Chapter 221

He thought of the Cailin he had known five years ago. She couldn’t bring herself to hurt a fly. She had wept over a dead bird she found in the garden.

But the woman in the wheelchair tonight — the woman who had looked at him with eyes like empty glass?

I will not rest until the English family name is nothing but a cautionary tale.

A cold horror moved through him.

Had she ordered this? Was this her justice?

“Sir?” Gavin said quietly, retrieving the phone from the pavement.

“Call the police chief,” Hilliard said, his voice shaking — not with grief, but with rage. “Tell him I know where Charla is. Tell him to bring a SWAT team to Kegan Aguirre’s estate.”

“Sir, if we do that—”

“Do it!” Hilliard roared. “She is still my wife. I will not let her become a murderer — not even to avenge herself against people who deserve everything coming to them.”

He turned back to the gate and drove his fist against the iron.

“Cailin!” he shouted into the dark. “I know what you did! Open this goddamn gate!”

Inside the estate, in the warm, fire-lit library, Cailin sat with both hands wrapped around a cup of tea. She couldn’t hear him. She was watching her children sleep on the rug by the hearth, their small chests rising and falling in the firelight.

She had no idea that outside, the man who claimed to love her was about to bring an army to her door — and accuse her of the one thing she had never done: becoming like them.

The sirens were deafening.

Blue and red light strobed through the tall library windows, painting the walls in a frantic, rhythmic pulse.

Cailin dropped her teacup. It shattered on the hardwood floor.

“What is happening?” she gasped.

Kegan rose from the armchair where he had been cleaning a vintage flintlock pistol. He didn’t look surprised. He looked annoyed.

“It seems your husband lacks patience,” he said calmly.

The front doors burst open with a crash.

“Police! Nobody move!”

A dozen officers in tactical gear swarmed into the grand foyer. Behind them, Hilliard strode in looking like the angel of death. He marched straight into the library and pointed a finger at Cailin.

“Where is she?”

Cailin stared at him. “Who?”

“Charla. Don’t play innocent. We saw the video, Cailin. The finger. Is she in the basement, or did Kegan already dump the body?”

Cailin’s mouth fell open. She looked at Kegan.

“You kidnapped her?” she whispered.

Kegan shrugged and holstered the antique pistol. “She hurt you. I balanced the scales.”

“You cut off her finger?” Cailin screamed, horror flooding through her. “Kegan! I didn’t ask for that! I wanted justice, not torture!”

“Justice is subjective,” Kegan said coolly.

“You’re sick,” Hilliard spat. He turned to the officers. “Arrest him. Check the basement.”

Two officers seized Kegan. He didn’t resist. He simply smiled at Hilliard as they cuffed him.

“You should thank me, Holloway,” Kegan said. “I did what you were too weak to do.”

“Get him out of here,” Hilliard growled.

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