it.
I wrap his right hand first, winding the gauze over the worst of the damage. "He was a coward. In the marriage and at the end. At least he was consistent."
His mouth twitches. Dark. Appreciating the venom.
I move to his left hand, the one that's bruised but not split. The bathroom smells like antiseptic and copper and him. The scent of his skin that I never forgot, not in twelve years.
"You are good at this."
"I've had practice." The words slip out too fast, and his whole body tenses, his hand tightening around mine.
"Chesca." Quieter now. "She fell a lot. You were at the ER three times before her second birthday."
Of course he knows. Of course he watched even that.
"She grew out of it," I say, because I don't know what else to say.
The tension eases. I finish wrapping his hand and sit back on my heels. He flexes his fingers experimentally, the white gauze stark against his skin, then looks at me. Really looks, that intense focus that sees everything I try to hide.
"Thank you."
Two words, simple, but the way he says them makes my throat tight.
I rise up on my knees, bringing my face level with his. I cup his jaw, thumbs tracing the edge of the bloodstain I haven't cleaned yet.
I reach for the washcloth on the towel bar, wet it in the sink. It comes away rust-colored the first pass, then pink, then finallyclean. I work slowly, erasing Adrian from Cole's skin one stroke at a time. Along the line of his face where he smeared it without thinking. Across his cheekbone. The corner of his mouth, and when my thumb traces his lower lip he exhales like I've wounded him.
"You don’t have to do this." Low. Rough at the edges. "Any of it."
"I know."
"You could have called Sal. He would have handled it. No—" His eyes drop to my hands. Rust-colored smears on my fingertips from cleaning his knuckles. "No blood on your hands."
But I wanted to touch it. I wanted to see Adrian on his skin and wash it away myself. The moment I let him walk out that door, I became complicit.
I don't want to uncross it.
I rinse the washcloth. Watch the water swirl pink in the basin. "I needed to be part of it."
"This is mine too. What you did. I wanted it done, and you did it."
"It was personal." His bandaged hands come up to cup my face, so gentle it makes my chest ache. "Everything about you is personal."
"I know. That's why it had to be you."
I lean forward and press my mouth to his.