By a Thread

by Jennifer Estep

  “I just bet it was,” he muttered.

  “I told them about Stu’s murder and Randall Dekes and how the vampire’s been pressuring me to sell my restaurant to him.” Callie hesitated. “Right before you showed up, Gin was telling me that maybe she could figure out a way to get Dekes to stop harassing us. To get him to leave us alone—for good.”

  Donovan’s face hardened, and his golden eyes sparked with anger. “Absolutely not,” he growled. “I told you. I’ll handle Dekes. I’ll get him to back off. What happened to Stu won’t happen to you. I promise you that.”

  Callie frowned at her fiancé, obviously wondering at his sudden show of temper. “You’ve said yourself that Dekes thinks that he’s above the law. That he gives too much money to too many people for anyone to want to rock the boat. So far, you’ve been right. The cops haven’t even questioned him about Stu’s death. So if Gin can help, then why not let her?”

  “Because I don’t exactly do things by the book or even by the law,” I said. “And you know how Donovan is—he’s such a stickler for the rules.”

  Donovan opened his mouth to say something, probably to call me out for mocking him, when Pete let out a low groan on the floor. A few seconds later, Trent rolled over onto his side and started to come to as well. Bria helped Donovan prop them both up in chairs and handcuff them; then Donovan called some of his fellow boys in blue to come haul them off to the nearest jail.

  Bria and Donovan moved to the other end of the bar, talking to each other cop-to-cop, while Callie grabbed a broom from the corner and started sweeping up all the broken glass. That left me to lean against the bar and keep an eye on the bad guys.

  After staring at me for the better part of two minutes, his face red with rage, Pete finally opened his mouth. But before he could speak, I casually palmed one of my silverstone knives and started flipping it end over end in my hand.

  “Yeah, yeah,” I said. “I know exactly what you’re going to say. I’m a bitch, this isn’t over, and I’ll be seeing you again real soon. If I had a dollar for every time I’d heard that, I’d be even richer than I already am.”

  Pete kept glaring at me, so I leaned forward so that my face was level with his.

  “Trust me, dude,” I said, letting him see the cold violence that always lurked just below the surface of my wintry eyes. “You do not know who you are messing with, and you do not want to find out. Do yourself a favor. When your boss Dekes springs you from the pokey, tell him that Callie Reyes is off-limits and to find somewhere else to build his fancy resort—or he will be sorry that he didn’t. You got that?”

  “Yeah,” Pete muttered. “I got it.”

  Maybe I was still feeling tired, maybe I wanted to limit the mess I made down here, or maybe I was still hoping to salvage some part of my much-needed vacation, but I was giving Pete and his boss a chance to walk away before things got any bloodier. I doubted that either one of them would take me up on my generosity, though. Still, it was more than I normally would have done. If they persisted with things, well, what happened would be on them, not me.

  The po-po arrived soon after that, their blue and white lights flashing in the parking lot and casting garish shadows into the restaurant. Bria stayed inside to say her good-byes to Callie, but I followed Donovan outside and watched him and two other cops load Pete and Trent into the back of a squad car. The two cops got into the front of the vehicle and pulled out of the lot.

  “How long will it take Dekes to bail them out?” I asked Donovan.

  He watched the blue and white lights fade away. “Not long enough.”

  “That’s what I thought.”

  We didn’t speak for a minute. A breeze blew in from off the ocean, plastering Donovan’s suit to his side and outlining his firm body. He stared out into the semidarkness as though the night held all the answers to his questions. I could have told him not to bother, that the shadows only whispered of lies, when they bothered to speak at all, but he wouldn’t have listened to me. He never had. Not before. Not about anything that had really mattered.

  Still, I’d felt something for him once and I hoped that he had for me. I owed him something for that, even if I knew that he would probably reject me just the way he always did.

  “You know, my offer still stands,” I finally said.

  “And what offer is that?”

  I didn’t know if it was intentional or not, but his voice dropped to a low, husky whisper, and his eyes glimmered like pure gold in his strong face. I realized that we were alone for the first time all night—and I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.

  I wasn’t good with feelings. I never had been, and everything that I’d seen and done as the Spider had only made me guard my heart that much more carefully. The more you cared about someone, the more and the easier they could hurt you, whether it was with words, actions, or the lack thereof. But I’d thought that Donovan had potential, that we had potential, so I’d opened myself up to him, or at least tried to. But he’d turned his back on me and walked away with no hesitation and seemingly no regrets. Donovan’s leaving had hurt me far more than I’d let on to anyone—even Owen.

  “To help Callie with Randall Dekes. To get him to back off—or else.”

  “I thought you were retired.”

  The old, sharp accusation flared in Donovan’s voice, and it surprised me how much it still stung to realize just how little he thought of me.

  I shrugged. “Assassins don’t ever really retire. But eventually, some of us decide to use our particular skill set for things besides killing people for money. Better things. That’s what I’m doing these days.”

  “Really? Is that what you did to Mab Monroe?” Donovan asked. “I heard, you know. About an assassin named the Spider killing Mab a few weeks ago in Ashland. Was that one of your better deeds?”

  “No,” I said. “Mab was personal, and the bitch got exactly what was coming to her.”

  Donovan shook his head and let out another laugh—that hard, caustic, bitter laugh that felt like acid eating away at me. After a moment, he looked at me again, his face remote, his eyes cold.

  “Stay away from me, and stay the hell away from Callie. I’ll keep her safe from Dekes. I don’t need your help, Gin,” Donovan snarled. “I didn’t back in Ashland, and I certainly don’t now. Got it?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I got it.”

  Donovan glared at me another second before he stalked into the restaurant, turning his back on me—again.

  6

  Bria came outside a few minutes later, and we drove back to the Blue Sands hotel in silence. It was still early, not quite nine o’clock, but we both went through the motions of getting ready for bed. Pulling robes and pajamas out of our suitcases. Laying out clothes for tomorrow. Showering.

  Eventually, I wound up on the patio, staring out at the endless black sea from three stories up. A light, steady breeze blew in off the ocean, carrying the tang of salt and sand with it. It was full dark now, but the night was warm, pleasantly so, and the humidity felt like a welcoming hug instead of the hot, suffocating embrace of earlier in the day. The silvery moon was as big and bright as I’d ever seen it, and the stars burned with pure, white light, like they were seconds away from falling from the sky. All around me, the stone of the hotel drowsily whispered of another day of fun in the sun and the promise of more of the same tomorrow.

  But the revelry wasn’t over for everyone. Down below, tiki torches blazed around an enormous, palm-tree-shaped swimming pool. Palm trees were a common rune in these parts, being the symbol for coastal beauty, and the elaborate shape of the pool was in keeping with that theme. More than a few folks had decided to go for a late swim, relax in the lounge chairs, or down some more daiquiris from the bamboo-and-grass-covered bar nearby. Couples swayed to cheerful calypso music on a patio on the far side of the pool. Beyond that, a few bonfires flickered on the beach, the folks milling around them backlit by the orange flames.

  Bare feet whispered on the patio behind me,
and Bria came up to lean next to me on the wrought-iron railing. We watched the swimmers, dancers, and drinkers until the song ended and the live band decided to take a brief break.

  “So what’s the deal with you and Donovan Caine?” Bria finally asked.

  I sighed. Bria was a cop, a good one, and she could be just as tough and tenacious as me when she set her mind to it. I’d known that the questions about Donovan were coming—I just hadn’t figured out what the answers were to them yet.

  “We used to have . . . a thing.”

  “A ‘thing’?”

  I sighed again, a little deeper and a little longer this time. “I’ve told you about Alexis James, the Air elemental who killed Fletcher and framed me for a murder I didn’t commit?”

  Bria nodded.

  “Well, Donovan was a detective with the Ashland Police Department back then. He got caught up in the conspiracy and found out that I was the Spider. But one of his superiors was working for Alexis, so we joined forces to take them both down. Later, he helped me out a bit with Tobias Dawson when Dawson was threatening Warren and Violet Fox. Along the way, Donovan and I slept together a few times.”

  “Until . . .”

  “Until Donovan decided that he couldn’t be the kind of man he wanted to be and still be with me at the same time. Basically, his chose his morals and his sense of right and wrong over me, the evil assassin who’d seduced him.”

  Bria winced. “Ouch.”

  “Yeah, ouch.”

  We lapsed into silence, listening to the laughter and splashes that floated up from the pool and the lively, pulsing beat of the calypso music as the band members returned from their break and picked up their instruments again.

  “So what are you going to do now? About Donovan,” Bria asked.

  I shrugged. “Donovan made it perfectly clear when he left Ashland that he didn’t want me, that he didn’t want anything to do with me, and he did the same thing again tonight at the restaurant. We’ve both moved on. He has Callie, and I have Owen. Donovan also made it clear that he didn’t want my particular brand of help in dealing with Randall Dekes.”

  “Can’t blame him for that, can you? He is a cop, after all. He’s supposed to follow the rules. Asking you to assassinate Dekes would not be following the rules.”

  I looked at her. “Yeah, but you’re a cop too, and here we are.”

  Bria shifted on her feet. “That’s different. You’re my sister.”

  I didn’t say anything because we both knew that it wasn’t different, not really. In her own way, Bria had just as tough a time accepting my being the Spider as Donovan had. She was just trying harder than he had to get past her aversion to my bloody, violent profession because we were family and I’d ultimately rescued her from Mab. Bria thought she owed me something for those things. She didn’t realize that I would have saved her whether we had a relationship or not, whether she wanted me in her life or not—whether she hated me or not.

  But running into Donovan and seeing the old, familiar disgust in his eyes made me wonder when Bria would quit trying. When she’d just give up on me. Donovan had, and my sister was the same kind of good, honest cop that he was. It wasn’t too much of a stretch to think that someday she’d make the same choice as Donovan. That someday she’d tell me she’d had enough, leave me behind, and never look back. Now that Mab was dead, she was free to do it anytime she wanted.

  I’d had plenty of pain in my life already, but I knew that if Bria turned her back on me like Donovan had, the tiny scrap of my heart I’d been able to salvage from my ugly childhood would break—and it would never, ever mend.

  All I’d wanted had been a simple, fun, carefree vacation, a weekend when I could relax from being the Spider and finally try and connect with my sister. But now I was right back in the middle of another messy situation whether I wanted to be or not. I might not love Callie like Bria did, but I just couldn’t stand by and do nothing either—not when I knew a good, decent person was being threatened and in very real danger of being murdered—burned to death, even. Fletcher had taught me better than that, even if I was an assassin.

  “And how do you feel about Donovan now?” Bria asked in a soft voice.

  I shrugged again. “You know I’m not good with feelings.”

  My sister raised her eyebrows at that particular understatement. She turned to face me and crossed her arms over her chest, her eyes level with mine. Waiting, just waiting. I knew she wouldn’t leave without an answer.

  “Donovan is a smart, strong, capable, attractive man,” I finally said. “That’s what drew me to him in the first place.”

  “But?”

  “But I love Owen,” I said in a firm voice. “Owen Grayson is one of the best things that’s ever happened to me. I’m not going to forget that—ever—and I’m certainly not going to do anything to mess up our relationship.”

  I meant every word that I said. Seeing Donovan again had only made me appreciate Owen that much more because Owen did the one thing that Donovan never had and never would—he accepted me for who and what I was. My bloody past as the Spider didn’t bother Owen because he’d gone through the same things that I had—losing his parents, living on the streets, trying to protect his younger sister, Eva. And he’d done some of the same things that I had—including killing people who threatened him or Eva. Owen hadn’t necessarily done all those dark things for money, not like I had as an assassin, but he understood them and me all the same. That’s why I loved him.

  Bria nodded. “Good. Because Callie’s my best friend, and she wouldn’t get engaged to someone if she didn’t love him with all her heart. I don’t want her to get hurt by being in the middle of you and Donovan and your . . . ‘thing.’”

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “She won’t get hurt. Not by me. But Randall Dekes is another matter, and we both know it.”

  “I talked to Donovan in the restaurant,” Bria said. “He’s been investigating Stu Alexander’s death, trying to find some way to connect it to Dekes and put the vampire in jail where he belongs. But he keeps running into problems with his superiors, who are getting heat from their superiors, because the vamp is so chummy with all the muckety-mucks on the island.”

  I snorted. “Well, that’s all well and good, but what’s Donovan going to do, exactly? Go out to Dekes’s fancy house and threaten to arrest him? Please. Dekes will laugh in his face. Or worse, he’ll keep Donovan there long enough for some of his goons to go out and hurt Callie. Is that what you want?”

  “Of course not,” Bria snapped. “But you can’t just go around killing everyone you don’t like, Gin. There wouldn’t be anyone left in the entire city of Ashland if you did that.”

  I thought about telling her that I was getting tired of killing people all the time back home, that I’d come down here this weekend to get away from all of that, but I kept my mouth shut. She wouldn’t believe me. Not tonight. And I didn’t think that she really wanted to anyway. She couldn’t do that and hold on to her anger at me at the same time.

  “Donovan and I deal with rich sleazeballs like Dekes all the time,” Bria continued. “Donovan will handle him.”

  “Like you handled Elliot Slater when Mab sent him to your house to murder you?”

  Bria flinched, and old memories darkened her eyes.

  “Because the way I remember it, you were gutshot, and Slater was about a minute away from beating you to death when I showed up and took out his men instead.”

  It was a low, vicious blow, reminding Bria of how Slater had almost killed her, of how he would have killed her if Finn and I hadn’t intervened, but it was a necessary evil. I didn’t want Bria to make another tear-filled trip to the cemetery to bury her best friend, but that’s what would happen if Dekes was as determined to get his hands on Callie’s restaurant as I thought he was.

  Bria pushed away from the railing and straightened up. The anger in her gaze glittered as brightly as the stars above.

  “I told Callie I would come by the restaura
nt for brunch in the morning,” she said in a low voice. “That I’d help her and Donovan find some way to deal with Dekes.”

  My eyes narrowed. “You didn’t mention that before.”

  “You didn’t ask.”

  We glared at each other, neither of us willing to compromise or admit that the other might have a valid point. Maybe, just maybe, Bria and Donovan could get Dekes to back off, at least for a little while. But what would happen when Bria went back to Ashland? What would happen when Donovan was called away on a case? Callie would be alone and vulnerable at the restaurant. A moment of opportunity, a locked door, a few matches, a little gasoline, and Bria’s friend would be just as crispy and deep-fried as the food she served up. That’s how I’d play things, if I were Dekes, along with planning a convenient alibi for myself. Hell, it sounded like the vamp was so connected and so powerful that he wouldn’t even have to go to the trouble of doing that.

  But I couldn’t make Bria understand that, any more than I’d been able to make Donovan realize the same thing back in Ashland. Maybe they didn’t want to understand. Hell, maybe they just couldn’t understand. Despite everything they’d seen on the job, Donovan and Bria still wanted to believe in the good in people, whereas my faith in the inherent decency of others had been shattered a long time ago. Maybe they were right and I was wrong, but I couldn’t let go of my cynicism, any more than they could relinquish their hope.

  Stalemate, once again.

  “I’m going to bed,” Bria muttered. “You coming?”

  “In a little while.”

  Bria stalked back inside the suite without another word. I heard her moving around, switching off lights, turning down the covers, and even brushing her teeth before shutting the bedroom door behind her, but I made no move to follow her. Better to let her cool off.

  Instead, I stayed outside for a long time, listening to the endless ebb and flow of the ocean and wishing the soft waves could carry my worries and fears out to sea with them, never to be heard from again.