Chapter 2
ZANE
ONE YEAR LATER
The autumn air is crisp against my skin, though the sun’s out with force today. Of course it is. The sun always shines for her.
Checkmate.
I grit my teeth, thankful for the scarf that shields my disdain from the sea of people dressed in much the same way around me—hats, scarves, and gloves to ward away the cold. Sunglasses.
With my tweed jacket, black jeans, and boots, I could be one of the younger professors over at NMU. Maybe in another life.
Today I’m here for her, just like everyone else.
Sitting on a wooden bench about thirty feet away from the raised marble stage created by the steps of City Hall.
An older woman at the other end tips her chin at me, her wiry curls blowing gently in her face.
I flash my most charming smile and her eyes go wide, cheeks flushing as she turns away.
Attention is the one thing I don’t want today anyway.
I clench my coffee tumbler as Vanall takes the stage. Bastard. My thoughts flash to the night of the masquerade, when my hands wrapped around his throat and finally… he knew the price of my retribution.
Then she got in my way and never left—Checkmate.
I haven’t gotten even a fraction as close to him since.
My temper boils as Vanall drones on, waxing poetic about the virtues of that ostentatious pain in my ass.
“Where would New Malcolm be without Checkmate?”
One can only dream.
“Checkmate saved a family from a raging inferno.”
A mob family, who started that fire themselves trying to destroy evidence.
“She protected City Hall from criminal infiltration.”
As if the biggest criminal weren’t speaking on the mic right now.
“She single-handedly stopped the largest heist in the East Side Bank’s hundred-year history.”
And she shits fairytales and rainbows, and everything she touches turns to gold.
Pfft. Please. Besides, it was information I was after that night, not money.
And it was pure, dumb luck she was even there.
I’ve learned to watch the rooftops since then, and spotting her crouched form among the stars has saved me more than one headache.
“Let’s have a round of applause for Checkmate, our very own hero of New Malcolm!”
She saunters on stage, the air locking in my lungs as I take her in.
Her skin practically glows, a million-watt smile stretching her full, rosy lips.
Chestnut hair cascades in perfect curls down her back and around her shoulders, luminous in the bright light.
I wonder if it’s her real hair color, or if, like so many Supers in New Malcolm, she wears a wig as part of her disguise.
As I look at her now though, her honeyed eyes flashing, her strong, voluptuous body sheathed in a brand new vibrant purple suit that highlights every sensual dip and curve, I can’t imagine her any other way.
If a “dream girl” is the woman who haunts sleeping and waking nightmares, then Checkmate is definitely mine.
“Fuck.”
The old woman glares at me, but I don’t care. I’m too busy missing the simple black suit she wore when I saw her last and envisioning the next time we fight. How distracted I’ll be. And it’ll be my own fault, but damn it—if this is hell, what a delicious way to burn.
Someone off-stage hands her a microphone, and her voice rings out loud and clear. “Thank you very much.”
“How do you like your new suit?” Vanall waves a hand up her body like he’s Vanna fucking White.
Cheers and a few wolf whistles roll through the crowd, and I have to throttle my coffee again so that I don’t rip through the crowd and strangle each and every whistler instead.
Then I throw it in the trash beside me because why do I even care?
“I love it.” Checkmate grazes her fingers over the material on her forearms, skimming down the line of her waist. “I feel like the eyes of Justice—your eyes, New Malcolm.”
The crowd erupts around me.
I have to suppress another scowl.
“You’re the face of New Malcolm now, the North Star we’ll follow.”
“Good.” Her lips curl at the corners, giving her smile a mischievous edge. “I want New Malcolm to see me. I want Charade to see me. To know that I’m coming for him—for all of them. I’ll shine so bright they’ll never be able to hide again.”
I’m on my feet before having ever consciously decided to move and slipping through the crowd. They burst into a cheer behind me, and it rings in my ears long after it ends.
I discard the shell of my clothes, peeling off layer after layer until the monster is revealed. Until I’m Charade again.
My mask shifts across my skin, almost alive as it forms to my face and thins so that I can see through the protective layer over my eyes.
In a split-second decision, I keep the gloves.
Tugging the material tighter over my fingers, I duck into the darkened doorway of my chosen stage to await my prey.
She doesn’t make me wait long.
The alley zigs and zags around the most crowded parts of downtown, and once she’s inside its curves, she too is lost to the world. But not to me.
It almost feels cruel. She’s not even looking where she’s going, her sure feet treading with steadfast abandon while she toys with the new chain around her neck and the massive over-sized key dangling from it.
It’s nothing to hook my arms around her torso as she passes.
Her momentum swings us both into the open mouth of the abandoned building, the door shutting behind us with a soft snick.
She gasps as her shoulders slam against the wall, bearing the brunt for us, but her head hits only the cradle of my hand.
My fingers bury into the silk of her hair to fist near her scalp.
Now I wish I hadn’t kept the gloves, that I could memorize the feel and texture of her hair, the way it caresses my skin. Another time.
She blinks, all doe-eyed, her face paling as moisture collects along her waterline.
She jerks in my grasp, her hands planting on my wrist, but I hold firm and lean my weight into her, planting my feet in a wide, solid stance that cages her in.
Her touch remains far away from the exposed skin between my sleeve and the glove, but that’s where I feel the heat first as her fingers begin to burn.
“Don’t.” I wave the glove in front of her eyes. “I’m playing nice, but it wouldn’t take much to change that.”
She releases me, both hands rising above her head as though I were pointing a gun at her. I loosen my grip on her hair.
“What do you want, Charade?” Her voice is steady, her gaze level, meeting my challenge.
“I came to congratulate you.” I brush a finger against the shining gold key resting between her breasts. “Key to the city. Quite the accomplishment. Maybe I can borrow it sometime.”
“It’s symbolic, jackass.”
I release her and take a step back, smirking. “A ‘North Star’ for us to follow. As if those people know anything about you.”
“Shut up. They know the one thing no one else ever could, and they accept me.”
I snicker. “No wonder Vanall loves you—what a perfect fucking martyr you’ll make. You don’t even know what you’re dying for, but you can’t wait to get in line.”
She shakes her head. “You don’t know anything.”
“I’m the only one in this city who understands you. Accepts you. That’s the great irony, isn’t it?” Her shoulders hit the wall before I realize that I’ve caged her in again. A cool breeze ghosts across my palm, and I realize the glove is unraveling under my touch.
I’m losing control, but I can’t stop.
“I do see you, Checkmate.” I sketch the same path over her new costume that her hands followed on stage.
I shouldn’t like the way this feels so much—having her in my arms. My fist curls around the key, its fragile chain dangling between us as I tip her chin with my thumb.
“Mommy and Daddy didn’t love you enough?
Didn’t give you the approval you crave, and now you’re out to show them there is something special in you, after all?
No one is going to give that to you here either.
You could be the strongest person in the city but instead you’re groveling at their feet.
All so that they’ll give you permission to exist. You’re pathetic. ”
Her palms are at my chest, and before I can even process the touch, I’m blown backward in a rush of heat and power. I land against a rickety table. The wood splinters, crumbling under my weight, a cloud of dust going straight into my lungs.
Sharp pain lances through my ribs. As I look at her silhouette, stance wide, fists raised, radiating power and steel, I hate the power she has over me.
Hate the way anger, desire, and desperation knots in my chest, binding me against eliminating her for good.
But in this moment, I’d wipe away every star in the sky if it stole that righteous smirk off her face.
“Someday, when they’ve taken everything from you and you have nothing else to offer—when they’ve grown tired of catering to that over-inflated ego—they’ll turn from you, Checkmate. You will fall, and you’ll pay dearly for what you’ve taken from me.”
She’s silhouetted in the open doorway, the light only illuminating her features as she flinches.
My heart clenches as I look at her—only now seeing the heaviness in her posture, the distance in her expression.
She wraps her arms around her torso, and for one fleeting moment, the sadness she so carefully hides rises to the surface.
I want to ask her to look at me, to let her see straight into my fractured soul as I take back every word, but I don’t have the right. Because that’s the problem with someone truly seeing who you are—they know exactly the ways to hurt you most.
Then she’s gone, lost in the light, and I can’t bring myself to follow her.
“Happy anniversary, Checkmate.”