Free Supervillainess (Part One) by Lizzy Ford Page B

cool spring night. Flames leapt out of the windows
and had begun to crawl towards the neighboring apartments.
    “No bodies, no crime,” Keladry said,
satisfied.
    Dazed, Kimber couldn’t look away from the
dancing fire. “Did you pull the fire alarm on the way out?” he
heard himself asking.
    “No. Why?”
    “Because there are hundreds of people in the
building!”
    Keladry was quiet, and he glanced at her
then back. Her brow was furrowed, as if she didn’t understand the
connection between the people and the fire. One of her hands was
pressed to her abdomen, and he saw the blood leaking between her
trembling fingers.
    “You are determined to bleed to death,” he
said. With no other form of bandage available, Kimber peeled off
his t-shirt and pressed it to her stomach.
    She gave a small sound of pain but didn’t
otherwise object.
    He met her gaze, uncertain what to think of
her. She lived up to the brag rights posted on her father’s
website, battling four men while horribly wounded. And she had
murdered them in cold blood, without any sign of remorse.
    She was, in every way, the most fucked up
individual he had ever met.
    So why was he gazing steadily into her dark
eyes, unable to avoid the strange connection lingering between
them? He was trying not to allow the signs of pain on her face to
affect him and not to be concerned about the homicidal maniac she
clearly was. Every fiber of his being screamed for him to run as
far from her as possible and turn her into the police or better yet
– a psych ward.
    All he could think about was how the light
of the fire brought out flecks of burnished gold in her eyes and
how soft her skin had been when he placed his shirt against her
abdomen.
    Is lunacy
contagious? He thought, appalled by his own
thoughts. Blinking out of the trance, Kimber took a step
back.
    “Stay here. I’m calling the authorities.
You’re going to the hospital, where I should’ve sent you long
before this,” he added firmly. He knelt and pulled on the shoes
still clutched in one of his hands.
    Without awaiting her response, Kimber ran to
the market at the bottom of the building and shouted for the
friendly cashier to call the police. He entered the building next
and pulled the fire alarm.
    Retreating outside, he studied the path of
the flames inching from his apartment to the one below and above.
If the residents of both apartments were asleep, it was likely
they’d end up trapped before the fire department could set up, let
alone put out the flames.
    Without hesitating, he plunged into the
stairwell and took the stairs three at a time as he ran up fifteen
flights to his floor.
    Adrenaline and concern replaced his shock.
Kimber was soon consumed in saving lives except, this time, he had
the knowledge of being the one to place them in danger.
    I can’t live with hurting
anyone else, he thought.

Six: Villains are always wealthy
     
    No one died that night, aside from the men
Keladry killed, whose bodies were either never discovered or not
reported on. Keladry Savage vanished just as mysteriously.
    Kimber stared at the photo on the front page
of the newspaper in his hands. Every day for the past week, since
the night of the fire, the papers had featured him and one of the
pictures snapped by bystanders with smartphones. Today’s photo left
him self-conscious and frustrated. He was photographed after his
last trip into the burning building, streaked with soot and
glistening with sweat, his sweatpants tugged too low for his
comfort and the muscles of his exposed upper body bulging from the
strain of carrying an elderly couple down the stairs.
    The Hero Our City
Needs, read the headline.
    “You’re so wrong,” he retorted under his
breath to the ridiculous photo and byline.
    Heroes didn’t shelter villains who set
entire buildings on fire after murdering home invaders.
    The flames had spread fast and engulfed the
upper half of the building before the fire department was able to
extinguish them.