Page 35 of Lesson In Forgiveness

“Perhaps I have other plans.”

He grinned at her nonchalant tone. “Little tiger, we both know any plans you have include me. As I’m technically your captor for the foreseeable future, I get to make all the decisions.” Stabbing a chunk of waffle, he let his grin widen before popping the morsel in his mouth. “Honestly, I’m more intrigued that you haven’t left so much as a smudged fingerprint on social media.”

“I utilize it if and when I need it.”

“To stalk people.”

She sipped her juice, her tongue sweeping out to catch a stray drop before it rolled off the edge of her lip. “Social media is the devil’s tool, Grit. Millions of people on each platform detailing their daily lives, their favorite places, what makes them tick and is most precious to them. They share pictures with strangers, share parts of themselves that can’t be taken back.”

He couldn’t disagree with that.

“For someone like me, it’s a map. Where does my target check in for coffee every morning? Which route do they take on their way to work, the mall, home? Is that four-legged bundle of joy they call Boo-Boo and dress up like a fucking doll a Chihuahua or a Malinois capable of ripping my throat out?”

Grit snorted. “I’d take a Malinois over a Chihuahua any day.”

“I’ve been attacked by both.” Swapping the glass for her spoon, she delved into her bowl of Lucky Charms. “The Chihuahuas were kicked over the fence easily enough, but the Malinois…” She smiled to herself as though the memory was a fond one. “That bitch hounded me up a goddamn drainpipe, then met me on the garage roof.”

“Please don’t tell me you kicked her over the fence too?”

“Of course not. Just off the roof.”

“Tabitha!”

Blue eyes glistening, she adopted an innocent expression. “What? I was killing small, defenseless animals before I knew the multiplication table. It was Rita’s favorite test. Exterminate any sense of compassion or empathy from an early age.”

That was Rita, he thought suspiciously. Tabitha had proven she was different more than once. “Nah, I don’t believe that. A person? Yeah, you’d shove your foot up their ass and give them a cheery wave as you pitched them over the edge, but a dog… maybe when your survival depended on it. Other than that, I call bullshit.”

A spoonful of cereal vanished between her lips; she chewed slowly, thoughtfully. “You wanted honesty.”

She was a tricky one, he reminded himself. She prided herself on being truthful anyway, without her agreement to follow his rules. “So the Chihuahuas went over the fence, and the Malinois took a dive off the roof. What happened to them?”

“The little ones landed on the neighbor’s trampoline.” Her lips twitched. “The big bitch took a swim in her master’s pool.”

“There’s a heart in there, after all.”

“Not the kind you think,” she argued. “Killing them didn’t serve a purpose, so why do it? They behaved as any dog would when faced with an intruder; the Malinois was simply doing as she was trained. Unless an annoyance becomes an insurmountable problem, there are ways to get around it.”

“Because you might force that annoyance into being a problem.”

“Exactly.”

“How did we go from movies to work?” he asked, shaking his head.

Tabitha looked sad, her loaded spoon poised midair. “It’s me. My conversational skills aren’t much use unless I talk about what I’m good at—murder is kinda the sum total of that.”

“At least we have something in common. Might be awkward otherwise.”

She laughed and let the spoon drop. “The only reason I’m here is because of you. If it was anyone else, if you were different, I’d already be on my way to Ireland.”

He thought as much. While she’d been ordering breakfast, giving him some alone time, he’d wondered when she was planning on heading back there to deal with the threat directly. “It’s being handled, Tabitha.”

“Ding dong rang the bell,” she murmured, “and everything went to hell.”

“No more rhymes, little tiger.” Grit admonished her gently. “I’m learning your tells, and you rhyme when things get uncomfortable. Just like I think you’re not quite as looney tunes as you like people to believe.”

Regret flashed in her eyes. “I thought that too, once. There are fractions of memories where I felt normal, but the older I got, it became simpler to use that manic energy as a shield. Eventually, the shield lost its effectiveness, so I threw more energy into building it until it consumed me. My lucid periods have grown shorter and shorter, and now I coexist with a beast who does what it wants.”

He’d seen that for himself. Sometimes the speed at which she flipped from one mentality to another was dizzying, but he could admit he believed she did it of her own volition. Guilt grabbed him by the balls when he realized she was a victim of her own mind.

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