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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

Across from her, lying on a cot on the floor, was Kovit’s internet friend and former colleague in the Family, Gold. Her bleached-blond hair was short and pressed flat against her scalp like a helmet, and half a dozen earrings danced up one ear. Her face had a bandage on one side from where Nita had burned her with acid, one arm was in a sling, and a crutch lay beside her cot, from when Kovit had dislocated her knee and shoulder.

“Did you know?” Nita asked, her voice tight and angry.

“Know what?” Gold rasped, still hoarse from screaming earlier.

“Did you know Henry was going to give INHUP evidence that Kovit was a zannie?” Nita snapped.

Gold was quiet a long moment, and then shook her head and looked away. “No.”

Nita’s shoulders slumped, and her fingers curled into her palms. She wanted to hurt Henry for what he’d done. But Henry was dead now, and there was nothing Nita could do to punish him, nothing she could do to vent her rage at this final betrayal.

No, now they had to deal with the fallout.

She turned around slowly, knowing the next step was to tell Kovit. He needed to know what had happened.

She thought of his face, the moment after he’d killed Henry. The absolute devastation in his eyes as he realized he’d broken his own rules, he’d killed someone who was like a parent to him. The rage as he made Gold scream, as something inside him broke, and he began to spiral downward into a dangerous place.

But she’d stopped him. Or he’d stopped himself. Or they’d stopped him together. For now, he was okay. Picking up the pieces of his shattered soul and forgetting his pain by causing pain to someone else.

Nita looked down the white hall at the pastel blue door at the end. Beyond that baby blue barrier, Kovit was doing what zannies did best. Hurting people and enjoying it.

Because Nita had asked him to.

She couldn’t hear the screams—the soundproofing was excellent. So she couldn’t hear what horrors he was committing to make himself feel better. Comfort food, he’d called it once, but she tried not to think too hard about the fact that he gained the same comfort from skinning people alive that others got from eating ice cream.

Her steps were silent as she approached the innocuous blue door. She hesitated in front of it. Maybe she should just wait for Kovit to be finished. He’d had a hard day. He deserved some downtime. Surely this news could wait until he’d had a good meal.