A Heart of Shame

by Kristen Banet

  “Fuck.” She sighed, leaning back. “I might not have needed to know that.”

  “You did,” Vincent’s voice cut in. She looked over to the door and saw him. Hours earlier, she had been sitting at his desk, and he had asked an important question.

  She’d given him the only answer she could think of.

  “Good evening,” she mumbled, looking back to her food.

  “Good evening,” he replied, sitting down and taking some of the fried rice from the dish in the center of the table. “I take it Elijah has been letting you in on some things?”

  “Yeah, training and the time you guys are going to take off.” Sawyer didn’t look back up at him. In the days since the hospital, she and Vincent had spoken very little. They gave each other wide berths and definitely didn’t eat together.

  “Good,” Vincent said, sounding like nothing had changed. She couldn’t get a read on his emotions and frowned. He was completely closed-off, by the sound of his voice. She looked up and continued to frown. His face showed nothing either.

  Jasper had always tried to bury his feelings and failed. Sawyer thought her old friend should take a page from Vincent. The Italian was a master at it.

  “Anything you want to add?” she asked, her frown deepening.

  “Not really.” He took a bite of rice, using chopsticks. Of course, he could. “Anything you would like to ask or say?”

  “Not really,” she mumbled, looking back down at her food.

  “Fuck me,” Elijah muttered.

  They ate in silence after that. Sawyer didn’t appreciate the calculating look Vincent was giving her—like he was trying to figure out a puzzle the entire time they ate. As Elijah went to throw away empty containers, she dropped her spoon on the table and glared at Vincent.

  “What?” she hissed.

  “I…” He didn’t finish, shaking his head.

  “Say something,” she growled out, “or stop staring.”

  “I’m just thinking about something.” He sighed. “Nothing important. Forgive me.”

  By the small, haunted look that entered his eyes, she had a guess as to what he was thinking about. She took a chance.

  “I know Axel was your brother… and Henry was your nephew. You can ask about him,” she said gently, switching to Italian to keep the entire statement private. “I have pictures if you want them.”

  That made Vincent pale, and he shot up from the table. He left the room without a word, and Sawyer winced at a door slamming.

  “What did you say?” Elijah inquired, reentering the dining room. “He’s not the storm-off kind of guy… most of the time.”

  “That he can ask me about Henry,” Sawyer said softly. “That I can give him some photos.”

  “Nice of you to offer.” Elijah sighed. “But… Vincent will need to come to terms with a nephew he didn’t know he had on his own schedule. He’ll ask for more when he’s ready.”

  “I just wanted to let him know I can help.” Sawyer stared at the chair where Vincent had been sitting. She meant well, she really did. She could give Vincent some peace with it, something happy. He just needed to let her. But watching him run, she could only feel the guilt of failing Henry and the pain of knowing Vincent would never meet his nephew.

  “And eventually, he’ll let you. Come on.” Elijah groaned, patting her shoulder. “Let’s go watch a movie. I’ll call Quinn in.”

  She walked down to the entertainment room by herself while Elijah went to find Quinn. A movie, something normal. Something before secrets and bombs. Before Special Agent Jon Aguirre killed himself because he’d failed so spectacularly against Axel.

  It felt like she’d stepped into an alternate reality, but at the same time, this was her life now.

  Assassin turned IMPO agent. Assassin who was on the chopping block if she fucked up.

  Yeah, something normal like a movie sounded nice. She could handle a movie. It was a hard thing to fuck up, honestly.

  Thank the heavens for that.

  2

  Vincent

  Vincent got into his car, ignoring the pounding pressure in his head. He turned on his music, some Giuseppe Verdi, and just let Rigoletto flow over him.

  He let the entire song play and switch to the next one before he started the engine and pulled out of the garage.

  The house had become suffocating in the last few days. It choked the life out of him, and her constant lurking around made him jumpy. He wasn’t scared of her, not for being an assassin. He was terrified of what knowledge she might have.

  He’d once told her that no one knew Axel better than he did. He’d never realized how wrong he could be. He’d never realized how depraved and awful his brother truly was. How cruel. He’d known Axel was a dangerous, sick man but never that sick. Vincent couldn’t wrap his head around how someone could survive a hell like hers and keep going.

  One foot in front of the other.

  He wished he could channel whatever inner strength she had because he was falling apart. He could hold it together, just barely. Just enough to keep on with what he was supposed to be doing. He needed to be okay because if he fell apart, the team did.

  He needed to get the cat and the boy off his mind. He needed to get Jon out of his head, the brain matter all over the wall, the sound of the gunshot, and his guilt over causing that. He needed to get her scars and her body out of his thoughts. He needed to stop thinking about her playing with a boy he didn’t know.

  Nothing would get that boy off Vincent’s mind.

  A boy named Henry. A nephew he would never meet or even visit in his grave. A charge she had taken care of and Axel had used against her. A son his brother had murdered in a fit of anger. Vincent, that first night back at the house after Atlanta, had locked his door and broken down. He’d been crushed. He still was. For Henry, the bonded animal, and the woman who connected all of them together. Without her, Vincent would have never known any of it. And that was Vincent’s fault.

  “Antonio,” Vincent whispered, as regret festered in his heart, “if I had known in the warehouse, I would have killed you then.”

  His brother was over one thousand miles away, locked in a dark cell by himself, awaiting sentencing from the WMC. He would get the death penalty, that much was certain. The only thing that wasn’t certain was when. It was entirely possible that he would be kept alive until all his operations around the world were completely shut down. Until he sold his allies down the river, and as long as he had something to tell them, he could keep himself alive.

  Vincent drove to a local bar in town as Giacomo Puccini’s works washed over him. Vincent’s particular favorites were Pavarotti singing to the great classics, especially Puccini’s works. He absorbed it for a little while longer before cutting the engine and getting out.

  He had one idea for tonight. Get hammered and pretend, for just one evening, that none of this had happened. He could do that for just one night. He could pretend he hadn’t driven a man to suicide. He could pretend that everything wasn’t his fault.

  He stepped into the bar, Harry’s, and gave a small smile at the raucous country music. He saw Jasper and Zander in a booth, already nearly done with their—Vincent counted the empty glasses–third, maybe fourth round.

  “Hey, guys,” Vincent greeted them in a mumble, sitting down. “You only left an hour before me.”

  “Yeah, well,” Zander scoffed. “Fuck it. I said I was getting drunk, so I am.”

  “Amen,” Jasper groaned out, holding up a half-finished whiskey. Vincent nodded slowly as a waitress came over with Vincent’s regular drink, a cheap scotch. He sipped it as Jasper downed the whiskey. Holy shit, Jasper was going to kill himself at that rate, the lightweight.

  “Who’s watching her?” Jasper asked, his speech a little slurred.

  “Elijah… probably has Quinn with him now, too.” Vincent sighed, giving up on sipping. He downed his entire drink in two swallows. “She was eating fucking fried rice last time I saw her.”

  �
�Jesus,” Jasper grumbled. “I can’t fucking handle this, Vincent.”

  “We don’t have a choice. At least it’s just her for you,” Vincent muttered, feeling a bit pissy himself. “I have a…” Dead nephew.

  He didn’t say the words out loud—had yet to say them out loud since he had found out. But the guys knew exactly what he was referencing.

  Vincent was particularly bitter over the fact that he could have been trying to catch Axel at that time, but the IMPO had told Vincent he was too young. He’d been untrustworthy. He could be used by Axel against the Organization.

  “How’s everything with you?” Zander’s mental voice entered his mind, drunk in his head, just like Zander was slurring in reality. They rarely spoke using telepathy. Vincent and Zander could both do it. So if they wanted a private conversation, they could have one. They rarely needed to. “Have you… talked to her about all that stuff? Have you talked to anyone about what you saw in the hospital? With Jon?”

  “I can’t right now, Zander,” Vincent replied, sending the words back to Zander. “I’m barely holding it together. And furthermore, I would like to ignore that entire topic. We were notably not given invitations to those funerals.”

  “It wasn’t your fault, Vin. Jon and his team, the decisions he made… they weren’t your fault.”

  “I know.”

  He did know that. He’d taken what Quinn had said to heart, and the team reminded him every time they got the chance. And Vincent kind of understood why Jon did it. If Vincent had failed his team so spectacularly, broken the code, tried to set other agents up, and gotten people killed like that… Vincent would have strongly considered ending it the same way.

  They sat in silence for a moment. Vincent knew Zander was just trying to do his duty as friend and healer, but the hothead was the last person Vincent wanted to talk about Sawyer with. Or Jon. Or any of it.

  “This sucks,” Zander mumbled, getting the silent message loud and clear. “Let’s just get drunk.”

  “Tomorrow we go back to normal,” Jasper reminded them. “She’s on the team now. We got to… I don’t know, be fucking teammates.”

  “You are just losing your mind, aren’t you?” Vincent huffed looking at Jasper. Here he was, their Golden Boy, the one with a rigid sense of morality. And he was madly in love with a woman who was guilty of crimes including, but not limited to, assault, theft, and murder. He nearly felt bad for Jasper. Vincent didn’t, though, because he felt Jasper needed that kick in the head to remember the world wasn’t black and white. It took him a year to get over being on Vincent’s team, thanks to his Castello background. Hopefully, even though Sawyer’s background was worse, they wouldn’t have such a hard time of it this go around.

  “Fuck, yeah I am,” Jasper moaned, putting his head on the table. “Being drunk helps, though.”

  “I’m glad to hear that,” Vincent mumbled. His second drink came and then a third. They lived way down in southern Georgia, where the towns were tiny and the communities were close. While the team didn’t engage with the locals frequently, the town remembered them. They would hit the bar after a rough case, and what they drank was remembered and kept flowing.

  This had definitely been a rough, strange, weaving case. It technically wasn’t over, since Sawyer was an extension of everything that had happened. And Axel wasn’t sentenced, yet. They were on vacation until that moment, until the WMC handed down Axel’s verdict.

  “We agreed to this,” Vincent sighed. “We agreed to it before we even knew…”

  “You know,” Zander started with a huff, “I’d do it again. I just wish that she had just been what she was. It would almost be easier if she was just—"

  Just an assassin.

  Vincent knew what Zander was trying to say. It would have been easier if she had just been an assassin. Not a victim of an awful game, a horrifying relationship, or his brother’s plaything. That was weighing on them all—a cloak of darkness that had blanketed the team since she had decided to tell them everything.

  Their newest teammate was a scarred, maimed creature, destroyed by Axel and then rebuilt to do horrendous things. She was a creature who went through another transformation into stalwart protector of the weak because of her creator.

  It would have been easier if she was just an assassin. Just a professional.

  “Not here,” Jasper groaned. “People are around. But yeah. I get what you’re saying, Z.”

  Vincent listened to them for nearly an hour as they all knocked back drinks. They were Magi, and the energy of their magic would burn it off faster than non-Magi, but they were still getting plastered.

  “You know what sucks?” Zander suddenly asked loudly, making people look at their booth. Zander wasn’t any quieter when he continued. “I still want to sleep with her.”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake!” Jasper growled. “Stop thinking with your dick for just a few minutes. She doesn’t need you panting around while—"

  “You mean you don’t need me panting around while you try to lock lips with her, again.” Zander growled back. Vincent noted the playful tone to Zander’s voice and frowned. Again?

  “That’s not what I meant!” Jasper hissed. “You know it!”

  “Again?” Vincent asked out loud, looking at the friend next to him. Jasper went red and began to mumble.

  “He kissed her like… a week before we headed out to Atlanta.” Zander laughed. “Then had the balls to come to me and say people just shouldn’t be kissing her.”

  “You’re both a couple of teenagers.” Vincent sighed, finishing his next drink. He didn’t know what number it was. The waitress had been kind enough to clean off the table the last pass she’d made.

  He also didn’t like the gnawing feeling in his chest at the idea of one of them all over her. He’d known it would happen eventually. They had a substantial history with her, friendly and romantic. He didn’t know how much or how deep it went, but he knew it was there.

  Before, he’d wanted to find out more about her. He had wanted to delve into her and uncover her secrets, expose her, see how sharp she could get with him. He’d wanted to hear about her life with Jasper and Zander from her, not them.

  Now he nearly felt like he knew too much and about all the worst things.

  “What time is it?” Jasper mumbled, looking over Vincent’s shoulder at his watch. Vincent held his arm up so he and Jasper could both read it.

  “Nearly ten.” Vincent sighed. “You two done being children over who kissed whom? When I specifically told both you and Elijah that trying to do that wasn’t allowed?”

  He didn’t feel the need to worry about Quinn. There wouldn’t be any point in telling Quinn to do or not to do anything of that nature.

  “Yeah, sure, but since she’s going to be with us for five years… I think we should throw that rule out the window.” Zander laughed. “Five years, Vincent.”

  “I’ve already given up,” Vincent mumbled, rolling his eyes. “I knew the moment she agreed to the WMC’s contract that there was no stopping this.”

  He just hoped he could stop himself. In his current state, if she crooked a finger, he was fucking done for. He would purposefully rile her up, just to see what happened—just to see how much her tongue could lash him before the end.

  That thought, as drunk as he was, made him fucking hard. Which made him worried about his sanity.

  His brother was still hanging between them, and he needed to remember that. Vincent wouldn’t blame her for never wanting to see his face again, much less not wanting to entertain his thoughts.

  “Thank the gods!” Zander roared, making people around the bar cough. “I can try to win her heart!”

  “And then you’ll break it because you don’t know how to handle something that valuable,” Jasper mumbled.

  Vincent rolled his eyes again. He came out drinking with Hopeless One and Hopeless Two. He should have known it would go down this route.

  “That’s why I have you. To keep me in check, and i
t’s Sawyer. I would never hurt her. Look, the Axel shit is done. She’s on the team. We can worry about the rest later.” Zander was still laughing.

  Vincent groaned as another drink was brought his way. He sipped it and lit a cigarette as the two of them kept talking about how appropriate or inappropriate the entire situation was.

  “Why don’t you both cool your heads for a moment?” Vincent asked, taking a long drag on his cigarette. “She obviously has some stuff to work out, and I’m not sure it’s something that can be rushed.”

  “Here comes Vincent,” Zander mumbled, glaring at him, “ruining the fun.”

  “Yes,” Vincent confirmed, pulling an ash tray closer to him so he could flick the ash without making a mess. “That’s me. Worried about the mental health of one of my new agents. Such a buzzkill.” While the thought was cohesive, the words coming out Vincent’s mouth were a slurred mess. Thankfully, this was a case of drunk people having the amazing ability to understand other drunk people.

  “Fuck,” Zander muttered, settling down. “She’s pretty, though.”

  “Pretty doesn’t cover it,” Jasper mumbled, even worse off than Vincent and Zander. Jasper didn’t normally drink. It just wasn’t his style. Vincent was honestly amazed that the golden boy was drinking tonight, no matter the circumstances.

  Vincent glared as the waitress handed him a check.

  “We’ve been cut off,” Vincent complained as Zander made the water in a pitcher do a little dance. That would be why. The locals didn’t appreciate the team getting drunk and using their magic. Jasper was causing bubbles of water to float high above and pop over the sides. Zander wasn’t even supposed to be using his magic at all, for health reasons, and there was Jasper, helping him mess around. They were the only Magi within fifty miles, except the old lady who helped them around the house, and she was harmless. They also stopped letting her around the house weeks ago, preferring to clean up for themselves since Sawyer had come to live with them.