Then the smile dies on my face.
I stagger and clutch the door frame as horror crashes over me. What the fuck was I just doing to my stepdaughter? The righteous anger that sustained me all evening and told me that terrorizing Lolita was the right thing to do has evaporated, and I’m left cold and empty. I hear a snatch of malicious laughter, and whip around.
“Who’s there?”
The castillo is empty around me. The chirping cicadas cut through the night air. I look down at my hands, the ones that so recently held my belt tight around Lolita’s throat, and see that they’re shaking.
Who am I? What am I becoming? I don’t recognize myself from the man I was this morning. The man I was before I met Lolita.
I charge upstairs, passing the door to Valeria’s bedroom and Lolita’s. I keep going until I reach a storage room where my things are packed away. There’s a large wooden chest, and I fall to my knees before it and dig a key out of my pocket.
I don’t want to be Zacarias anymore.
I unlock the chest and throw back the lid. The empty holes in the mask stare up at me. I kept it out of affection. I never intended to wear it again, but then I never imagined I would need the Black Fox as much as I need him now.
It’s the work of just a few minutes to change. As I dress, I feel my heart-rate steadying. The mask and hat go on, and I can think straight once more. I slip through the darkened house and step out onto the terrace. When I draw my sword, a sliver of moonlight catches the razor sharp edge.
“Hello, old friend,” I murmur, a smile on my face.
Below, lights twinkle here and there in the town. I sheath my sword, and in silent, booted feet I slip into the shadows. There’s a path leading down to the cobbled streets. I’m moving so fast that I don’t hear her, don’t see her, until I’m right on top of her.
Lolita is standing in the middle of the path, hands over her face and sobbing. The path is narrow and my body thuds into hers. Out of reflex, I scoop her up in my arms to prevent her from being knocked to the ground.
Her tear-filled eyes grow very large in the thin, silvery light as she gazes up at me. “It’s you.”
She lifts a shaking hand to touch my mask. I tense, ready to pull away, but she doesn’t try to lift it and discover my identity. Her trembling finger traces the mask, then my jaw, and then finally my lips. Her soft touch makes my heart turn over.
“Black Fox. I thought you’d disappeared. You haven’t been heard of for months, and I feared that…”
I reach up and brush the backs of my fingers across her wet cheek, searching my soul for some trace of the cruel beast that made me hurt her so mercilessly not ten minutes ago. “I was never gone. I’ve always been close by.”
Lolita’s eyes fill with grateful tears. “I knew it.”
“Don’t cry. I won’t let anything bad happen to you.”
My words seem to have the opposite effect, because she bursts into sobs and buries her face against my chest, her slender shoulders heaving with sobs. There’s a large, flat rock behind me and I sit down with her on my lap, pulling her close.
Lolita cries brokenly for several minutes, giving into her misery and fear. I wrap my arms tightly around her, furious that anyone could do this to her; wracked with guilt that it was me. There’s no trace of that beast anywhere in my heart now. I’m the Black Fox, and only the Black Fox.
Finally, Lolita begins to hiccup her way back to composure. She lifts her face to mine, and her gaze lands on my mouth. I’m hypnotized by the sight of her beautiful, tear-streaked face in the silvery light. She reaches for my mask once more, but I grasp her hand and press it to my thundering heart.
“I met you once before,” she whispers. “Do you remember me?”
Hoarsely, I say, “Down in the town. A summer’s night a year ago. You dropped a book.”
She cries out and throws her arms around my neck. “You remember, you remember.”
“I went back for you.” I stroke my hand through her long, silky hair, wretchedness expanding through my chest. How different things might have been if I’d only found her. “I searched the streets all night, but I couldn’t find you.”
She lifts her head. “You did? Oh, that makes my heart feel so full. Perhaps it was a good thing you didn’t find me, though, because I was only seventeen and I would have covered you with kisses and made you angry with me.”
I find myself smiling down at her. Her body is a warm bundle in my arms. “Never. I could never be angry with you.”
Lolita gives a shaky, tear-stained laugh. “Everyone’s always angry with me.”
“Not me. Never, mi dulce.”
She tilts her mouth up to mine, inviting me to do what I most crave in the world; lower my lips to hers and kiss her. I turn my face quickly away.