Game of Lies

by Sadie Moss

  When I woke, yellow sunlight was peeking through the curtains, doing its best to bring light to the dim room. I wasn’t sure what time it was, but I felt like I’d slept for hours. My body was mostly recovered from the explosion, thanks to the healer’s skill and a good night’s rest. My mind felt clearer too.

  A pall of grief still hung over me, but I could see through it, at least. I could function.

  Fen lay next to me, his hand splayed across my stomach and his face buried in my hair. He made a grumbling sound and pulled me closer to him when I shifted.

  Slowly, I became aware of other sounds in the room. Other people breathing.

  I sat up, keeping the sheets pinned to my body. Corin, Akio, and Jae were all sprawled on the floor in little piles of blankets and pillows. My eyes widened, and I pursed my lips, not sure if I should smile, laugh, or cry at the sight. At my apartment, we’d all slept in the same bedroom out of necessity—it was the only one there was. But all of us cramming into a single room in a giant mansion that had enough space to house a small army struck me as hilariously ridiculous.

  It was a little strange to wake up in bed with one man, surrounded by three others. But I was beginning to accept that this was my life now, and as odd and occasionally awkward as it may be, I wouldn’t want to change it.

  These men were all as attached to me as I was to them. The feeling of having them near me in this room soothed me in a way I never would’ve thought possible, even if it did leave me with the conundrum of how to get out of bed and put some clothes on without making things even more awkward.

  I opted for speed and stealth, slipping out of Fenris’s grasp and tiptoeing to the wardrobe as quickly as I could. It didn’t even squeak when I opened it, and I snatched a dark blue dress off a hanger. I turned around, hidden from half the room by the large wardrobe doors, and was about to slip the dress over my head, when a pair of green eyes caught my attention.

  Jae was the only one in the part of the room the wardrobe doors didn’t shield me from, and his head lifted off the pillow, his light brown hair slightly mussed from sleep. His gaze locked on me, and although the expression on his face was inscrutable, I could tell he wasn’t breathing.

  Well, that made two of us.

  My cheeks flamed, half from embarrassment and half from… something else.

  I trusted Jae completely and had come to care so much for the kind, intelligent, thoughtful man I knew him to be. But I’d never been sure of our relationship beyond that, of what else might exist between us. Even now, with his eyes locked on my naked body, I couldn’t read him the same way I could’ve read Corin or Fen. The sight definitely affected him, but his control over his emotions was so tight I wasn’t sure he could even admit that fact to himself.

  Slowly, keeping my gaze on his, I slid the dress down my body. When it settled around my curves, Jae seemed to finally shake himself from his stupor, drawing in a quick breath and blinking a few times. He opened his mouth like he wanted to say something, but then closed it again. Pulling his eyes away from me, he rested his head back on the pillow.

  A heightened awareness buzzed through my veins as I grabbed a pair of panties from the dresser and slipped them on. I tiptoed across the room, careful not to wake any of the others, and when I reached the door and turned back to look, Jae’s eyes were closed again, his breathing even.

  I padded down the hall in bare feet, my grief ratcheting up with each step I took. This house was Beatrice’s, and it felt different without her. I thought of what she’d said about walking past the kitchen just to hear us talking and laughing inside, and I wished I had been thoughtful enough to notice and invite her in.

  Halfway down the stairs, I cocked my head.

  There were voices coming from the main floor.

  Male voices.

  I paused, my foot hovering above a step. Shit. My four were all upstairs, and that definitely wasn’t Retta and Darcy talking. Could it be someone else my grandmother had employed? I knew she’d had other help besides the cook and maid, but those two were the only ones who seemed to come every day. The house had several self-cleaning spells on it, so it didn’t need an army of maids to keep it spotless.

  Had the Representatives sent Peacekeepers to force us out? Without Beatrice’s protection, I wasn’t sure I had any allies left in the government.

  My daggers were still upstairs, but thanks to my training with Jae, I didn’t feel as naked without them. I held up a hand, and an orange flame burst to life above my palm. No harm in being prepared.

  I descended the steps and crept down the large hallway. The voices were coming from a living room off the main hall that I’d passed by plenty of times but never been in before. Holding my fireball at the ready, I darted forward and peered around the doorframe into the room.

  The TV was on.

  Two men on the screen were discussing the differences between pixies and fairies, and what exactly it was that made fairies so pleasant to be around and pixies the opposite.

  Ivy turned around, kneeling on the couch to peer over the back. “Oh, you’re awake!”

  Letting the magical flame flicker out, I pressed a hand to my chest, trying to slow my racing heartbeat. “Good gods, Ivy! You scared me to death!”

  Her brow furrowed. “Well, that’s not true. You’re still alive; I can tell.” She brightened. “But if you want me to try, I can—”

  “No! No. That’s okay.” I held out a hand. Ivy was obsessed with how much better our friendship would be if we were both ghosts, but I wasn’t ready to give up on living just yet. Not when I had four gorgeous men sleeping upstairs and an oppressive magical government to overthrow.

  Ivy tucked a lock of her blonde bob behind her ear and sighed. “Oh, fine.”

  I peered at the ghost more closely. “What are you doing here?”

  “It got too quiet.”

  A chuckle escaped me. “Couldn’t adjust the TV volume yourself? Or did the batteries on the remote die?”

  She fixed her big brown doe eyes on me, tilting her head. “Not the TV. The apartment. I liked it better when you were there. And when those four pretty men were there. I missed you.”

  An odd lump tightened my throat, and I looked away. For someone who’d spent years insisting she didn’t need anyone, I had somehow managed to gather a pretty incredible group of people around me—even if not all of them were technically alive.

  “I missed you too, Ivy. I’m glad you came.”

  “Me too!”

  She smiled brilliantly at me then flopped down on the couch again, her focus shifting back to the TV. Now that she’d made it clear she liked having me around, she obviously didn’t see the need to keep proving her affection.

  I grinned. Just like a cat.

  Slipping out of the room, I headed toward the kitchen, my anxiety rising as I neared it. Would Retta and Darcy even be here? Had anyone told them about Beatrice’s death?

  The answer became evident when I pushed open the door and the somber mood in the kitchen washed over me. Retta sat at the island, attempting to fold linens, but her hands were shaking so badly she kept having to start over. There were several loaves of bread lined up on the counter, and Darcy stirred something that simmered on the stove, her movements jerky.

  They both looked up when I entered, grim expressions on their faces.

  “You heard.” It wasn’t a question.

  Retta nodded, her eyes wider than ever behind her thick, round glasses. “Yesterday. I’m so sorry, Miss Crow.”

  “Thank you. And call me Lana, please.” Now that Beatrice was gone, keeping up any pretense of status over these women seemed pointless. I chewed my lip, feeling lost. “Look, I know you worked for my grandmother, not for me. If you don’t want to stay….”

  “Are you staying?” Darcy’s round face was serious.

  “Yeah. Well, at least until I… figure out what to do next.”

  “Then we’re staying,” she said, nodding decisively. “Those men of yours need someone t
o feed them.”

  Gratitude welled in my heart, although there were plenty of practical reasons for them both to want to stay. Good jobs were scarce for the Blighted, and the ones that paid well were usually incredibly dangerous.

  I sank down onto a stool at the island. “Thank you. The gods know I can’t do it. And Fenris would die without your bread.” I hesitated, then added, “Look, I don’t know what Beatrice was paying you, but I’ll double it. And I’ll make sure you’re taken care of, even if—when—I do leave.”

  A squeak slipped out of Retta’s mouth, and she dropped the napkin she was folding so she could dab at her eyes. “Thank you, Miss Cro—Lana.” Her usually soft voice was barely a whisper, and she picked the napkin back up, wringing it in her hands.

  “Are you okay?”

  “She’s scared,” Darcy said softly. “We all are. Word of the attack on the palace spread fast yesterday, and gangs of Gifted have been roaming the Outskirts looking for revenge.”

  A chill crept over my skin. “But the Representatives don’t even know who did it. At least, they didn’t yesterday. I was there; I spoke to the Minister of Justice.”

  She rested the wooden ladle against the edge of the large pot, turning to me. “It doesn’t matter. It was a nonmagical bomb. That’s all the Gifted need to know.”

  “They’ll use it as an excuse to go back to the old ways. Claim the Blighted are trying to bring another plague down on the Gifted, that we’re trying to kill them all.” Retta gave up folding the napkin entirely and used it to blot the tears streaming down her face. “They’ll come after us again, just like they did before. I told William to stay home today to be safe, but what if that’s worse? What if he’s trapped inside, and they come and—”

  She broke off, pulling in deep, shuddering breaths. I could feel the fear and panic radiating from her, and it stirred an answering fear in my stomach. William was her eight-year-old son; she talked about him often.

  Unbidden, Corin’s story about the attack on his family rose in my mind, and I had to force down a sudden wave of nausea.

  “I’ll have Tarik go pick him up and bring him here. And anyone else you want. Darcy, do you want me to send someone for your family too?”

  The large woman shook her head grimly. “No. My Travis will want to stay. Our building takes care of each other, and he’s one of the only people there strong enough to fight.”

  I wanted to tell her I’d bring them all here, every single person who lived in her building. But then what? What about the building next to theirs, and the one next to that? I couldn’t shelter every Blighted person from the Outskirts inside this house. And even if I packed the mansion with people, it would be like putting a Band-Aid on a mortal wound. If I was going to have any hope of keeping these people truly safe, I needed to fix the problem at the source.

  The Gifted.

  The Representatives.

  I swallowed. “Beatrice said I was supposed to succeed her seat on the council. I… I don’t know how that works exactly, but I’ll speak to them. I’ll tell the Representatives they have to make an official statement saying they don’t know who planted the bomb.”

  Retta looked up hopefully, but Darcy shook her head, her usually kind eyes hard. “Until they find who did it, it won’t matter. People will believe what they want to believe.”

  Godsdamn it. She was right. The hatred the Gifted had for the Blighted was a burning ember, just waiting for a spark to reignite it into an inferno. But if the bomb hadn’t been set by anyone in the Resistance, then who could have—?

  “Fuck,” I breathed.

  “Fuck who?” Akio walked into the kitchen, his tattoos shifting as he stretched.

  The other three men followed close behind him. Fenris planted a kiss on my lips that made my toes tingle despite my anxiety, and then he made a beeline for the breads on the counter. Darcy was so distracted she didn’t even stop him with a ladle-whack to the hand.

  I shot a glance at Retta, who seemed to have barely noticed their entrance. “Retta, I’ll have Tarik get William. And I’ll do what I can to make the Representatives listen. I promise.”

  I inclined my head in the direction of the door, and the men and I headed out, Fenris snagging a huge slice of apple bread on the way. It seemed safer not to let Retta and Darcy in on the entire situation, especially given the tension already permeating the kitchen.

  When we entered the large living room where Ivy sat in front of the TV, Corin did a double take. The ghost glanced up and waved happily as we all piled into the room.

  Akio leaned against the back of the couch. The curtains were drawn open, but no other lights were on in the room, and the pale yellow glow of sunlight danced over the dark lines of his tattoos. “I believe there was talk of fucking?”

  What?

  Oh.

  I shook my head, hauling my train of thought back onto its rails. “What if the bomb was set by Gerald?”

  The incubus tilted his head. “I need more, kitten.”

  “He’s a Gifted man—or at least he was. He was a target of mine a couple months ago; I was contracted to deliver him to a drop-off point alive and unconscious. But I ran into him on the steps of the palace yesterday, and he didn’t even remember me. And… his magic was gone.”

  The room quieted.

  Finally, Fenris spoke around a mouthful of bread. “Gone, gone?”

  “Yes. Maybe it was repressed or something, like mine was by the ring my father gave me. But I couldn’t feel any magic coming off him. And when I met him before, his power was strong.”

  “What was he doing at the palace?” Jae rubbed his jaw, his elegant brows furrowed.

  “I don’t know. He didn’t seem to know. He was confused, rambling about someone giving him his magic back.” I looked around the room, thoughts whirring as energy thrummed through my body. “But it’s a strange coincidence to see him at the palace the same day a bomb goes off there, right? What if he was the one who set it? On the orders of whoever took or repressed his magic?”

  Corin wrapped his arms around me from behind. His breath stirred my hair as he interlaced his fingers with mine. “It’s worth considering. We don’t have any other leads at this point. It wasn’t the Resistance, and I’m not sure I buy Christine’s theory that it was a random agitator with a vendetta. But even if it was Gerald, that still doesn’t necessarily help us find out who’s behind this.”

  “It might.” I craned my neck to look up at him, my brain working overtime. “Someone’s been abducting the Gifted, and I think it’s the same person who had Gerald plant the bomb. I charmed a guard to put him in a holding cell under a different name and then forget the whole thing. He should be safe, no one knows who he is or why he’s really down there. I need to talk to him, see if I can force him to remember something.” I turned to Jae. “Is there a spell that can unlock forgotten memories?”

  He rubbed his chin with the long fingers of one hand. “Those spells do exist, but I don’t know any. They’d have to be extremely powerful, as any mind-altering magic is.”

  I grimaced. “Shit. I’m sure he knows something worth uncovering. We’ll have to find some way to get it out of him. In the meantime, have Christine send someone to The Crow’s Nest to track down Rat. He’s the one who got me that job. Maybe he can give us a name, or at least a description of the person who put the contract on Gerald.”

  Corin huffed out a breath, nodded thoughtfully. “Good idea. We’ll tell her.”

  “Thanks.” I pulled his arms tighter around me for a moment, basking in the warmth of his love. I’d need it where I was going. “While you do that, I need to head to the palace.”

  Akio’s dark eyes flicked to mine, his sharp features highlighted by the living room’s dim light. “You’ve got that look in your eye, kitten. What are you planning?”

  “I’m going to crash a council meeting.”

  Chapter 18

  I instructed Tarik to drive me to the palace and then head into the Outskirts to pick up
Retta’s son and anyone else the housekeeper or cook requested. His bright green eyes widened with shock at my order, but he bowed his head deferentially, his fairy magic filling the car and making me feel calm and even a little hopeful.

  My four had barely agreed to let me leave the house without one of them accompanying me. I could see genuine fear in their eyes, feel the panic radiating from them. I understood the sentiment. I didn’t like leaving them either. But I needed to do this alone. And I had my communication charm with me, so I could reach them in an emergency.

  When the green-haired fairy pulled the SUV up outside the palace, my eyes widened. The steps leading up to the entrance were lined with guards. Apparently, security had been ramped up after the attack yesterday. I didn’t know if that made me feel more or less safe.

  I needed to find Gerald in whatever holding cell the guard had put him in and see if I could get him to talk rationally. Hopefully the charm I’d used on the guard had been strong enough for him to carry out the task I gave him and then forget all about it. I didn’t want anyone else to know Gerald was hidden below the palace until I had a chance to visit him.

  If he was the one who’d planted the bomb yesterday and the Representatives got wind of it, he’d probably be killed immediately. Not only that, but word would get out that it was a Blighted man who had attacked the palace, and the Gifted mobs trolling the Outskirts would ramp up their retaliatory attacks.

  The guards watched me with wary eyes as I made my way up the steps, but no one tried to stop me. More guards were stationed along the hallways as well, and I had to ask one of them for directions to the council room. I’d only been there once before, and I’d been so distracted I hadn’t made note of the route.

  When I reached the large double doors on the fifth floor, I hesitated, listening to the raised voices of the Representatives inside. My grandmother should be in there, but instead there would be an empty chair where she once sat. Pain and anger twisted in my heart at the thought. Why couldn’t the bomb have gone off in Victor Kruger’s office? Or Nicholas Constantine’s?