by Amanda Foody
“I need your help,” Jac told him.
Levi glanced at the stacks of ledgers in front of him. He wasn’t sure he was in a condition to help anyone. “My help? With what?”
“I think Charles is going to kill Sophia.”
Levi should probably have considered his words before he spoke them. And he might have, had he had another seven hours of sleep. “Hasn’t that been a concern from the start?”
“Of course,” Jac snapped. “But we met with him yesterday for the first time, and—”
“You what? Why would you—”
“Because we needed to know what we were up against. I never met Sedric, but I swear, this one is worse.” Jac shivered. “Sophia is—”
“Sophia knew the risks, and so did you.” Levi tidied up his papers just to have something to do with his hands, tossing nearly all of it into the waste bin. He didn’t mean to be so frustrated, but the past two days had been far from easy. “Harrison is depending on this. If the deal is compro—”
“It’s about more than the deal, Levi,” Jac growled, now pacing around his bedroom. Levi winced as Jac leaned against the exact spot on the wall where he and Enne had kissed. “This isn’t just business.”
“Of course it isn’t just business!” Levi said, then cleared his throat. He shouldn’t raise his voice. “You need to get out before you get hurt.”
“What about the election? What about the deal?” Jac asked.
“My biggest priority is making sure that you’re all right.”
“Since when?” Jac asked, making Levi wince. “This has always been about your freedom. You don’t get to pretend like this is suddenly about keeping me safe.”
Levi’s mouth went dry. Was that what his friend really thought of him? “I never should’ve asked you to do this, but I never asked you to stay there. This hasn’t been about me for a long time. It’s been about you and her.”
“Am I supposed to just not care? You know what the Torrens did to me. Are you upset that it isn’t all about you?”
“I’m upset because I don’t want to see them destroy you all over again!”
Levi stood up. He didn’t want to have this argument with Jac. He was too frustrated about the volts for Vianca’s party, about the Irons, about the city. He was holding so much together that Jac’s words threatened to make Levi say something he didn’t mean—or worse, something he did.
So Levi walked toward his door, trying to come up with an excuse to speak to Tock or the other Irons, but then he stopped and turned around.
“What help did you need?” he asked, his voice strained.
Jac crossed his arms. “I need volts—and men.”
“What about the volts Harrison gave you?”
“I don’t think outplaying Charles is the best strategy anymore. The only way to end this is to kill him. Sophia doesn’t agree with me, but she wouldn’t need to be involved. It would only take—”
“So you’re acting alone now? Are you shatz?”
“I’m doing what needs to be done.”
Levi didn’t even know what to say to that. Since when did his Creed-clutching friend talk so casually about murder? “The city’s on curfew. You think the Irons are making voltage now? I can’t help you. And Harrison won’t help you. What would you have me do?”
I sound like Jonas, he realized, hating himself a bit.
“I’d have you care,” Jac growled, as though Levi didn’t. As though those papers in his waste bin meant nothing to him. Not his friends, not his dreams.
“I care about you, but I think you should leave.”
“What about Enne? Isn’t she one of the richest people in the North Side now?”
“Not anymore, with...” Levi squeezed his hand into a fist. “You’d ask her? You’d ask her after the promise you made me swear?”
Jac stiffened. “I only asked because of Vianca. It’s Enne’s freedom on the line, too.”
“Vianca is our problem. You overheard one conversation and pretend like you understand. It isn’t that simple, and these past few weeks have been awful because of it.” Levi took a deep breath. When he’d practiced saying this, he hadn’t imagined it would be here, in this room. He didn’t want to taint his good memories with an added layer of guilt. “Jac, I... I broke the promise I made to you. I tried not to for a long time, but—”
“I’m not surprised, Levi,” he said brusquely. “And it’s fine. I don’t care. If anything, I get it—”
“You’re not surprised? You don’t care?” Levi bit back the urge to shout. He’d spent months trying to be better about keeping his promises, and his best friend was telling him he’d known all along that his effort was useless? That it hadn’t mattered to him anyway?
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Jac said quickly. “Just that knowing you both...it was going to happen. And no, I don’t know everything about Vianca, but I know it would’ve been better for you and Enne to wait.”
“How can you say that you don’t care?” Levi snapped. “I’ve been beating myself up for months about this. I made her cry. I’ve been so unhappy, and just... You don’t care?”
“Unhappy? You’ve gotten everything, Levi. You got the gang. You have more volts than you could ever need. Everything you’ve ever wanted fell right into your lap. Just like it always does.”
“Like it always does?” Levi kicked over his waste bin, sending crumbled paper scattering across the floor. “Like that time Chez nearly killed me? Or Vianca trapped me? Or I was invited to the Shadow Game? Meanwhile, I’ve been so worried that sending you on this assignment would be a mistake—would be terrible for you. Now I realize I sent you away to have the time of your life. What was I worried about?”
“You told me you trusted me,” Jac said sternly. “Did you lie about that?”
“Of course I lied,” Levi hissed. His voice was rising—he wanted to scream—but he restrained himself. It was a habit with Jac.
“You still won’t yell at me.” Jac shook his head. “I can’t believe this. I shouldn’t have come. I didn’t even think you’d have it in you to last this long.”
Levi winced. He was used to taking blows from Jac—he’d said far worse years ago when he’d been desperate for his next lull. But that had been then. And while he knew Jac wasn’t coming from the same place, whenever his friend grew harsh with him, it left a bad taste in his mouth. Like worry and helplessness.
As Jac headed for the door, Levi followed. “You don’t get to claim the high ground when you’re taking the same risks—worse, even! You don’t get to ask for help when you should be leaving the Torren business behind!” Jac stopped, his shoulders tensed. “Are you happy? I’m yelling now!”
Jac whirled around, and Levi took a step back. Jac looked angry enough to punch him. “When you take risks, it’s part of the game. When I do it, I’m self-destructive.” He curled his hands into fists. “When I ask for help, you make a business decision. When you ask for help, there is no decision. I’m constantly trying to make it up to you, keeping my cool so you don’t get worried, not wanting to weigh you down.”
“You’ve never weighed me down,” Levi said, quickly sobering. “I just want to understand why you’re doing this. I never asked you to take it this far. Is it just for her?”
Jac took a slow, steady breath, and that was when Levi knew he’d lost him. “You still don’t get it. I’m doing this for me.” Then he turned around, opened the door, and left.
Levi froze in shock. That was his best friend walking away.
But Levi didn’t know what words to say that wouldn’t be lies. He wouldn’t apologize, because he wasn’t sorry.
Everything you’ve ever wanted fell right into your lap. Just like it always does.
He sighed and bent down to clean up the mess. The waste bin overflowed with schedules and invoices that no longer mattered, thanks to the lockdown.
For weeks, the lords had lived like kings. And now he feared they might die like kings, too.
Lev
i plugged his phone back into the wall.
Moments later, it rang.
He kept the receiver several inches from his ear as the casino manager yelled. “This is only a temporary situation,” Levi said reassuringly. When the yelling continued, he forced a tired lie. “Believe me, I understand. But you know me. I came from nothing, and here I am. I’ll have it under control soon.”
JAC
Jac fell asleep on the bench outside his old One-Way House, and he woke to an unpleasant jabbing on his forehead. He swatted it away, expecting it to be a pigeon or a seagull, but then Lola grunted, “Did you ask me here to tell me you’re homeless now?”
Jac groaned and sat up. He hadn’t meant to take a nap while he waited for Lola, but he hadn’t slept well last night, dwelling on Charles’s threat, and his argument with Levi had drained him down to empty.
“You look terrible,” Lola told him.
“And did you come here just to insult me?”
“I came because you sounded desperate.” She sat beside him on the bench. “But I don’t have forever. I’m meeting a date later.”
Jac furrowed his eyebrows. Lola’s hair, as always, was tangled and unkempt. She’d donned the same pleated men’s clothes she wore every day, in varying shades of beige, as well as his stolen watch. “Lucky them,” he said sarcastically.
“I could leave, Polka Dots.”
Jac admittedly hadn’t called Lola to fight. He needed advice, and though Lola Sanguick was far from a sage, she was a keen listener. So he launched into the story from the beginning, filling in the pieces of what Lola had already heard from the radio and from Enne, all the way through his fight with Levi.
“Of course Levi didn’t give you volts. According to Grace, the Irons are about to go dead broke,” Lola said. Levi had told him as much, but it did little to lessen Jac’s anger.
“It’s not about the volts. It’s about the fact that he can’t see why I want this.”
“Why do you want this?”
“Because this is my story. It’s not Levi’s or Enne’s or Vianca’s. It’s mine. But the whole city revolves around them. He can barely sneeze without making the front page.”
“So it’s about your ego,” Lola prodded.
“So what if it is? Don’t I get one?” He squeezed the iron arm of the bench in his fist, hard enough to make it bend.
She smacked him. “Stop destroying property with your toxic masculinity.”
Jac frowned and put his hands in his lap. “What am I supposed to do? I can’t protect Sophia, not from Charles. And I know it’s not just about me. It’s her fight, too. But I don’t think she realizes—”
“If this was also her fight, you’d be talking to her right now, not to me.”
He cleared his throat. “I haven’t seen her since last night. And...you know...”
Lola crinkled her nose. “Gross.”
“I didn’t want to ruin it by being like this.” He’d left his cigarettes in his apartment because he hadn’t wanted Sophia to see him grab them. He hadn’t told her he was going to speak with Levi because he didn’t want her to suspect that he was planning something. It’d barely been twelve hours, and he was already being weak and dishonest and avoiding her, and it would all crumble, just like everything in his life always did. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to drag you into this. These are my problems.”
She smacked him again. “Do you think I came out here thinking we were going to a taffy store? I came out because I knew we would sit here, on this bench, and you would cry to me about your problems and you wouldn’t ask me about mine. But that’s okay, because I want to be here. Because I’m your friend. I want to help you, not hear you apologize to me.”
It hadn’t even occurred to Jac to ask about Lola’s problems. “Thanks. Now I feel like an asshole twice over.”
“It’s not my fault you don’t know how to have a healthy conversation. I’m not trying to make you feel lousy. I’m trying to help you decide how to make yourself feel better.”
Jac narrowed his eyes and begrudgingly continued. “I still stand by what I told Levi. I think Charles needs to be taken down.” Before he has the chance to take us down.
“You told me his deadline isn’t until November.”
“He didn’t seem like the sort of guy who cares much about deadlines.” Jac resisted the urge to squeeze the arm of the bench and for Lola to scold him again. “He wants some sort of brawl, and I refuse to give him that. But I don’t have the resources I’d need to take him down otherwise.”
“What would Sophia say?” Lola asked.
“She’d say that it’s only been one night, and we have months to figure out a new plan.” Jac normally wasn’t the man with the plan—that was Levi. But now Jac was alone in this. “What would you say?”
“I’d say it’s only been one night, and you have months to figure out a new plan.”
Jac scowled. “And what if he kills her between now and then?”
“She decided to do this as much as you did. She knows the consequences, probably better than you do, even.” Lola gave him an awkward, reassuring pat on the shoulder. “You’re convinced something terrible is going to happen because a lot of terrible things have happened to you. I mean, of all the places in the North Side, you wanted to meet here again. The sad origin story of sad Jac Mardlin. So if something terrible does happen, you can turn around, you can point to this, and you can have an excuse.”
Jac winced. Lola didn’t need to carry any of those daggers when she could throw around words like that. “You’re the one who used to always say, ‘This story will end badly.’”
“We’re psychoanalyzing you right now, not me,” she snapped. “All I’m saying is that, however much of a monster Charles Torren is, he’s gotten into your head. And when you let something get into your head, you don’t tell anyone about it. You avoid your girlfriend. You get in an argument with your best friend. And when every single one of them gives you the same advice, you ignore them.”
Jac stood up. “I really do that, don’t I? I’m...” He rubbed his temples and cursed himself for craving a cigarette. Everything Lola told him was absolutely true. He was a muck partner, a muck friend, and an all-around muck person. And not because he was rotten, but because he sat around and let himself rot and claimed he didn’t know how to stop it.
Lola stood up, too. “Don’t walk away. I’m not done. You don’t get to leave yet.” She placed a hand on his shoulder and turned him around. She glared down at him until he returned to their bench, and Jac swore that tall women would be the death of him.
“When we last spoke months ago, you were anxious and resentful. You were convinced this assignment was going to kill you, and you talked about it like, when Levi asked, you didn’t even have a choice. But you don’t talk like that anymore. You’re more confident. You’re less twitchy. You’re better.”
Lola had a way with words that made you want to believe her. Probably because she was an honest person who had been unwillingly dragged into all of this. But it wasn’t like that for her, either. Not anymore. She’d chosen this, just like he had.
“You’re better, too,” he told her.
Lola crossed her arms, but she didn’t quite manage to hold back her smile. “This isn’t about me, though.”
“It could be. I’m very curious about this date. Do you like them?”
She flushed. “Stop it.”
“I bet I can guess who it is. I remember, that night at—”
“You’ve never met her. She’s not from here. She’s from, um, far away. She won’t even be here long, because she’s just visiting. She doesn’t read the papers or know who any of you are. She—”
“So when’s our double date?”
Lola had an awfully serious face that didn’t handle embarrassment well. Nor did she lie well, but Jac could forgive her for that...for now.
“She’d...she’d hate you,” she stammered.
Jac placed a hand on his heart. “And yet you’d
keep her?”
Lola apparently decided she’d suffered enough humiliation, because she spun around and walked away.
“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!” he called after her.
She held up a rude hand gesture.
“Thank you!” he added, no longer joking. Lola didn’t have to drop everything and travel across town for someone she’d barely spoken to in weeks, but she had. And Jac might’ve preferred gentle comfort to her particular brand of tough love, but he’d needed to hear it. He was still far too angry at Levi right now to walk back to Olde Town and apologize, but he knew Levi still cared about him, and so he’d listen to everyone’s advice. He’d wait.
Lola turned back for a moment, hands stuffed in her pockets, and gave him a smile.
“Next time we’ll talk about your problems!” Jac called. “Like why you’re far too private with your personal life when I already know—”
“Goodbye, Jac!” Then she swiveled away, quickened her pace, and waited for the pedestrian light to flash.
Once she’d disappeared from sight, Jac turned to stare at his One-Way House, and he decided that chapter of his life would finally end here. He had a far grander story to write.
He took Charles’s invitation from his pocket, shredded it, and tossed it away.
9
“Eight Fingers didn’t create the Scarhands on his own, you know. There was someone else. Not just his second—he was his partner.
“But that’s not how oaths work. There can only be one lord, and without oaths, there’s no loyalty.
“They were good friends, I heard. That’s why gangsters don’t have friends. Because one day, you might have to put a bullet in their head.”
—A legend of the North Side
ENNE
Morning meals at Enne’s finishing school had always been extravagant affairs, with frittatas in scallion cream and teas mixed with flower petals. In the Spirits, each of the girls washed down stale bread with spiked coffee, their dark under-eye circles hidden beneath the day’s copies of The Crimes & The Times.
