Page 27 of Secondhand Soul

“Well, I’m protecting people now. I live with the dead, where my parts ought to be buried. I show a little respect, and I make sure I don’t hurt the living. The innocent. That’s all I can do with what I am, especially since now that I’ve been made, I can’t seem to be unmade again.”

Victoria’s eyes stay on mine for a long time. “No?”

“Huh?”

“Sorry. I... You’re right. You can’t be unmade. But you’re wrong. You are a living person, no matter what you’re made of. You think. You feel. You protect.”

“So does a German Shepherd. It’s all just training.”

Her lips twitch. “Really? That’s what they trained you to do?”

I blink.

Just the opposite, in fact. “No.”

“You chose to leave. To do what you do. To bake yams for your adopted parents and rescue girls in ditches, and rush to the store three times in one day to get ingredients like apple juice, frozen mac and cheese, and now toothpaste.”

“Well—”

“You have free will and choice. That’s not training. That’s human. Humans act with souls calling the shots; trained animals have instincts and behaviors. Action, reaction, reward.” She shifts in her chair, body still painfully stiff on one side. “What’s your reward for saving me, Lazarus?”

I feel something hot and hard sear down my middle and land in my cock, where I don’t want it.

Instinct is more alive and well in this dead man than she’ll ever know. I want my reward to be her, just like Manny’s reward for existing was once Rhea, a mate. A gift. A thing like him who could understand him.

Victoria might be broken, but she’s not like me.

“Maybe I have one less person I hate. That’s good enough. I’m gonna get your car. Be back soon.”

FREE WILL. CHOICES. Souls.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

I can’t get all hung up like this.

Back to Manny and Rhea’s. Retrieve wet, muddy clothes from the bathroom floor. I meant to wash those.

But... fire.

The house smells better. Less like an inferno.

I search the pockets of her pants—thin, stretchy material, but sturdy. Black undershirt. Black zippered top that matches the leggings.

Simple. Dark.

Her keys are in the pocket—no phone, but that’s because she dropped it in the grave. I gotta get that back, even though after being out in the wet earth, it might not be salvageable. We’ll see.

The keys, though. The keys are off. Something about them strikes me as... wrong.

Victoria doesn’t have a keychain. She has two keys on a single thin steel hoop.

As someone who handles keychains ten times a day, that’s just... odd. Not to be sexist, but that’s especially odd for a woman. They usually have heavy collections of clangy, jingling keys and keychains, a multitude of little charms, tassels, and even photos in tiny metallic add-ons. At least once a day, I hear Manny patiently lecture someone on how excess weight on their keychains can cause wear on the moving parts of their ignition assembly.

Victoria only has two keys. No car remote.

That’s not right. I don’t know when the last time I saw a set of keys without a remote.

I run to the cemetery, ignoring the cars that are coming home now, ignoring the chatting people in winter coats as they hug goodbye in driveways.