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Back When Villains Rise Save as PDF
Chapters (52)
  1. Copyright
  2. Dedication
  3. One
  4. Two
  5. Three
  6. Four
  7. Five
  8. Six
  9. Seven
  10. Eight
  11. Nine
  12. Ten
  13. Eleven
  14. Twelve
  15. Thirteen
  16. Fourteen
  17. Fifteen
  18. Sixteen
  19. Seventeen
  20. Eighteen
  21. Nineteen
  22. Twenty
  23. Twenty-One
  24. Twenty-Two
  25. Twenty-Three
  26. Twenty-Four
  27. Twenty-Five
  28. Twenty-Six
  29. Twenty-Seven
  30. Twenty-Eight
  31. Twenty-Nine
  32. Thirty
  33. Thirty-One
  34. Thirty-Two
  35. Thirty-Three
  36. Thirty-Four
  37. Thirty-Five
  38. Thirty-Six
  39. Thirty-Seven
  40. Thirty-Eight
  41. Thirty-Nine
  42. Forty
  43. Forty-One
  44. Forty-Two
  45. Forty-Three
  46. Forty-Four
  47. Forty-Five
  48. Acknowledgments
  49. Read More from the Market of Monsters Series
  50. More Books from HMH Teen
  51. About the Author
  52. Connect with HMH on Social Media

“I’m a liar, it’s true.” Fabricio gave her a bitter smile. “I had to be, to survive. I lied and lied and lied to stay alive. I lied so much that sometimes even I don’t know what’s true anymore.” He closed his eyes for a moment and his smile fell as he confessed, “Sometimes, when I’m alone, I think I could have been a good person. In another life. When I didn’t need to fight to survive. But that’s just another lie. Because no one knows who they really are until they’re tested the way we’ve been—and you and I, we both chose to survive, no matter what the cost. We gave up being good people to be living people.”

She stared at him a beat, then snorted. “I don’t think I’ve ever been a very good person.”

He laughed softly. “Given your upbringing, that doesn’t surprise me.”

Nita’s face fell at the reminder of her mother. The reminder of what she’d done to her mother.

“Sometimes I wonder,” Nita whispered, “if we aren’t all destined to become certain types of people, no matter our upbringing. The girl I was trapped in a cage with, Mirella, is an activist now, working against unnatural trafficking. If she hadn’t been kidnapped, she wouldn’t have that cause. But she always had fire, she was always passionate. So would she have just found another cause?”

Fabricio blinked. “I don’t know.”

“If I hadn’t been kidnapped, I’d still be trapped with my mother. I wouldn’t be a killer.” Nita met Fabricio’s eyes. “But I wonder if it was only a matter of time and opportunity before I rose up against her.”

“Perhaps.” His voice was soft.

“And I wonder if it’s only a matter of time before you betray me again.”

He winced. “I lie to survive—there’s no survival benefit to keeping up this cycle of vengeance with you.” His gaze was steady. “Don’t trust me, that’s fine. But trust my desire to live. I don’t care about you, Nita. I don’t care what you do, or if you live or die. I don’t want or need vengeance. All I want is to be left alone. And if you agree to do that, you’ll never have to see me again.”

Nita watched the police file out of Kovit’s room and down the hall. They were hunched together in a group, whispering, but they didn’t look angry or violent, and there was still a guard posted at Kovit’s door, so Nita imagined the meeting couldn’t have gone too disastrously.

But that didn’t mean it wouldn’t in the future.