Page 35 of Love Her Ruin
The question is out before I can evaluate whether it's appropriate, whether it's too much, whether asking a rape survivor if she considered suicide while standing over the grave of a rape victim who completed it is the kind of thing that gets you justifiably slapped.
But Sera doesn't operate on the same social protocols as the rest of the world, and I need to know.
"No," she says. "Not once."
I wait because I sense there’s a lot more.
"The rage was greater than the helplessness," she says, her voice steady. "From the moment it happened to the moment he was found not guilty, the rage was louder than everything else. Louder than the despair. Louder than the part of me that wanted to disappear." She pauses. "Some people break inward. I broke outward. The explosion went out, not in. I don't know why. Idon't know what makes the difference, why I turned the blade on the world. But I know the rage saved me, even when it was destroying everything else."
She squeezes my hand.
"You weren't wrong to tell her to trust the system, Eddie. You were wrong about the system, but you weren't wrong to believe in it. That's not the same thing. The system failed her.Youdidn't. You believed her. You stood with her. You told her she mattered enough to fight back."
Her eyes meet mine, dark and steady and utterly certain. "Do you know how many women never get that? Do you know how many women report and the first person they tell looks at them like they're lying? You didn't do that. You believed her on the first word when she told you about this guy. That mattered more than anything else."
Something shifts in my chest. The tightness redistributes, just slightly, making room for something else alongside it.
That something might be the knowledge that I did what I could with what I had, and what I had wasn't enough, and that's the system's failure, not mine.
I'm not sure I fully believe it yet. But I believe that Sera believes it, and for now, that's enough.
I look down at Lily's headstone and exhale. "She would have liked you."
Sera's mouth quirks. "She likely would have thought I was insane."
I chuckle and pull her closer to wrap my arm around her. "Maybe that too. But she would have liked you regardless. She had a thing for people who refused to be small."
The wind dies. For a moment, the cemetery is perfectly still, and the only sound is the faint, rhythmic pulse of the bond that ties me to the dark.
I gaze at Sera, the woman who rode into a diseased city with a purpose and burned it clean. She's a beautiful weapon. A fierce queen.
“What’s next?” I ask quietly.
She inhales and holds it for several beats before sighing. “I’m not sure yet. Do I want to be a librarian again, or do I want something different? Do I want to stay at Gas N’ Go where I can keep an eye on this city, or do I want to try the career path I always wondered about?”
“Which was?”
“Writing erotic fiction like I did in Kansas City for five years or veterinary medicine,” she says with a soft smile. “Books and animals have always been my weaknesses.”
I blink. Something some of the guys at the sheriff’s department were talking about yesterday clicks into place, and I realize I have the perfect gift for my queen. But she’ll have to wait. Today is Lily's. Today is grief and guilt and the slow, grudging work of letting someone help me carry what I've been carrying alone.
Maybe tomorrow.
My heart beats faster at the thought. The cold beneath my skin hums in response, and I swear I feel Azhrael's attention sharpen with something that might be approval.
Chapter 18
James
TheycallwhileI’mcleaning blood off my bone saw. Rude, that.
Unknown number, same as always. Same nothing-voice, same clipped mission-speak. “New timetable. You’re wheels-up in forty-eight hours. Overseas. Duration is classified.”
“Forty-eight?” I say. “Aye. Here’smynew timetable. I quit.”
Silence.
Then the tone hardens. “You signed the fucking contract—”
