Unwanted

  “Not really,” I agreed. “Now, do me a favor. Go inside, get cleaned up, and check on your son.”

  She opened her mouth like she was going to argue, but after a moment, she pressed her lips together and jerked her head. She let me help her to her feet, then hurried up the lawn to the front-porch steps and disappeared into the house.

  I waited a few seconds, until I was sure that she wasn’t going to come back outside, and pulled my cell phone out of my jacket pocket. It was still in one piece, and I hit a number on the speed dial. The person on the other end picked up right away.

  “Yeah?” A harsh voice filled my ear.

  “It’s Finn. I need a favor. Of the large variety.”

  Silence. “How many?”

  “Three.”

  I could hear the smile in her voice when she answered me. “I’ll be right there.”

  Twenty minutes later, a classic convertible with swooping fins pulled up and stopped in front of the Vargas house. The driver’s door opened, and a woman got out. She was a dwarf, a little more than five feet tall, with a strong, stocky body. She looked like she should have been doing maintenance work, given her black coveralls and heavy boots, but her specialty was definitely cleanup. Sophia Deveraux, the head cook at the Pork Pit and my go-to body disposer.

  From my spot on the porch steps, I waved to Sophia, then got up and met her in the middle of the lawn. She eyed Bart’s crumpled form and those of the two giants by the SUV at the curb.

  “Looks like someone had fun tonight,” she rasped in her rough, broken voice.

  I started to laugh but had to stop because of my bruised ribs. “Not exactly. But I need you to help me make these guys disappear, along with their SUV. Will you do that for me?”

  She grinned, reached out, and pinched my cheek like I was a kid. “Always.”

  I rolled my eyes. Sophia chuckled, and the two of us got to work. She pulled a measuring tape out of one of her coverall pockets, using it to figure out the best way to jigsaw the giants’ bodies into the oversized trunk of her convertible. Then the two of us dragged the bodies over to her car and loaded them inside.

  Actually, Sophia did all the heavy lifting with her impressive dwarven strength, and I just supervised, given my aching ribs. While she moved the bodies, I gave her a brief rundown of everything that had happened.

  “Poor family,” she said when I’d finished.

  “Yeah. But at least this guy won’t be bothering them anymore.”

  “Good riddance,” she muttered, and shut the trunk on the dead giants.

  I couldn’t agree more.

  Sophia pulled her car keys out of her pocket, ready to drive the bodies off to parts better left unknown, but I reached out and gently grabbed her arm. There was one more thing I needed her to do.

  “Please don’t tell Gin or Bria about this. Okay?”

  Sophia’s eyebrows shot up, but after a moment, understanding filled her black gaze. “You don’t want them to worry.”

  I grimaced. “No. Not any more than they already have been worrying about me. I’ve put them, you, Jo-Jo, and everyone else through enough the past few weeks. So let’s just keep this between us, okay?”

  Sophia nodded. “Okay.”

  I reached out and hugged her, and she hugged me back even tighter, cracking my back and causing fresh aches and pains to ripple through my body.

  “Ribs . . . bruised ribs . . . remember?” I squeaked out.

  Sophia laughed and dropped her arms. She winked at me, pinched my cheek again, got into her car, and drove away.

  I stood by the curb, rubbing my chest and slowly breathing in and out. That woman did not know her own strength. But that was one of the things I loved about her.

  Now that the bodies were gone, there was only one thing left to do. I trudged up the lawn to the front-porch steps. Isabelle had been sneaking looks at Sophia and me through the windows, and she stepped outside onto the porch with me.

  “The bodies are gone,” I said. “Sophia will come back for Bart’s SUV tomorrow morning at the latest and get rid of it too. Everything’s been taken care of. You and Leo should have some peace and quiet now.”

  “I just checked on him,” she said. “He slept through the whole thing.”

  “That’s good.”

  She nodded. “I want to thank you. For saving me. For saving my son. You were right. Bart would have hurt us both tonight, maybe even killed us.”

  “You don’t have to thank me. It was the least I could do.”

  She snorted. “People always say that, but they very rarely do anything at all.”

  I couldn’t argue with that.

  We stood on the porch, both shifting on our feet, not quite sure what else to say.

  Finally, Isabelle squared her shoulders, raised her chin, and looked me in the eyes. “I’m sorry that I blamed you for my husband’s death. Mr. Mosley told me what happened to you at the bank. How you were tortured during the robbery . . . by your mother.”

  I winced. “Mosley told you what happened? He told you about my mother?”

  “Yes, earlier today, when he was here at the house with the other mourners. I’d heard the rumors, of course, but he took me aside and explained it all to me in private.” Isabelle shook her head. “You didn’t deserve that. No one deserves that. Especially not from your own mother, the person who’s supposed to protect and love you above all else.”

  I couldn’t argue with that either.

  “You’re a good man, Finnegan Lane,” she said in a soft voice. “I hope you find a way to move past all of this.”

  My throat closed up, and tears stung my eyes at her sympathetic tone. I didn’t deserve her understanding, much less her sympathy. And yet here she was, giving it to me anyway. Isabelle Vargas was a good woman and a far better person than I was.

  “Mama? What’s going on?”

  We both looked over to see Leo standing in the doorway, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes and clutching a stuffed penguin to his chest.

  “Mama’s just chatting with her friend,” Isabelle said. “Go back inside, and I’ll come and tuck you in soon. Okay?”

  “Okay.” Leo yawned and disappeared back into the house.

  Isabelle waited until he was gone, then faced me again. “I don’t know how I can ever repay you.”

  I shook my head. “There’s no need for that. I’m just happy that you and Leo are safe now. You’re a great mom. That little guy is lucky to have you.”

  Isabelle smiled at me for a brief moment before going back into her house.

  I waited until she had shut and locked the front door, then walked to my car. I got in, cranked the engine, and switched on the heat. While I waited for the vehicle to warm up, I looked back over at the house.

  Through the windows, I could see Isabelle picking up Leo and hugging him tight. She snapped off the downstairs lights, and they vanished into the darkness.

  The familiar guilt filled me at the thought that Peter wasn’t with them and that their family wasn’t whole anymore, but the razor-sharp edges of it had softened just a bit. I’d done a lot of things wrong when Deirdre had come to town, but tonight I’d finally done something right.

  “Sleep tight, guys,” I whispered to Isabelle and Leo, even though they couldn’t hear me.

  I smiled, put my car into gear, and drove away, feeling better than I had in weeks.

  8

  Despite the fact that I’d almost been beaten to death by a giant, my night was not over yet. Far from it.

  Stuart Mosley had sent me several texts while I’d been dealing with Bart the Butcher, asking where I was and why I wasn’t at the bank helping him with those safety-deposit boxes yet. The tone of each text was sharper and more demanding than the last, indicating that if I didn’t get my ass over to the bank ASAP, I might as well not bother coming back
ever again.

  I drove to the bank, parked my car, and knocked on the front doors. The giant standing guard inside eyed the blood and bruises on my face, but he didn’t ask me any questions as he opened the doors. No doubt, he thought I’d gotten a richly deserved beating for everything that had happened. He wasn’t wrong about that.

  But I couldn’t let Mosley see me looking like this, so I headed downstairs to my office to change out of my blood-, dirt-, and grass-covered clothes.

  My office door was cracked open, a sliver of light spilling out into the basement hallway. I frowned, pushed the door open the rest of the way, and stepped inside. Weird. I didn’t remember leaving my office unlocked or the lights on when I’d left earlier today—

  My desk chair whirled around, and Stuart Mosley was sitting there.

  I yelped and staggered back against the door. “What are you doing in here? You almost gave me a heart attack!”

  The dwarf arched his bushy eyebrows at my harsh, accusing tone. “Well, it’s my bank, Finn, so I can go anywhere I want to, including your office.”

  I winced and ducked my head in a silent apology. All the while, though, I was eyeing the bathroom door on the other side of the office, wondering how I could politely dart in there without Mosley noticing my battered face or, worse, all the blood and dirt on my clothes.

  The dwarf crossed his arms over his own impeccable suit jacket. “It’s about time you showed up,” he growled. “I didn’t think it would take you so long to deal with that giant bookie. Don’t you usually eat guys like that for breakfast?”

  For a moment, his words didn’t register, but when they finally did sink into my brain, my head snapped up, and my mouth dropped open in surprise.

  “You knew about Bart the Butcher? That he was threatening Isabelle?”

  Mosley scoffed. “Of course I knew. I know everything that goes on around here, especially when it comes to my employees.”

  “But—but how?”

  “Peter came to me about a month ago, wanting to take out a second mortgage on his house. He told me about his brother’s gambling debts and how Bart Wilcox was pressuring him to pay up or else,” Mosley said. “Then, right after Peter’s death, Isabelle came to me, asking how fast she could get his life-insurance money. It wasn’t hard to put two and two together.”

  Understanding flashed through me. “That’s why you wanted me to walk Isabelle outside this morning and go to her house after the funeral. You knew that Bart would be outside the bank waiting for her, and you knew that he would probably show up at her house too, trying to get his money.”

  Mosley gave me a noncommittal shrug.

  “But why?” I asked. “Why would you want me to know about Isabelle’s problems with Bart?”

  The dwarf leaned forward, propped his elbows on my desk, steepled his hands together, and gave me a steely look. “I wanted to see how much like your father you really were.”

  And just like that, everything made sense. I’d always known that Mosley and Dad had been friends. Dad was the one who’d helped me get my first internship with the bank way back when. But apparently, Mosley had also known about my dad’s penchant for helping people who couldn’t help themselves, both as the businessman Fletcher Lane and as the assassin the Tin Man.

  “You sly son of a bitch,” I muttered. “You set me up.”

  A faint smile creased Mosley’s face. “I prefer to think of it as creative problem solving.” He arched his eyebrows at me again. “I take it that the situation has been handled to Mrs. Vargas’s satisfaction?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t say that she was satisfied by my bloodying up her lawn, but those men certainly won’t bother her ever again,” I said in a wry tone.

  Mosley nodded, ignoring my sarcasm. “Good. I’ll call her first thing in the morning and tell her that the life insurance has been paid in full.”

  My eyes narrowed. “Wait a second. You’ve had the life-insurance money this whole time? Why didn’t you just go ahead and give it to her? Or at least offer to help her get out from under Bart’s thumb yourself?”

  He shrugged again. “Because I knew that Isabelle would be too proud to take any help that I might offer her, just like Peter was too proud to take it when I offered it to him. I wanted to make sure that Isabelle and her son would be taken care of for the rest of their lives. Not have to throw all that money away on a debt that wasn’t even theirs. Now, thanks to you, I’m assured of that. I’ve done right by Peter. We both have.”

  I stood there like a fool, my mouth still gaping, trying to understand everything. I’d always known that Mosley was clever, but I hadn’t imagined that he was this clever. He’d put events in motion, then had sat back and watched while everything had fallen into place exactly the way he’d wanted. I didn’t know whether to admire or be angry at his manipulations of me.

  But he was right about one thing: Isabelle and Leo were better off because of what I’d done tonight.

  Mosley got to his feet, buttoned his suit jacket, and came around my desk. He stopped right in front of me, examining the bruises on my face and the bloodstains on my clothes.

  “Go get cleaned up, Finn,” he said in a kinder voice. “Then meet me in the vault in twenty minutes. We still have work to do tonight.”

  This time, it was actually a request instead of an order.

  I nodded. “Yes, sir.”

  “Good man.” Mosley reached out, patted my shoulder, and left my office.

  I shook my head, still trying to wrap my mind around this new revelation, then did as he’d asked. Fifteen minutes later, I’d showered, changed into a fresh suit, and slathered a healthy amount of Jo-Jo’s healing ointment on my face and ribs. I still ached with every breath I took, but the Air elemental magic in the ointment took the edge off the worst of the pain.

  I went over to my desk to get some folders, and my gaze locked onto Deirdre’s icicle-heart rune, still sitting in the candy dish. The jagged diamond icicles glinted as brightly as ever, despite all the ugly things that had happened between my mother and me.

  I grabbed the necklace and held it up, watching it sway back and forth like a clock’s pendulum, ticking off all my mistakes. Looking at Deirdre’s rune still hurt, as did thinking about everything she’d done to me and all the people who’d died as a result of her twisted scheme. But it didn’t fill me with quite as much misery as before. I didn’t know what I would ultimately do with the necklace, but for now, I would leave it here, as a reminder both of her betrayal and of the promise I’d made at Peter Vargas’s grave. I couldn’t change what Deirdre had done or bring back the guards she’d killed, but I could look out for their loved ones who’d been left behind.

  Whether they wanted me to or not.

  “Finn!” Mosley bellowed from out in the hallway. “Are you ready yet?”

  “Yes, sir! Coming, sir!” I called out.

  I carefully nestled Deirdre’s rune back in the candy dish, grabbed the folders, and left my office.

  It was time to get back to work—in more ways than one.

  Keep reading for a sneak peek at the next book in the Elemental Assassin series

  By Jennifer Estep

  Coming soon from Pocket Books

  1

  It was the perfect night to kill someone.

  Thick, heavy clouds obscured the moon and stars, deepening the shadows of the cold December evening, and an icy drizzle spattered down from the sky, slowly covering everything in a slick, glossy, treacherous sheen. Icicles had already formed on many of the trees that lined the street, looking like gnarled, glittering fingers that were crawling all over the bare, skeletal branches. No animals moved or stirred, not so much as an owl sailing into one of the treetops searching for shelter.

  Down the block, red, green, and white holiday lights flashed on the doors and windows of one of the sprawling mansions set back from th
e street, and the faint trill of Christmas carols filled the air. A steady stream of people hurried from the mistletoe-festooned front door, down the snowmen-lined driveway, and out to their cars, scrambling into the vehicles and cranking the engines. Someone’s dinner party was rapidly winding down, although it was only nine o’clock. Everyone wanted to get home and be all safe, warm, and snug in their own beds, dreaming of sugarplums, before the weather got any worse. In ten minutes, they’d all be gone, and the street would be quiet and deserted again.

  Yes, it was the perfect night to kill someone.

  Too bad my mission was recon only.

  I slouched down in my seat, staying as much out of view of the passing headlights as possible. But none of the drivers gave my battered old white van a second look, and I doubted that any of them even bothered to glance at the blue lettering on the side that read Cloudburst Falls Catering. Caterers, florists, musicians. Such service vehicles were all too common in Northtown, the part of Ashland where the rich, social, and magical elite lived. If not for the lousy weather, this entire street probably would have been lit up with holiday cheer as people hosted various parties, each one trying to outdo their neighbors with garish light displays.

  Once the last of the cars cruised by and the final pair of headlights faded away, I straightened up in my seat, picked up my binoculars from my lap, and peered through them at another nearby mansion.

  A stone wall cordoned this mansion off from the street, featuring a wide iron gate that was closed and locked. Unlike its neighbor, no holiday lights decorated this house, and only a single room on the front was illuminated—an office with glass doors that led out to a stone patio. Thin white curtains covered the doors, and every few seconds, the murky shape of a man would appear, moving back and forth, as though he were continuously pacing from one side of his office to the other.

  I just bet he was pacing. From all the reports I’d heard, he’d been holed up in his mansion for months now, preparing for his murder trial, which was set to begin after the first of the year. That would be enough to drive anyone stir-crazy.