“What happened with Skovil?” I asked. “What went wrong?”
He exhaled through his nose. “Everything, from start to finish. It was another one I let get too personal, given your connection to him. I rushed things, I let emotion overrule judgment, and it cost me my anonymity.”
My mind flooded with reminders of the case, the aftermath. “That night when you came home . . . that beating wasn’t from Jiu Jitsu?”
“No.” He rolled his head, cracking his neck. “My very first kill I nearly botched as well. I was sloppy with Creeden, a ball of nerves and a flood of anger. It was personal—too personal—and I spent the entire month that followed confident the cops would show up to haul me away for his murder.” His eyes lost focus. “But no one ever came. They wrote it off as a suicide, no one taking a closer look at the evidence that might have suggested otherwise because of the type of scum Robert Creeden was. That’s when I realized I could use that inclination to overlook certain things a so-called productive member of society would be afforded to my advantage.”
I touched the photo of a young girl who resembled Andee in her younger years. One Thadeus Tucker was to blame for stealing the innocence that girl once possessed. “There was so long between Creeden’s and Volkner’s suicides. Murders.”
“My mission had gone from avenging my sister to all sisters. And brothers. And loved ones.” His forearms tensed, veins pushing to the surface of his skin. “I could only do so much if I got caught or killed in the process, so I took my time, learning, practicing, studying—exercising my mind as much as my body.”
My eyes skimmed down the mass of him. He’d put on twenty pounds of muscle from when we’d first met, along with amassing the wisdom of twenty generations before him. “You were basically turning yourself into a human killing machine.”
His head lowered, dark hair hanging like a blind in the abyss. “Basically, though there was nothing simple about it.”
“God,” I breathed, gripping the edge of the bench. “The running, Jiu Jitsu, late nights, long weekends. All these years I never came close to guessing what you were really up to.”
The muffled cadence of our breaths tangled, keeping the silence at bay while words evaded us.
“I missed out on so much.” His voice was barely, though markedly, tight. “I sacrificed what was not mine alone.”
Light caught my wedding ring when I flipped the next page. A reminder. A caution. I wasn’t sure of the significance. “It was more noble than having an affair, like I might have presumed at different points in our marriage.”
“It was still an act of selfishness.” His head lifted for a moment before falling under the invisible weight he bore. “I’m sorry. A part of me knew when you first came into my life I should let you go, that the disease I carried couldn’t be kept from you. But in another selfish act, I refused to release you.”
My forehead creased. “We didn’t have some whirlwind romance, or embody some fairy tale story of infatuation and longing from afar before exchanging vows. We didn’t know of each other’s existence until one night when we both drank so much we didn’t remember each other’s names the next day—we sure as shit didn’t pause to consider protection—and then four weeks later, I had to stake out the student union building in hopes you’d eventually make an appearance so I could reintroduce myself and inform you I was pregnant with your child.”
He shifted from his post on the stool. “I remembered your name, Grace Payne.”
“Well, I didn’t remember yours, Noah Wolff.” My arms crossed. “And recalling the name of some girl you slept with hardly encapsulates an epic romance. You asked me to marry you because you felt like you had to, not because you wanted to.”
“And you said yes because you thought you had to as well, not because you wanted to.”
Words filled with contempt and laced with fire rose from within, but I swallowed them back into the void they’d spawned from. I was done fighting recurring battles that no one ever won, leaving both sides bloodied and broken. Our marriage, from start to finish, was a mess, but it was our mess. Nearly two decades into it, and I was ready to pick up the pieces and dust off the cobwebs.
A heavy exhale rolled past my lips. “Some story we have, right?”
“Obligation might have been the reason I married you, but love is what has kept me here the past seventeen years, Grace Wolff.” Pale eyes looked out from beneath the shadow of his bowed head, apologetic and honest. “I’m not a noble man, nor a particularly good one, but I am yours. I should have let you and Andee go instead of allowing you to marry me, but you were my weakness back then, Grace. Now”—his eyes connected with mine—“you’ve become my strength.”
Thoughts twisted and words faltered. “Noah . . .”
Rising from the stool, he grabbed the prepared syringe and set it on the binder in front of me. “When hunting animals, one must be wary not to become one in the process.” His fingers brushed mine before falling away. “I fear my time is edging near.”
My head shook. “What time is that?”
A remnant of a sad smile stitched across his mouth. “The time where I meet my victims’ fate.”
Pinching the syringe, I set it aside. “I’m not going to kill you.”
Noah shifted closer. “Then what will you do?”
“Stop asking me that. I don’t know.” My eyes clamped closed as the wave of awareness and knowledge swept over me.
My husband was the Huntsman. A murderer. He’d taken the lives of thirty-three men. Or were they more monsters than men? Uncertainty thickened, making any kind of definitive thinking impossible.
“Do you want to turn me in?” he asked softly. “I won’t object. I won’t struggle. You can be the one to single-handedly turn the Huntsman over to the police. Your father will be proud.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose and evaded his question. “That’s a sentiment my paternal figure is not inclined toward extending my direction.”
My body turned to stone when I considered what my parents, Andee, the task force, and my colleagues would think if they found out about Noah. Some would assume I knew all along and either played some part by aiding or overlooking my husband’s dark project, while others would pity or shun me. The end result for all would be gradual alienation.
“What do you want, Grace?”
His question dissipated into the air, lingering in my mind.
“I want time to . . . think. I need time to wrap my head around the weight of accepting my husband is a mass killer. The same one I’ve pledged to help uncover and turn over to the authorities. The one who has taken the law I’m sworn to uphold into his own hands, and seen fit to execute those who fall short of his personal standard for justice.”
Noah exhaled. “You believe I’m wrong? Taking the lives of those who prey upon the innocent?”
My eyes opened to find him right in front of me. “I believe it sets a dangerous precedent. What happens when other people, inspired by the Huntsman’s methods, wind up further skewing your subjective sense of justice and take other lives?” My hands gestured at him. “You are intelligent, careful, and methodical. Setting aside the argument as to the right or wrongness of your vendetta, the average citizen cannot be seduced into thinking justice is up to interpretation.”