24. Hudson
HUDSON
Lake Superior doesn’t do anything halfway.
It doesn’t soften itself for tourists or put on a show for people trying to outrun their problems.
It just exists—cold and vast, not caring about anything that happens along its shoreline.
I’ve always liked that about it.
There’s no pretense and no noise here. Just water, sky, and wind sharp enough to cut through everything.
I sit on the back deck, boots up on the lower railing. My coffee cools in my hands while the morning light spreads across the lake.
Earlier, I walked the shoreline out of habit, scanning the rocks as the water rolled over them.
Lake Superior agates show up if you know what you’re looking for. They’re bands of red, orange, and blue hidden among dull stones, polished smooth by years of water and pressure.
You can’t rush finding them.
You just keep searching, and sometimes you get lucky.
That’s the thing about this place.
It doesn’t give anything up easily.
It feels like the edge of the world, quiet in a way that’s rare these days.
No endless traffic. No neon signs. No constant hum of people desperate to be somewhere else.
There are towns, sure. A diner here and there. The occasional gas station. Maybe a cell tower if you go looking for one.
But it never feels like any of it has taken over.
Life moves more slowly up here. It’s simpler somehow.
People here get through winters that would shut down most cities. After months of snow, harsh cold, and isolation, they still come out steady and unhurried.
I lean back in the chair, sipping my coffee while the wind rolls off the lake.
It’s been four days since we got here.
Four days of changing bandages, making food Eva barely touches, and forcing pain medication down her throat while she glares at me as if I personally offended her.
Most of that time, she’s stayed in bed.
But each day, she gets a little steadier. The panic in her eyes slowly fades, replaced by something sharper and stronger.
The first couple of days were rough.
She tried to hide too many tears, and there was too much pain behind her eyes.
Now, she surprises me by stepping out onto the deck wrapped in that fuzzy, grey robe I bought her in town that first morning.
“You’re supposed to be resting,” I say, keeping my eyes on the lake.
“I am resting,” she says, voice rough with sleep. “Just in a more scenic location.”
I glance back at her.
Her hair falls in a loose braid over one shoulder, with strands escaping everywhere, refusing to stay in place for long.
She moves slowly toward the railing and braces her hands against the wood.
One of them is still heavily bandaged.
Maya did what she could, but there’s a good chance Eva’s finger will never fully heal.
Guilt twists in my stomach before I can shut it down.
Martin trained that feeling out of us years ago.
Regret was weakness. Guilt got people killed.
But around Eva, it keeps finding its way back anyway.
She looks better.
Not good. Not even close.
But no longer hollowed out the way she was before.
Color has started returning to her skin, and most of the swelling has gone down.
She eases herself into the chair across from me, moving carefully with every bruise and healing cut.
“Can I get you some coffee?” I ask.
Her eyes linger on me for a moment before nodding, “Sure. That would be nice, thanks.”
I head inside and pour her a cup, along with a refill for myself.
When I come back out, I’m balancing sugar packets, creamer cups, a spoon, and a napkin in one hand.
I set everything on the small table beside her chair.
“Thank you,” she says, and takes a sip before looking back out at the water.
“This is pretty,” she says after a moment. “What lake is this?”
“Superior.”
Her eyebrows lift.
“Huh. I’ve only ever seen Lake Michigan.”
“Well, fun fact,” I say, leaning back into my chair, “the Upper Peninsula actually borders three Great Lakes.”
“Interesting.”
I can’t tell if she really means it or is just being polite.
“You’ve been up long?” she asks.
“I’m usually up early.”
I nod toward the shoreline below.
“Went walking on the beach earlier.”
She glances back at me, sounding genuinely surprised.
“You walk on beaches?”
One corner of my mouth twitches.
“Occasionally.”
“How was it?”
“Peaceful,” I say. “I was looking for rocks.”
“Oh.” She straightens. “Those gray coral-looking ones with the little hexagon pattern?” She squints, trying to remember the name. “My college roommate used to bring them back from Michigan every summer. Petunskys? Pelunkeys? Something like that.”
I can’t help but chuckle. “Petoskeys,” I correct.
She looks back at me, surprised.
“Yeah,” she says. “Those.”
“They’re fossilized coral,” I tell her. “Millions of years old.”
Her eyebrows lift.
“Okay,” she says. “That’s actually kind of amazing.”
“You can find agates up here, too,” I say. “Different kind of stone. Usually banded. Reds, oranges, sometimes blue.”
“Agates are pretty.”
“They are.”
She watches me over her coffee cup for a moment longer than usual.
“You’re not what I expected,” she says finally.
I raise an eyebrow.
“How’s that?”
“You keep insisting you’re this terrifying monster,” she says. “But you hunt for rocks and make coffee and braid hair.”
I make a low noise of disagreement.
“I kidnapped you.”
“True,” she says. “But you’ve also repeatedly stopped me from dying, so emotionally this has gotten a little confusing.”
I can’t help but laugh.
“Don’t get too comfortable,” I mutter. “I still might kill you.”
Eva rolls her eyes, almost impressively so.
“Please. If you were actually going to kill me, you would’ve done it already.”
She ticks them off on her fingers like this is a casual conversation, not whatever the hell this is.
“The alley. The car. The house. My room. The bathroom.” She pauses thoughtfully. “The bathroom was probably the most efficient.”
“Good to know you’ve analyzed the logistics.”
“I’m thorough.”
She shifts in her seat, wincing slightly, then settles again.
“Martin kept fucking me up, and you kept putting me back together.”
Her eyes lift to mine.
“You’re softer than you pretend to be.”
I feel a twist of shame in my chest.
“I’m not soft.”
That earns a quiet snort from her.
“Okay. I’m just saying there are a million ways to die. Dragging me all the way up here to kill me seems like a lot of effort.”
She gestures vaguely toward the lake.
“This place obviously matters to you. It does not exactly scream ideal murder location anymore.”
I look out at the water again.
“You thought this would be a good place to hide a body?”
“Initially? Absolutely.”
She pauses.
“Now?” She looks back toward the shoreline. “Not so much.”
“You don’t know anything about me,” I say.
“Neither do you,” she counters.
“Fair.”
The conversation fades again, leaving only the wind and water between us.
Eva leans back carefully in her chair, eyes drifting back to the water.
“What happens now?” she asks after a while.
I don’t answer right away.
Because I still don’t have a clear one.
“You heal,” I say finally.
“And then?” she presses.
I exhale slowly.
“And then we figure it out.”
“That’s not a plan,” she says.
“No,” I agree. “It’s not.”
Her eyes narrow slightly, like she’s trying to solve me.
“You’re making this up as you go,” she says.
“Yeah.”
“And that doesn’t bother you?”
I think about it for a second: Martin, the club, the room I pulled her out of.
“It should,” I say. “It doesn’t.”
“Why?”
“Because the alternative is worse,” I say hesitantly.
She goes still for a beat and does not ask what that means.
She already knows.
The wind picks up slightly, rustling through the trees.
She pulls the robe tighter around herself, shivering.
“You should go back inside,” I say gently.
“In a minute,” she says.
She takes another sip of her coffee before looking over at me again.
“You stay with me?”
Her question is softer this time, like it slipped out before she could stop herself.
I look at her—bruised, exhausted, and still stubborn enough to hold herself together after everything that’s happened.
And somehow, she still trusts me enough to ask that.
Past her, Lake Superior stretches out under the gray-blue sky. It feels big enough to swallow every bad thing I’ve ever done.
“Yeah,” I say.
And I stay.