Page 90 of Once a Villain
Joan swallowed hard. In the back of her mind, she’d always associated Nick and Aaron—her love for them—with the two halves of herself, monster and human. With the feeling of forever being wrenched apart. She’d always seen her two worlds as unreconcilable, but, somehow, Nick’s and Aaron’s counterparts had found a way. Their love would have been illegal here—monsters and humans weren’t permitted to be together in this world—and they’dstillfound a way.
And then they’d been erased. Wiped from the world, with only remnants left of them.
And that made her feel... No, she didn’t know how she felt. All she knew was that they were dead. And Nick was dead. Another wave of grief hit her, strong enough to steal her breath.
She sought to untangle her thoughts into words for Aaron. “I’m so sad and so sorry that we erased them.” Her voice hoarsened as she spoke. “And I’m sorry that they had to live in thisterrible world. I’m glad they had each other, though.”
To her surprise, Aaron bent to kiss her head, his breath warm in her hair. “I love you.” It was heartfelt, like when he’d first said it. Joan turned toward him, and he drew her closer. Lips still pressed to her hair, he murmured, “This world is so diverged from ours that we barely seem to be the same people.”
Joan wished she could see his face. There’d been a heavy note in his voice that she didn’t understand. “Aaron—” she started, but he hushed her.
“You want to know what I think about my counterpart and Nick’s?” he said. “I think you were dead in this timeline.”
“What do you mean?”
He lifted his head finally, letting her see his face. His expression was achingly open now. “If your counterpart had lived, it would have been you and Nick in this timeline. You two were together in thevera historia, and the timeline would have brought you back together here too.” He was silent for a moment. “I suppose I would still have known you both, with Nick as an Oliver gladiator....” His eyes were distant, as if he was imagining watching them from afar. “You would have made sense together, like you did in every timeline.”
Joan didn’t know what to say. She pressed her forehead to his chest, and his arms tightened around her. He always smelled good. Right now, he smelled like himself, but also, faintly, of an expensive cologne with notes of bergamot and crisp winter air. The scent was from his robe, Joan realized. The slightest trace of his counterpart.
There was nothing left to say. She held him closer and shut her eyes.
Aaron took a long time to fall asleep. When he did, it was fitful at first. He woke in jolts, reaching for Joan, as if he thought she’d vanished. As if he thought the Court Guards had come to take her away from him. Eventually, though, his breathing evened out, and his arm around Joan’s waist grew heavy.
The hearth fire flickered over his face. His beautiful features were soft with sleep, a pre-Raphaelite painting. Joan couldn’t stop thinking about what he’d said.You would have made sense together.As if Aaron wouldn’t have made sense in the same way.
“I love you,” she whispered to him. He hadn’t believed it when she’d said it to him awake. Maybe his subconscious would hear it and know it was true.
She must have fallen asleep herself after that.
She woke again, disoriented, in the darkness, and with a feeling that something was very wrong; something terrible was going to happen.
And then she remembered. The terrible thing had already happened. Nick was dead.
Pain flooded through her, choking her, and she wrenched out a near-silent sob. Nick wasdead.
A second later, strong arms were around her.Aaron.He held her, and Joan turned toward him, breathing him in.
“It doesn’t feel real,” she whispered to him. She couldn’t understand it. There were no more chances. No more timelines. “How can he be dead?”
Aaron didn’t answer. There was no answer. He kissed her forehead. “Do you feel up to coming somewhere with me?” he whispered.
Twenty-Seven
An hour later, Aaron parked his car near the colosseum. The clock on the dashboard read 2:17 a.m.
Joan stepped out. Behind her, the click of the car door seemed overly loud. Rose petals still littered the path, but otherwise, the street was empty. She drew a shaky breath as she looked up at the white statues of theCuria Monstrorum. Aaron had known what she’d needed, without her even knowing it herself.
“My mother was executed at the Oliver house,” Aaron whispered. “In the Lily Garden—you haven’t seen it. It’s at the far west of the estate. I never did like the smell of lilies, and I really can’t stand them now, but... the night she died, I sat in that garden for hours. I don’t even know why. I just needed to.”
Tears stung Joan’s eyes. Aaron never talked about his mother, and especially not her death. She reached for his hand, and he took it.
It was shockingly easy to get into the colosseum this time. The building was as empty and unguarded as the street, and eerily quiet. They walked through the cave-like space beneath the arena. The lamps had been dimmed, and it was barely bright enough for them to see their own feet.
Joan’s breath caught as they ascended a stone staircase into the arena. The sand was concrete-pale in the moonlight, and itlooked untouched now—bloodless and clean and neatly raked.
They walked over to the spot where Nick had died. Joan didn’t know what she’d expected to find—perhaps his ring. Perhaps a scrap of clothing. There was no sign of him, though. Other than the lingering scent of incense, there was no sign that anything had happened here.
She knelt on the raked sand, smoothing it. “You know... I think I flattened him in my mind,” she said. “When he was alive.” She’d imagined Nick in black and white, like he was a character from an old-fashioned movie. The hero from a story.
