Funny how life worked the way it did.
Two years ago, my empire had crumbled to ashes. The federales thoroughly hunted my puppets, forced them to rat each other, tossed them behind the bars. Good thing I'd been prepared. Soon as I heard of the death of that old man I'd brainwashed, I forged my death, relocated, took up a new identity. I even picked up a new face, which, considering how surgeries went these days, was nothing but a routine procedure.
As far as the world knew, as far as he knew, I was dead in that park.
I was alive. Still in the game, even. How could I not be? The simplest way to ensure those hunting you would never catch you was to work with them. And as time passed, I realized I was safe. Nobody suspected me. Not even him, when he returned.
His returned boiled my blood. Here he was. The man who ruined all my life's work. I had to punish him. But how? None of my contacts remained. His death would trigger an investigation. Days and weeks passed as I brooded, contemplating how I should take revenge on him. That he still existed, cheerful as ever, and as remorseless, filled my veins with rage.
Then, a miracle. Not that I believed in such things, which, I supposed, was something he and I had in common. But it turned out that I never needed to come to him. He came to me.
And just like that I got a plan.
I'd been feeling alive again since then.
And look at us now.
Across me sat the love of his life, though he was either too proud or too churlish or even too embarrassed to admit it to her face. His loss. And she'd realized that, too. If she waited for him she might never have the family she wanted, a real family, not just the surrogate one she'd had back in the office. That's just as well. Course, I wasn't so delusional as to believe she was crazy for me the way she was for him, or the way all those puppets had been for me, but far as I was concerned, what she felt for me was just enough. She liked me. She was mine.
We talked. It was a lovely evening. She was a lovely woman. In fact, even as I revealed my intention—slyly, of course, though I thought she'd guessed it pretty quickly, which was smart of her—she remained understanding, trying her best to keep calm and see if both of us could make the best of our situation, make it work. No wonder he liked her. If she didn't have a hand in my empire's downfall I might even have fallen for her for real.
In fact, I really had no plans to kill her. That would be too easy. For both him, and her. No. I was going to marry her and have kids with her and live with her until the end of my days. All the while she had no idea she was never being loved. All the while he watched us together inseparable and cursed himself for being too late.
Live well. It is the greatest revenge.
For the second time, I told her what I wanted.
She said nothing.
I reached her hand.
"I'm asking, what if we went to DC, you and me, together."
He is mar, people?