The Billionaire Throuple

Samuel the Third [A Family of fixers]

I've convinced Nehemiah to take Andreas to the hospital. Actually, the credit for that must go to Andreas. He explained how the heart proves I'll not get away with my crime. I built upon this carefully laid foundation by claiming that Cameron isn't an organ donor and further explaining why I cannot accompany them. The heart mustn't arrive at the same time, else they'll be implicated.

The heart can survive four to six hours outside of a body and still be used for transplantation. I will not keep my dear Andreas waiting nearly that long, but I will use the two hours I must wisely. Nehemiah would like me to burn, as would I, and I should. The Simulation has other plans. It is far too powerful to be undone by something as ambiguous as common sense. It still has use for me. It will always require the services of a monster like me.

I follow Nehemiah up the spiral staircase to the study, taking care neither to touch anything nor step foot in the room. I'm covered in blood. I cannot make cleanup more difficult than it already promises to be. I rush back down to the armory and find my phone lying on the ground. I took it upstairs and left it on the mantle before I started dissection. Now, it'll have to be destroyed.

I continue through the warehouse and stop inside Cameron's bedroom. I open the tunnel to find Gregor waiting on the other side with two jackhammers, shovels, concrete mix, a steel drum, acid and gallons of bleach, among other useful tools and reagents he's couriered through the tunnel.

There are two men with him. I do not trust them, but I trust Gregor entirely. One man is called Calvin. He is a fixer of a different sort, one sent by Father to handle me. I saw him last, the day I lost Reginald. He is tall, handsome and capable, perhaps five years older than me.

The other man fits the written description for Gregor, but otherwise they look nothing alike. Per Father's request, he will bring the heart to the hospital. He will be seen there and then, never be seen again. I hand him the icebox, so he'll have it, but he'll work up until it is time for him to leave.

Without words, Calvin pins me against the wall by my neck and unsheathes a large blade from his waistband. He holds the dull end up to my throat and smiles, then lowers it to cut away my clothing until I'm stripped down to nothing. He lives, so this must be Gregor's doing at Father's behest. I appreciate the gesture, but I cannot be rescued from my fate. Perhaps, in a different life, one where I hadn't murdered my younger self, one where Nehemiah didn't see me for the monster I am, one where my dearest Andreas's life wasn't hanging in the balance.

Calvin turns on the shower head and pulls me underneath it. Gregor and his companion throw my clothes and my offering to the Simulation into a steel drum. While they scour the floor with bleach, Calvin scrubs my pale skin with a pumice stone. He intently tears away layers of skin until whatever is left underneath is as red as the blood he's erasing from existence. I close my eyes and smile as I hum Andreas's favorite tune—one I've composed myself.

I am not happy with what I've done, though it may seem that way. I am content with the result it shall bring and I am happy that Andreas smiled at me before he left. I am happy that he understands and will forgive me in time. When he does, so shall Nehemiah. This gives me hope that our union will not only remain intact, but be stronger than before. Nehemiah will never abandon Andreas and Andreas will never leave me.

I open my eyes to see Calvin staring into them. I do not mind, so long as he keeps scrubbing. I am a monster, one he can never hope to understand. It is only natural, he should stare.

Gregor laughs as he turns a jackhammer upright. "You'll get used to him." Apparently, he notices my discomfort. "He'll be living here from now on. Your mother requires it."

He turns on the jackhammer and starts chipping away at the concrete. The steel drum will be filled with acid and buried underneath the block of concrete being carved out. A back up generator will be mounted on top of it to look inconspicuous in the extremely unlikely event of a search warrant that allows drilling through the manor's foundation to reach a soon-to-be otherwise inaccessible panic room that doesn't exist on any floor plan.