Page 53 of Antihero

“For me? Protective of me, are you? Is that what this is about?”

“In part. Yes.”

“So protective that you can’t see them for who they are?”

“Who are they?”

“Humans. Fallen, wretched humans in need of saving. More than I am. They are already in hell. Right now, as we speak.” She scrutinized his reaction. “What?”

“I tend to give religion a wide berth, along with politics.”

“Why’s that?”

“The hypocrisy chafes me.”

Her gaze narrowed. “I will make this right with God and then He will let me understand and then maybe someday I might even find forgiveness. But I am not my damage. I will not harden and hate. What happened to me is not for you. It is not your wound to heal. And it is not the flag you’ll wave into war. I don’t allow it. I won’t allow it.”

The criteria for Saint Augustine’s just-war theory appeared in Evan’s head, and he ticked off the boxes, one after another, though two and nine admittedly proved shaky.

“Men like this don’t stop,” he said. “We have a responsibility to the other girls and women they will hurt next.”

“How dare you,” she said. “How dare you talk to me about my responsibility right now.”

“There’s a place where forgiveness ends and duty begins.”

The sides of her nose reddened with fury, her eyes hard as basalt. “And there’s a place where your justice ends because it’s your justice. Because you’re only one man.”

It was incredible to see a face so delicate snarl like that.

They rode in silence until her stop.

Unsteady from pain and meds, Anca clutched Evan’s biceps as they glided upward on the escalator. The circle of the world above irised ever larger until they stepped into the night air.

She shuddered against him and again he felt her birdlike delicateness. She gestured faintly. “A few blocks this way.”

He kept his arm on offer and she kept her grasp. At his side, she coasted forward, light on her feet, as if something were carrying her. They threaded through foot traffic, the night quieter than made sense for the Bronx.

The church was more austere than he’d anticipated, a humble white-stucco building fringed with black mold at the gutter lines. Barred windows, weather-beaten mosaics, several metal crosses rising from the roof sat alongside dishes and vent pipes. Security lights and snarled wires cluttered the eaves. The sole note of grandeur was a hexagonal cupola, its peak topped with a Latin cross featuring a lower beam of a footrest.

They stepped between a row of scraggly trees with whitewashed trunks thrusting crookedly from the pavement and crossed the street. A broad set of newly poured concrete steps led to a brief plaza and the plain wooden front door.

Anca slowed as they neared, her grip tightening on Evan’s arm.

“Wait,” she said. “Hold on, please.”

She stooped, hands on her knees.

“Would you like to sit down?”

Her mouth pulsed, as if tasting something bitter. “Need to … get horizontal.”

She slumped and he caught her, easing them down on the front steps of the church. Her head lolled and then came back. “Please … help.”

“I will.”

“Can you stay?”

“Yes.”