The Darkest Corner (Gravediggers #1)(30)

"It's a shock, isn't it?" he continued on. "All of a sudden this woman shows up out of nowhere, usually when things are about to go straight to shit and you're wondering not if you're going to be taken out of the game, but when you're going to be taken out. Then Eve Winter shows up like the Angel of Death and tells you since you're already marked for death you might as well come to work for the devil and live a little longer. We're all going to die eventually, right?"

"I believe the life we live on this earth prepares us for the life that comes after. I'm grounded in my faith, and I did not sell my soul to the devil. I've seen the devil and her name is not Eve Winter."

"But she got you to join us?" Deacon asked, surprised at Levi's first words.

Levi picked up the other bottle of water and drank it slower this time, contemplating his answer.

"I agreed to fulfill the contract in hopes of continuing my quest for justice. There is still work to be done on this earth, and my destiny hasn't been fulfilled."

"You seek vengeance?" Deacon asked, unsurprised.

"Don't we all?"

"To a point. There's a lot of good in humanity, but in our line of work we rarely see it. We're protectors."

"That we can agree on, though I'm wondering now who exactly I've agreed to protect."

Deacon knew the feeling. When Eve Winter showed up and told him the only options he had were death or a new life created by her, his first response had been to tell her he would gladly choose death. But Eve knew things. Things that no one else could know. And she knew exactly the buttons to push to make a man agree to her proposition instead of choosing death. He didn't know what had made Levi Wolffe make the decision, but he did know it was deeply personal. It was deeply personal for all of them.

"You're working for the good guys, but it's no different than any other covert ops mission. Sometimes you wonder. And sometimes you don't know which devil you're working for."

"She told me I had to die and be reborn. That my family and friends could never know my fate or they would suffer and meet me in death. Most of my family was killed during a Palestinian rocket attack. They were at the market and there was no warning. Only mayhem and death. My younger sister was the only one to survive, though her injuries were grave. I was willing to leave that life behind. But that doesn't mean that life won't revisit me. We can never truly separate ourselves from our pasts."

"I know. But we can live now and ask for forgiveness later."

A hint of a smile quirked Levi's lips, but it was gone almost before it began. A shudder wracked his body and his hand went back to his head. Then he very deliberately looked at Deacon and then over at the white pill sitting on the nightstand.

"It's a bitch of a headache," Deacon said.

"Yeah," Levi answered. He reached over and grabbed the pill and popped it in his mouth, swallowing it down with a gulp of water. "I don't know what happened to me, but I figure you've had plenty of time to kill me if that's what you wanted to do."

Deacon smiled, but there was no happiness in it. Only bitter memories of his own transition from life to death to life.

"Once you sign that contract, there's no going back. There are no other meetings or negotiations. All you know is they'll do all the work and bring you over. They don't tell you they'll ambush you when you least expect it, to the point you think whatever is happening is real. They don't tell you about the serum they shoot through your body, or that you can feel yourself dying. That your fully functional brain panics as you lose control and begin to feel your heartbeat slow. That you'll be paralyzed just before you slip into unconsciousness."



       
         
       
        

Deacon watched as Levi's knuckles turned white, but he didn't stop there. "You were lucky. I was the first. And all I can remember is my eyes opening to complete darkness, and trying to suck air into lungs that couldn't remember how to breathe. I remember not being able to move my legs, because it takes a while for the paralysis to completely disappear, but I could move my arms. I didn't know I'd been buried underground. I only knew I was trapped in some kind of box. I clawed and pushed at the sides and top until my fingers bled, and every minute that passed it was harder to breathe.

"Then there comes a point when you're hovering just on the brink of death, where pain and fear disappear and it's nothing more than waiting to take the last breath. All the prayers you know have been said at this point, and there's peace."

"Yes," Levi said, in complete understanding.