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“There’s no need to be sorry. This is normal for the first few times you see someone tortured.”
I try to run my fingers through her hair again but she flinches back.
“The first few times?” She shakes her head, pushing herself up to stand as she flushes the toilet. “That will not be happening again. The only reason I was there in the first place was for Evie. Now, I see she’s fully capable of handling the violence on her own. I find no reason to sit through that again.”
She angrily yanks the door open, stalking out to the hall while ignoring me completely. I grin maniacally behind her.Her attitude is fun.
It’s hilarious to watch her mess up with something in training and see her snarky side come to life. It happened a lot more often when she could hear her phone dinging constantly with messages from her boy toy.
Does he even really work? Because it seems like all he ever does is text her.
She storms into her room, and I follow without invitation. After all, I am a villain. We don’t have to ask for what we want, we take it.
I try to reach out for her, but the blood coating my hands makes her eyes go wide. I hadn’t even noticed it was still on me. She backs away, her face turning green, then runs to her bathroom to vomit again.
I quickly rinse off my hands in the sink and sit beside her to hold back her hair. Who the fuck am I right now?
She scowls down at my pants that are stained with blood, my shirt covered as well. “Take it off or get away from me. I don’t want to see blood again for at least a week.”
I laugh at her request, and she squeezes her eyes shut as tight as she can. As if the crimson stains would fade if she only wished it hard enough. I tilt her chin up to look me in the eyes.
“Baby girl, our lives are stained with the blood of those who stand between us and the ones we love. It’s not all unicorns and rainbows out there, and you can’t expect it to be.”
Her brows pinch slightly, as if the mere idea of the world not being peaceful and full of happiness was blasphemy.
“What’s so wrong with liking unicorns and rainbows? Just because I don’t bathe in the blood of my enemies doesn’t mean my skills are less than. They’re just different.” She closes her eyes, but when she opens them again, it’s with a look full of new resolve. She stands up tall, straightening her spine, and moves to the sink to rinse out her mouth.
“Do you know why I chose a bow as my weapon?” she asks me as I follow her back to her room.
“Because it looked cool?” It’s sarcastic but at least it gets her to smile a bit.
“I learned to be good with a bow so that my enemies stay at a distance. I prefer to use my words and my body to manipulate people and play the game that I was born into. It doesn’t mean I haven’t killed men, it just means I don’t relish in it. And there’s nothing wrong with that.”
I think about that. She’s not wrong. She has skills that not even I can master. Her words are sharp and careful. She stands and walks to the door gesturing for me to leave, but just before I cross the threshold she gets so close our lips are only an inch apart.
“Havoc?” she breathes.
“Yes?”
“You got blood on my floor.” Her hands ghost over my abs, hovering just a hair away from the blood coating my clothes. “I told you to get your clothes off or get out.”
She pops the button on the top of my jeans, my dick swiftly growing painfully hard just behind the zipper.
“Maybe next time, you’ll listen.” She takes a step back, then slams the door in my face.
I clearly need to re-evaluate who the women of the underworld really are. They don’t all have to be like E. She craves the color red—I think my little unicorn might prefer pink.
???
The next day I’m running jobs with the others, collecting money and learning some of the routes around town. We take a break to stretch our legs, and I end up walking past a children's store. A little girl catches my eye, her blonde hair pulled into adorable pigtails, reminding me so much of my little Elise.
She trots into the store and points at a stuffed snowman that seems oddly misshapen with a carrot nose too big for his face. She squeals as her mother buys it for her, and a rare genuine smile touches my lips.
I enter the store, looking at the snowman with the name “Olaf” written across it. The Norse name is interesting for a child’s toy, but then I see the item sitting next to it.
The words Laney spoke to me yesterday have weighed heavily on my heart. I desperately want to find a middle ground with her. I feel like I scared her and now that she sees who Evie really is, I don’t want her to be afraid of us. If she wants to stay away from that side of what we do, I don’t see anything wrong with that.
I grab the plush next to the relic snowman and pay for it. The guys eye me when I get back to the truck, but I ignore them. They will eventually be working for me and if they say anything now, I sure as hell plan to bring it up later.
