“I could… I don’t know…” Raymond thought frantically. “I could work up between eighty and maybe ninety million depending on how things sold.”
“You said you could do twenty easily. Someone with that kind of money could have way more of a house than this. Isn’t that a lot in liquid cash?”
“Not for someone who wants to be ready to flee the country on short notice and still live in comfort,” Lorelei noted.
Alex put his hands over his face, trying to think past Raymond’s whimpering and labored breathing. Eighty million dollars, fourteen thousand accounts… It didn’t divide out to a whole lot in the end. Better than nothing, for sure, but there had to be more. “That’s from fourteen thousand people? Where’s the rest of it?”
“I’m dying here! I can’t put together a PowerPoint right now.”
“Fucking humor me, asshole!” Alex spat, still more desperate than angry. The fact that Raymond was the one whose life was on the line did nothing to assuage Alex’s fear. He’d never felt so much pressure.
Raymond made an exasperated noise. “Some of it went to big bonuses for people who helped me…most of it was corporate profits. I can’t draw it all out here.”
“But you could draw it all out for the Feds, right?”
“What?”
“You’re going to turn yourself in, Ray,” Alex growled, stepping closer to the bed. “When you get to the hospital, you’re going to get on the phone with whoever you’ve got to and start selling off every fucking thing you own to give as much back to your investors as you possibly can. Even if that’s only a few grand for each of them, it’s still more than they’ve got now, right?
“And while you’re doing that, you’re going to call up the FBI and confess everything to them. You’re going to connect all the dots and you will do your god damned best to make sure as much money as possible goes back to the people you fucked.”
Lorelei watched without betraying emotion, but Alex didn’t look at her. His eyes were fixed on Raymond, who breathed heavier in both fear and hope. “You’re going to call for help for me?”
“Yes,” Alex said, “and you aren’t going to say a god damn thing about us being here. Make up whatever shit you’ve got to. I don’t care. But I’m going to read in the papers starting fucking tomorrow about your amazing change of heart. And if I don’t, you’re dead. Got me?”
Raymond nodded weakly, and couldn’t help but glance up nervously at Lorelei. “I have already done this to you,” she said. “I can and will find you and end you in any way he wishes.”
“Sure as hell won’t be as fun as the way you almost died,” Alex added. “Where’s the phone?”
“It’s in my pants,” Raymond winced. “Please hurry. I’ve probably got an infection.”
Alex grabbed the trousers at his feet and threw them onto the foot of the bed without thinking about it. He found a dried stain of…something along the front.
“Master,” Lorelei said, her voice showing her first visible emotion besides anger since she came into the room. Her expression had softened somewhat, altered by some mixture of guilt, sympathy and perhaps embarrassment. “Let me do this.”
“It’s fine,” Alex said, shaking his head. He checked the pockets and found the cell phone. “Do we have everything you need here? I don’t want to flip out, but this shouldn’t wait and I don’t want anything from this piece of shit. Not his money, not his toys. Nothing.”
“I came primarily for what is in my purse. There is also a car in the garage that belongs to me. It was not purchased with his money. I believe you would approve if I explained,” she added slowly.
“It’s fine. Nothing else? Lots of incriminating evidence.”
“It will never be traced to me.”
Alex nodded, and then stopped himself from touching the cell phone. He tossed the pants at Raymond. “Call for help yourself. I don’t want to worry about fingerprints.” He waited until Raymond dug out the phone on his own. “Let’s get out of here,” he told Lorelei.
Raymond dialed frantically. He watched as the hottest thing he’d ever scored in his charmed, ruthless life collected a beat-up leather jacket and old sweats from off the floor. She followed this holier-than-thou kid she called “master,” of all things, out of his room and out of his life.
Everything below his navel radiated in five kinds of awful pain. He fearfully hoped she was out of his life forever.
Five minutes later, Alex and Lorelei stood up the street between her parked car and his motorcycle. They watched as a fire truck and an ambulance arrived, firefighters rushing up the steps to get inside.
“Lorelei,” Alex finally said, as the firefighters looked for a way into the house, “are you okay? I should’ve…I should’ve asked before now.”
“You have nothing to apologize for, Alex,” Lorelei said. Her arms were crossed over her chest. She seemed lonely and cold. If anyone should apologize, it is me. I should have told you what to expect. I regret that you were put through this. I should have…”
He waved it off. “I pushed you, and I didn’t ask for an explanation. It’s not your fault.”
Her gaze fell to the pavement. “I might have volunteered an explanation.”
“Why didn’t you?” he asked, placing a hand on her shoulder. She reached for it without looking at him.
“Affection is not an emotion I am accustomed to. Compassion is even more alien. I am not sure I recognize it in myself, or know how to follow it.”
“You were made to punish people,” Alex said.
“I was. What you did in there, I…I would not have thought of that. I have never seriously considered such things. The victims of my prey were never my concern. I do not know if I feel appeased for this, or merely that I am satisfied that you are satisfied.” She looked to him and shrugged. “You are a good person, Alex. I am not.”
“Do you want to be?”
“I don’t know,” she answered honestly. “I have never found cruelty or malice especially thrilling, but I cannot remember experiencing angst over it, either. I feel as if I…” Her voice trailed off until she shook her head. “It is difficult to know what I truly want for myself when I feel such a strong desire to please you.”
“What I want is to make you happy. As much as I can.”
“I know, Alex,” she nodded softly. They watched the paramedic crew break out their gurney and start hustling it up the steps. “You have done a very good thing here. All that I was interested in out of Raymond Cordingly was another soul bound for Hell.”
He couldn’t tell if that was a confession or simply an observation, but he squeezed her shoulder comfortingly anyway. Then his eyes widened. “Oh my God,” he blinked. “Lorelei, is that-is that going to be a problem? I mean did I just cheat some demon?”
“That depends on your definitions of cheating and fairness,” Lorelei said, her voice stronger with the shift in topic. “Hell would see it that way, but only because that would work to its advantage. The Hosts would think differently.”
“Yeah, but is someone going to come after us?”
Lorelei just shrugged, eliciting a groan from Alex in response. She turned to look at him. “Would that knowledge have changed your actions?”
“What do you mean?”
“Cordingly’s victims will likely get some measure of their life’s savings back. Other thieves who escaped scrutiny may now face punishment. Cordingly may even make good on his life with this second chance and find redemption. It is unlikely, but possible. Nothing in my experience with you suggests that you would have turned from the chance for all that because you might incur someone’s displeasure, regardless of who or what they may be.”
Alex considered this, staring absently at the house. “I guess maybe you’re right.”
“I am,” she said. “You are a brave man, Alex. My feelings for you may be conflicted in many ways, but that is something about you that I adore without reservation.”