Page 44 of Selling Innocence

She didn’t dress flashy, despite the fact I had no doubt the clothing cost a bundle. Instead, she still looked young and casual, like the most welcoming sight that was sure to get anyone to lower their guard around her. Or maybe that wasn’t her clothing at all and just her personality.

“You are more important than some little scratch,” I assured her.

My words had been meant to calm her, to even make her smile. How many times had I told clients that I would happily trade my life for theirs? That was why they hired me, after all, to keep them safe. The fact that I would pay that cost always reassured them.

I expected the words to do the same for her. I wanted her to take a deep breath and see that mark as proof that I would do whatever it took to keep her safe.

Except, that didn’t happen. If anything, more color leeched from her cheeks.

She twisted, tearing her chin from my grasp. “Then you’re a fool,” she whispered as she finished cleaning the wound.

“A fool? I’m not going to argue that, but how is it you figure?”

Kenz took a large bandage from the first-aid kit, opened it, then covered the gash, pressing at the edges to ensure a good seal. “Make sure to keep this clean and change the bandage every other day. If you can’t get the bandage on yourself, just ask.” She gathered the trash in one hand, then closed the lid with the other and stood.

She was fleeing. I’d fought enough in my life to recognize when a person did that, when they retreated. What I didn’t know was why.

Without thinking about it, I caught her wrist gently. “Why am I a fool?”

Kenz didn’t look at me, and I got the sense she saw something else, something from her own past. “You’re a fool for being so willing to throw your life away, for thinking that someone else’s life matters more than yours. Life is precious—all life—and no one should be so quick to offer theirs up.”

“That’s my job, Kenz. It’s my place to stand between people and the things that want to hurt them. That’s why they hire me.”

“And you think that makes me happy? You think that you treating your own life as expendable is going to make me feel all safe and sound?” That chilling edge to her voice had returned, the one that sounded as if pain and trauma had honed it. She shook her head and let out a long shaky sigh. “The last thing I want is someone trading their life for mine. I can tell you right now that if you do that, I won’t ever forgive you.”

When Kenz tugged her hand, it brought my gaze down to where I held her. I could so easily keep that grasp, and I wanted to. I wanted to keep her close, to explain it all to her. She was too naïve, too innocent to understand the world, the real danger there.

Only that reason explained how she could spout such optimistic nonsense. If she really understood what could have happened to her today, she’d have been happy to have me as a shield. People valued their own lives more than anything else in my experience.

Except, I couldn’t force her to understand, and a part of me wanted her to keep that sweetness. I didn’t want the world to harden her, to force her to see things she didn’t want to see, to live with the harsh, ugly reality of what people really were.

So I released her, and when she left, when she went into the bathroom and shut the door, I knew our conversation was over.

Which was for the best, right? She didn’t need to become more intertwined with our lives than she had to. If we kept going, we would finish what we had to and Kenz?

She could go back to her perfect little life, none-the-wiser of the monsters in the world.

Chapter Ten

Char

My cheeks ached from smiling, but I hardly noticed it. Sometimes, when I slid into one of my many personalities, I sank so deeply that my own thoughts turned fuzzy.

“You are adorable,” I told the woman who leaned in closer and put her hand on my arm.

She traced a design on my bare skin, the most obvious come-on I’d seen in a while. “You’re just being nice, I’m sure.”

Kenz sighed beside me, the sound loud enough to cover up the fake-shy laugh of the woman.

I turned to see Kenz with her gaze down, on her notebook, even though she hadn’t actually drawn anything. It had been that way for a few days, though. She would take out that sketchbook and a pencil, but never touch the graphite to the paper.

Why?

Some sort of weird artist’s block?

“What are you doing after class?” the woman asked.

“Kenz and I are getting some lunch,” I said.

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