Blood and Money (6 page)

He sat on the edge of the bed and rested a hand on Munir’s arm.

The boy didn’t react.

Isra made a promise to himself and to his sister in the room beyond: he would take the boy under his wing and be the father he deserved.

He spoke softly, saying anything that came into his head, but the boy didn’t seem to hear any of it.

The one thing Isra didn’t say was that everything was going to be all right.

Isra gathered Munir into his arms.

“Is there anything you want to bring? A toy? Something special to you?”

Munir didn’t answer. He pressed his face into Isra’s chest.

Isra could feel their blood on his skin. No amount of scrubbing had been able to cleanse him. Surely the boy could smell it on him? Surely he knew who Isra was? What he had done?

Munir didn’t fight him as Isra carried him out of the house for the last time.

Tomorrow it would be a ghost, just like the boy’s parents.

The only ghost Isra had ever intended to create was the Nightwalker’s. But something else had happened in that room. Instead of dying, the Nightwalker had become immortal.

That side of him, the killer, would live forever.