“WHAT?” GYPSY SOUNDED HORRIFIED BY the accusation, and for a second, I almost wanted to believe her.
“You can drop the act.” I looked between her and Birdie. “I know.”
“Know what?” Birdie demanded. “It seems like the only thing you know is your own delusions.”
I pulled out the printed sheets of search history that had been removed from her ipad, sliding it across the table so we could drop the bullshit.
“Insulin would be a good weapon of choice,” I told Gypsy. “But you didn’t take into account that I had eaten a meal shortly before the injection, unfortunately for you.”
Her hands shook as she read through the printed search history detailing how to kill someone with insulin, and when she looked up at me, her eyes were blurry with unshed tears.
“I didn’t do this,” she declared. “I never searched for these things.”
I wanted to believe her, and I hated myself for it. I hated myself for being weak and for falling in love with her, exactly like she wanted. Her actions had destroyed me, but I couldn’t show it. I couldn’t show her how much power she had over me, even at that moment.
“I suppose you’re going to tell me that even though this search history is on your ipad, you weren’t the one to sneak into my hospital room that night and inject my saline bag as well.”
Horror painted her features, and it only managed to fuel my ire when she tried to deny it. “I would never.” She choked. “Lucian—”
“What I can’t understand is why you were in such a hurry,” I snapped. “I was dying anyway. Was it really so terrible to wait until it happened naturally?”
Gypsy brought a trembling hand to her mouth as tears spilled free from her eyes. They looked so real, but I’d fallen for that before. It was only after the insulin incident that my eyes had been opened and the truth came to light. She was playing me, just as she’d played every man before me.
“I begged you to stay.” Her hand reached across the table but stopped short. “How could you ever think I would want you to go?”
I couldn’t look at her. I couldn’t allow myself to get sucked back into her lies. So I retrieved my phone and pulled up the financial transactions that had occurred since my supposed death. The evidence was there on the screen, and she couldn’t deny it when I showed it to her.
“What is this?” Her eyes moved back and forth as she examined the documents. “What is this supposed to mean?”
“This is the proof that you’ve been funneling money into an offshore bank account. Cashing out my investments, selling off assets.”
“What assets?” she demanded. “Lucian, this is insane. I don’t know anything about this, I swear. I just… I don’t know how you could believe I did this.”
“How could I not?” I scowled. “It’s the game you play, isn’t it?”
She stifled a sob, and this time, Birdie was the one to answer. “She doesn’t do that anymore, and you have no fucking right to come in here accusing her of—”
“Birdie,” Gypsy pleaded. “Stop.”
“No.” Birdie stood, her blue eyes piercing into me. “For months, I’ve watched her cry herself to sleep. I’ve watched her shrivel up and die inside because she thought you were dead. And where the fuck were you?”
I intended to answer her, but she cut me off as her tirade continued. “Where were you when someone sabotaged her car in an attempt to kill her? Are you going to accuse her of doing that too?”
I looked at Gypsy, my stomach threatening to empty the contents of my meager dinner as I processed those words. “What is she talking about?”
Ace interjected. “Someone cut the steering shaft on the car. Birdie was driving it to the store when it snapped.”
I glanced at Birdie’s casted arm, my gut churning as I considered that if this was true, it could have been Gypsy. It could have been my wife, heavily pregnant with my child. Rage burned inside me, threatening the edges of my vision.
“That can’t be right,” I murmured. “It must have been a mistake.”
“It wasn’t a mistake,” Ace argued. “And to be honest, I think the girls are right, Lucian. I don’t think they had anything to do with this.”
I looked at my friend, who in my absence, had suddenly been won over by my wife, and betrayal coated my tongue. “How could you know that?”
“Because he’s been here the entire fucking time,” Birdie snapped. “He’s the one looking out for us while you’re off in hiding, letting everyone think you were fucking dead like a selfish prick.”
“That wasn’t my doing.” They all looked at me like I was the one who lost my goddamned mind. “I left after I got the letter. What else did you expect?”
“What letter?” Gypsy asked.
“Your letter.” I didn’t want to show her the crumpled paper in my pocket. I didn’t want her to see how many times I’d read it, studying the words while I tormented myself on repeat.
Her voice softened when she replied. “I never wrote you a letter.”
I craned my neck back to relieve some of the tension that had gathered there. This bit was tiresome, and I was over it. I wanted her to admit the truth. I wanted to hear the words from her own lips.
I retrieved the folded square of paper and handed it to her. She opened it and stared at the worn ink, her face blank. There wasn’t a word said between us as she pored over the letter that described how she wished I’d just let her go in the beginning. How she hated herself for what she had to do, but this was who she was. She described how she dreaded my death because of the burden of guilt it would bring her, but freedom would release her in the end. There were so many personal truths in that letter, and I expected a reaction from her. I expected that this was the evidence she wouldn’t be able to deny. But when she finished, she carefully folded it back together before ripping it into two pieces and throwing the remnants into the middle of the table.
“I didn’t write that.”
“Of course, you didn’t.” I sighed.
“Who gave it to you?” Birdie glared.
I looked at Father Hawk, who hadn’t said a word so far. I didn’t expect him to. And I didn’t much like bringing him into this either, but I had no choice. Everyone looked at Cristian as I nodded in his direction. He was quiet, his hands steepled on the table while his brows pinched together in concern.
“I brought him the letter,” he admitted.
“But I didn’t give it to you,” Gypsy insisted.
Cristian was quiet for several moments before he inclined his head and shook it. “No, you didn’t.”
His words came as a surprise, and the solidity of my foundation of truth began to shift. He’d never mentioned that Gypsy hadn’t given him the letter directly. He only delivered the letter to me in what he thought would be my final hours, and that was it.
“Who gave it to you?” I asked.
“It was given to me in confidence.” Cristian shifted uncomfortably. “I thought that it was authentic. I had no reason to believe otherwise when I gave it to you.”
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
He knew that, yet he chose not to answer. He’d given his word to whomever delivered the letter and getting it out of him would be impossible. It went against everything he believed, and the struggle was plain to see in his eyes.
“See?” Birdie said. “That just shows you that you’re wrong. You’re wrong about all of this.”
I wasn’t wrong. I wasn’t ready to believe that yet just because one of the facts was skewed. For all I knew, the letter could have been delivered by Birdie herself.
“Did you know he wasn’t really dead?” I looked up to find Gypsy staring at Father Hawk, betrayal etched into her features.
“No,” he answered. “I didn’t.”
“Everyone thought I was dead because you’d written an obituary and planned a funeral,” I stated sourly.
“Because she thought you were dead!” Birdie shouted. “Because that’s what we were told!”
This conversation was giving me a headache, but still, I indulged her trail of breadcrumbs. “Told by who?”
All three of them turned their gazes to Cristian, and this time, my confusion couldn’t be denied.
“He had nothing to do with this,” I said.
“He was the one who told us you were dead,” Birdie insisted.
Father Hawk bowed his head and released a deep breath as we waited for his response. It was quiet and full of remorse. “I told them you were dead because that’s the information I received.” He looked up, his eyes cloudy and troubled. “From Nolan.”