Bitter Bite

by Jennifer Estep

  “Going to tear into me for daring to question your boy toy’s loyalty?” he growled.

  “Nope.”

  Finn had been ready to argue the point, and my simple answer took some of the wind out of his sails. He settled for glaring at me instead. “Good. Because in case you’re forgetting, I’m the one who’s always been here for you, Gin.” He stabbed his finger into his chest, right where his heart was. “Not Owen, not Bria, nobody else. Just me.”

  “You and Fletcher,” I said in a soft voice.

  Finn’s mouth twisted, and pain flashed in his eyes, mixing with his anger. “Well, Dad’s not here anymore, but I still am. And for the past year, I’ve always had your back, no matter what happened and how bad things got. That hot mess with you and Donovan Caine? I was here. You taking on Mab? I was here. You battling Madeline and the underworld bosses and anyone else who came at you? I was always right fucking here.”

  “I never said you weren’t.”

  But Finn was on a self-righteous roll now, and he threw his hands up into the air and went on as though I hadn’t even spoken. “And now, when the tables are turned and I need something, when I need a little support and understanding after getting the shock of my life, what do you do? Threaten to kill my mother right out of the starting gate.”

  I shrugged. “I was just making the consequences of being in your life crystal-clear to her.”

  “Oh, you made them clear, all right. As clear as the point of your favorite knife. It’s a wonder she didn’t run away screaming.”

  “Oh, I don’t think Deirdre is quite the delicate flower she appears to be.”

  Finn crossed his arms over his chest and glared at me again.

  I sighed. “Okay, okay, so maybe I shouldn’t have whipped out the I’ll-kill-you card right off the bat.”

  “But?”

  “But she didn’t run away, did she? And now she knows exactly what will happen if she screws you over. C’mon, Finn. Don’t tell me you’re actually buying into her act.”

  His chin jutted out. “And what if I am?”

  “Then you’re a fool.” I regretted the words as soon as they left my mouth, but it was too late to take them back.

  Finn stared at me, but instead of the anger I expected, a mixture of hurt and weary resignation flashed in his eyes. That made me feel worse than if he’d started shouting. “You really believe that, don’t you?” he said, a sad note creeping into his voice. “That you’re the invincible superhero who always knows what’s best for everyone, and I’m just your cheerful, carefree, idiot sidekick who shoots people for you on occasion.”

  “I don’t think that—not at all.”

  “Of course you do.” Finn shook his head, his voice even sadder than before. “Because that’s exactly what Dad trained you to believe.”

  I didn’t know what to think about his accusations, much less how to respond to them. Of course I didn’t think I was a superhero, and I definitely didn’t view Finn as a sidekick. He was my brother, and I loved him, simple as that.

  But the way he was looking at me right now, with such . . . disappointment, wounded me more than all his harsh, angry words had. Even worse, it was like every single thing I said only pushed him farther away. I had to fix this—now.

  “C’mon,” I repeated. “Do you really believe what Deirdre said about Fletcher? That he threatened to kill her if she ever came back to Ashland? If she ever tried to contact you?”

  “You know Dad,” Finn said in a gruff tone. “He was capable of it.”

  “Certainly,” I agreed. “And I also know that the only reason—the only reason—he would have made a threat like that was to protect you. Deirdre might be your mother, but she’s been playing you like a fiddle. She’s dangerous, Finn. Surely you can see that.”

  “Of course I can see it,” he snapped, a stubborn note creeping into his voice. “But maybe I want to give her a chance anyway.”

  I frowned. “Why would you want to do that?”

  “Because I never had a mother,” he said in a soft voice.

  Finn stared at me, the same raw, naked longing on his face that I’d seen last night at the party and again here at the restaurant. A bone-deep yearning for something that he’d never had, that he’d never experienced, that he’d been missing out on his whole life.

  “I never had a mother,” he repeated in a louder voice. “I never had anyone to kiss my scraped knees or bake me cookies or sing me to sleep. Yeah, Dad did his best, but he wasn’t exactly the most open and forthcoming person, especially when it came to his emotions. And we weren’t exactly alike, especially as I got older. Not like you and he were. Jo-Jo did her best. So did Sophia, for that matter, and I’m grateful to both of them that they cared enough to even try.”

  “But?”

  He blew out a breath. “But it wasn’t the same. It was never the same. And now my mother—my real mother—is here, and I can see so much of myself in her. It’s like I’ve suddenly found a part of me that I didn’t even realize was missing. Surely you can understand that, given how long it took you and Bria to really reconnect after she came back to Ashland.”

  “I do understand that, probably better than anyone else.” I sighed. “There’s no denying that Deirdre is your mother. She says she wants to be a part of your life. Okay. But where has she been for the last thirty-some years? What’s she been doing? Why didn’t she find some way to contact you sooner, Fletcher and threats be damned? Don’t you find all that suspicious? I certainly do.”

  This time, Finn sighed. “Of course I find it all suspicious. Dad raised me too, remember? I might not have your insane level of paranoia, but I’ve got plenty of my own to go around. I want to know what Deirdre is doing back in Ashland just as badly as you do.”

  “Then what’s the problem with my approach?”

  Finn stuck his hands into his pants pockets and drew the toe of his wing tip back and forth, as though he were drawing a line on the dirty asphalt. It was several seconds before he spoke again. “Because I’m hoping she’s telling the truth. That she actually came back for me—just me, nothing else. Is that so wrong?”

  And just like that, I realized how much this had already affected Finn and what an intense longing Deirdre had woken in him, one that I’d never even suspected he had. I’d never thought much about Finn’s mom, and I’d thought even less about the fact that he’d never had a mother to call his own. Even I’d had a mother at one point, before Mab Monroe murdered her.

  I remembered Eira Snow, my own mother, fondly enough, although I’d often tended to get lost in the pack as the middle child. When she died, I wasn’t old enough to start becoming more of a friend to my mother, like my older sister, Annabella, but I also wasn’t young enough to still need her constant attention, like Bria had back then. So I could understand Finn’s longing, even if it was different from my own longing to have had a little more time and attention from my mother.

  But that didn’t mean I was going to let him get hurt by it. Not when Fletcher had asked me to look out for him.

  “All right,” I said. “All right. You win. I will give Deirdre a chance. Anything to make you quit giving me those sad puppy-dog eyes.”

  Finn immediately brightened. “You will? You’ll really give her a chance?”

  “Yes, yes, I really will.”

  His eyes narrowed. “No more talk of conspiracies and knives and killing her, then?”

  “No more talk of killing her.” I paused. “At least, not to her face.”

  Finn glowered at me, but I shrugged back. That was the only concession I was willing to make.

  “You’ll really give her a chance?” he repeated. “Cross your heart and hope to die?”

  “What are you, twelve?”

  He stared me down. “Cross your heart and hope to die, Gin?”

  I rolled my eyes, but I drew a giant X over my heart. “Cross my heart and hope to die.”

  Finn whooped with glee, threw his arms around me, and lifted me off the groun
d. He spun me around in a dizzying circle, making me laugh, before setting me back down. Then he hugged me. “Thank you, Gin,” he whispered in my ear. “You don’t know how much this means to me.”

  I grimaced. “Oh, I think I know exactly how much it means from my bruised ribs.”

  “Oops. Sorry about that.” He dropped his arms, drew back, and grinned at me again. “So does this mean that I have your permission to bring Deirdre back here for lunch tomorrow? I’d really like the two of you to start over.”

  I grinned back at him, although I had to clench my jaw to hold the fake expression in place. “Sure. Deirdre is welcome here anytime.”

  “Terrific! I’ll text you the details later. This is all going to work out, Gin. You’ll see.”

  He hugged me even tighter, driving the air out of my lungs and cracking my back at the same time. He beamed at me again, then opened the door and hurried into the restaurant, probably to whip out his phone so he could call Deirdre and tell her the good news.

  I stayed behind in the alley, having zero desire to hear Finn chatter on with his mama. I hadn’t been lying to him, though. I was going to give Deirdre a chance. In fact, I was going to give her every single chance she wanted and then some.

  Because the longer the rope I gave her, the sooner she would hang herself with it.

  And when she did, the Spider would be waiting to cut down that rope—and put Deirdre Shaw in the ground for good this time.

  15

  Sometimes keeping your word really sucked.

  But I kept my promise to Finn. Much as it pained me to do so, I held my tongue about Deirdre, and I even made nice with the woman whenever I saw her.

  Which was every single day.

  Over the next week, Finn spent almost all his free time with Mama Dearest. Sure, I wanted to keep an eye on them, but I was witness to far more of their bonding time than I would have liked. They strolled into the Pork Pit every day, sometimes lingering two hours or longer over lunch or an early dinner. And every time—every single time—Finn would wave me over and excitedly recount some silly story that Deirdre had told him about when he was a baby. How he had laughed at this or cried at that or always sneezed at her peony perfume.

  Deirdre seemed to have an awful lot of those cutesy-wootsy anecdotes for someone who’d only been around for the first few months of her baby’s life. Not that I mentioned it to Finn. Or that he would have listened anyway, given how wrapped up he was in her. So I nodded and smiled and made the appropriate noises when necessary, thinking that if this kept up much longer, I was going to grind my molars into dust. As it was, I had an almost perpetual ache in my face and squint to my eyes from holding on to all my fake smiles.

  The only thing that kept me more or less calm was the fact that I was plotting just as hard against Deirdre as she was snowing Finn.

  Not only did I see Mama Shaw during the day, but I saw her at night too, although these dates were far more one-sided on my part. Silvio had tracked down her car and had also pinpointed the penthouse suite she was renting at the Peach Blossom, a luxe apartment building. The same apartment building and suite that Raymond Pike had stayed in when he came to Ashland to terrorize Lorelei Parker, although Finn waved it away as mere coincidence when I told him about it, the same way he ignored my concerns about how strong Deirdre was in her Ice magic, claiming that she would certainly never hurt him with her power.

  The night after that first tense meeting at the Pork Pit, I’d scoped out the Peach Blossom and found a sweet little spot on the roof of the building across the street that let me look directly into Deirdre’s penthouse. Naturally, I took along all the spy gear that Silvio had procured for me. Binoculars, digital surveillance cameras, directional microphones, the whole package. I watched her like a proverbial hawk, studying her even more closely than I had my assassin targets when I worked as the Spider.

  But she didn’t do anything.

  Deirdre didn’t take meetings with underworld bosses, didn’t engage in cryptic phone calls, didn’t do or say anything that would confirm my rampant suspicions of her. All she did was wine and dine Finn from one end of Ashland to the other, call rich people and ask them to donate to her jewelry exhibit, and go over financial reports for her charity foundation. She liked to order caviar and escargot from room service, got a deep-tissue massage and an Air elemental facial every other day, and took a champagne bubble bath every single night.

  Seriously. Champagne bubble baths. Who did that anymore? It was like she was some old-school movie star. Deirdre Shaw was definitely a diva with a capital D.

  Hugh Tucker went almost everywhere with her, opening doors, fetching coffee, taking messages—just like Finn had said. Tucker’s bland, bored expression and slow response time made me think he wasn’t particularly happy being Deirdre’s assistant. Couldn’t imagine why. If I had to watch her simper and sashay all day long, I would have cheerfully smothered her in her sleep with a pillow long ago.

  One night, after Deirdre had finally dismissed Tucker and gone to bed around midnight, I was heading back to my car with my black duffel bag hanging over my shoulder, when a guy stepped out of the alley and onto the street in front of me. He was big, more than six feet tall, with buzz-cut black hair and a fake diamond stud glinting in one ear.

  “Give me the bag, toots,” he snarled, baring his stained yellow fangs at me.

  “A mugger?” I said, my mood brightening. “Excellent!”

  The vampire frowned at my happy tone. Apparently, he decided that I wasn’t nearly scared enough, because he reached into his pocket and came out with a pitiful little switchblade.

  “A mugger with a knife.” I grinned. “This just keeps getting better and better.”

  His dark eyes narrowed in suspicion, and he glanced around, peering into the shadows that surrounded us. “Are you a cop? Is this some kind of undercover sting?”

  “Me? A cop? Oh, that’s funny, sugar.” I chuckled. “Believe me, I am the very furthest thing from a cop.”

  This wasn’t going at all the way he’d expected, but the vamp still thought I was an easy, if crazy, target, so he stepped forward and sliced his switchblade through the air, trying to intimidate me with the weapon.

  Please. I had bread knives that were sharper than that thing.

  “Give me the bag. Right fucking now. Or I’ll gut you where you stand.”

  “Sure. This sucker’s heavy anyway.”

  I slid the duffel bag off my shoulder and placed it on the sidewalk. Then I stepped over the bag and grinned at the vamp again.

  “You want the bag?” I drawled, crooking my finger at him. “Come and take it from me, sugar.”

  “Crazy bitch,” he muttered.

  “You have no idea.”

  But I must not have seemed crazy enough to make him forget about mugging me, because the vamp snarled and raised his knife, getting ready to gut me, just like he’d promised.

  I darted forward and grabbed his wrist, digging my fingers into the tendons there and making him grunt and drop the knife. Then I stepped in even closer and slammed my fists into his stomach in a brutal one-two combo. The vamp’s grunt was replaced by a far more ominous coughing spasm. Music to my ears.

  He staggered back, but I followed him and punched him twice in the throat before smashing my fist into his nose. The feel of bones breaking, the sound of him choking, and the faint spatter of blood against my hands made me grin even wider.

  As a final touch, I dropped down into a crouch and swept the vamp’s legs out from under him. He fell flat on his back, his head cracking against the sidewalk. He let out a soft, squeaky noise, between a groan and a whimper, before he lost consciousness.

  And just like that, the fight was over. Not that it had been much of one to start with.

  Still smiling, I got back up onto my feet, cracked my neck, and swung my arms a few times. Nothing like an attempted mugging to get the blood flowing. After watching Deirdre these past several nights, it was nice to tackle a problem head-on
for a change. I felt better and more relaxed than I had since she’d first come to town.

  I glanced into the shadows, hoping he had a friend or two I could use to let off some more steam, but he was all by his lonesome. Ah, well. A girl couldn’t have everything.

  I hoisted my bag back onto my shoulder, stuck my hands into my pockets, and walked away whistling.

  * * *

  My relief was short-lived. Deirdre maintained all her patterns, including her simpering-sweet behavior. By the time she and Finn finished their lunch at the Pork Pit the next day, I was wound as tightly as ever.

  Normally, I was good at reading people, but I just couldn’t get a bead on this woman. She seemed so damn sincere in her desire to get to know Finn and so damn patient and understanding with me, despite all my snotty comments. She didn’t show a hint of annoyance or anger, no matter what I said or did. Instead, she just kept giving me smile after smile, as if my suspicious nature and thinly veiled threats amused her. Maybe they did.

  Either way, I was completely stumped about what she might be plotting—if she was plotting anything at all.

  I still had no concrete proof that she was up to anything, other than trying to get closer to Finn. All I had was that box of keepsakes and that vague warning letter from Fletcher. Not exactly hard evidence.

  I’d thought about giving Finn the casket box of mementos and Fletcher’s letter to him a dozen times, but Finn was so wrapped up in his mother that I doubted he’d take the old man’s words seriously. He’d just dismiss them outright like he had all the other things about Deirdre that didn’t quite add up.

  Besides, Fletcher had asked me to wait until after Deirdre was gone, whatever that really meant, before I gave Finn the letter. Maybe Fletcher had hoped that Deirdre’s intentions were genuine and that Finn would never have to read the letter and learn what horrible truths it most likely contained. Either way, I was going to honor the old man’s wishes, even if a big part of me just wanted to rip the letter open and read it for myself.