As Lie the Dead

Chapter Twenty

5:24 P.M.

The phrase “You could cut the tension with a knife” flashed through my mind, because his final statement shut down all activity in the room. He didn’t move. I didn’t move. Even the distant hums of electricity and running water faded out, replaced by numb silence. My brain refused to understand what he’d just admitted. I felt queasy, unbalanced. Seriously confused.

He blinked and broke the spell.

“You …” I swallowed hard against a lump in my throat, mouth dry. “You didn’t lead the attack on Sunset Terrace. How—?”

“That’s not why the Kitsune … It’s not that.”

I closed my eyes and exhaled hard. The queasiness increased as I prepared to learn the real reason the Kitsune Elder had accused me of protecting a killer. It wasn’t for the Coni and Stri; it was something else entirely. When I looked up, Wyatt had slumped into one of the room’s two upholstered chairs. He gazed at the floor, hands folded in his lap. Miserable.

I’d cut into a festering wound because I couldn’t stop needing to control my environment and everything in it. I couldn’t just accept his word; I had to know the facts for myself. And it had opened up a side of Wyatt I’d never seen or asked about before—his past. He hadn’t sprung, fully formed, out of a hole in the ground. I just hadn’t questioned his life before the Triads; he never talked about it.

It was lame, but all I could come up with was, “I’m sorry.”

“You know better than that. You hate pity as much as I do. Don’t do that.” He leaned forward, resting both elbows on his knees. Still giving the floor his full attention. “I don’t deserve it.”

“You were seventeen, Wyatt.”

“I wasn’t there. I couldn’t try to stop it or save them, because I wasn’t even there that night. I should have been. We promised we’d be there by eight to help inventory the food, but we went to a friend’s house instead.”

“We?” I tried to recall what he’d told me about that story—what I’d thought was simply a brief history of the Triads’ birth. What had, in fact, been a snapshot of his own life. “You and your brother?” It felt so odd to say those words.

Even odder to see him nod. “Nicky … Nicandro hated that restaurant. Hated working there after school. His revulsion made sense afterward.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean he was Gifted, too, Evy. He had precognitive abilities, but he had no control over them. Usually he couldn’t figure out what the hell he was seeing or why. He told me he thought his visions about the restaurant involved us, that he was saving our lives by keeping me away that night.”

Being born Gifted is extremely rare. It requires that the birth take place over a Break—a magical hot spot. They exist all over the city, but none of them in hospital delivery rooms. The odds of two people in the same family being born … Wait. “Wyatt, were you and Nicky twins?” I asked.

He scrubbed both hands across his face, then looked at me with red eyes. “I was six minutes older, but he was always trying to protect me. I guess he did, since we lived and our family died.”

A hundred questions whirled through my mind, all eager for answers. But Wyatt seemed willing to tell the story at his own pace. I turned to face him more directly and just listened.

“I know the Fey came to us because they sensed our Gifts,” he said, speaking as much to me as to himself. “Nicky and I were three months from eighteen, so no one objected when our supposed aunt showed up to take temporary custody. She offered us help with our Gifts and opened up the entire Dreg world to us.”

“Amalie?”

“In her avatar form, yes. She and her sprites were a driving force from the start. I fell headfirst into training and never looked back. There were seven of us those first couple of months, learning to track and to fight—how to turn a specific Dreg’s strength into their weakness. All of the things we teach. Then we started hunting.”

“Rufus?”

“He was there—the last of the first seven to be recruited. We couldn’t stand each other, actually, not for a long time.”

My mouth twitched. Rufus had admitted the same thing two days ago. Funny how that hatred had grown into a solid friendship over the course of a decade.

Wyatt inhaled deeply, held it, then exhaled hard. “Nicky hated it, every minute, and for a while I hated him. I thought he was weak. I was so angry at everything we’d lost and at the people who’d done it, I couldn’t see straight. Killing goblins and Halfies and anything else we were sent after … it let me feel something, when the rest of the time all I felt was numb.”

Boy, could I commiserate with that state of mind. “What happened to the bounty hunters who killed your family?”

His expression became thunderous. Deadly. “Eight months after the fire, we were really no better than those bounty hunters. Amalie fed us information through her sprite aides, and some of her other Fey contacts tried to guide us in the field, but we had no chain of command. Nothing that really worked, so we did what we wanted.”

Hearing the tumultuous beginnings of an organization I’d always seen as rigid and uncompromising was as disturbing to me as it was a relief. It was difficult to imagine Wyatt ten years ago, his fury at life driving him away from his own brother, blinded by vengeance for the dead. So unlike the man I knew—and yet, still so much the same.

“It was ten years ago last month. By sheer luck, I found out who one of the bounty hunters was. I wanted to rip his lungs out through his throat and wear them like wings. Nicky tried to stop me, wouldn’t let me leave our apartment. He said if I went after this guy, I’d be killed, too. I was so angry, I didn’t care, and I told him so. We fought, and I pushed him.”

Although Wyatt’s voice remained calm, he looked lost, caught up in the memory of such awful pain. I could guess how his story ended, and I wanted to stop him from saying anything else. Wanted to save him the emotional agony. But something thick and heavy clogged my throat and stole my voice.

After a deep exhalation, Wyatt said it: “Nicky tripped and hit his head on the corner of the dining table. It fractured his skull and killed him instantly.”

I don’t know when I’d started to cry—tears skimmed my cheeks. His story broke my heart—his tone of voice as much as the content. He’d spoken with a matter-of-fact clarity usually reserved for unemotional topics while still loading each word with fury and humiliation. Admitting to the tragic consequences of his temper had to have been as hard to verbalize as my own earlier monologue had been for me.

“I think he knew it was him or me,” Wyatt said, his voice almost a whisper. “He knew one of us was going to die that night, so he did what he always did, and he protected me.”

“Because he loved you.” I almost choked on the words, the perfect echo of Wyatt’s own death. Taking a bullet meant for me, risking permanent death to make sure I wasn’t the one to die.

“Yeah.”

Ten years last month.

A memory returned with a sudden rush of clarity. I was barely a week over the flu and home alone when I found him in front of the apartment door with a bottle in his hand. It was the only time in my life I’d seen Wyatt drunk. And not just a little drunk—totally and utterly hammered. He’d muttered something about an anniversary but never elaborated. I hadn’t asked, and he eventually passed out in my room. But not before he kissed me—something I’d written off and filed away as a liquor-induced Bad Idea. We’d never spoken of the uncomfortable encounter. Hell, I hadn’t even thought of it again until today. I’d put myself to sleep with a couple of Jesse’s lagers and convinced myself I’d dreamed the kiss.

Did Wyatt remember it—or anything he’d said that night? Would things have been different between us if I’d pried the information out of him then? If I’d kissed him back?

It didn’t fucking matter. Not anymore.

I stood and crossed the room, unsure if he’d want me or turn away. He leaned back in his chair, arms open, eyes sparkling. I curled into his lap, and it should have been awkward. I should have been embarrassed by the position. I wasn’t. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, while he looped one around my waist and the other around my knees. We hugged each other, speaking volumes in the silent embrace.

“I went out and killed the guy anyway.” Wyatt’s voice rumbled through his chest and into mine, breath hot on my neck. “I hated that I could do it only once. We never did find the second one.”

Drawing back a bit, I met his gaze. “After ten years?”

“After ten years.”

“What would you do now if you did find him?”

His eyes unfocused as he went somewhere internal. Considered what I’d asked. It gave me hope that he hadn’t answered right away. “I honestly don’t know, Evy. I’m not Andreas Petros, son of a Greek immigrant, anymore. I buried him with Nicandro and the rest of his family.”

I touched his face, featherlight, tracing features I knew by heart. Strong jaw, straight nose, perpetual stubble, thick eyebrows. The man I knew and cared for was right there, a man named Wyatt Truman. I believed him when he said Andreas was gone. I also knew what it was like to carry the anger of another lifetime. It would always simmer beneath the surface, waiting for the right spark to be struck and ignite an inferno.

Wyatt tilted his head to the side. “Are you sorry you asked?”

“I wish I’d asked sooner. It’s amazing the things we don’t know, even about people we consider our closest friends.”

“We’re both private people, Evy. Most people wouldn’t understand our kinds of pain anyway.”

“True, but some will try if given half a chance.” I put my head on his shoulder, and we held each other for a while. I listened to the thrum of his pulse and the gentle rasp of his breathing. Let the minutes tick away in companionable quiet, until my curiosity got the better of me. “It took three years to come up with the system we have in place now?”

“Give or take, yeah.” His fingers drew light lines up and down my arm, tickling. “You put six strong, angry personalities into one room and no one likes to give in and take orders. Plus our antics were getting noticed by the real police, so we needed protection from them. Someone to make the right reports disappear or to turn a blind eye to certain activities.”

“The brass.”

“Right. We needed to have people on the inside.”

“Wyatt, are any of the original six—?”

“No. Two of them are dead; two are trainers at Boot Camp.”

I pictured the four trainers who’d tortured us through Boot Camp. They were all Wyatt’s age, maybe up to ten years older. Any of them could be the original Hunters, but I couldn’t bring myself to intrude further into Wyatt’s memories by asking. “And the other two are you and Rufus,” I finished for him.

“Yes. I don’t know how she recruited the cops who help us, but she did, and their identities are one of the most guarded secrets in the Triads.”

“She?”

“Amalie set that up for us.”

My entire body jerked. Amalie knew the brass, and I felt like an absolute idiot for not thinking of her sooner. She’d had a hand in the Triads since their conception. Would she really be party to tearing them down from the top?

“Don’t even think it, Evy. If Amalie had any idea of the deal you made with Phin, she’d—”

“What? Use her supersprite abilities and have me killed?”

“She’d probably use all of her vast influence and power to prevent you from succeeding. She believes completely in the mission of the Triads. She helped create us, for Christ’s sake.”

“Because she didn’t want to see humans overpowered by the other species?”

“Yes. If we lose control of this city, then First Break becomes more vulnerable to others. We saw what almost happened with Tovin. If we hadn’t been there to stop him, the city would be crawling with demons.”

“I know, okay?”

He squeezed my knee. “Phineas said he wouldn’t ask for Rufus’s life if we helped him. We’re doing that. What’s the point in exposing the brass now? Wasn’t the point to save Rufus?”

I hated that he was right. Exposing the brass had been a means to an end. Now that the end was met, the path was no longer viable. Only, once I had an idea in my head, I had a hard time letting go. If orders like the Neutralization on Sunset Terrace and on me—orders that came with no proof and no positive results—could make it through unchecked, the system needed an overhaul.

Phin wanted Therians included in the Triads. The races wanted more influence in governing themselves without living under the constant threat of human smack-down. It wasn’t a completely unreasonable request. Maybe it would have prevented all the conflict with Call and his militia. Saved everyone a lot of heartache.

“Do you still believe in this system?” I asked.

“You mean the system that tried to kill you twice, wiped out an entire were-Clan, and puts all the blame for what you kill on the shoulders of your Handler?” He sighed. “Yeah, I do. It’s flawed, sure, but our intentions are right. It’s all we’ve got.”

“And if you could change it?”

“I think it would be an uphill battle the entire way. Some people embrace change, others resist it. Still others resist violently.”

“Which one are you?”

He was quiet for a moment. “I think the only thing I’ve got to lose is right here, and that we make one hell of a team.”

I considered that, head comfortably nestled against his shoulder. We were on the precipice of a war—one the rest of the city would never see coming. But they’d see it when the violence spilled out into the streets. Fear had kept the rogue vampires and Halfies in line—fear of swift death at a Hunter’s hands. Only now they were organizing. The choreographed attack that had left my two Triad partners dead was well planned and better executed. Even if someone was pulling their strings, they were listening. Call’s militia stood to destroy everything.

If we didn’t rip apart from the inside first.

“So …” I let the single syllable drag out into three. “You know how you said the Assembly was calling you a killer?”

“Not tonight, Evy, please? I’ll tell you about it, but ripping open one wound a night is my limit.”

“They said I should ask the killer I protect about Snow and his connection to the Triads. If you’re who they were talking about—”

“I don’t know who Snow is.” His voice hinted at truth, but the hard tension thrumming through his body told otherwise.

“Then why would the Kitsune Elder call you a killer and seem not terribly surprised at what Snow’s planning?”

Someone knocked on the door. Annoyed at the interruption, I almost told whoever it was to fuck off. But Phin was due in, so I regretfully left the warmth of Wyatt’s lap.

“Don’t think this conversation is over, Truman,” I said as I trotted to the door. Sure enough, Phin stood back far enough to be fully visible through the peephole. I unlocked the door, and he breezed inside without waiting for an invitation.

“Jenner called me,” he said. “I’m sorry about the Assembly. You deserved that information.”

I shrugged as I closed the door and relocked it. “The more I talk about it, Phin, the less sure I am that they’re in danger. I just …”

“What?”

“Something Jenner said that day in his office still bothers me—that line about fairy tales. What does that even mean?”

A smile tugged the corner of his mouth. “He was giving you a hint as to the identities of the bi-shifting Clans.”

“Really? Because as clues go, that one sucks.”

“We’ve been here a long time, Evy, long enough to have inspired quite a few myths and legends among humans.”

I flashed back to Tattoo the Halfie’s reaction to Phin on the gym roof. “Like angels?” I asked.

“Precisely.”

It made an odd kind of sense. Part man, part animal. Greek myth had a story about something half man and half horse. Huh. Maybe after this was over, I’d hit the library and try to guess which of the other Clans were bi-shifters. Or I’d make Wyatt do it; he was way better at the research thing. “Thank you, Phin.”

He nodded.

“Anyway, there’s nothing left to be done on that front.” I took a step closer, as he’d retreated deeper into the room. “Did you meet Call?”

“Yes.” Phin’s nostrils flared. His gaze flickered to Wyatt, still sitting comfortably in his chair, then back to me. What was …? Oh. Heightened sense of smell—a little bit of Wyatt must have rubbed off. I quirked an eyebrow at Phin.

He continued. “Average human male, about your age, lanky build, maybe three inches taller. Brown hair, dark eyes, no discernible scars or birthmarks. Pretty forgettable fellow, except that he’s cut like an Olympic swimmer.”

“No one you’ve ever seen before?” I asked.

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Don’t think so, or you know so?” Wyatt asked.

Phin narrowed his eyes. “I know I’ve never seen him before. From the way they talked, Call and Snow have a history. They sounded like old friends, comfortable with each other.”

“So looking into Snow’s past might be useful in conjuring up Call,” I said, giving Wyatt a meaningful glare.

Ignoring me, he said to Phin, “I don’t suppose you brought a snapshot?”

Phin shook his head. “I couldn’t manage one without being obvious. I do have other news. He wants to meet you.”

For a moment, I thought Phin just forgot to look at me. But he was gazing right at Wyatt, whose eyebrows shot up into his hairline. “Me?” he asked at the same time I said, “Why?”

“He didn’t tell me why,” Phin said. “I never admitted I knew who or where you were; he just assumed. He said to bring you with me tonight.”

“Just Wyatt?” I asked.

“Believe it or not, Evy, not everyone knows that you’re alive—for the first time, and certainly not the second.”

“Maybe it means Call knows me,” Wyatt said.

He was actually considering it. I planted both hands on my hips. “Or Snow knows you and Call’s playing along, and one of them wants to put a bullet between your eyes. You can’t—”

“No?” He stood up, hands balled into fists. “He’s the big bad, Evy, and he wants to meet me face-to-face. How the hell often does that happen?”

“Like I said, usually before the bad guy kills the unsuspecting hero. Way to walk right into his plan, Wyatt.”

Something dangerous flittered across his face. “If Call had asked for you, you’d be the first one out the door, and my objections be damned.”

“I …”

What? He had me pegged, and we both knew it. Any protests I tossed at him would be deflected, because I had no good reasons for them. Just selfish ones. I didn’t like being the one on the outside looking in.

“If it helps at all,” Phin said, “I didn’t get the impression Call wishes to kill him. He seemed more interested in a conversation.”

“Did he hint at the topic of conversation?” Wyatt asked.

“He didn’t say much of anything at all. Snow did most of the talking. A lot of his same spiel about the races policing themselves and holding accountable those responsible for crimes against them.” His words held no direct accusation; Wyatt still flinched.

“Wyatt,” I said, “why would the Kitsune Elder tell me to ask you about Snow’s beef with the Triads? Why you, specifically? What did you do to the Kitsune Clan?”

My questions hung in the air like blocks of ice, chilling and impenetrable. Wyatt went perfectly still, his face utterly blank. I’d seen so many emotions there in such a short span of time that the emptiness startled me. He didn’t want to reveal something, and everything seemed to point toward that very secret.

“You,” Phin said. Eyes wide, something like shock in his tone as he stared at Wyatt. “You were the one who killed Rain.”

Wyatt paled and seemed to teeter on the edge of vomiting. I reached for him; he pulled away to the other side of the room. When he reached it, he froze. Then he pivoted, face blazing, hands shaking, every ounce of that fury targeted at Phin. “Yes, I killed her. I took the Neutralize order and carried it out myself, so no one else would have to know. Especially my Hunters.”

“Who’s Rain?” I asked.

“Were-fox, Kitsune, whatever you want to call her,” Wyatt replied, his voice as venomous as his expression. “It was four fucking years ago. Why does Snow care so much now?”

“I don’t know,” Phin said. “Snow mentioned the name once during his pitch. He used her death as an example of how the Triads were out of control.”

I looked back and forth between the two seething men. Getting answers out of them was like prying teeth with tweezers. “Why was she killed?” I asked.

Phin’s eyes narrowed, and his head twitched to the side. He looked like a bird of prey about to attack—more of an animal than I’d ever seen. He was deferring the question to Wyatt, who continued glaring at Phin. I wanted to knock their heads together until the answers spilled out and the testosterone was washed away.

“Officially?” Wyatt asked. “She was considered a threat to the preservation of the human race.”

I blanched. “You want to translate that unofficially?”

He fell silent. Phin picked up the slack and said, “She fell in love with a human, Evy. That was her crime. She wanted to love and marry outside of her species.”

The room felt ten degrees colder, the air thicker. Harder to breathe. Shock tore at my stomach, threatening to upset its meager contents. The brass had ordered the death of a woman because of who she chose to love. And Wyatt had requested the kill so he could hide it from the other Hunters. Hide the fact that such an order had ever come down.

If the woman had been a Blood, maybe I could understand. The risk of infection was too great to chance such a pairing, even if I believed vampires capable of loving humans, which I didn’t. Any other species was barely human—goblins, trolls, gargoyles—many of them little more than monsters. Therians had always seemed both more and less threatening—more because they could appear completely human; less because they chose to live among us without upsetting the status quo. How much could one woman’s love of a human truly hurt? What if Aurora had loved a human? Or Danika? Or Phineas? Would they have been ordered murdered for that assumed crime?

A lump clogged my throat, backed by tears I refused to let spill. I turned the full power of my bewilderment on Wyatt, who actually took a step backward. “Why?” was the only word I could manage, and it came out as much a growl as a question.

He worked his mouth open and shut several times before attempting a halfhearted reply. “Fraternization between the race—”

“Don’t give me the fucking textbook answer, Truman. I had it mashed into my brain in Boot Camp, and I saw what happened to Bradford.” The single lesson our instructors drilled over and over was the utter inhumanity of the Dregs. We are human, they are not. Period.

Only not period, not anymore. These last few days with Phin had seriously screwed up my judgment, messing with four years of blind acceptance of everything Boot Camp had taught me. And without blind acceptance, Hunters began questioning orders, which made us harder to control. As long as we saw in perfect black and white, we couldn’t question the shades of gray in between.

“It shouldn’t surprise me, should it,” I asked, “after everything the brass did to me, that they’d go to such lengths to keep their control? They can’t let a were-fox love a human and turn a blind eye, because it goes against everything they teach Hunters about how to view Dregs.”

“There was more to it than that.”

“I just bet.” My hands began to ache, and I realized I’d clenched them so tight I’d cut my palms with my nails. I squeezed them harder, glad for the external pain. “So what kind of fucking hypocrite does that make you? Killing her for loving someone she shouldn’t, then you turn around and fall in love with me when you should have goddamn well known better?”

Every furious accusation seemed to strike like a fist, and he wilted a little with each blow. I hated seeing him like that—weak and defeated and utterly miserable—but part of me was also glad. Glad to see the guilty eaten alive by their conscience. Glad to know he still felt pain over what he’d done.

“If I hadn’t done it,” he said, “someone else would have. I had to keep it quiet, Evy. Why do you think no one uses Rain’s death as a Triad object lesson? No one else knew.”

“Of course not. Can’t have the other Hunters thinking we go around murdering people for the holy hell of it.”

Full-force sarcasm armor: check.

“That’s not fair.” He stood up straighter, shoulders back. His temper was returning, making him fight. “You have no idea why I did what I did. You hadn’t joined the team yet. You don’t know the part of me that I sacrificed that night!”

“So fucking tell me!”

His eyes blazed with fury, as hot as I’d ever seen. I half expected him to spontaneously combust under the heat of it. Instead, he said, “There were two names on the Neutralize order, Evy. Rain and the man she loved. Both of them were supposed to die.”

It all started to make a strange kind of sense. Four years ago, right before I joined. Wyatt took the job to keep it from the others, and from his own Hunters. He’d lost a part of himself. Oh God …

“Tell me you didn’t kill Cole,” I said. “Tell me he was not the one in love with Rain and that his name wasn’t on the order. You fucking tell me that.” His silence broke my heart. Tears stung my eyes. I stumbled back until I hit the bed, then sat down hard. Unable to tear my gaze off a dull spot on the floor.

“I did take the order because his name was on it,” Wyatt said, the words spat out as though they tasted foul. “I took it so he wouldn’t have to die.”

My head snapped up. Phin had moved in closer to me, remaining on the periphery of my attention. Everything in me was fixed on Wyatt. On the way he could look both furious and defeated, and on the fire that still burned in his cheeks, even though his eyes were cold. I didn’t have to ask this time. He was going to tell me.

“I knew Cole was seeing someone, I just didn’t know who until the brass sent the order. They said it was my Hunter who was the problem, so it was now my problem to solve. I just couldn’t make myself tell Jesse and Ash. I couldn’t tell anyone what I was planning.

“I went to Rain’s apartment first, and I used a sniper rifle to eliminate my first target. She was a clerk in the office of a criminal defense lawyer who was prepping for a high-profile trial, so her murder was easily explained by the city police.”

The detached way he spoke of eliminating his target sent chills wiggling down my spine. I knew the psychology—put up a wall between yourself and your actions, dehumanize the victim. Make her a job, not a person. Training I’d utilized dozens of times in my Hunter career, putting down Bloods, weres, and other Dregs solely on the say-so of others. Animals to be euthanized, not people with lives and loved ones and futures. I hated seeing him so cold.

He continued. “I picked up Cole and drove us to the mountains. He didn’t question me at first—not until I stopped the car in the middle of the woods. I told him about the order, and then I stabbed him in the shoulder.”

My face must have asked the question he hurried to answer. “The knife blade was coated with a spell I’d spent my life savings to buy. It knocked him out and wiped his memory clean—nothing left of his past or his life as a Hunter, or his knowledge of Dregs. I drove him a hundred miles away and left him in front of an emergency room. Alone.”

His life savings to give Cole another chance. So damned familiar. “How exactly was that better than just killing him?”

He blinked owlishly, obviously not prepared for my question. “I couldn’t kill him, Evy. He was one of mine. He didn’t do anything wrong.”

“And Rain did?” Hadn’t she, though? A month ago, I’d have been less quick to judge Wyatt’s decision. Taking Rain’s side never would have occurred to me. She’d have been guilty of seducing a human—a sickening crime I’d have been all too eager to punish her for, and probably enjoyed myself. Had Rain done anything wrong?

Yes. No.

Who the hell am I to judge her for loving someone?

Not just someone—a human Hunter, dammit.

“Faking both bodies would have raised suspicions,” Wyatt said. “The brass had to believe I’d killed him so I could save him.”

“Save him?” I snorted. “Dumping him in a strange city, with no idea who he is or where he’s from, and without telling him the truth about Rain? Maybe you didn’t pull the fucking trigger, but you killed everything that made Cole who he was. How is that not murder?”

I couldn’t take back the final question, and that was what crushed him. He crumpled into the closest chair, his strings cut by my barb. Repugnance and sympathy warred inside me. I wanted to hold him and make the agony of his actions seem okay, but they weren’t. I wanted to rage against what he’d done and hate him for allowing Cole and Rain to be torn apart. I wanted to rip out the part of me that understood why he’d done it and that applauded him for choosing the human over the Dreg—a part being slowly beaten back and struggling against being completely silenced.

The idea that Wyatt could save Cole’s life by taking away everything he knew and making him forget had been born of some noble sense of protection. He was a Handler protecting his Hunter. What were we really, except our memories? My body was different, but my mind was intact. I knew who I was, even with those bits of Chalice peeking out once in a while. Cole had been taken away and replaced by a shell.

“I’m sorry,” Wyatt whispered, barely audible. No strength left in his voice.

“You don’t owe me an apology.”

“No, I do, because you’re right. I am a hypocrite. I destroyed two lives for doing the same thing I did. You can’t choose the people you fall in love with. I know that now, and it’s too late to fix it.” He inhaled a shuddering breath, then released it in short, wheezing pants. “Something tells me apologizing to Snow when I meet him isn’t going to help.”

I flinched at the thought. Snow seemed to know what Wyatt had done—a turn of events I could only guess at, because Wyatt was careful. He wouldn’t have left incriminating evidence behind, and it was very likely this was the first time in four years he’d spoken to anyone of those events.

Being Kitsune, Snow was as likely to kill Wyatt on the spot as entertain any notion of apologies. Call wanting to meet him was very likely just an excuse to get him at Snow’s mercy. I didn’t quite know how to forgive Wyatt, but I couldn’t let him walk into that sort of blind trap.

Phin made a soft, strangled noise that earned our collective attention. He was staring at the ceiling as though it held some prophetic answer, his mouth open. I glanced up, wondering if I’d missed something.

“What is it?” I asked.

“What was Cole’s surname?”

“Um, Randall. Cole Randall.” From the corner of my eye, Wyatt nodded. Then the sudden change in his expression, from misery to shock, got my full attention. “What? What am I missing here?”

“Cole Randall,” Wyatt said. “Leonard Call. Son of a bitch, I didn’t even see it.”

“Or you didn’t want to see it,” Phin said.

“Goddammit!” I jumped to my feet, alarmed and annoyed.

“The name is an anagram,” Wyatt said. “We know Call is someone with a grudge against the Triads, don’t we? What if something went wrong with Cole’s memory spell? Phin’s description is vague, and brown hair and brown eyes describes three hundred thousand people in this city, but it also describes Cole.”

I should have been elated at our breakthrough, but something in Wyatt’s calm acceptance enraged me. I was across the room, had hauled him out of his chair, and shoved him against the wall before my brain caught up to my actions. He didn’t protest when I grabbed the front of his shirt, or leaned in until we were almost nose to nose. Our eyes met, and I saw something there I’d never seen brought on by my own hand—fear.

“You’ve had this information in your head the whole damned time,” I seethed. “The whole goddamn time, Wyatt!”

He didn’t try to defend himself. Just let me hold him there. “I never had a reason to doubt the memory spell, or think it would break down. Cole never occurred to me as a possibility until this moment.”

“Not even when we were talking about Neutralize orders or people with grudges? Not once?”

“No!” With the frustrated denial came a hint of annoyance. “How many times should I say it, Evy? Cole was gone, dead and buried along with dozens of other Hunters.”

“Not all of us stay dead.”

My statement was meant to wound. Instead, it seemed to anger him. “I’m done apologizing for that, Evy.”

“No one’s asking.”

“Then what do you want from me?”

I wanted time to be angry at him. Time to absorb all the things he’d told me in the last hour, from his parents to his brother to this. Time to sit and talk about things like normal adults. Most of all, I wanted time to figure us out. Only we had no time. We never did. Our lives were about the next step, planning for the next fight. Until the city was free of Dreg threat and I no longer had to stand watch as one of the city’s invisible sentinels, there would never be time for us.

“Nothing,” I said, surprised by the coldness of my tone. I released him and backpedaled to the middle of the room. He stayed by the wall, watching me warily. I turned away from him, toward Phin. “Looks like we’ll be able to solve the mystery of Leonard Call once you and Wyatt meet him. Make the phone call.”

“In a moment,” Phin said. He was difficult to read. The argument he’d just witnessed didn’t seem to bother him at all. Then again, as I’d seen, he was a great actor. He pulled a square of paper from his pocket and unfolded a photocopy. “This fell out of Snow’s pocket, and I don’t think he realized.”

I took the paper. It was dark, badly copied, but still legible. It was an invitation to the fund-raiser Kismet had mentioned earlier. “He’s going to a party?” Then I saw the location—Parker’s Grand Palace—and it dawned on me. Parker’s Palace. Park Place. Close together, but not the same location.

The rest of it detailed the exact function of the fund-raiser—money to repair the basement structure of the historic Parker Palace stage theater and bring the arts back to the old riverfront. Held in the lobby at seven sharp, tonight. A silent auction to raise money. Other donations welcome, with donors designated Patrons of the Arts.

“Holy fucking shit,” I said. “There really was something happening, only that idiot at the gym had the wrong day and place.”

“Or he had it right,” Wyatt said, somewhere close behind me, and his nearness made me flinch, “only we couldn’t see them going in and out last night.”

Phin’s head jerked to the side. “How is that—?”

“The tunnels,” I said. “Goblins stick to Mercy’s Lot because of the old sewer system and bootleggers’ tunnels that run beneath it.”

“But they shouldn’t have river access for at least six blocks,” Wyatt said. He stepped around to my left, completing our little conversational circle. “It’s why half of those buildings were abandoned after the river flooded fifty years ago. Water got into the tunnels and ruined the foundations. The tunnels were filled in and blocked up, but the damage was done. No one wanted to pay the extra expense of repairing them.”

I arched an eyebrow at him. “Until someone comes along who needs the access, so they take the time to dig it out.”

“That’s reaching, Evy, and it’s also giving Call a lot of planning credit.”

“He seems like the planning type—especially if this little revenge is four years in the making.” I found no satisfaction in his flinch. “Look, if there’s a tunnel that comes out beneath any of the four buildings on the corners of Park and Howard—”

“They could have met without our ever knowing,” Phin said. “They could still be there, waiting for orders.”

Over my shoulder, the digital clock read quarter past six. “We need a plan—and soon.”

Wyatt produced his cell phone and dialed, determination creasing his brow and pulling his mouth into a grim line. “Gina, it’s me. Check the basements of all the buildings on the Park-Howard corners. I think you’re going to find access to the underground.” Her muffled voice squawked back. “I know they were. Just trust me on this and check them out. Do you still have someone watching the theater where that fund-raiser is being held?”

More squawking. He frowned. “Well, get someone back there, because it’s a likely target tonight.” She talked some more; I shifted my weight from foot to foot. “Think about it, Gina. We killed three hundred of one of the oldest and most powerful Clans in the city. At least that many of the city’s richest and most influential people will be there pretending to care about the arts. It’s the perfect target, and if we’re right, one of those tunnels is going to lead under or close to the theater.”

Another long pause had me wanting to slap Wyatt for not putting it on speakerphone. He finally got another word in. “I have something else I need to do. Just watch your back and do what you can, okay?” He hung up.

“She didn’t sound convinced,” Phin said.

“She’s not, but they’re checking out the basements, and she’s diverting Baylor’s and Morgan’s teams to the fund-raiser. Half the other Triads are Uptown dealing with reported sightings of coyotes and cheetahs in the historic district.”

“Shit,” I said. They were miles away.

“Distraction?” Phin asked.

“Very definitely.”

I was torn between wanting to run down to Parker’s and help, and needing to stay close to Wyatt when he met Snow and Call. Something told me the meet wouldn’t be far from the party. No sense in planning carnage if you’re not around to enjoy it.

Phin produced his own phone, but before he could dial, I said, “I’m going with you two.”

“You can’t,” Phin said.

I bristled, ready to dig in my heels.

“Snow thinks you’re dead,” Wyatt said, adding logic to the dog pile. “Kismet thinks you’re dead. We need you to stick to the shadows, because regardless of who thinks what or why, you’re the only advantage we’ve got.”

He was right, and I hated it. So I stayed quiet, afraid if I opened my mouth, I’d start screaming frustrated profanities.

Phin took my silence as permission to continue and dialed. “I’m with him,” he said after it seemed no one would answer. “All right, we can be there in ten minutes.”

“Be where?” I asked as he snapped the phone shut and put it away.

“A few blocks from here, corner of Twelfth and Grover. A car is coming for us.”

“I’ll never be able to track you in a car without their noticing.”

“We’ll end up within a few blocks of the theater, I’m certain.”

“Yeah, and fanning that out in four directions doesn’t narrow it down. After what Wyatt just told us about Snow and Cole, I’m not letting you two out of my sight.”

“You may not have a choice,” Wyatt said. “It’s more important to head down to Parker’s Palace and make sure—”

“No. Absolutely not.”

“Should I make that an order?”

I snorted. “Good luck with that, partner. I’m not …” It hit me, so obvious I laughed because I hadn’t thought of it sooner. Not that sixty seconds into an argument was awful timing. “Phin, do you know Jenner’s home number?”

“It’s in my phone memory. Why?”

“Because I think I know how to track you once you’re in their car.”