Sharpest Sting

by Jennifer Estep

  Sophia nodded, as if satisfied that everything was as it should be, and glanced over at Liam Carter, who was still sitting in the back corner booth. She waved at him, and he returned the gesture.

  Sophia crossed the storefront and stepped around the counter to where I was now slicing up green and purple cabbages for the day’s coleslaw. She grabbed a black apron patterned with blue skulls from a hook on the back wall and tied it on over her clothes.

  “Bodyguard here again?” Sophia rasped in her eerie, broken voice.

  “Yep. He stays until I say otherwise.”

  She nodded again, then headed over to the stoves to start cooking.

  “See?” I told Silvio. “Sophia doesn’t have a problem with Liam being here.”

  He snorted. “That’s because she could crush his smug skull with her bare hands.”

  “Absolutely.” The Goth dwarf winked at the vampire. “I take requests too.”

  Silvio glanced at Liam again. “Maybe later,” he muttered.

  I laughed and helped Sophia whip up a pot of baked beans, which she put on the stovetop to simmer away in Fletcher’s secret barbecue sauce with its sweet brown-sugar notes and spicy cumin kick. While we worked, the rest of the waitstaff showed up, including Catalina Vasquez, Silvio’s niece, and I opened the restaurant at eleven o’clock on the dot.

  For the next few hours, I lost myself in the familiar rhythms of cooking, cleaning, and cashing out customers. By the time the lunch rush slowed down, I was feeling much calmer and more optimistic. Working in the restaurant always soothed me. Sometimes I almost thought I could see Fletcher perched on the stool behind the old-fashioned cash register, smiling and softly whispering ghostly advice whenever I walked by.

  Only a few folks were eating, the waitstaff was taking a break, and I was fixing my own lunch when the bell over the front door chimed, and two people strolled into the restaurant.

  The man was my age, early thirties, and wearing a gray overcoat on top of a dark green suit that brought out his green eyes, tan skin, and walnut-brown hair. The woman was in her mid-twenties, about five years younger than me, with shaggy blond hair, blue eyes, and rosy cheeks. She was sporting a short navy peacoat over a navy sweater and dark jeans and boots. A gun was clipped to her belt, right next to a shiny gold police badge.

  Finnegan Lane, my foster brother, and Detective Bria Coolidge, my baby sister, walked over to the counter and slid onto the stools beside Silvio.

  “Hey,” I said. “What are you guys doing here?”

  An amused smile creased Bria’s face. “Don’t tell me you forgot.”

  “Forgot what?”

  Her smile widened. “The final fitting for our bridesmaid dresses.”

  I groaned. I had totally forgotten. Ever since I’d killed the giants in the cemetery, I had been focused on when and how Mason and Tucker might come at me, not the events that Mallory Parker and Stuart Mosley had planned leading up to their Saturday wedding.

  I looked at Silvio. “Why didn’t you remind me the final fitting was today?”

  He waggled his tablet. “I did remind you during the morning briefing. Right at the fifteen-minute mark when you usually start tuning me out. Perhaps if you had paid attention during the entire briefing, you wouldn’t be so surprised.”

  I rolled my eyes at his chiding, but I couldn’t argue. I did tend to tune him out after a while, especially these days, when I was so preoccupied with the Circle.

  “Aw, don’t look so glum, Gin,” Finn chirped in a bright voice. “I had the final fitting for my new Fiona Fine tuxedo yesterday.”

  Stuart Mosley was Finn’s boss at First Trust bank, and the two of them had a very close mentor-mentee relationship. My brother was in the wedding as Mosley’s best man.

  “Yes, but you actually enjoy that sort of thing,” I muttered.

  “Absolutely. I never pass up an opportunity to wear a tuxedo and show off my handsomeness to its fullest, most devastating potential.” Finn preened and straightened his tie, which was already perfectly in place. Then he nudged Bria with his elbow. “Tell her where the fitting is.”

  She grinned again. “The Posh boutique.”

  I let out another, louder groan. The Posh boutique was the scene of another one of my many crimes. Last summer, Finn had dragged me out dress shopping there, and I’d stopped a would-be robber from holding up the joint. However, the salesclerks hadn’t been too thrilled about the blood I’d gotten on their fancy designer gowns in the process.

  “Wait. What happened to the bridal shop where we got the dresses?” I asked.

  “The seamstress started working at Posh instead,” Bria replied.

  “You have got to be kidding me.”

  My sister’s grin widened. “Nope. We’re supposed to meet Mallory and Lorelei there in thirty minutes.”

  I sighed, but there was no getting out of it, so I stripped off my blue work apron and told Sophia where I was going. She grunted and kept stirring another pot of baked beans simmering on the stovetop.

  Liam Carter watched me grab my black fleece jacket from the coatrack beside the cash register. He raised his eyebrows in a silent question, but I shook my head, telling him to stay put.

  “You’re not taking him with you?” Silvio asked in a snide voice.

  “Nope. Bria and I will be fine. Besides, the restaurant is a much bigger, more obvious target. So you get Liam all to yourself for the next few hours.”

  Silvio shot me a sour look, then glanced over at Liam, who had finished with his newspaper and was now reading an epic fantasy book. I heartily approved of his literary choice.

  “You should go sit with him,” Finn chimed in. “Liam looks a little lonely.”

  My assistant turned his sour look to my brother. “I don’t see how that’s any of your business.”

  Finn threw his arm around Silvio’s shoulder. “Aw, come on, man. Let me help you with this. We all know I’m the lady-killer of our group, with my handsome good looks, witty banter, and devilish charm.”

  “Oh, really?” Bria drawled, crossing her arms over her chest. “And what ladies have you killed lately?”

  Most men would have wilted under her cool, steady gaze, but not Finnegan Lane. Instead, he flashed her a wide, dazzling smile and threw in a saucy wink for good measure. “Only you, baby,” he purred. “Only you.”

  Bria huffed. “And you’d better keep it that way, pal.”

  Finn batted his eyelashes at her and drew a big, dramatic X over his chest. “Cross my heart and hope to die in your arms.”

  The two of them stared into each other’s eyes, their faces soft and their mutual love clear for everyone to see. Finn winked at Bria again, then turned his attention back to Silvio.

  “As I said, I’m the most accomplished lady-killer of our group.” He paused. “Although I suppose we could change my title to man-killer for this particular operation. Either way, I’m the best chance you have of getting your guy.”

  Silvio’s head drew back, his lips curled with disgust, and he actually shuddered, but his obvious reluctance didn’t deter Finn. Few things did. My brother clapped the vampire on the shoulder, leaned forward, and started talking in a low voice. A few of his whispered words drifted over to me. Optics, first date, new suit.

  Silvio looked at me and mouthed a distinct phrase: Help me.

  I laughed and shrugged into my jacket, leaving my assistant and his burgeoning love life in the trusty man-killing hands of Finnegan Lane.

  * * *

  Bria and I left the Pork Pit, got into her sedan, and drove over to Northtown, the ritzy, glitzy part of Ashland, where those with money, power, and magic lived, dined, shopped, and schemed. I watched the mirrors while Bria drove, but no one followed us, and she pulled into the parking lot in front of the Posh boutique about twenty minutes later.

  Bria cut the engine. “Silvio’s love life aside, I find it highly interesting that Liam Carter is still hanging around the restaurant.”

  “I told you before. I figur
ed it wouldn’t hurt to have Liam analyze my security protocols and station a couple of his giant guards around the Pork Pit in case Mason, Tucker, and their goons come calling. The last thing I need is a shootout or an elemental fight in the restaurant.”

  “Yes, but why are you suddenly so worried about that? Why now? We’ve been investigating the Circle for months, and you’ve never hired bodyguards before.”

  I bit back another curse. Like Silvio, Bria knew me far too well, and she realized that I wasn’t telling her everything. She waited a few seconds, but when I remained silent, she let out an aggravated sigh.

  “Fine. Don’t tell me,” she muttered. “But I can’t help if you won’t let me in, Gin.”

  “I know, but I don’t want you to worry. This is my mistake, my mess, so I should be the one to suffer the consequences. Not you or anyone else.”

  “We will suffer the consequences together,” Bria said in a fierce, determined voice. “You, me, Finn, Owen, and everyone else. We’re all behind you, one hundred percent, no matter what happens.”

  She paused, but when I still didn’t confess, she gave me a more speculative look. “This should go without saying, but you do realize that none of this is your fault, right? Not our parents being part of the Circle, not Mason killing them, not Tucker trying to recruit you to become a member. None of that is on you, Gin.”

  I let out a tense breath and thumped my head back against the car seat. “I know that. In theory, at least.”

  Bria’s eyes narrowed. “But?”

  I let out another breath. “But part of me feels like if I hadn’t been so determined to expose Deirdre Shaw as a fraud, then none of this would have happened. I wouldn’t know about the Circle, and you and I would still be blissfully ignorant about our parents being involved with the group.”

  Deirdre Shaw was Finn’s mother and another member of the Circle. She’d come to town a few months ago and weaseled her way back into my brother’s life so she could try to rob First Trust bank. She had tortured Finn with her Ice magic, although he had eventually ended up killing her in order to save me, which was something else I felt guilty about.

  “If you hadn’t exposed Deirdre for the snake she was, then Finn would be dead,” Bria pointed out. “You had no way of knowing she was involved in the Circle.”

  I shrugged, not wanting to argue. We could go ’round and ’round about it, but part of me would always think it was my fault we’d ever heard of the Circle. Bria might not blame me, but I was the one who’d set us on this dark road of discovery, and I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if my sister was murdered like our parents had been.

  Bria hesitated, then reached down, pulled a manila file folder out from between her seat and the center console, and held it out to me.

  I took the folder and set it on my lap. “What’s this?”

  She hesitated again before answering. “It’s the police report of the car crash that supposedly killed our father.”

  The folder suddenly felt as heavy as a cement block crushing my legs. “What does it say?”

  “Nothing good, which was pretty much what I expected,” Bria replied. “The police might have said that Tristan died in the crash, but I had Ryan review the info.”

  Dr. Ryan Colson was the coroner and another one of our friends. He often helped Bria with her cases, and he’d also done me a few favors.

  “What did Ryan say?” I asked, dreading but still wanting to know the answer.

  Bria chewed on her lower lip. “That our father was tortured to death, given the injuries he sustained.”

  The folder got a little heavier on my legs. “Is his name listed in here?”

  “No. The car was reported stolen, and Tristan was never officially identified. He’s listed as a John Doe. No last name.” Regret rippled through Bria’s voice. She’d been a baby when our father died, so she didn’t have any memories of him.

  I frowned. “But if he was listed as a John Doe, then how did you find the file? And how do you know this is our father?”

  “Because the victim looks just like the photo of Tristan that you bought during the auction at the Eaton Estate a couple of weeks ago. His face is intact. It’s the rest of him that was…damaged.” Bria cleared her throat, as if the last word had somehow choked her.

  “As for how I found the file, well, it wasn’t easy. I’ve been searching for it for weeks, going through the accident reports from around the time we thought he died. When you sent me the actual date of death from his tombstone a couple of days ago, I was finally able to narrow down my search. The file wasn’t where it was supposed to be, but I kept looking, and I eventually found it in the cold-case storage room. Here’s the interesting thing. Tristan supposedly died in a single-car accident, so there was no reason for the report to be in the cold-case room, unless…”

  “Unless someone deliberately misfiled it.” I finished her thought. “But why do that? Why not just steal the file and destroy it?”

  Bria shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe the person who moved the file was interrupted before they could get rid of it, or maybe they forgot about it. Either way, I found it, although part of me wishes that I hadn’t.”

  “So there’s no concrete info in here about our father? Nothing that would help us track down Mason?”

  She shook her head again. “No. Like I said before, Tristan was listed as a John Doe. Even weirder is the fact that I can’t figure out what happened to his body. There’s no record of Mom or anyone else claiming his remains and no mention of him being cremated. It’s like Tristan’s body vanished into thin air. Poof! He’s gone.”

  Bria stopped and cleared her throat again, as if she was having trouble getting out her next words. “There are pictures in the file, if you want to see them.”

  My whole body involuntarily jerked back, trying to get away from the folder, even though I couldn’t go anywhere in the car seat. I drew in a deep breath, slowly let it out, and forced myself to relax, although several seconds passed before I mustered enough courage to open the folder and peer at the photos inside.

  They were awful.

  The pictures had been taken more than twenty-five years ago, so they were in black-and-white, but the lack of color made the images seem even bleaker, starker, and more depressing, as though the life had been drained out of them the same way it had been drained out of my father. The first few photos had been taken from a distance and showed my father sitting in a crushed car, his body tilted forward, his head resting on the steering wheel. Tristan wasn’t wearing a seat belt, although, strangely enough, the car was crumpled up like a sheet of paper around him, and he was perfectly untouched in the center of the destruction.

  I moved on. Other photos showed different angles of the car, as well as the crash site. According to the police report, Tristan’s car had skidded on a snowy road, plowed through a guardrail, and careened two hundred feet down a mountainside until the vehicle hit the trees and rocks at the bottom.

  Lies, all of it.

  No churned snow or skid marks streaked across the road indicating that he had tried to stop, and the guardrail looked like it had been cleanly sliced apart instead of being smashed to pieces. The crash site had obviously been staged to cover up his murder.

  Finally, I reached the photos in the very back of the file. The first few shots showed my father stretched out on a metal autopsy table, with a white sheet draped over his torso. Bria was right. Tristan’s face had been left untouched, and he looked the same as in the photo I’d bought at the Eaton Estate. Dark brown hair, straight nose, strong jaw, although his gray eyes were closed in death.

  I traced my fingers over his face, then moved on to the other photos, the ones that showed close-up views of his injuries.

  My father was a mess.

  The blood had been washed away, but cuts and bruises covered his body from neck to toe. Some of the bruises were thick, solid, circular masses about the size of a fist, while others were long and thin, as though he’d been whi
pped. All put together, the marks looked like fat black spiders suspended in the center of the blue webs that had been etched into my father’s skin.

  The bruises were only the beginning. According to the coroner’s notes, most of Tristan’s major bones had either been crushed or snapped in multiple places, and the shattered ends stuck up at odd, impossible angles, like needles trying to poke through his skin. Every single one of his fingers had been dislocated and broken, and the swollen digits resembled purple sausages that were barely clinging to his hands. His toes had been given the same treatment, and several of them were missing altogether, as though they had been chopped off with a sharp blade.

  My father had been completely, utterly broken.

  As an assassin, I had done a lot of horrible things, hacked and slashed and hurt and killed people in cold, vicious, ruthless ways, and I had been injured myself in equal, severe fashion many, many times. All that violence haunted me, no matter how much someone might have deserved to die. But what had been done to Tristan, to my father… Well, it was a whole new disturbing level of brutality done for one reason only: to torture him to the fullest extent possible before his death.

  A choked sob rose in my throat, and I had to clamp my hand over my mouth to keep from screaming. I managed to swallow down the sob, but I couldn’t stop the tears from leaking out of the corners of my eyes. The drops dripped off my chin and landed on the photos, slowly oozing across the black-and-white images.

  Bria reached over and grabbed my other hand with both of hers, squeezing tight. I threaded my fingers through hers, clutching her hand as strongly as she was clutching mine. We sat there in silence for a few minutes, drawing what strength and comfort we could from each other.

  “You okay?” Bria whispered.

  I wasn’t, but I had to pretend like I was. Otherwise, I’d break down completely, and I couldn’t do that. Not in front of my baby sister. Not when she was hurting just as much as I was.