Page 121 of Famine

After I finish telling him what happened, he lays there, brooding.

“Twice now you’ve saved me,” he eventually says. “Why? Why do such a thing when I have brought you so much pain?” He sounds desperate to know the answer.

Gently, I place my hand against his face. “I don’t know, Famine. Because I am foolish, I suppose. And because I’m too curious for my own good. But most of all, because I like you every bit as much as you like me.”

The way the Reaper’s eyes shine in the darkness, I’m half sure that if he had hands at the moment, he’d reach out and pull my lips to his. Instead the two of us drink each other in.

“What happened to you after you left me?” I ask gently.

I know it’s going to ruin the moment, but I can’t not ask. He’s been brutalized.

His eyes slide away from me. “I was ambushed.” That’s all he’ll say on the issue.

Did it hurt?I want to ask, but of course it hurt. It clearlystillhurts.

“I’m sorry,” I say again, because that’s the only thing I can think to say.

Famine’s eyes move back to mine. “Youhave nothing to be sorry for.”

“I’m not apologizing for me. I’m apologizing for humanity.”

At that, Famine is quiet.

“Does God really hate us?” I ask softly. Now seems like an appropriate time for that question.

“Not as much as I do.”

“That’s not an answer.”

Famine’s face sobers up. “Your kind is running out of time,” he says.

Of all the frightening things I’ve seen and heard tonight, that might honestly be the most terrifying. Whatever celestial test humanity has been given, we’re failing at it.

The Reaper lets out a groan.

“Are you okay?” I ask, my heart jumping at the sound.

“I will be. It’s just some brief pain. It’ll pass soon enough,” he says, his voice strained. “But, distract me, flower. Tell me about your life.”

My gaze moves down to him. “You want to know about my work at the bordello?”

“I want to know aboutyou,” he replies, and not for the first time this evening, Famine’s words send a pleasant heat through me.

“How far back should I go?” I ask.

In response, the horseman sighs, like I’ve taken a simple thing and made it overly complicated.

“Oh my God, calm your tits, I’ll start back at the very beginning.”

I can’t be sure in the darkness, but I think I see him smile, just for a moment.

“I never knew my mother,” I begin. “I mean, I knew her—I just don’t remember it. When I was two, she died giving birth to my brother, who also passed along with her—or maybe he passed before her, I still don’t know the full story on this.

“My father raised me alone, but he was a good dad. He called me his little princess and I remember he’d stop by my school to drop off treats from the grocery store he worked at.” I hadn’t remembered that story until now, and the thought of it fills me with an aching warmth.

“What happened to him?” Famine asks.

“He died of complications from diabetes when I was still a young girl.”

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