Web of Deceit

by Jennifer Estep

  Web of Deceit

  The girl was a natural-born assassin.

  Cold, calm, cen­tered. Con­fi­dent in her­self and her abil­i­ties. As she bloody well should be. I hadn’t spent the last three years train­ing her to be a shrink­ing violet.

  As an assas­sin myself, as the Tin Man, I’d killed my share of bad sorts—for money or revenge, mostly. Some­times, because they’d sim­ply needed killing. But the years and the injuries and the blood had started to wear on me, more so since a job of mine a few years back had gone so badly for every­one involved—and a cou­ple of inno­cent folks had died as a result. Even­tu­ally, every assas­sin needed an appren­tice, a fresh face and a clean set of hands to take over and do what needed to be done—and Gin Blanco was mine.

  I’d dubbed her the Spi­der, partly because that’s what she’d reminded me of the first time that I’d seen her cow­er­ing in a small crack in the alley that ran behind the Pork Pit, my bar­be­cue restau­rant in down­town Ash­land. Thin arms, long legs, gaunt face. To me, Gin was a grand­daddy long legs spi­der come to life, full of poi­son but not strong enough to bite back at those who’d done her wrong—yet.

  Mostly, though, I’d named Gin the Spi­der because of the scars that adorned her palms. A small cir­cle sur­rounded by eight thin rays. A spi­der rune. The sym­bol for patience. Gin had that all right—in spades. She’d had got­ten the scars after a par­tic­u­larly nasty Fire ele­men­tal had tor­tured her by melt­ing a sil­ver­stone medal­lion shaped like the rune into the poor girl’s hands. But Gin had lived to tell the tale, one of many ways in which the girl was a sur­vivor, as well as an assassin.

  Now, I stood in the coal-black shad­ows across the street from a row house, one of many that lit­tered South­town, the part of Ash­land that was home to the down­trod­den, down-on-their-luck, and just plain dan­ger­ous. With its peel­ing gray paint, plywood-covered door, and barred win­dows, the house had a for­lorn, aban­doned air. Every­thing about it sug­gested that no one lived there any more, and the steps lead­ing up to the front porch sagged like the skin under an old crone’s neck. The out­side was a dis­guise, though, a mis­lead­ing façade like so many other things, so many other peo­ple, wore in the south­ern metrop­o­lis of Ashland.

  Inside, I knew that the house boasted the finest things that money could buy. Expen­sive fur­ni­ture. Bone china. Gilded mir­rors. Beds made up with silk sheets. Even fuck­ing mints placed on the pil­lows just so. The expen­sive fix­ings made it eas­ier for a soul-sucking giant scum­bag like Jimmy Fontaine to lure the rich folks who lived in the ele­gant con­fines of North­town down here to his dressed up drug-and-kiddie whorehouse.

  Jimmy Fontaine was some­thing of an Ash­land suc­cess story—a white trash gang­banger who’d put together enough cash to fix up a place, increase the qual­ity of his drugs, and mar­ket his ser­vices to a richer clien­tele. Which, in turn, upped his own prof­its even more. Fontaine’s game was sim­ple. He hooked run­away, teenage girls and boys on drugs, then made them turn tricks in his row house in order to get their next fix—or just enough fuck­ing food to eat for the day. And when he ran low on vol­un­teers, Fontaine snatched kids off the street to be the grist in his ever-grinding mill.

  The giant’s most recent vic­tim had been Vio­let Wong, a pretty, bright, happy, sixteen-year-old girl who’d left home one night to go to a party with some of her friends—a party that she’d never come home from. A week later, Vio­let had been found dumped in a South­town alley, dead from a vicious beat­ing. As if that hadn’t been bad enough, the autopsy had shown that the girl had been bru­tal­ized from a series of rapes and had enough drugs in her sys­tem to kill a cow.

  Two days after Violet’s funeral, Vic­tor Wong, the girl’s dis­traught father, had asked me to find out who was respon­si­ble and do some­thing about him—permanently. Because that’s what I did—tracked down peo­ple who did bad things and made them pay with their very lives. Me. Fletcher Lane. The assas­sin known as the Tin Man.

  Peo­ple talked, the way that they always did in Ash­land, and the rumor mill had quickly led me to Jimmy Fontaine and his gussied-up row house. I’d spent a week doing recon, then another prep­ping Gin for this, her first solo job as an assas­sin, as the Spi­der. Now, all that was left to do was wait for my appren­tice to arrive and see how well she’d learned all the deadly skills that I’d taught her—

  “Are you sure that she’s ready for this, Fletcher?” a light, sweet voice whis­pered in the dark­ness beside me.

  I turned to look at Jolene “Jo-Jo” Dev­er­aux, one of my old­est and dear­est friends. Even though we were haunt­ing this dan­ger­ous South­town neigh­bor­hood just after mid­night, the five-foot-tall dwarf wore a pink flow­ered dress trimmed with white lace and a pair of match­ing pink san­dals. Her getup would have fit in per­fectly at one of those swanky, North­town gar­den par­ties that she was always going to. A set of pearls topped off Jo-Jo’s dress. The moon­light slanted down onto the stones, mak­ing them gleam like teeth strung together.

  Maybe I should have brought Jo-Jo’s sis­ter, Sophia, along tonight instead of my middle-aged dwar­ven friend. With her black clothes, black lip­stick, and even blacker soul, the Goth dwarf would have blended per­fectly into the shad­ows with me. But Sophia didn’t have the same sort of heal­ing Air ele­men­tal magic that Jo-Jo did—magic that Gin might need before the night was through. This might be the Spider’s first solo job, but the Tin Man was going to look after his appren­tice tonight.

  Espe­cially since I hadn’t man­aged to do that before, when Gin had really needed me.

  “She’s ready,” I said. “She’s been help­ing me on my hits for more than a year now. Hell, she prac­ti­cally did the last two her­self. That girl can wield a knife like no one I’ve ever seen before. And the blood doesn’t bother her at all. That’s impor­tant, you know.”

  “Maybe,” Jo-Jo mur­mured. “But you know as well as I do, Fletcher, that deep down, Gin is still just a lit­tle girl who’s miss­ing her fam­ily, even though it’s been three years now since they were murdered.”

  The dwarf stared back at me, her pupils look­ing like dots of black ink in her clear, almost col­or­less eyes. There was no judg­ment in her gaze, no accu­sa­tion for what I’d failed to do, and I knew that there never would be. Still, I shifted in the shad­ows, although the move­ment didn’t do any­thing to lighten the guilt on my soul. The truth was that Gin was one of the many heavy weights that swung back and forth there, like the slow arc of a clock hand cir­cling my heart. Turn­ing, turn­ing, turn­ing, and never stop­ping, not even for a second’s respite.

  A long, white Cadil­lac coasted down the street, stop­ping in front of the row house, and a boy of about twenty hopped out of the driver’s seat. Blond hair. Blue eyes. Clear skin. Nice smile. A tall, thick, six-foot-six frame that marked him as being a half-giant. The kid looked like a fuck­ing star quar­ter­back, right down to the puffy letterman’s jacket that he wore over his white T-shirt, blue jeans, and expen­sive sneak­ers. Jack­son Fontaine, Jimmy’s younger brother, who was respon­si­ble for trolling local foot­ball games, par­ties, and high schools in search of young, fresh meat for the older giant’s operation.

  Jack­son hur­ried around to open the door on the other side of the Cadil­lac. He held out his hand and helped the girl inside up and out onto her feet—Gin Blanco.

  My green eyes fixed on my appren­tice. At six­teen, Gin was still lean and thin, with curves that hadn’t quite filled out yet, but you could still see the stun­ner that she was going to turn out to be in a few more years. She wore a T-shirt, jeans, and sneak­ers just like Jack­son did, although she’d topped her out­fit off with a navy fleece jac
ket. All the bet­ter to hide the sil­ver­stone knives that she had tucked up her sleeves—and the blood that would splat­ter on her after she used them. Gin had pulled her choco­late brown hair back into a high pony­tail tonight, which made her look younger, softer, inno­cent, even. Although I knew that her inno­cence had been burned away the night that her mother and older sis­ter had been mur­dered by a Fire elemental.

  Jack­son said some­thing and laughed, mak­ing a joke of some sort. Gin laughed as well, although her smile did lit­tle to thaw the ice that coated her gray eyes. Jack­son didn’t notice, though. Tar­gets never did, until it was too late.

  Jack­son opened the back door of the car and reached inside for some­thing. Gin turned away from him and started scan­ning the house in front of her. We’d gone over the pho­tos and blue­prints a dozen times, and I knew that Gin was com­par­ing the phys­i­cal house with the men­tal image that she’d formed in her mind. Mark­ing all the entrances and exits, just in case things didn’t go as planned.

  The plan itself was sim­ple. Gin would attract Jackson’s inter­est when he made his usual round of the week­end par­ties, tell him that she was a run­away, and get him to take her back to his older brother Jimmy’s row house. Once inside, Gin would kill Jimmy, leave the house, and walk the sev­eral blocks over to the Pork Pit, where I’d be wait­ing for her.

  I just hadn’t told my appren­tice that I’d be watch­ing from the shad­ows to make sure that every­thing went smoothly tonight. No rea­son to hurt the girl’s pride just because I wor­ried about her like I was her real father. Just because I didn’t want to admit that she was grow­ing up and com­ing into her own as an assas­sin, as the Spi­der. She was already bet­ter than I’d been at her age. Colder. Calmer. More focused. One day soon, she’d be bet­ter than I’d ever dreamed of being.

  I just hoped that my train­ing her would be enough to make up for how I’d failed her so mis­er­ably before. For my part in her mother and older sister’s deaths. For how I’d failed to pro­tect Gin and the rest of her fam­ily from the fiery wrath of Mab Monroe.

  Per­haps it was my dark thoughts or the intense focus of my gaze on her, but Gin sensed that not all was as it should be. She turned away from the house and scanned the rest of the block, her gray eyes peer­ing into the shad­ows. Maybe the cracked pave­ment under my feet had given me away. As a Stone ele­men­tal, Gin could sense vibra­tions in what­ever form the ele­ment took around her, from a brick house to a con­crete side­walk to a weath­ered gran­ite tomb­stone. People’s feel­ings and emo­tions sank into the stone around them over time, and Gin could lis­ten to and inter­pret those impres­sions. Per­haps she could sense my mixed feel­ings of worry and pride even now, rip­pling through the pave­ment toward her.

  Jack­son fished some­thing out of the back of the car, and I spot­ted a glint of metal before he stuck the gun in his coat pocket. I frowned. The kid brother pack­ing a pis­tol had not been part of my cal­cu­la­tions tonight, but I wasn’t too wor­ried. Jack­son wasn’t the only one here with a gun tonight or the know-how to use it.

  Jack­son moved to take Gin’s arm and started lead­ing her toward the row house. After a moment, Gin let him take her the direc­tion that she wanted to go any­way. Jack­son escorted her up the sag­ging steps and opened the door. Golden light from inside the house slanted across Gin’s face, empha­siz­ing the hard set of her fea­tures. What­ever she might be feel­ing on the inside, no emo­tions flick­ered in her eyes. No doubt about what she was here to do, and cer­tainly no fear. My heart swelled with pride. She was my girl, all right.

  “I can’t wait to intro­duce you to my brother,” Jackson’s voice drifted across the street to where Jo-Jo and I stood. “He’s going to love you, Gin.”

  “Of course he will,” she replied. “He’s going to love me to death.”

  With those omi­nous words, my appren­tice stepped inside the house.

  #

  The door had barely closed behind Gin when Jo-Jo poked me in the shoulder.

  “Well? What are you wait­ing for?” the dwarf said. “Go around to the back of the house and keep an eye on her in case she gets into trouble.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said.

  Jo-Jo’s pale eyes nar­rowed, but her lips curved up into a smile, show­ing the laugh lines on her face. “Don’t you tease me, Fletcher Lane. I’ve got a hundred-plus years on you. Didn’t your mama ever teach you to respect your elders?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I repeated and ducked out of the way before Jo-Jo could jab me with her fin­ger again.

  I left the dwarf behind, crossed the street, and slipped into the alley that ran beside the row house. Garbage car­peted the pave­ment, and the steady, cool, Octo­ber breeze sent more than one soda can skit­ter­ing into the wall. The air reeked of sour beer and stale cig­a­rettes. These sorts of places always smelled the same, as the sweat and des­per­a­tion so preva­lent in South­town soaked into the land­scape. I won­dered if Gin could sense those same feel­ings with her ele­men­tal Stone magic. She prob­a­bly could. Some­times, I thought it was bet­ter to be a sim­ple human and largely igno­rant of such foul things.

  It took me less than two min­utes to work my way around to the back side of the house and crawl up onto the top of a metal Dump­ster. From there, I was able to grab hold of the fire escape and scale the rick­ety iron lad­der up to the third story of the house, some­thing that I was able to do with ease, despite my sixty-some years. An old man, Gin often called me, which was her own term of endear­ment for me. Maybe I was with my wispy, whiten­ing hair and wrin­kled face, but I was still as spry as the devil himself.

  My posi­tion on the fire escape gave me a clear view through a win­dow and into Jimmy Fontaine’s office. If there was one thing that I’d learned from all my years of being an assas­sin, of being the Tin Man, it was that nobody ever both­ered to close their cur­tains above the first floor. Fontaine was no excep­tion, which is why I was able to spot him sit­ting at his chrome-and-glass desk.

  Jimmy Fontaine was a giant, which meant that he topped out at around seven feet, with the strong, thick body to match his large frame. He had blond hair and blue eyes just like his kid brother Jack­son did, but the sheer mean­ness in his gaze twisted his good looks into some­thing hard and ugly. He sported a sharp black suit, as though he were a real busi­ness­man instead of a sick, greedy bas­tard who made his money off the backs of teenagers coked up on drugs and forced into prostitution.

  Fontaine shuf­fled a few papers around on his desk. A minute later, a knock sounded on the door, and Gin stepped inside, fol­lowed by Jack­son. The younger giant closed the door behind the two of them—then dis­creetly locked it.

  Gin’s gray eyes cut to the side, and I knew that she’d heard the lock click home. Her hand twitched, like she wanted to palm the sil­ver­stone knife that she had hid­den up her sleeve, but she restrained her­self. Good girl. Move too early, and she ran the risk of miss­ing Jimmy Fontaine. Gin knew as well as I did that the giant would beat her to death with his fists if he thought that she was any kind of threat to him. That’s how he’d got­ten to where he was in the first place—by beat­ing down any oppo­si­tion and com­pe­ti­tion that came his way.

  Fontaine also had another four giants sta­tioned through­out the lower two floors of the house, all mak­ing sure that things ran smoothly and that none of the teens tried to bolt. The iron bars on the win­dows helped with that too. But I wasn’t wor­ried about Fontaine scream­ing for help, since the giant had had his office sound­proofed long ago. He just hadn’t real­ized that one day it might be the death of him.

  “Jimmy, this is Gin,” Jack­son said, lead­ing Gin for­ward and mak­ing the intro­duc­tions. “Gin, this is Jimmy.”

  Jimmy Fontaine got to his feet, but­toned his suit jacket, and extended a hand to my appren­tice. “Gin, it’s so nice to meet you. Jimmy’s told me so much about you.”

  Gin shook the giant’s
hand, although she let out a lit­tle snort of dis­be­lief as she did so. “Really? I find that kind of hard to believe, since I only met him like an hour ago.”

  Jimmy’s blue eyes nar­rowed at her dis­be­liev­ing tone, and he gave Jack­son a dark look. Fontaine wasn’t stu­pid. Like most preda­tors, he could sense when oth­ers were near, and I could tell that his radar was already ping­ing when it came to Gin. He dropped her hand and stared at her with sus­pi­cion, but my girl just gave him a win­some smile and started explor­ing the room the way that any curi­ous kid might.

  “Gin’s a run­away,” Jack­son explained, try­ing to smooth things over.

  “Is that true?” Jimmy asked, his blue eyes locked on Gin.

  Gin shrugged and picked up what looked like a real Ming vase. “Not really. But my family’s all dead and burned to ash, so what the hell does it matter?”

  Jimmy frowned at her words, but Gin put the vase down and moved over to a paint­ing hang­ing on the far wall. To a casual observer, she was doing noth­ing more than wan­der­ing aim­lessly through the room, but I knew that she was doing exactly what I’d trained her to do—scanning the area for hid­den weapons, hid­den guards, or any­thing else that might be a threat to her.