Page 51 of Secondhand Soul

Sadness over a guy. Want. Longing.

Maybe it’s perverse, because he could hurt me worse than another person could. Maybe it’s only because he’s telling me I can’t have him that I want him so much.

Or maybe it’s because I see how a hollow shell sent to kill put his parts back together in a better way and has started building a sweet little life for himself—if he wouldn’t sabotage it.

If I hadn’t come along.

“You think we can change, you and I? Together?” he asks softly.

Hope shoots through me. “I do. I didn’t think I had a chance to pick a different path, or even a reason to want to—until I came here. Met you.”

Lazarus cocks his head. “Funny. You made me start to think about different things, too. Different paths. But now I don’t trust a single word that comes out of your mouth. You say you only assassinate the bad guys, but you’re a hired killer. You take out someone who traffics women and kids or sells guns and drugs? Good for you. You do it for someone who is just rubbing out other criminals so he can make more money by being the only supplier? What the fuck is that about? Your hands are just a different type of bloody.”

His words hurt, and the hope in my heart is shot through, crumpled up and riddled with the way his words stab.

I never thought of it that way.

I don’t think I’ve been thinking much at all. Not since I saw Frank Bocella’s leering, grinning face, holding a single white rose and wanting to “make nice” after breaking my ankle and killing our baby. My baby.

It’s my turn to swallow.

He starts to walk away, faster this time.

“You left, too. You didn’t stay in the CrossRealms and fight evil or anything. You could take out Pazcuso. Untemeyer—that’s the new doctor. But you just saved your own skin and ran, right? I’m not... We’re not superheroes. We’re survivors. We save who we can.”

Lazarus stops in mid-step and turns back. “That’s real pretty, Victoria. And everything you say gets right inside my head and my heart, and I hate that.”

The words pop out before I realize I don’t want the answer. “Do you hate me?”

“I don’t want to see you,” Lazarus whispers. “I don’t want to make plans with you, or save the world, or survive with you. I’m meant to be alone.”

“That’s not true!” I call after him, voice breaking.

He leaves. Slams the door so hard it falls off its hinges from the force.

I sink onto the bed, barely aware that I’d risen from it in the first place. My heart is pounding. Dry sobs start in my chest and turn wet when they hit my throat.

This is a mess, and everything he said is right—but what I said was right, too.

And some part of me is clinging stubbornly to one thought, the only thought that’s made me feel alive in months.

We could be monsters together—and in time, as long as we had each other, there wouldn’t be anything monstrous left at all, just a bad, dark past to turn away from.

I want that. Want him. Want a new life, with him.

And I’ve blown it.

All the plans, for evil or good, are unraveling around me, a web collapsing under a spider.

The spider gets all the little flies, but I forgot there are bigger predators out there, like hawks and snakes, who’ll eat the little spider while she’s spinning her own messy web.

Chapter Fifteen: Victoria

I’m waiting by my car, blowing into my hands, when Rhea and Manny show up.

I have the laptop and parts catalog ready, plus the key they gave me. I didn’t feel right about waiting inside.

“What in the world are you doing out here in this cold? Where is your coat, young lady?” Manny barrels out of the work van, his stained blue mechanic’s jacket already off and heading to drape around my shoulders.