Grievous

  But I’m not afraid of him.

  “I knocked,” I say. “You didn’t answer.”

  “And that didn’t tell you something?”

  “It told me a lot.”

  “Yet there you stand.”

  “Would you rather I have went away?”

  He says nothing.

  He’s not going to answer that question.

  After a minute or so passes, he lowers the gun. That’s all the answer I need from him. He’s not going to shoot me. If he were, he would’ve done it way back at the start.

  Carefully, I push away from the door and stroll into the library, coming closer to him.

  I notice right away that the table is turned over, puzzle pieces scattered all along the floor around him. Wordlessly, I grab the table, flipping it back onto its legs. It’s a pain in the ass, heavy, but I manage to get it upright again without any help—which is good, because he doesn’t look like he planned to offer any. I pick up the lamp next, plugging it back in before setting it on the end of the table.

  As soon as I turn it on, Lorenzo dramatically winces.

  I laugh at his reaction, perching on the end of the table near him as I look around. “What happened to your puzzle?”

  “Adam’s dick disappeared.”

  My brow furrows. “What?”

  He runs his hands down his face, grumbling, “A piece was missing.”

  “Oh.” I look at the mess, my chest tightening, not mentioning the fact that it probably got lost the night he fucked me on top of it. “That sucks.”

  He laughs bitterly as he tilts his head back, slouching in the chair, stretching his legs out, covering his eyes with his forearm. The gun rests on his thigh, in his lap, his free hand on top of it, keeping it securely in place as his leg steadily moves back and forth. Antsy.

  “There’s more to the story,” I say quietly after a moment.

  His arm shifts, his eyes meeting mine.

  “The Juniper Tree,” I say, holding up the book I bought to show him. “The little boy is reincarnated into a bird, which is born from the tree. The bird sings a song, rats out the stepmother, and she dies as punishment for killing him, before he’s once again reborn into a kid.”

  Lorenzo blinks a few times, his voice completely flat as he says, “That sounds like bullshit.”

  “Better than the story you told me.”

  “I like my version better.”

  “Do you?” I ask. “Really?”

  Another question that goes unanswered.

  “Didn’t think so,” I whisper.

  He sits up. Fast. So fast it catches me off guard. I freeze in place as he shoves out of the chair, gripping the gun tightly so it doesn’t fall to the floor. He doesn’t aim it, doesn’t even raise it, instead slamming it down on the table beside me as he stalls in front of me. “What do you want from me, Scarlet? Huh? Haven’t I done enough for you?”

  “You’ve done more than enough, but—”

  “But,” he says, cutting me off. “There’s always a but, isn’t there? Nothing’s ever good enough as it is; we have to tack on a fucking but.”

  I stare him in the face as I set the book down on the table. He’s struggling hard to control himself right now. I don’t know what’s gotten into him, but something has him teetering on the edge.

  “Are you okay?” I whisper, pressing my palm to his scarred cheek, my thumb gently stroking the rough skin.

  He doesn’t like that.

  At all.

  Instantly, he pulls back, moving out of my reach, anger flickering across his expression. He leaves the gun on the table beside me as he clenches his hands into fists, like he’s about to punch something, like he might find that so much more satisfying at the moment than pumping bullets through whatever it may be.

  Not me, though.

  He won’t hit me.

  You might be sitting there thinking I’m stupid, that I’m insane for thinking that way. A few minutes ago, the guy had a gun aimed at me, so what makes me think he’ll keep his hands to himself?

  Well, it’s simple, really... it’s what I told Sasha.

  He’s got a heart in his chest.

  I see it when I look him in the eyes. I see the agony he feels. He’s tortured, twisted, all tied up in knots. He’s busy beating himself up inside. But most people don’t see that, because they don’t look at him. They turn away from the surface, terrified, because what he shows the world can be downright fucking scary. But if they just took a second to really see him, they’d know what I know.

  They’d believe what I believe.

  And what I believe is this man is far from being a monster. I’ve lived with monsters. I know them. And maybe, on the surface, Lorenzo falls into that category. Legally defined, he might be a serial killer, or maybe a spree killer... I know he has killed. Who knows how many lives he’s taken—I’m not trying to justify that. Psychologically, they’d probably diagnose him as something dangerous, but I believe the world is wrong about him.

  Because I see what they don’t bother looking for, assuming it must not be there.

  I see his conscience. I see his compassion.

  I’ve listened to the heart strongly beating in his chest that he desperately tries to silence to keep everyone from hearing.

  “Why are you here?” Lorenzo asks, an edge of anger to his voice, his tone almost accusatory. “What do you want?”

  “I don’t know,” I say, because it’s true... I don’t know. I could list off reasons all day long as to why I might be standing here, but I’ll never know which was the reason that put me in this room. Gratitude. Guilt. Regret. Longing. Maybe it’s all of those, or maybe it’s something more, something deeper. “I just... don’t know.”

  He looks away from me, scrubbing his hands over his face as he starts to pace. “Why are you doing this to me? Huh? Why can’t you just stop? Why can’t you leave? Just go the fuck away?”

  “Is that what you want?”

  “Yes!”

  He yells the word so loud that I cringe. Oh no, his hands won’t ever hit me, but his words might. It’s like a punch straight to the chest.

  “I want you gone,” he says. “I want you out of my life. Out of my system. I don’t want to spend another goddamn second thinking about you, wondering about you, worrying about you. I don’t want to look at you, don’t want to see you or smell you or taste you or hear you. I don’t want this. Do you get that? I don’t want any of this. It’s driving me fucking insane. I can’t sleep. I can’t eat. I can’t think. I hate this, whatever this is... whatever this bullshit is that I’m feeling because of you. Make it go away.”

  I just stare at him, because I don’t know what to say to that. I don’t know much of anything right now except what I’m feeling, and even that is hard to comprehend.

  “You want the fairy tale,” he continues. “You want the happy ending. You want the little boy to be a fucking bird so he can fly away and make everything okay, but I can’t do it. I’ve told you that. It’s not me.”

  “I know.”

  “So why the fuck are you here?”

  “Because I love you anyway.”

  It’s like the world stops at that moment.

  I wish I could say it was beautiful.

  Wish I could say the sun shined and the flowers bloomed and the birds sang. Wish I could say there were fireworks, that there was happiness, that the stars aligned just right. But this isn’t Mary Poppins. I’m no goddamn Cinderella. The fairy tale I’m sitting in the middle of right now isn’t made by Disney.

  There’s not a symphony playing in the background.

  The word is meek when I say it, barely a whisper. I hadn’t meant for it to come out. It wasn’t something I planned to say to him. I’ve never said it to him before, struggled admitting it even to myself, but it’s true, the truest syllable I’ve ever spoken.

  Love.

  I love this dangerous, menacing asshole.

  I can very easily stand on my own two feet, but the th
ought of losing him makes my knees go weak. The thought of not having him around makes my chest ache. I can breathe without him. I don’t need him. He’ll never complete me, because I’m already complete. But yet so much of me is now tangled up with so much of him that the thought of living the rest of my life without him around makes me feel cold inside, like he gives me my warmth.

  “Don’t,” he says, or more like he growls, still not looking at me. “Don’t fucking say that.”

  “It’s too late,” I whisper. “I already said it.”

  “Don’t do this to me.” He shakes his head, still pacing. “Why are you doing this to me? Why couldn’t you just fuck off and go find your picket fence?”

  “There’s one right outside.”

  His head turns, his gaze shifting my way when I say that. “Not that one.”

  “Well, I mean, you didn’t exactly specify...”

  He doesn’t look amused by that. He looks like he wants to run outside right now and set the fence on fire before ripping it out of the ground.

  “What do you want, Morgan?” he asks after a moment, his voice low. “Just... tell me what you want from me. I can’t stand here and do this with you.”

  “You named me,” I say. That’s not the first time I’ve heard him call me by my real name. Morgan. “You only name what you keep, remember?”

  He just stares at me.

  “So I’ll go away, if that’s really what you want, if that’s what will make you happy. I’ll leave you alone, Lorenzo. You’ll never have to see me again, and you can forget I ever said what I just said. We can pretend I didn’t mean it and go our separate ways. But... you named me. And maybe it’s stupid of me to believe this, and I’m not trying to make shit weird, but it makes me think you might feel the same way. So if that’s true...”

  I trail off, and he says nothing. His expression is blank, a mask of nothingness. I give him a moment to respond, to think about what I’m saying, but it gets to be too much eventually.

  I’m bearing my heart to him, when so much of me is hardened not to, and he’s not reacting.

  Maybe I’m wrong.

  Maybe he’s trying to spare my feelings here.

  Pushing away from the table, I turn to leave. If he wants me gone, I’ll go. I’m not going to push him. I make it a few steps before he reaches out, snatching ahold of my wrist.

  I glance at his hand before looking at him.

  The world stops yet again.

  This time, it’s not quite so ugly.

  He doesn’t say anything.

  What, did you really expect him to?

  Have you been paying attention at all?

  He’s not a man of emotional declarations. He shows you he cares through his actions. And words... they’re just words, remember? Letters and syllables. Kassian told me he loved me so many times that those words don’t have half the meaning as Lorenzo clutching my wrist does as he stops me from walking out of his life.

  He stares at me.

  I wait for him to speak.

  “The prequels are some of the worst movies ever made,” he says eventually, finding his voice. “You’ll never convince me otherwise.”

  “Come on, they have General Grievous. He’s badass.”

  “Yeah, but they also have Jar Jar Binks, who should’ve never been created.”

  “I thought he was kind of funny.”

  “He’s an abomination.”

  “And what, like we’re not?”

  His serious expression cracks for just a moment as he pulls me to him. He lets go of my wrist, instead cradling my face as he leans down, gently kissing my lips. It’s soft, and sweet, a few simple pecks, as I close my eyes and grasp his forearms, savoring the moment.

  I’ve missed this. Missed him.

  It’s only been a week since I’ve seen him, two weeks since I’ve kissed him, but a lifetime of hell passed within that time. I try to deepen the kiss, eager for more, groaning into his mouth, when a small voice calls out.

  “Mommy?”

  The sound startles me.

  Lorenzo pulls away. Fast.

  I turn, seeing Sasha in the doorway, her eyes bouncing between me and Lorenzo, alarmed. Leo’s behind her, just out in the hallway.

  “Sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt,” Leo says. “It got quiet, so I figured it was safe, and she said she was thirsty, and I wasn’t sure what she was allowed to drink, and well, the kitchen is this way, so...”

  “It’s okay,” I tell him, so he’ll stop stammering, before motioning to Sasha. “Come here, sunshine.”

  She approaches, and I kneel beside her. She eyes Lorenzo suspiciously, looking up at him, while he stares down at her like he thinks she might bite. They’re both damn nervous. It’s kind of cute.

  I mean, there’s a chance one (or both) of them might freak the fuck out any second, but still... cute.

  “Sasha, this is Mommy’s friend, Lorenzo. He helped me when I was looking for you, helped me find you.”

  “And did surgery on Buster?” she asks quietly.

  “Yeah, he’s the one who sewed up our Buster,” I say. “That was nice of him, wasn’t it?”

  She nods.

  “And Lorenzo, this is—”

  “Your little Scarlet Letter,” he says.

  “Uh, yeah, that’s one way to put it,” I say with a laugh. “You said you wanted to know what a mini-me was like, so here she is.”

  Neither of them says anything right away.

  They just stare at each other. Assessing.

  It’s like they’re sizing one another up, getting a read on the competition, gauging whether or not they’ll be willing to share my attention. I’m not at all surprised when it’s Sasha that cracks first, but the words that fly from her lips nearly knock me on my ass.

  “How did your face get all hurt?”

  She points at him, right at his face, at his scar.

  Lorenzo blinks at her.

  Oh god.

  “Sasha, baby, you know we don’t—”

  “It’s fine,” Lorenzo says, cutting me off, his gaze on her. “You want to know what happened to me?”

  She slowly nods before cutting her eyes at me, like she’s worried I’m going to be mad. Not him, no... she’s not worried about him. If she were, she wouldn’t have asked that. I’m the scariest one in the room, apparently.

  Lorenzo hesitates, like he’s considering how to answer, or even if he still wants to answer. But eventually, he says, “I got hurt a long time ago by a very bad man.”

  “What kind of bad man?” she asks.

  “The kind that liked to call himself my dad.”

  Her eyes widen. “My daddy is mean, too.”

  “I know,” Lorenzo says. “I’m glad he never hurt you like I got hurt. I tried to make it so he couldn’t.”

  She processes that, her brow furrowing, before she says, “Will your face get all better?”

  He shakes his head. “It’s stuck like this.”

  “Does it hurt?”

  I see Lorenzo’s cheek twitch.

  I think maybe he’s done entertaining questions, but he answers before I can chime in.

  “Sometimes,” he admits. “The eye hurts. It doesn’t really work anymore.”

  “It got broken?”

  “Yes.”

  I’m not sure if she understands the concept, since his eye is still there. It still blinks and moves, looking pretty normal except for the lighter coloring.

  She frowns, but it only lasts for a moment before her expression brightens. She holds up her bear, as if he’s never seen it before. “Maybe you can give yourself surgery like Buster! His eye got broken, too.”

  “I think that’s enough for now, sunshine,” I say, squeezing her in a hug before standing back up. “Go ahead to the kitchen and find something to drink. You can have anything but the rum.”

  Leo laughs from the hallway.

  She starts to leave when Lorenzo clears his throat.

  “It’s nice to meet you, Sasha,”
he says.

  “You, too, Mommy’s friend,” she calls back as she runs out of the library.

  Sasha. He called her Sasha.

  He used her name.

  My eyes sting. I can feel the tears welling up. There’s a lump in my throat that’s getting harder and harder to swallow down.

  As soon as she’s gone, Lorenzo looks at me. “I swear to fuck, Scarlet, if you start crying right now, I’m going to throw you out of my goddamn house.”

  “I’m sorry, I just—”

  “Don’t apologize to me.”

  “Ugh, okay. I’m not.” I try to shake it off, clearing my throat. “That was just really nice of you. I didn’t expect you to be so...”

  “Nice?” he guesses. “I’m not an asshole, you know. Well, I am, but not that much of one. I was a kid once. I remember what it was like when adults were assholes. I’m not going to do that to her. Besides, she’s yours, so I didn’t really expect her to make this shit easy for me. Her mother sure as fuck doesn’t.”

  No, I guess I don’t.

  Pausing, I reach up, pressing my palm to his cheek again. He grimaces but doesn’t move, doesn’t pull away, although I can tell part of him wants to. “Do you, uh...?”

  “Do I what?”

  “Do you at least like The Force Awakens?”

  He stares at me. “I haven’t seen it.”

  “Wait, what? How can you call yourself a fan if you haven’t even seen the new movie?”

  “I’ve been a bit busy lately,” he says. “Dealing with you has taken up a lot of my free time.”

  “Oh, whatever. That’s bullshit. You had enough free time to put together a gazillion piece puzzle. You’ve got time to watch a movie, and you know it. I’m just... I’m ashamed of you. Legitimately ashamed.”

  “I’m guessing it’s good, then?”

  “Oh, I don’t know.” I shrug. “I haven’t watched it. Been too busy.”

  Lorenzo pulls my hand away from his face and laughs.

  Genuinely laughs.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  The seven deadly sins and I are on a first-name basis.

  Gluttony. I don’t deny myself anything.

  Greed. I want it all, everything there is.