When Villains Rise (Market of Monsters #3) - Rebecca Schaeffer Page 0,45

old lady’s curtains.”

“What happened?” Nita asked.

“The person he was supposed to kidnap resisted.” Kovit shrugged. “Matt had a violent streak. He pulverized the man’s head, murdered him. Brought the body back. Oh, man, Henry was mad. They were only planning to scare the man, give him a good rattling. They didn’t want him dead.”

Kovit sighed heavily. “It wasn’t the first time something like that happened, and well . . . Henry decided Matt was a liability.”

“And asked you to get rid of him,” Nita finished.

“Yeah.” Kovit looked around the room, his eyes dark, lost in the past. “It’s still so hard to wrap my head around. That Henry killed him, after everything. It doesn’t feel real?” He ran his hand through his hair and gave a sharp laugh. “I never saw the body. I don’t know how or when it happened. And I’m in a strange place, so there’s no memories of him here, nothing to remind me that he should be here too but isn’t.” He closed his eyes. “Sometimes, I feel like he was just a dream, a phantom I made up to be not so alone in the Family.”

Nita was quiet a long moment before she asked, “Is it easier? To pretend he was a dream?”

“Easier? Maybe. But it makes me feel like a shitty friend.”

Nita didn’t have much to say to that. She’d felt similar when grieving for her father. She still felt it now. Anytime she let the world distract her, let her mind slip away from the pain, she’d suddenly see something and be struck by the realization that her father was, indeed, still dead. And she’d feel like she betrayed him every time she forgot, even for those brief moments.

“What about Henry?” Nita asked.

Kovit’s expression darkened. “What about him?”

Nita hesitated. “You’ve been avoiding talking about him.”

“I don’t want to grieve for him. He betrayed me in every possible way. He ruined my life, he treated me like an object, and he murdered my best friend. I shouldn’t grieve for him.”

“But you can’t help it,” Nita said gently.

Kovit swallowed heavily. “Why does he get so much space in my mind? Matt was a friend, a real friend, but Henry’s the one whose death haunts me, who plays over and over in my head.” His voice was bitter. “I wish I could just turn it off, shut out all these feelings. I don’t want them. He doesn’t deserve them.”

Nita bowed her head. “It would be a lot easier if we could stop caring about the people who hurt us.”

She thought of her mother, and her dark promise to get rid of Kovit, and shuddered softly. Why did Nita always go back to her? Why couldn’t she have remembered her passport the first time?

“It would,” Kovit agreed. He ran a hand through his hair. “I just keep coming back to that moment we realized he’d sold me out to INHUP. If he couldn’t have me, no one could. Like those pet owners who’d rather put down their pets when they move than let another person adopt them. Like he thought he owned me.”

“I think,” Nita said carefully, “in his mind, he did.”

Kovit sighed. His eyes were dry, and his expression was calm, but she could see that he was hurting underneath it all. She didn’t blame him. He’d be some sort of superhuman if he could get over murdering his surrogate father in only two days.

She’d opened her mouth to say something when he elbowed her gently, a wicked grin coming over his face, breaking the spell of grief.

“Look,” he whispered, eyes hungry and violent and full of delight.

Nita followed his gaze and found a man checking in at the registration desk. A slow smile crept across her features.

Kovit pulled out his switchblade and smiled, cracked and dark and promising agony for all those in his path, and he whispered, “Time to have some fun.”

Eighteen

NITA KNOCKED on the door to room 403. Kovit stood just to her side, invisible through the peephole. There was no answer the first time she knocked, so she did it again, and called in Spanish, trying to mimic Fabricio’s strong Porteño accent, “Mr. Almeida, you left your credit card at reception. We’ve been trying to call your room phone, but it doesn’t seem to be functioning.”

There was a muffled thud, and then the door opened to reveal a sweaty middle-aged white man glaring at them.

“What?” His Spanish was heavily Portuguese-accented. “Are you sure?”

Nita just smiled and smashed two knuckles into his