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“What the world really needs is to focus on the love of Jorva.”

Oz was almost afraid to ask, but recognized that he had to. “Who or what is ‘Jorva’?”

“The Goddess of Freedom and the Hunt.”

“Okaaay…”

“I’m a strict adherent to her wise teachings.”

Oz felt completely lost by the sudden change of direction this conversation just had. “…Which are?” He asked, feeling helpless.

“I’m not sure yet.” She admitted. “But it’s still early in the day. Sometimes it takes a few minutes.”

“Huh.” Oz had no response to that. “Well, I fully support all faiths, obviously. Even the spontaneous ones which don’t yet have actual tenets.”

“That’s nice. You’re not as totalitarian-y Nazi as some of your Cape friends.”

“Thank you.” He nodded, accepting the praise. “I thought you liked the Freedom Squad though?”

She considered that for a minute. “I’ve got a lot of thoughts about them today, I haven’t figured them all out yet.” She shrugged disinterestedly. “How did you get mixed up with them, anyway?”

“If you want to do good work, you have to go where the resources are.”

“And that’s what you were doing at the Agletarian embassy then?” She arched a perfect red eyebrow. “’Good work’?”

“I was… I was doing my job.” He decided, recognizing that it was a weak explanation even to him. “And just what were you doing there, anyway?”

“’My job.’” She snarked, repeating his words .

“Your job is to go to parties at foreign embassies?”

“Maybe I’m a hero. That’s apparently their main activity. And they can’t…” She trailed off. “Dammit. I think I’m a vegetarian.”

“You are?”

“No!” She paused. “Well, today. Maybe. Unless I can convince myself not to be.”

“I… I find conversing with you to be a very confusing experience.”

“Me too.”

Oz spent most of his life trying to walk a narrow line he’d charted for himself. Trying to keep his life orderly and his mind free of… darkness.

But at the moment, his mind was firing on all cylinders, trying to keep up with his passenger. She couldn’t possibly be as weird as she seemed. She had to be making sense, he just needed to figure out either how to understand her mind, or how to reason with her.

He didn’t seem to be having much luck with either of those things though.

So, instead, his often underutilized imagination began to daydream about this woman, while he continued to not look at her legs.

In his head, the woman was smiling at him as she stepped out of the shower in the morning. Not a seductive smile, but… something so warm and pleasant. A perfect smile flashed just for him, because she was happy to see him.

No one was happy to see Oz.

It was the single most erotic thing Oz’s mind had ever imagined.

And he wasn’t even focusing on her body, he was focusing on the comfortable intimacy of her smile.

This wasn’t a sex fantasy, this was… a life fantasy.

He wanted the life that image promised, not merely the body it featured.

He wanted to be the kind of man who could deserve that smile from someone so beautiful.

To be someone that could inspire that kind of trust and happiness. Someone… someone who wasn’t trash.

Someone who was the woman’s hero.

Oz was very rarely comfortable anywhere. With anyone. Even himself.

And at that moment, Oz just didn’t care about the rules he’d created for himself anymore.

He wanted that smile. He wanted someone so beautiful to smile at him in complete adoration.

And, yes. If he was being honest, he wanted to see that woman stepping from the shower, beads of water dripping down her clean perfect body…

He had no idea who this woman even was, so this wasn’t love at first sight.

He simply wanted what she represented. He wanted the crazy mixed up reality she seemed to live in.

This woman was… freedom. She was everything he’d ever both dreamed and feared his life to be.

All of the things which his aunt had warned him about and all of the things his rituals urged him to avoid.

She was mysterious and weird and chaotic and pure and…

She needed his help. The bruise to her face told him that, even if she’d refused to tell him the truth about how she’d gotten it. She was some kind of damsel in distress, and Oz was a superhero! He’d gone his whole life wanting a chance to rescue such a beautiful woman from an unseen danger.

She was a break from everything which made him tired. And afraid. She was… She was some kind of deliverance. Or some kind of siren, here to drag him into the abyss.

And he would look forward to either of those options, just so long as it was different from the monotony that Oz lived with on a daily basis.

But then reality set back in. And Oz started to think about all of the things which could go wrong and all of the many, many reasons why ogling some random redhead was a bad idea.

It would get him into trouble. He wasn’t entirely sure what Freedom Squad rule it would be breaking, but they must have had something about that in their bylaws.

There was doubtlessly mountains of red tape to keep someone like Oz away from someone as perfect as this woman.

Besides, even if it wasn’t against his employer’s standards and practices, it was certainly against Oz’s rituals.

And when rituals were broken, when patterns of behavior weren’t followed, bad things happened. Things fell into chaos.

Plus, she was in need of his assistance, which meant that he couldn’t exactly abuse that aspect of their relationship.

Just being a Cape was enough to have power over someone, which was a whole other issue.

From a public relations standpoint as well as a moral one, hitting on this woman was a terrible idea.

He started staring at his passenger with something akin to sad longing. If he were a different kind of man, he could have had someone like that. He would be saying something charming right now, or impress her with some grand accomplishment he’d made.

But that just wasn’t Oz.

Oz was trash .

And trash didn’t impress treasure. All it could do was look on with sadness at something which it could never have.

“You know, I had you pegged for a rule follower, Oz,” the woman observed calmly, “but I respect the fact you just did 90 through a stop sign.”

Oz looked down in alarm at the speedometer, then turned the wheel sharply to avoid a parked cab. “ Cheese and crackers! ”

The car was silent for a beat.

“You did not just fucking say that.” She finally got out, sounding amused.

“Um…”

“I’m just going to pretend you said something profane and manly.”

“Me too.”

She snorted in laughter. “Forget it, we all have bad days.” She pointed out the window at a seemingly empty street. “This is me anyway.”

Oz pulled the car up to the curb, then peered out at the neighborhood. “You sure? It doesn’t look residential…”

But the woman was already out of the car and walking away.

Oz couldn’t remember ever feeling so dispirited. It was like Oz’s chance at… something , was walking away from him. Leaving him to wallow in his…

A second later, the woman was stalking back to the car.

She tapped one glittery red fingernail on the glass, and Oz lowered the passenger side window.

“Okay, look. I don’t…” She trailed off, then swore to herself.

“I mean, fuck this is weird.” She started to wring her hands, obviously uneasy about something.

“Okay, see, today is a really bad day to do this, because the myself I am today isn’t really a ‘myself’ that…

” She let out an annoyed groan and stamped one of her feet.

“Know what? The hell with it.” She extended her hand.

“Natalie Quentin. I work at the Department store at Van Cleef Square.” In her hand was a business card.

“Come find me, Oz.” She swallowed, like the words left her feeling exposed.

“If… if you want.” She made an odd hand gesture.

“May Jorva’s love go with you, always.” She paused for a beat.

“Fuck, that’s going to get annoying.” She whispered to herself. “Fuck today and everyone responsible.”

Oz looked down at the object that she’d given him.

The business card was completely blank except for the information she’d written down on it in pen.

Which was certainly odd. Oz couldn’t figure out why anyone would carry around blank business cards, but when he looked back up to question the woman about it, she’d disappeared .

Oz lived a normal, predictable life.

And Natalie Quentin could completely destroy it.

He couldn’t wait.