An officer jogged up to us, attempting to corral us toward the armored truck. “There’s burn ointment and bandages in the truck,” he shouted at Noah. “You should get that checked out at the hospital though. Make sure it doesn’t get infected.”
Noah gave a salute of acknowledgement. “I’ll be fine. Thank you for your help.”
“Why don’t you wait in the truck with your wife, and when we’re done here, we’ll drive you both home?” the officer suggested, keeping his attention on the frenzied crowd as the ribbons of smoke spread.
“My car’s close by. I can manage the rest on my own.” Noah tucked his arm around my neck, steering me across the street.
“Sir, I really must insist—”
“We’ll be fine,” Noah interjected, continuing to guide me away from the fray. “I pity the person who tries to pick a fight with me with the mood I’m in,” he muttered as his car came into view, parked along the curb half a block down.
“What happened back there?” I asked, jogging to keep up with his rushed pace.
“Bedlam.”
“Why did the officer mention burn ointment?” I asked, scanning the side of his face closest to me.
Noah pulled his keys from his pocket and unlocked the doors when we were still fifty feet back. “One of them had a red-hot brand and thought I’d appreciate having it pressed into the side of my neck.”
Leaping in front of him, I inspected the other side of his neck. My hand covered my mouth when I saw it. “They branded you?”
His jaw set as he angled his head to the side, giving me a better view of the bubbled skin. “Nice of them, wasn’t it?” His eyes held the sarcasm his voice was missing. “Makes me look tough.”
“God, Noah.“ My hand reached for him, but I knew better than to touch it. “Is that a . . .”
“Theta? Yeah, I assume it is.” Noah continued to direct us to his car, constantly scanning the perimeter, hands curled in fists, tension in his muscles.
“We really should get it checked out.”
Noah whisked me around the side of his car, swinging open the passenger door and waiting for me to crawl inside. “I’ll be fine.”
“You always say that,” I argued. “Even after a couple hundred ruffians just tried to kill you.”
A smile pulled at one corner of his mouth as he stood in the doorway, looking at me. “That’s because, until my death proves otherwise, I always am fine.”
“Noah,” I said, a whole speech jammed in the two syllables of his name.
His expression mirrored mine. “Grace,” he answered, echoing the same tone. “I’ll get it checked in the morning. If for no other reason than to have proof that I’m some innocent victim in this whole Huntsman debacle.”
“Positively innocent,” I scoffed as he closed the door behind me, then jogged around the hood of his car before climbing into the driver’s seat. Beneath the undertones of sweat, blood, and a charred, charcoal-like aroma, I detected the faint hint of his cologne.
My stomach churned when I realized that the charred smell came from my husband’s burned flesh.
I frowned at the angry patch of raised skin, blistered and red, unable to imagine the pain it must have been causing him while he sat there, apparently no more distressed than if he were lounging on a beach in Hawaii. His tolerance for pain, both physical and emotional, knew no match.
When he caught me staring, he nudged me. “Irony.” He adjusted the rearview mirror so he could examine it. The skin between his brows creased. “They mark me for the Huntsman, all the while unknowing I am the very creature.” He stared out the window, watching the ensuing madness around us as though it were a spectator sport. “Let the sinners crucify their savior. It’s all part of the plan.”
His foreboding words made the skin on my arms rise.
“Now you’re likening yourself to a god?” I said, grabbing a handful of napkins from his glove box to wipe off the blood staining his face.
“Not a god,” he replied, not so much as blinking when I dabbed at his wounds. “But a guardian.”
“They’re not going to stop,” I whispered as a group of Disciples rushed across the street in front of us, a stuffed body with a rope around its neck dragging behind them.
“They torment me for him, unknowing I am him.” An amused sound emitted from Noah’s mouth as he pulled away from the curb. “It’s diabolical. Not even I could have come up with a better plot twist.”
Shaking my head, I reached across his lap to secure his seat belt. “For a man whose mark of death is still emitting the scent of cooked meat, you’re enjoying this far too much.”
When his shoulder lifted, exposed skin pressed through the tear in his shirt. “I’m the last person they’d ever suspect.”
“Doesn’t one small part of you want to admit to them who you really are?”
“No. I never did any of this in hopes of earning merit or glory or popularity.”
Noah tapped the brakes when another cluster of Disciples rushed across the street in front of us. One of them was carrying a sign that read in large, oxblood-colored letters, The Huntsman Will Rise Again.
A caustic spark lit in Noah’s eyes. “Everything I’ve done is simply a matter of justice. The real kind. Justice is protecting the innocent. It’s not the reverse, as it’s become.” Noah passed through the intersection once it was clear, turning down the next street that would lead us to the interstate. “When the system places more importance on rehabilitation than prevention, society needs to step in. When more money is being funneled into our prisons than our children’s programs, drastic measures must be taken.” He glanced at me. “This was mine.”
Setting the bloody napkins in my lap, I took his free hand, remembering the first time he’d touched me with it, reminding myself it was a hand that had dealt the sentence of death to thirty-three men, picturing how large and unsure they’d looked holding Andee for the first time. His hands possessed an unparalleled power; they were harbingers of love and hate, dealers of life and death.
When and if the time came to let him go, I wasn’t sure I could.
So for now—tonight—I held on.
Twenty-Eight
The Huntsman had ignited a spark that had set fire to a country brittle with indifference and drought-ridden from moral decay. The fire burned wild and hot, spreading to every corner and borough inhabited by those who’d felt the sting of injustice.
The chaos that ensued following the arrest of the counterfeit Huntsman had subsided to a dull roar, everyday life going back to some semblance of normal. For the Wolff family, we’d embraced a new normal, one they centered upon loyalty and dedication: to our family, to our commitments . . . and to a clandestine mission that would go on as long as Noah and I lived.
Andee was, and would remain, unaware of the furtive activities her parents were partial to. Her ignorance would protect her when and if the truth—the real one—became exposed.
Mere weeks had passed since the start of all this, yet in that timeframe, I’d become a new person. The kind I could respect. The type who felt authentic instead of fake. The search for a serial killer had infused my life with purpose in the most unlikely of ways, and I’d finally become the person I’d always aspired to be. To get better, I had to do better—that was my mantra.