Page 166 of Victorious

THE sun broke red over the city.

June stood before the penthouse windows, watching the crimson spill across the skyline, and decided it was going to be a good day.

It helped that she’d slept well. Eight hours on eight-hundred thread-count sheets did wonders for a person’s mood. So did the gourmet coffee—the kind apparently shit out by some rare animal—and the plush robe that came with the room. June was glad she’d decided to stay over and make use of the amenities.

She sank onto a sofa that probably cost more than this job—she should really raise her rates—her hair freshly washed, a bottle of polish in her hand, and her bare feet on the glass table.

Her hair. Her hand. Her feet.

She leaned forward, wincing with the effort of reaching her toes. The motion tugged at the tender skin of her stomach and back, where the bullet had gone through.

It had been more than a year since she’d been shot, but June had since discovered, much to her chagrin, that her body only healed while she was wearing it.

And so, after avoiding her body for so long, June had no choice but to spend more time inside it. Let it air.

It was terrifying, being so exposed. She knew, from ending lives, just how fragile they were. How easily damaged. Even lost. Every minute she lingered in this form was one something terrible could happen. Her skin, so soft, her eyes and organs, so easily damaged, her heart, protected by nothing but a flimsy cage of bones.

There was an upside, though, to spending time in her own skin. Indulging in luxuries she’d denied herself so long, she’d forgotten how good they felt. The deluge of a rainfall shower, hot enough to steam the room. The softness of a down duvet. The way a square of dark chocolate tasted when it melted on her tongue.

She couldn’t bring herself to linger very long—no doubt why she was still healing—but the skin had knit, at least, gone from red to pink to silver-white as it scarred.

June held her breath as she applied the rosy polish.

Then wiggled her freshly painted toes. “I like this shade,” she said aloud. No one answered.

Sunrise—that was the name according to the label on the bottom. She held it up against the floor-to-ceiling windows where the bloody light was pooling.

Not even close. It was more a Summer Blush, she thought, a Tip of the Tongue pink.

She was about to apply a second coat when her phone chimed on the nearby counter. June sighed, and rose, wincing at the wave of shallow pain as she stepped around the body on the floor.

The woman had been pretty, in a dolled-up way, heavy on the makeup and fillers, given her age. She now lay face down on the silk rug, her hand limp where it had fallen, nails painted the same shade. Her body like a speed bump between the sitting area and the kitchen.

The penthouse had an open floorplan, the rooms not so much distinct as divided by low furniture, the entry hall giving way to the sitting area which then bled straight into the kitchen.

If June had looked to her right, she would have seen the path to the front door, and the man sitting upright in the entry way, slumped against the wall where he’d been shot. In the crotch. And the heart. And the head. It seemed a tad excessive, but that was what the wife had wanted.

The wife, not to be confused with the mistress ruining the rug. As a rule, June didn’t usually sign up for killing other women, but she had thrown a vase at June’s head, and called her a sloppy, washed-up cunt.

Of course, the words had been directed at the wife, not June, but still. The wife had found out what she was, what she could do, had insisted that June wear her body for the gig, so the man and the mistress would know exactly who was killing them.

When June asked why she didn’t simply do the job herself, the wife had balked.

“I’m not a murderer,” she’d said, in a truly impressive display of cognitive dissonance. She’d wrinkled up her nose when she said it, as if the very concept were distasteful (and hey, given the fact there were brains on the carpet, maybe it was).

It hadn’t stopped her from calling to ask for a full debrief after. She’d wanted to know their expressions. Their last words. Now, as June reached for the phone, she guessed it was probably the wife, asking for more gory details.

She was wrong.

June’s hand dragged to a stop, fingers hovering over the screen.

It was Victor.

His sonar pings had petered out these last few months, as if he understood that she’d gone off the board. That whatever purpose she’d been looking for, it wasn’t worth the cost.

She didn’t know why he was back, and didn’t care, was about to swipe left, and clear the text, but when her finger came to rest against the screen, the message opened. It was three words long.

They have Syd.