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She takes a seat on the bench and I sit behind her, trying to ignore the proximity of my crotch to her bottom.
“Are all your jobs contracted? That would make them legal in the Alliance’s eyes, correct?” she asks as I carefully grasp a section. I start brushing in smooth strokes from the bottom length, marveling at the way some pieces look golden in the light.
“No,” I say. “There are many things I do because Mak has asked me. Usually, he has a goal in mind that might involve my stealth— information he desires, threats he wishes to send. He doesn’t issue that many hits, but he does send me many places that require a bit of unsavory work. He’s not recognized because we don’t rule our planet, so technically speaking, his orders aren’t protected under any laws. But that is about to change. I also take hits of my own choosing. Which is most certainly illegal. Vigilantism, you see. Not approved of by the powers that be.”
“Does Mak approve of it?”
I laugh. “That rutting bastard approves of nothing he didn’t authorize. Why do you think I’m here instead of in battle? He’s had enough of my insubordination.”
“Viro said you two know how to argue.”
“It was always the case,” I say. “Mak, Niko, and I grew up together. Mak and I would butt heads, and Niko would be the peacemaker, joking to see that we’d let our grudges go. I guess I finally crossed Mak’s line… and Niko took his side too.”
“It sounds like they care deeply about you,” she observes. “Don’t you think they did it with the best intentions?”
I huff. “Certainly. Doesn’t mean I have to like it.”
“How do you choose?” She clears her throat. “Who you kill, I mean.”
“There are many details to that which would bore you out of your skull,” I tell her. “Tedious things. Let’s just say I pay close attention to Azza politics from afar. I try to know what’s going on across the border, so that when an opportunity arises, I can strike someone that contributes to their military or someone who is important in their hierarchy.”
“So you only kill bad men?” she asks. “You said yourself that it’s vigilantism.”
I’m quiet for a few taps, watching the bristles smooth the tangles into bouncy waves.
“No,” I manage to say. It would be easy to lie to her. I could tell her that every kill was deserved, that every person I watched take their last breath was my explicit enemy. Her shoulders tense. “You could argue that every kill I chose to pursue on my own deserved it, because they support a regime that thrives on slave labor, oppression, and genocide. But even that would be a stretch. I’ve killed Azza civilians; ones that never chose the world they were born into. Important people are often not alone. They have partners. They have assistants. Do I know whether the lover of an evil male supported his cause? What about their secretary? Perhaps they’re only doing a job? No, I wouldn’t know. But if they stand between me and my target…”
“I see,” she chokes out. I don’t have to have a good view of her expression to know I’ve disgusted her.
“I try to avoid it, but it has happened. You can plan to catch someone alone, but there are things you can’t account for.”
“They were accidents?”
“Are you regretting your request to know everything?”
“No.”
“Because there’s more. Do you think every person that the Alliance or the Intergalactic Union lists on their wanted list deserves to die? Do you trust that a government only issues such hits on violent criminals?”
She says nothing.
“The worst time… I can’t forget it. It was a male with a family. He made some mistakes, I suppose. Made a deal with some criminal organization, and they decided to take his mate and threaten him. He stole some government secrets. I didn’t care to know the details, but I needed the money at the time, and he was on the contract list at a high price because he was smart— hard to find. The mob had killed his mate and all he had was his child. The way he begged comes to me in dreams sometimes. It wasn’t the only time someone begged, but it was memorable. And when I told him I don’t kill children and that he need not worry for the kid, he stopped his carrying on and accepted his death. So I made that child an orphan. That is my worst hit, I think. The least deserved, if that’s the qualification you’re after.”
“Do you regret it?”
“Maybe. But if it had not been me, then it would’ve been another. I could tell myself that he made his child an orphan with his choices.”
“That doesn’t—”
“I know. I never truly regretted those mistakes until recently. After all, regret suggests that you wouldn’t do it again if given the chance. I thought that the spirit was guiding me to these choices. Death was my trade, my mate, in this life. I was willing to sacrifice my soul for every step I took closer to complete revenge against the Azza. They took everything from me, so I would commit everything I have to defeating them— a deal that I could sleep soundly with. But now there’s you. A mate. I never expected it. I was willing to walk away and continue my life holding death’s hand instead because you deserve better. And as a human, you would not feel the absence. You wouldn’t even know.”
“You saw me before that day,” she says, her fingers digging into her thigh. “I knew something was off about our first encounter.”
“I did. I thought you’d be staying onThe Rightful Heir. I decided not to approach you. There was no need to draw you into my web, not when you were safe and happy.”
“I don’t—”
“You know I’m on contract lists. That much is implied, isn’t it? The Azza has teams assigned to my case, not to mention a price on my head for any bounty agency that’s bold enough to attempt it. So do I regret the few times I have removed an obstacle that would not let me at my target?” I clench the brush in my fist. “I regret it now. And I’d like you to be somewhere that you’ll never be noticed by a hunter like me, the kind with no morals to speak of. I never want you to be bait, or an obstacle between me and a blade. Selfish, selfish thoughts from a male with my track record.”
