Page 73 of Bound to a Killer

She’s okay.

Roughened up, but okay.

I gently close the door after buckling her in and slip behind the wheel, starting the car after tossing the gun into the glove box. Relief comes in fragments, dulling the ache Tanner left behind.

Both girls are okay.

That’s enough for me.

My chest clenches as I fist the steering wheel, backing out. We need to leave before anyone comes to investigate the noise.Cops don’t pass by often, but I’m not interested in any nosy onlookers.

“I checked the desk,” Frankie says quietly. She doesn’t meet my eyes in the rearview mirror. Instead, she stares out her window. “There was nothing. I couldn’t find any IDs or anything. Not that it really matters now, right?”

A suffocating sensation tightens my throat. My inner torment claws back to the surface, gnawing at me. I can’t help but feel like this is all my fault. Everyone’s suffering traces back to the moment where I first fucked up.

There’s a reason Tanner didn’t mention Antonio to me back inside. It makes sense now. His threats, coming here without backup, coming to terms with his own death.

He’d changed. Or maybe he was right, and I’m the one who’s really changed.

The signs were all there. I was just too busy to stop and face them.

Despite our differences, and despite him going against me, he couldn’t go through with hurting either me or Frankie. He chose to sacrifice himself when he couldn’t persuade the outcome. Something about that realization sits heavy in my gut.

He knew nothing would stop me from going after Antonio.

That I would’ve done anything to protect Aria.

He couldn’t choose between Frankie, me, and Antonio. So he left the choice in my hands.

But is that what I did? Did I choose Aria over him?

I guess in a way, I’d always choose her, back to the very moment I decided to take her from that house. I’ve chosen her above everyone else’s safety. My own included.

Maybe Tanner’s death is my fault. But dwelling won’t do me any good.

What’s done is done. What’s lost is lost.

I didn’t pull the trigger on him. But somehow, it still feels like I did.

I bury the thought deep, snuffing out the feeling until I’m nothing but a numb wall. My only remaining thought is how to move us forward.

With Antonio gone, it feels like the chains have finally slipped off. Aria’s fate rests solely in my hands now. I choose how we all move forward. And I know what she’d want if given the choice.

Aria’s small voice breaks through the bleak fog stretched between the three of us. “W-Will they find us?”

Us.

I’m not sure which she means—the police or The Ringer—my mind narrowing in on the specific way she chose to phrase her question, linking herself with me.

I make a conscious decision to unfurl my fingers from where they dig into the wheel, contemplating.

Members of The Ringer will scatter without Antonio’s lead or mutate into something else entirely, likely away from here. The threat over her life disappeared the moment I blew a hole into Antonio’s head.

“The cops won’t be able to link this to any of us, unless we come forward ourselves. They have no suspicious activity record for?—”

My words clip off, unable to say his name.

“Any of them,” I finish. “It’ll just look like a random act of gang violence gone wrong. Chances are some criminal will catch the scene during a drug deal or something long before any cop comes around that place. They’ll want to protect their meeting spot and burn the bodies off.”