Pulling Her Trigger(16)

“Baby, look at me. Talk to me, please.” Opening my eyes, I try to read his. He’s always so intense, but I’m sure he can read me clearly. There’s no hiding the battle raging inside me.

“I wish I could tell you that I’m sorry about what brought us together, but I’m not. Not any of it. Your file hit my desk and I was a goner. I’ll never hurt you, Mackenzie. You can tell me anything. Let me in and I’ll prove it to you.”

Maybe if I give him a taste, he’ll see how I can never work with him—the man who lives his whole life by the letter of the law, and me making up my own rules as I go.

“I went into the Air Force because I wanted to fly. I know it sounds silly, but I did,” I say, remembering lying on my parents’ back porch, staring up into the sky as the birds flew by. Wishing that I could do the same.

“I didn’t come from a family like yours, Vincent. My childhood wasn’t filled with Sunday dinners and trips to the zoo. Mine was filled with a miserable father who wanted to make everyone else miserable with him, including my mother and me. He hated that I wasn't a boy, and told me that when he beat me. He was so hard on me, and said it was to toughen me up, which was bullshit. Charlie just liked having us at his mercy. Then I lost her, my mother. The doctor said she fell down the stairs and snapped her neck. I was too much of a coward to tell them what really happened.”

“You were fourteen when your mom died, Mackenzie.”

Looks like he didn’t just read my file, but memorized it.

“Doesn’t matter. I didn’t protect her, which is ironic, because it's what I did in the Air Force. I just learned too late. I went in to learn to fly, but I’m too small. I was good at shooting, in fact I was the best. So that’s what I did. I sat on the walls protecting our bases. Then I got called out for a few emergency missions for the Marines, and after that, they seemed to call on me time and time again. I was in the Air Force, but Lucias—Pres —was a marine and he was my squad leader. I ended up working with them more than I did with the Air Force. For once in my life I felt like I belonged, like I had a family. One that I protected, and I won’t fail again. But, you see, my lines started to blur along the way. I don’t see things as black and white as you do, Shield.”

“How do you see it?”

“I always took my orders and carried them out without question, but sometimes there’s no time to wait for orders. Sometimes you have to determine if someone should live or die on your own. When you sit and watch the world through a scope, you see things before others. I made my own judgment calls.”

“I can understand that, I’ve had to do that a few times myself. It’s our job, Mackenzie.”

“What would you say if I still did that and it wasn’t my job anymore? That I sometimes I still made judgment calls.”

I know he has to know what I am talking about. I didn’t outright admit anything but if he read my file like I know he did he will have put two and two together. I killed my father.

“That let’s say I came home, saw my father still doing what he did but to a new family, and I made a judgment call.”

Not only did I kill him but I planned it out like a mission. I waited for his new wife and her daughter to head off to work, and I shot him through the heart. He never ever knew what hit him. Dead on impact. Unlike my father, I don’t care to watch people suffer. I just like it to be over. Then I placed a call to the police letting them know there was a dead body that needed to be cleaned up. His new wife and stepdaughter didn’t need to come home to that shit. He had already put them through enough.

“I don’t care if you killed him.”

I turn my head to try to break eye contact. Bringing my hands up to my face I rub my eyes. This isn’t supposed to happen. This isn’t the plan. I am the one who is supposed to be getting information from him, but I just keep giving him everything he asks for, I can’t seem to stop myself.

A firm hand grips my chin, making me look back at him.

“I don’t care, Mackenzie, whatever your reason was for killing him. Whether you had cause or not. I stopped caring the moment I saw you. I know you don’t believe me yet but over time you’ll see. You’ve spent years protecting people. I’m going to show you that I’m going to protect you whether you want it or not.”

“You’re a fed,” I remind him. “I’ll always cross lines you won’t like.”

“If you think I’m going to lecture you on justice, you got the wrong guy. I read your file countless times, but I know you’ll always do what you think is best. Your system of justice is just a little different than mine. I’d never ask you to change who you are. ”