In Death 16 - Portrait in Death

blame yourself for that. Or punish yourself for it."
     
     
"There should be some payment. Goddamn it, Eve, there should be something. I feel... helpless, and I don't like it. Here's something I can't fix-can't fight with my fists, can't buy or steal or talk my way around. No matter how I line it up, she's dead, and he never paid."
     
     
"Roarke, I don't know how many times-you can't keep them in your head or you go crazy-I don't know how many times I've knocked on someone's door and ripped apart the whole fabric of their life by telling them someone they loved is dead."
     
     
Hoping to comfort, she brushed her fingers over his hair. "They feel what you're feeling now. And no matter how you line it up, the one who caused it never pays enough."
     
     
"You won't like to hear it, but I'll say it anyway. There have been moments, countless moments through my life that I wished I'd been the one to do him in the end. But I've never wished it more than I do now, even knowing it means nothing, changes nothing. Maybe that's one of the reasons I didn't tell you. How can you understand that I think I'd feel more of a man right now if I had his blood on my hands."
     
     
She looked down at his hand, and the gold ring, their symbol, that shone on his finger. "You're wrong if you think I don't understand. I understand because I've got my own father's blood on mine."
     
     
"Oh Christ." It sickened and infuriated him-he'd wallowed so deep into the mire of his own life that he'd so carelessly thrown that in her face. He drew her against him. "I'm sorry. Baby."
     
     
"It wouldn't help." She eased back so he could see her. "Take my word. And believe me, you're more of a man than any other I've known."
     
     
He rested his forehead on hers. "I can't do without you. I don't know how I ever got by before you."
     
     
"We'll just go from here. You've had a rough couple of days, so I'll try one of your favorite sports and make you eat something."
     
     
He smiled, finally, when she rose to go to the AutoChef. "Tending to me, are you?"
     
     
Glancing back she studied him. He wore nothing but the trousers. Though there were hints of amusement in his eyes now, the shadows under them still dogged them.
     
     
And he was pale yet, pale from worry and fatigue.
     
     
Well, she would damn well fix that.
     
     
"I think I can figure out how, since I've been on the receiving end often enough." She went for soup. "I don't know much about mothers-neither do you-but from everything you've just said she'd hate you blaming yourself for what happened. If she loved you, she'd want you happy. She'd like knowing you got away from him. That you grew up to be successful and important."
     
     
"However I managed it."
     
     
"Yeah." She fiddled with the soup, then brought it to him. "However you managed it."
     
     
"He's in me, you know."
     
     
She nodded, sat beside him again. "I guess it works that way, which mean she's in you, too. Gives you a big one up on me, on the DNA chart."
     
     
"I've been shuffling the past behind me all my life. It doesn't shadow me the way it does you." He ate, without much interest, because she'd gone to the trouble for him. "I didn't want to bring you into this, or anyone. I wanted to sort it out for myself, that's all. But it's eating at me. I can see her face now, and I always will. I have family I didn't know of, people who lost her. I don't know what the hell to do about it. So I find myself guilty and churned up and frustrated."
     
     
"You don't have to do anything until you feel easier about it." She lifted a hand, stroked his hair. "Give yourself a break."
     
     
"I couldn't tell you straight off." He looked at her now. "Couldn't get the words out. Shutting you out was easier. Easier yet, it seems, was taking some of that guilt and frustration out on you."
     
     
"Not so easy when I knocked you on your ass."
     
     
He leaned over, kissed her softly. "Thanks for that."
     
     
"Anytime, pal."
     
     
"I'm sorry I left you alone last night. You had a nightmare."
     
     
"I'd say we both did. We'll figure this out, Roarke."
     
     
"Not so much to..." Her face blurred, doubled, shimmered briefly into focus again. "Ah, fuck me. You tranq'd the soup."
     
     
"Yeah, I did." Her tone was cheerful as she took the bowl before it tipped out of his limp fingers. "You need to sleep. Let's get you into bed while you can still walk. I can't carry you the way you do me."
     
     
"You're enjoying this