I look at the floor again, only this time it’s to hide the pain in my face, the tears forming in my eyes. Not because I know what’s going to happen next, but because…I know he’s right. If I continue to allow Victor to love me, it would be selfish of me. I can’t fight him on this, as much as I want to, because if I don’t let him go; if I don’t let him find himself again before it’s too late, he’s going to die because of me. He will die because of me…
“I sent Iosif Veselov to Mexico,” he admits. “I sent him to watch you.”
I’m shocked, but I can’t be mad about it like I was with Fredrik and Dante. I’m shocked by the information, but not surprised.
Now I know why Iosif was familiar—I must’ve seen a file on him among Victor’s contacts.
“I did it because, like I said, I have become weak. Because Kessler was right. About everything. Because I needed to send him—because I love you. And everything I do—everything I’ve done since the day I met you—is a mistake.”
I swallow; my eyes begin to sting and water, but I hold back the emotion. I’m angry and moved by him at the same time, and the opposite emotions are too much for me to bear.
I’m tired too…I’m tired of being the ‘girl’; I’m tired of being the ‘girlfriend’; I’m tired of men looking at me with a protective brother’s eyes; I’m tired of asking permission to be who I am, who I’ve become. Only problem is, I could never be tired of Victor, and loving him apparently goes hand-in-hand with everything else I want to rid myself of.
“It ends today,” he says one last time.
And then he turns and walks out of the room.
Frozen in this spot, for a torturous moment my legs won’t carry me forward. I imagine myself running out after him, grabbing his arm to stop him, even jumping on him from behind and beating my fists against his back—I imagine myself begging him, like I told myself I’d never do. But I do nothing. I stare at the open door he just left through, and let my heart continue to sink into the depths of the earth.
When I finally manage to get my head together, and I start for the door to run after him, Mozart steps into the room in front of me. There’s a sheet of paper dangling from his hand. He holds it out for me.
“He wanted me to give this to you,” Mozart says as I take it into my fingers.
Just before he leaves me alone with the letter, Mozart says, “My advice: don’t go looking for him. I know you love him, and that he loves you, but a man like him wasn’t built for love. Don’t go looking for him,” and then I hear his footsteps as he rounds the corner.
It takes several moments before I gather the courage to open the letter, my hands trembling as I read:
Izabel,
I am confident that my solo mission to find Vonnegut will be the end of me. I am confident that you will never see me again. But I cannot die without letting you know how deeply my feelings run for you, and always have.
You have been the best and worst thing that ever happened to me. I love you, yet I cannot love you the way I want to. I cannot live with or without you. I cannot let you go, yet to free myself of you, I have never been able to bring myself to kill you, either. I never imagined or believed that I could be compromised the way my love for you has compromised me. I was conditioned in every scenario—especially this scenario—yet love still found a way. I have realized that love always finds a way, and that no amount of training in the world can ever prepare one for it; no one can avoid it; it truly is the most powerful force in life; the Great Destroyer. If my training taught me anything, it was that love is not our friend; it is dangerous, it makes us feel things that never last, things that will one day be torn away from us, because nothing lasts forever. You will die. I will die. Everyone and everything you will ever love will die.
Do not look for me, Izabel. I need to do this alone, without you, of all people. No one, not even my brother will know where to find me. Yesterday I would have told you I am seeking Vonnegut for the same reasons I have sought him these past couple years. But today I only seek him so that I can destroy the man who made me the way I am, the one who destroyed me when I was just a boy. But I would be a fool to think I will be able to do this without getting killed in the process. So, do not look for me. I am no longer yours to seek. Today it ends. Vonnegut. Me. Us. The illusion that was us. Today it ends.
Do what I could not do: stop loving me; put me out of your mind; go on with your life and live in happiness and peace without me.
Do what I could not do…
Victor
When I look up from the letter, I find myself sitting on the chair by the window, but I don’t know how I got here. Looking down at the letter again as it dangles between my thumb and index finger, I’ve never felt weaker than I do in this moment; I’ve never wanted to cry so hard into my hands. He left me. Victor Faust pulled the thread that held me together, and he left me. For a long time, I still don’t believe it.
I—
No. I do believe it. And I accept it. How? Why? Because I’m not weak; because I don’t want to cry.
And because I don’t want him to die.
I walk out of the room, past Mozart, and I stop in the doorway before exiting.
“If you hear from Victor again—”
“I won’t—”
“If you hear from Victor again, tell him one thing for me.”
“I won’t hear from him, but you can tell me if you want.”
I pause, thinking back to a day that wasn’t so long ago, a day when I hid in the trunk of an assassin and escaped Mexico. Was it for love that fate led me to his car? Or was it something else?
I raise my eyes to Mozart.
“Tell him that he was wrong. It doesn’t end this day—it begins.”
Izabel
Two weeks later…
When I went to Mexico, I didn’t exactly get what I went there for, but I brought back with me something I never anticipated—myself. Cesara and Javier; for all of their faults, they helped me realize who I truly am, who I’ve always been, and who I’ll always be.
“I’m so fucking tired of following in the shadows of men.”
While although I’m certainly not some kind of man-hating Amazon, I have accepted in my heart that I’m stronger than any man I’ve ever known, and that as much as I’ll always love Victor, I can move on in my life without him. I don’t want to—but he gave me no choice, so what else am I to do but move on? It’s what I’m doing, though not like Victor wanted. He hoped I would go back to the normal world, to live the typical American life, to get married and have kids and a dog and go on family vacations to places where I won’t get kidnapped and tortured.
I’m sorry, Victor, but I can’t. I will still work as an assassin—for what clients, I have yet to figure out, but I will—and I will still play roles that could lead me right into the grave. Because I like it. I enjoy everything about it: the missions, the different faces I get to wear, the satisfaction I get out of killing people who deserve it.
Maybe I don’t even need clients. I truly am the only client I really need. Because the job isn’t about money for me—it’s about vengeance. And bloodshed. It’s about being a voice for those whose voices were stolen from them. And there is no shortage of people who deserve to die, that’s for sure.
Of course, I wouldn’t turn down money, either, if a job came my way.
“You’re a wolf in the chicken pen; you kill because you’re hungry, because it’s in your nature, and your remorse only goes as far as what you’re willing to let affect you. Because you secretly despise affection, companionship, and love. You crave power above all things, because up there, at the top where no one can touch you, influence you, or love you, you know you can never be hurt.”
Javier was right. But as I think back on those words he said to me with so much conviction, I realize something extraordinary—the same words can be said of Victor Faust.
I am more like Victor than I ever knew; maybe that’s why I’m taking our separation so calmly; m
aybe that’s why I’ve accepted it. Because we are the same person. With the same struggles and faults and ideas. The same strengths and weaknesses. The same bloodlust. We love and hate each other. We are equally encumbered, burdened by one another. We are the same. Therefore, I am Izabel Faust.
It began the day Victor thought it would all end—the new identity, the new name. Izabel Seyfried is dead along with Sarai Cohen. Seyfried was the apprentice. Faust is the Master. She is who I am now.
But my priorities have shifted—I will no longer hunt Vonnegut. He is Victor’s kill, and he can have him.
And since I haven’t heard even a whisper from Fredrik or even Niklas, I’ve had no other choice but to move with the waters of change and accept those changes for what they are.
Victor’s Order is broken. Disbanded. It no longer exists. I’ve checked every secret location, even the Safe Houses, and there’s no one in them anymore. I’ve tried contacting the remaining members, and only a few could be reached. James Woodard took his family and moved to Oregon. I traveled there to visit with him:
“When was the last time you saw Victor?” I had asked, sitting in his small living room surrounded by blue flowered wallpaper.
“It’s been a long time, Izabel,” he told me, “longer than the last time you saw him. I think it was right after you two came back from Venezuela.”
“Did he say anything?”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know—anything?”
“If you mean did he tell me anything that might point you to his current whereabouts, then no, sorry but he didn’t.”
I nodded.
“Well, how’d you know to…move on from his Order then?” I had asked.
“I’m always here if he needs me,” he had said. “Had to get off the East Coast; my family is important to me, and I just felt like the longer I stayed there…” He didn’t have to finish; I understood.
The real reason I went to see James Woodard that day wasn’t because I’d hoped he would have information on Victor’s whereabouts—although I certainly wouldn’t have ignored it if he did. But I wanted to ask James if he wanted to work for me.
But before I left his house, I changed my mind.
James Woodard is, and probably always will be loyal to Victor Faust. And I can’t do what I intend to do with those ties still in-tact.
Nora Kessler, on the other hand, I did still intend to recruit. She never treated me like the ‘girl’; she never had any problem throwing me into a situation where I might die.
But at the last minute, just like with James, I changed my mind.
Problem with Nora is that Victor was the driving force that led her to his Order; she risked her life to be accepted into it, and…well, I still wonder to this very day—why?
I admire Nora, but in my heart, I’ve never really trusted her.
So, who was left?
No one.
Fredrik is gone—he could be dead, I don’t know, but I’m not going to go looking for him. It hurts, the last words he spoke to me. And just like with Victor, I’ve learned to accept that Fredrik meant what he said that night. And Fredrik has a lot of deeply disturbing, unresolved issues, that I could never even begin to know how to help him with.
Niklas? I don’t know why, but I thought that out of everybody, Niklas would be the one I could count on, that he’d be the one who would jump at the opportunity to work together, on our own, free from bosses and rules and procedures already set in place. So, I was surprised when I went looking for Niklas at the bar where he lived upstairs, and no one had seen him in over a week. I broke into his room; his stuff was still there; nothing looked like it had been touched; a thin layer of dust had settled on his belongings on the nightstand.
“He was paid up for three months,” the owner of the building told me, standing in the doorway with the keys after I’d already broken the lock. “But the rent was due three days ago, and I still haven’t seen him. I don’t really know the guy, but it’s a bit strange that he hasn’t been down at the bar. He’s always at the bar.”
I walked through his room, looking for anything that might give me an idea where he is.
“Who did you last see him with?”
“Jackie, of course,” the owner had said. “They were always hanging out here together—she’d always end up here in his room.” He paused, pointed at me briefly. “You’re not his wife or somethin’, are ya?”
I laughed a little. “No, definitely not.”
He nodded, relieved he didn’t just rat Niklas out.
“So, what can you tell me about this Jackie?”
The owner gave me her description, and said he thought she lived in a trailer park somewhere, but he couldn’t be sure.
“Are you gonna pay for that?” he asked about the broken lock just before I went to leave.
I gave him enough cash to pay for the lock, and Niklas’ rent for another three months. Just in case.
I did have a bad feeling about his disappearance, but at the same time, it was typical of Niklas, and certainly wasn’t the first time he’d left without telling anybody. He could handle himself. Besides, I had begun to realize that going there to recruit him was the worst idea ever anyway. He was worse than Victor when it came to letting me go on missions, and worrying about me all the time. And then something hit me:
“If Fredrik sent Dante to Mexico, and Victor sent Iosif, then who did Niklas send? He had to have sent someone—there’s no way in hell he would’ve let me go on that mission without sending someone too.”
I pace the floor of my living room for a long time talking to myself, pondering the whole revelation.
Then I stop mid-stride as the pieces begin to come together. I go over to my laptop on the coffee table and research the Lockhart Family; a knowing grin spreading across my face as I see a photo of Mr. Lockhart’s daughter, Frances, standing beside him at some kind of college function. She definitely wasn’t the Frances Lockhart I saw at the auctions. And apparently, Cesara didn’t look hard enough, or she would’ve found the same picture, buried about twenty pages into Google images. Maybe she gave up on page nineteen, like I almost did.
I conclude that the woman I saw at the auction had to be someone Niklas sent—that’s why I felt as sorry for her as I did for Dante. Could she be this mysterious Jackie, perhaps? I may never know. Because just like Fredrik, and Victor, I may never see Niklas again.
For now, at least, it looks like I’m on my own, and I’m going to make the most of it. Maybe this is the way it was always meant to be; this is the place fate was leading me when I hid in the back of Victor’s car. Not into his arms, but into the start of a new life—my life—the one I was born to live, that only Victor could show me.
Victor…
I will always love him, and despite what he wanted me to do, I will never stop loving him; I will never stop looking for him; and I will never put him out of my mind.
Because I know one day we will meet again.
As lovers? Friends? Enemies?
It is the one thing I fear and desire more than anything else. To see him again; to feel his hands on me; to look into the eyes of the man who made me…understand who I already was.
Victor…
LOOK FOR THE EIGHTH BOOK IN THE SERIES, IN THE COMPANY OF KILLERS…
-OTHER BOOKS BY J.A. REDMERSKI-
Speculative Fiction/Contemporary Fantasy
DIRTY EDEN
Fiction & Literature
EVERYTHING UNDER THE SUN
Crime & Suspense
KILLING SARAI (#1 – In the Company of Killers)
REVIVING IZABEL (#2 – In the Company of Killers)
THE SWAN & THE JACKAL (#3 – In the Company of Killers)
SEEDS OF INIQUITY (#4 – In the Company of Killers)
THE BLACK WOLF (#5 – In the Company of Killers)
BEHIND THE HANDS THAT KILL (#6 – In the Company of Killers)
SPIDERS IN THE GROVE (#7 – In the Company of Killers)
&nb
sp; THE DARKEST HALF (#8 – In the Company of Killers)
More to come…
New Adult Contemporary Romance
THE EDGE OF NEVER (#1 – The Edge Series)
THE EDGE OF ALWAYS (#2 – The Edge Series)
SONG OF THE FIREFLIES
THE MOMENT OF LETTING GO
Young Adult Paranormal Romance
THE MAYFAIR MOON (#1 – The Darkwoods Trilogy)
KINDRED (#2 – The Darkwoods Trilogy)
THE BALLAD OF ARAMEI (#3 – The Darkwoods Trilogy)
-ABOUT THE AUTHOR-
J.A. (Jessica Ann) Redmerski is a New York Times, USA Today and Wall Street Journal bestselling author and award winner. She is a lover of film, television, and books that push boundaries, and is a sucker for long, sweeping, epic love stories. Things on Jessica’s wish-list are to conquer her long list of ridiculous fears, find a shirt she actually likes, and travel the world with a backpack and her partner-in-crime.
To learn more about Jessica, visit her here:
www.jessicaredmerski.com
www.inthecompanyofkillers.com
www.facebook.com/J.A.Redmerski
www.pinterest.com/jredmerski
Twitter - @JRedmerski
Table of Contents
-PRAISE FOR IN THE COMPANY OF KILLERS-
-ABOUT SPIDERS IN THE GROVE-
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
Spiders in the Grove Page 19
