Red Rainbow by G Johanson (best e reader for academics txt) 📕

Florence acted as though she truly believed that victory by any cost was the way it had to be here. Perhaps she was right. Hilaire still believed there was a limit, albeit her own was fairly far, her restraint mostly from concern for her dead sister’s belief system. Hilaire said coolly, “Goodbye then.”

“Goodbye.” Florence only took one step before turning to explain herself. “The Love Phantom was going to be my mouse to toy with for years to come whenever I felt like it. A girl has to have sport. After what happened I’m not going to bother, I won’t see him again.”

“What a sacrifice you’re making. That’s the true tragedy of all this,” Hilaire said sarcastically. She wanted praise for choosing to not torment someone she’d, barring intervention from a greater power, actually killed.

“There was no tragedy. Nobody important died this time.”

“Deveral Meyer.”

“I said important. Joking. He was innocent, kind of, but he chose suicide by goddess, tried to eroticise it in ways I was not interested in. He was dying anyway and chose it.”

“And you obliged.”

“I did. There was one tragic loss in this. Our friendship. It actually meant a lot to me. I’ve lost it, haven’t I?”

“We’d just repeat the same cycles. I couldn’t help you. I don’t think I even tried that much. I wrote you off. You need someone who has faith in you. Sorry, but that’s not me,” Hilaire said apologetically. She knew that Florence had been active throughout the liberation of the city. Chaos like that suited her. Hilaire had kept a low profile, her involvement kept to a minimum just as she had planned.

“It’s not just you. That person doesn’t exist. I’m glad you’re both okay.”

Hilaire felt misplaced guilt after Florence had trundled out with slumped shoulders. She’d borrowed that walk from clown school, exaggerated physical sadness. The words, though – was there a degree of self-awareness and self-loathing there, or was it just another act? Hilaire gave her the benefit of the doubt over César’s passing, an act that Florence was totally to blame for (and César would be justified to despise her for it). Hilaire had foolishly trusted the hunter and hound to rescue the fox; even if Florence had genuinely intended to achieve that outcome, that wasn’t her nature. The Love Phantom’s power made people want him. Of course Florence wasn’t going to be able to pull away. The darker possibility, which Hilaire couldn’t completely discount, was that this wasn’t accidental at all. Florence could well have engineered a scenario where she could kill her chosen prey and make it look like manslaughter instead of murder in the first degree. Hilaire would never know for sure. She wondered if Florence even knew.

Another uninvited visitor appeared shortly after Florence left, this one literally appearing from nowhere. Hilaire had feared this visit since César’s return. Death was not a genie doling out wishes unconditionally. Death was a taker, not a giver. She had expected Death to adopt the form she had at the theatre, the English socialite she’d adopted chiefly the last 30 plus years.

That would have been too easy. There was no sting in that appearance, Hilaire having no background with that woman’s original body. Death had a different look for her. Not Maxi – not even Death was cruel enough to do that to her, plus while Hilaire had been kind to Luc, Maxi had been even kinder, like a second mother to him. Death still struck close to home, choosing the form of her second sibling, late brother Rollo. ‘He’ stood with his arm resting on the mess of a mantelpiece, frozen in time at the age he was when she had killed him in self-defence in this very room.

“Don’t be too hard on her. She is a good servant of mine. We do what we do, we are who we are.”

“Okay.” Hilaire could hardly argue the point with her visitor. Not when he/she had done her a huge favour when she begged her – them.

“This city has always been a favourite. The activity may die down a little now, bar the lovely counter reprisals, but I’ll always have a soft spot for old Paree. You can go back to your quiet life. You were kind to Luc. I’ve watched over you for that reason. You didn’t ask me to, it was something I was willing to do. I stopped someone from informing on you on the rooftop. Silly, foolish, fuckwit me, I didn’t realise you’d stored that up to use as currency in an emergency.”

“I had to say something dramatic to get your attention, that was all.”

“I see and hear everything. You got cocky. Florence thought she could take it to the edge and not go over. You thought you could control her. César thought he was a Trojan horse. His death was signposted, and you all chose to ignore it and then had me tear down the sign. For expecting a favour from me, that protection is gone.”

“I didn’t expect it. I’m grateful, though.”

“You were kind to Luc. You were also kind to Kass. Enough said, really.”

“I don’t know what you mean by that. I don’t think you’re going to tell me either. How are they?”

“You deprived me of the Love Phantom. The time for social niceties is done.” He/she wasn’t smitten, surely? This had to be an example of Death’s twisted sense of humour – Hilaire knew who had fathered Luc, which was a prime example of that.

“How do I find her?” That was if she wanted to say a better goodbye, Hilaire having no plans to accompany Florence on her European destruction tour.

“How do you find any vulture?”

César’s ability to land on his feet surprised even him. It was known he’d socialised with Nazis during the Occupation, which could have been an issue now that it was time for receipts to be paid. There was an argument that he had collaborated. He had tried to make things run smoothly. There was a distinction between