Page 50 of Deathless
SANTOS
Torr only told his plan to three of us—me, Devin, and Hudson. What he proposed was shocking, and yet somehow made total sense. It felt right. As he spoke it aloud, it cemented into my mind as the only answer. This was what we had to do, what was meant to happen.
“Only the four of us can go.” Torr’s voice was steady, a general confident in his battle plan. “No one else gets involved. We don’t even tell anyone else about it. This has to be us, because we were chosen for this.”
Hudson, the only one of us who seemed unsure, scratched the side of his head. “I understand you three, but why me? I’m not part of your little group. I barely even talked to her last night before it all went down.”
“And it was a pretty significant conversation, wasn’t it?” Torr said.
“I don’t know. I mean, I guess.”
“You’re also good with a gun,” I reminded Hudson. “So you and Devin will be our backup with the more traditional weapons.”
Torr looked across the table expectantly at me. “Are we ready?”
“In a sec.” I looked at Hudson. “Can I get a word with you?”
He looked surprised but nodded.
“Make it fast.” Torr rose from the table, his footsteps echoing over the warehouse floor. “The sooner we get that thing out of Rori, the better off we’ll all be.”
Devin followed after Torr, but not before giving Hudson a reassuring squeeze of his hand. Without another word, my former friend and I went to stand by a stack of wooden pallets for relative privacy.
“So, what’s up?” Hudson tried to sound casual but there was no hiding the eagerness in his voice.
I pulled in a long breath, gathering my thoughts before speaking. “If you can promise me now, and mean it, that you will never seek to harm Rori, or any other woman, again, I can maybe forgive you for trying to kill her.”
He opened his mouth to reply, but I held up an index finger. “I’m not done.” Abruptly, his mouth closed and he nodded, waiting for me to continue.
“It doesn’t matter if it’s with a gun, your hands, or your fucking words. You are somehow important to all this, so I gotta deal with you being around. It’s really fucking inconvenient to hate you if I gotta see your face all the time, so that’s why I’m extending this olive branch. But onlyifyou can guarantee that women, especially mine, are safe around you. I don’t care what kind of relationship you have with Rori, if any. But if you even break her shoelace, I will banish you myself. That’ll be the end of her hospitality. Got it?”
Hudson just stared at me for a while, then blinked a few times. “Yeah. I got it, but—”
“Good. I’m glad we could have a productive conversation after what happened.”
“Santos, my dude.” He huffed out a laugh. “You realize she’s not exactly the damsel in distress type, right? She can boot me out herself if she wants.”
“She can.” I rested my hands on the hilts of my machetes. “But she shouldn’t have to. She shouldn’t have to raise a finger to exile the man who shot her on sight.”
“I am sorry about that.” All humor dropped from his expression. He looked and sounded sincere, the regret weighing heavily on his shoulders. “I really am. It was wrong.”
“Why?” I wanted to hear the reason from his mouth.
“Because she was innocent. She was helping you guys rescue me.” He shrugged. “She had done nothing to warrant me almost killing her. I realize that now, and I regret being so reactionary.”
I took several seconds to inspect him, sizing him up from head to toe like I would an opponent in the fighting pit. “You’re really different in such a short time,” I observed. “That’s a good thing. You look better, more alive. Well, even.”
Hudson shrugged. “Devin’s been the biggest help, honestly.”
“Devin?” I noticed the flush that creeped up his neck. “How’s that going?”
“Um, good.” He blushed darker, avoiding eye contact with me.
“Just good?”
“Fuck, Santos.” Hudson dropped his forehead into his hand and groaned. “I think I’m falling for him. Hard.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” I said. “I fell hard and fast for Rori. If you two are happy, then—”
