Authors: Erica O'Rourke

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“All the time these days. They like to harass your father and me, for all the good it will do them. Waste of my tax dollars.”

“Yeah. It’s an outrage. So, what’s on here?”

“Payroll, of a sort.” The list, then. The one Jenny needed, that my dad had warned me about. Billy made a shooing motion. “Go on with you. I’ve a timetable to keep.”

“It’s not like he’s going anywhere,” I said. But I pocketed the drive and headed out again.

My father caught me at the door. “He gave you the list?”

“So much for stalling,” I said.

“Give it to me,” my dad said. “You’re upset. You shouldn’t be dealing with Ekomov like this.”

There was a dull ache in my chest, but I ignored it. No matter what Nick said, and no matter what happened to me and Colin, I had to honor my deal with Billy. “I’m fine. But this is a huge gamble. Why risk letting Ekomov have these names?”

“He thinks the payoff’s worth it. Like I said, it’s his silver bullet,” he said.

“No. This is his backup plan.” The Arcs had been Billy’s silver bullet, not a computer file. And my uncle was canny and cagey, but he wasn’t a gambler. He wouldn’t risk something like this if he wasn’t assured it would eliminate Ekomov. I’d expected him to come up with a new way of threatening me, and instead he’d gone in a different direction entirely. It didn’t make sense, but I was so wrung out from the conversation with Colin, I couldn’t figure it out.

“You don’t need to do this,” my dad said. “Let me handle it.”

The door to the back room swung open. “She’ll be fine, Jack,” called my uncle. “But they’re expecting her.”

I grabbed the delivery cart and shrugged. “I can handle Ekomov.”

“Never doubted it for a minute,” Billy said, coming to stand next to my dad. “Mo’s a girl of many talents.”

As soon as I stepped outside, Colin climbed out of the truck. “Took a long time.”

“Got waylaid by my dad. Who has suddenly sprung a conscience.”

“I’m not sure how sudden it is,” he said. His eyes were shuttered, dark and impossible to read. He turned up his collar and we started off. The sun was setting, the heavy blanket of clouds turning everything dim and dingy, the cars throwing slush against the curb with a hissing sound, the shops and restaurants and offices casting feeble yellow glows that barely reached the sidewalk. “He’s been worried about you ever since he got back. I think it started before then, even.”

“So he went to work for Billy?”

“Easier to look out for you if he’s on the inside.”

Memories stirred uneasily. “He said you’d look out for me if something happened to him.”

“Yeah. That was before ...” He jerked his head back in the direction of the truck. Before I’d betrayed his trust, destroyed our relationship, stomped all over his heart. Not hard to imagine that Colin might feel unenthusiastic at the prospect now.

“You don’t need to,” I said quickly. “That’s not why I asked. It’s just a weird thing to say, isn’t it? Like he thinks something might happen to him.”

“First, I
would
look after you. That doesn’t end because we’re not together. But you made it pretty clear you don’t need it. Second, your dad picked a dangerous line of work, and he knows it. He made a plan, and hopes like hell he won’t need it.”

“Is that what you did? For Tess?”

Colin scrubbed a hand through his hair. “If something happened to me, Tess wouldn’t notice. But, yeah, I made sure she’d be taken care of.”

“You’re a good brother to her.” A good person. The best I’d ever known. God, I missed him already.

He didn’t respond. When we reached the door of Shady Acres, he put a hand out for the cart. “I’ll come inside with you.”

“It has to be like usual. He can’t know you know.”

Colin frowned.

“I’ve done it a hundred times,” I said, and his scowl deepened. “Okay, not a hundred. Ten, maybe. Fifteen, tops.”

Edie buzzed us in. He held the door while I wrestled the cart through.

“Five minutes,” I said, and headed down the hallway, past the library and the game room. They were all quiet, the residents likely having dinner. I could smell the faint aroma of pot roast and overcooked green beans overlying the pine-scented cleaner. My nerves prickled. Even the magic was on edge.
Do the job and get out,
I told myself. Billy was up to something, but right now all I could think about was the hollowness inside me where Colin had once been.

I wanted to scream so badly my throat ached with the effort of keeping it in. I wasn’t feeling regret, because I knew with an awful, thudding certainty I had done the right thing. But it wasn’t supposed to be like this. If you loved someone, that was supposed to take away all the obstacles. Give you the strength to overcome whatever difficulties you had. Make you better and stronger and truer. Colin had pushed me to find my voice and take charge of my life and make my own path—and then that path had taken me away from him. Maybe my English teacher would call it irony. I called it unfair.

I pushed open the swinging door of the kitchen. Normally, Ekomov waited until I’d started unloading the cart before entering, but today he stood at the counter, age-spotted hands curling over the top of his cane, the wrinkles on his face sagging heavily. He’d always been old—older than Billy, older than Orla. But I’d never mistaken him for frail or helpless. Only dangerous. The courtly mannerisms, the offers of help—they were an indulgence. He could afford to be generous with me because he knew I was trapped.

But today, he was only old, and the look on his face was decidedly ungenerous.

“You’re late,” he said.

“Busy afternoon,” I said, and started setting the pies on the counter, lining up the boxes neatly to calm myself.

“I have always thought it ... odd ... that you would choose to betray your uncle. That you would put so little value on family.”

I thought about what Colin had said, that my dad had rejoined Billy because he wanted to protect me from the inside. About how my mom had given up her dreams and her husband to give me a solid future. Putting Billy in jail was the best thing I could do for my family and the Donnellys. But Ekomov was watching me carefully, so I kept my expression neutral.

“My uncle doesn’t value me,” I said, trying for nonchalant despite the tightening of my nerves.
Go,
the magic seemed to urge, sending me the image of a mouse scampering across an open field, an eagle poised to strike.
Go now.

“He sends you here. That suggests he values you greatly.”

“Because I deliver pies?” I injected a note of exasperation into my voice. I finished stacking the white cardboard boxes, pocketed the payment envelope just like usual. “He doesn’t even know you’re here.”

“Oh, my dear Mo. I wish that were true.” He sounded genuinely sad. “For both our sakes.”

I edged away, toward the door leading back to the lobby. I needed to escape. To buy myself some time. “Here,” I said, tossing the flash drive on the counter. “I brought this. Files from the office computer. I copied them while the police were harassing my dad.”

My dad, who had not wanted me to come here. I was beginning to think he was right.

“You were supposed to arrive earlier,” Ekomov said again.

“I’m sorry. It was a bad day.” I twisted my fingers together, glancing at the door. “I hope I didn’t waste your time.”

He lifted his shoulders, let them fall again heavily. “We waited. I learned many things I would not have otherwise known.”

“Great,” I hissed as the corner of the cabinet banged my hip. “Like I said, the drive’s got—wait.
We?
”

“We,” he said. “I did not wait alone.”

The far door, the one that led to the dining room, swung open.

“Hello, Mo.” Anton smiled, sunny as a spring morning.

C
HAPTER
33

M
y mouth dropped open, but I couldn’t get a full breath. “You?”

“Surprise,” Anton said, with barely restrained glee.

“Mr. Ekomov,” I said, “this man ... I don’t know what he promised you, but he is dangerous. You can’t trust him. Believe me when I tell you that you do not want to work with him.”

“I’m not,” Ekomov said. “We had a good amount of time to talk, waiting for you. I am not the one working with your Mr. Anton.”

“He’s not mine.” I paused. “What did you talk about?”

“All sorts of things,” Anton said. “You, specifically. Yuri was
so
disheartened to realize you were working for your uncle. He’d thought you were estranged.”

“We are.”

“And yet you’ve been working for him all along.”

I closed my eyes for a brief second, opened them to see the resignation on Ekomov’s face. Resignation, not anger. The realization unnerved me. “I had to protect Colin. I couldn’t say no.”

“Now, that’s not quite true,” said Anton, wagging a finger at me as if I were a child caught in a lie. I chopped down the cherry tree. I ate the last cookie. I work for my mobster uncle, not you. “You told him no just the other day. Ungrateful, when you consider all he’s done for you. Anyone would take offense.”

And then I understood. “Son of a bitch. He figured he’d team up with you instead.”

You’ll regret this moment,
Billy had said.

“What’s that saying you’re so fond of?” Anton said to Ekomov, who was leaning heavily on the cane, his face like clay. “The enemy of my enemy ...”

“Is my friend,” Ekomov replied. “I am not so fond of it lately.”

“If it’s any consolation, he turned me down the first time I offered a partnership. Thought he could get through to you. Happily, you did the honorable thing and said no. But that’s all water under the bridge, isn’t it?” said Anton, dusting his hands. “Shall we move on?”

“You don’t have to do this,” I said, feeling sick. “He’s an innocent bystander.”

“Hardly innocent,” said Anton. Ekomov shrank back.

“Please,” I said softly.

“You wouldn’t honestly sacrifice yourself for this man, would you? That Flat I’ve seen you with, certainly. Your family. Your friends. Luc DeFoudre.” He paused, tapping his chin thoughtfully. “That would be interesting. Do you think he’d let you do it? I doubt it. But this man? You’d hand yourself over to save his life?”

“He doesn’t deserve to die.” Ekomov was shuffling toward the back door. If I could distract Anton long enough, maybe he could escape. I could feel Anton drawing on a nearby line, gathering the magic he needed. “You don’t need to do this.”

He studied me. “You’re right, I suppose. On both counts.”

My legs trembled with the urge to flee, but I locked them. Showing fear would only encourage him. Ekomov had nearly reached the open door.

“But I don’t really care.” He flung out an arm, and a deep-blue bolt sliced through the air, striking Ekomov in the chest.

He barely had time to look surprised. He grunted, then crumpled, his body spinning from the force of the blast. His cane clattered on the linoleum, and then he was just a sad, limp mass, his face the same color as the dingy snow outside.

The magic jerked and twisted, rising up within me. The earlier whisper—
go now run go run now
—built to a shriek inside my head, so loud I couldn’t tell if I was screaming, too, backing away from Anton, shaking and sick to my stomach.

“Easy enough,” he said, and I could barely hear him over the tumult in my head. “He didn’t suffer, you know. It didn’t hurt. Much.”

“You didn’t have to kill him!”

“What sort of person would I be if I didn’t keep my word? I promised your uncle I’d help him cement his position in exchange for a chance to see you alone.”

I reached out for Luc, and Anton tsk’d. “Don’t bother,” he said. “I’ll just pull you Between before he gets here. And I wouldn’t recommend rushing a Rivening. It makes mistakes almost inevitable.”

“Inevitable.” This couldn’t possibly be my fate. There had to be a way out. But Anton was strolling toward me in his slightly rumpled suit, a manic light in his eyes. I backed away, trying to find the knife block, but it was halfway across the room. Too far to reach.

He grabbed me, fingers biting into my upper arms, and shoved me against the countertop until the edge dug into my back. I thrashed from side to side, kicking and snarling, and he grabbed my hair, twisting it painfully, slamming my head into the cabinet until black dots swam before my eyes. Fueled by my own terror and the magic’s, I fought to stay conscious. He threw me across the room and I landed inches away from Ekomov’s body, his brown eyes sightless and dull.

“Stupid. Stupid Flat.” He straightened the cuffs of his navy suit jacket, watching me with a clinical coldness. I felt him drawing on the lines, knew he was readying another blast. He couldn’t kill me, but he could knock me out or immobilize me. I’d be at his mercy.

He didn’t have any mercy.

I scuttled backward on hands and knees, whimpering as I brushed against Ekomov’s icy hand.

And then there was a new noise, a crack that hung in the air, almost as deafening as the magic. And then another. And another.

Anton’s hands fell to his sides, the blue light cupped in his fingers dissipating into mist, and red seeped across the crisp white of his shirt. He grunted and toppled over.

Colin stood in the doorway, gun in hand.

“Are you okay?”

I gasped, and he crossed the room in three strides, pulling me up, urging me out the door. My feet tangled together as I stumbled toward him.

“We need to go,” Colin said. “He’s dead.”

Anton lay faceup on the linoleum, blood pooling around him, but he wasn’t dead. I felt him tugging on the lines, saw a pale blue glow spreading over his chest. “Not dead. Healing.”

Colin’s grip tightened. “Then we really need to go.”

“Wait!” I skirted around the two bodies and snatched up the thumb drive as Anton rolled to his side. His pull on the lines was sluggish and his spells were mumbled, but he was healing too quickly for us to escape. We needed time. I snatched up Ekomov’s cane from the floor and swung at his head like I was batting cleanup.

He fell still again, but the lines twitched intermittently, all the proof I needed that he wasn’t dead. I needed to do a lot more damage, but Colin was hauling on my arm. “
Now,
Mo.”

We ran down the corridor, past the front desk. Edie looked up in alarm.

“Is everything okay? I thought I heard—”

“I knocked over some stuff,” I said. “Pots and pans. I cleaned it up.”

Colin wasn’t wasting time on niceties with Edie. Hand on my back, he hustled me out the door. We burst onto the darkened street, the sudden noise of everyday life disorienting. I halted, trying to get my bearings, feeling for any tension in the lines that would indicate the Seraphim were nearby. Aside from the faint, erratic pull from Anton as he healed himself, there was nothing. Even the Quartoren’s protective wards were gone, and I cursed myself for not having noticed it before.

“Can I borrow that gun?” I asked, setting off for the bar.

“Not in this lifetime,” he said. “You can’t go back to Morgan’s.”

“Billy sold me out. He handed me over to Anton in exchange for his getting rid of Ekomov. I am
definitely
going back in there. And I will finish this.”

“Ekomov is dead. The cops will be here soon, and once they figure out who Ekomov really is, they will be all over Billy. You were the last person to see him alive. The damn delivery cart is still in the kitchen. Your prints are everywhere—including on his cane. You cannot be here right now.”

I jammed my hands in my pockets and kept walking.

“We need to get out of here,” he insisted. “We’ll deal with Billy later, I swear.”

“No. We deal with him now. This minute.” I gripped the thumb drive so hard that the crest of St. Brigid’s was probably permanently embossed into my skin. “But not here.”

Moments later, we were speeding down I-57, away from Morgan’s and the wreckage of my family, toward the only way I could think of to stop him. Jenny Kowalski, who could give the drive to the police. With the list of Billy’s contacts and bribes, they’d have all the proof they needed.

“You should call your mom,” Colin said.

“And tell her what? ‘Your brother put a hit out on me, and I have to go destroy the criminal organization he works for, so don’t hold dinner’?”

“She’s going to worry. Your house isn’t safe right now. Billy’s going to be looking for you.”

“Looking for you, too.” A pang of regret struck me. “You can’t go home, either, can you?”

“It’s the first place he’ll look for us.”

I thought about the beautiful furniture he’d made, the pride he’d taken in transforming a broken-down warehouse into a rough-hewn sanctuary. Who knew how long before he could go back. Or if he could at all.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. It was always a possibility.” So like Colin, to consider the situation from every angle, cover every outcome. Thorough and careful. “I never thought he’d actually hurt you, Mo. That was the one thing I banked on.”

“He’s desperate. That makes him dangerous.” The words reminded me of something Luc had said. I needed to warn Luc. He’d know what the next move against Anton should be. Tentatively, I felt along our connection, but my concentration flitted away before I could do much more than envision the chain between us. I’d missed something important in Colin’s words. There was an angle he hadn’t seen. A soft spot that Billy could dig into.

I grabbed his arm. “Tess.”

He glanced over, his face blank.

“Tess,”
I said. “He’ll go after her next.”

“He wouldn’t—”

“I’m family, Colin, and that wasn’t enough to protect me. You’re all the protection she has.”

He wrenched the wheel so hard I slid into the door.

The rush-hour traffic was thinning, and we sped across town. All of Colin’s attention was focused on the road, and I tried to will the cars out of our way, change the lights to green. I tried magic, and prayer, and sheer concentration, with no clue whether any of them helped.

We’d hit three greens in a row, sailing down Kedzie, picking up speed, and I touched his leg gently. “We’ve got a head start,” I reminded him. “He might not even know yet.”

“Might?” was all he said, and pressed down on the gas.

Suddenly there was a flash, as if lightning had struck a few feet beyond the car, and when our eyes cleared, someone was standing in the middle of the road, just out of the street lamp’s yellow circle.

Colin swore and stomped on the brake. Tires squealed as the truck fishtailed. Momentum slammed me into the dash, seat belt jerking tight across my chest.

“Jesus,” he said. “You okay?”

I fumbled for the seat belt, trying to force air into my lungs again. “Yeah. Did you hit them?”

The street was deserted, and I could feel the thrum of the lines, like an echo. Someone had done magic—big magic—at the moment of impact.

The knock at the window practically levitated me out of my seat.

“Sorry about that,” Luc said when I opened the door.

“You know how hard it is to come Between in a moving vehicle?”

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