Threescore & Tequila (Toil & Trouble Book 4)

by Heather R. Blair

  I’ll share everything I have all right, but not what I fear.

  That shit is mine to deal with and mine alone.

  He refuses to take me into the tunnels. Yet, anyway. But Merry does agree to tell me where each one of the breached entrances leads.

  Carved deep into the earth by elemental magic, the gnome underground is a tangled but highly efficient highway to just about anywhere—for gnomes. No one else can navigate them without losing their mind. At least, that’s the story.

  Merry informs me there will be multiple possibilities of a final destination. I figured that much. But after I give him every entrance I’ve tracked the vics to, he is able to confirm that they all lead to the Old World—northern Europe. Just like I suspected. A twinge of unease works its way down my spine, but I shrug it off. Europe is a big place. Working with Merry, I’m hoping to narrow that down to a single country or region.

  I give him the dates and times next. Descriptions, ages, all the crap that sounds so clinical coming out of my mouth, but I feel each name in my soul.

  Especially the last two. Fiona and Julie.

  All of the missing are young, all witches. Ten in total that I know of. There could be more. Six have been taken within the last four months. Whoever is behind this was careful at first, but the disappearances seem to be escalating. The oldest witch taken is thirty-two, the youngest is Fiona. She was taken almost two weeks ago, and her sixteenth birthday is in three days. A strawberry-blond teenager whose lively, freckled face is burned into my brain. Her dad showed me a worn picture, taking it out of his wallet, pressing it into my hand with shaking fingers, blinking back tears. She doesn’t look much like Carly, not really, but I couldn’t help but feel the punch in my gut. I took the job. I figured it would keep my mind off of Stephen, but I wasn’t getting much of anywhere. Until Julie’s best friend approached me last week—not a witch herself, but a dryad named Taika.

  It’s odd for a forest spirit to have such a bond with one of the Rootless that they would miss them, let alone hire someone to find them. Taika, however, is definitely torn up over the disappearance of her friend. They could be lovers, I suppose, but I didn’t ask. Especially when Taika offered me a payment that blew my goddamn mind.

  Dryads, naiads and the like haven’t much use for money. A lot of the FTC world is the same. Barter is the currency of choice in our realm. I would’ve taken her case for a lot less, especially after Fiona’s, but what she was offering, I wasn’t about to refuse.

  Taika was how I found out about the others.

  A cold wind kisses the nape of my neck. I swear I hear the pad of soft footfalls behind me.

  When I turn to look around the stone-scattered hill, my fingers brushing the hilt of my sword, there’s no one in sight. I walk past the foot of Enger Tower nice and slow, watching my back and following the sun as it sinks toward the horizon.

  With Merry on board, I should feel one step closer to figuring everything out. Instead, I have that nagging feeling, the one that says I’ve forgotten something.

  It’s probably a lot bigger than just leaving the stove on at home, but with nothing else to do until he gets back to me, I might as well check.

  Carly is in the kitchen. Styx is with her.

  I hesitate before walking in. Ana returned from her ‘errand’ last week, but Carly hasn’t been home since Seph came back.

  I know where Ana was, or rather when. Mom is still there, keeping an eye on something. Carly, though . . . I haven’t a clue what Carly has been up to and I’m sure as hell not going to ask. Especially with that monster lurking over her shoulder, his golden eyes flat when he notices me loitering in the doorway.

  Styx unnerves me. I know Seph trusts him and Carly is in love with him, but Ana and I have been around the block a few thousand times more than those two. We agree there is something not quite right about that man, something indefinable. He’s not an FTC, which is fine. I’m not racist, despite my father’s inclinations. I’m also ninety-nine percent sure he’s not a god, no matter what the Ojibwe think. Whatever Styx is, though, you can bet it’s one hundred percent trouble.

  Unlike Ana, I didn’t voice my concerns to Carly. I won’t—not until I have something concrete. Ana can be a nag. As it’s kind of my fault she’s that way, I ignore it most of the time. The problem is, Carly and Seph ignore her, too, which means it’s on my shoulders to make sure they stay safe. Whether they know I’m doing it or not.

  I prefer not.

  Mushy stuff makes me skittish. It’s been that way since forever. Well, not forever, just since the night we ran from our father. I didn’t know what was going on, not really. I was six years old.

  I did know that Mom was scared. And I knew we had to get out. I could feel the darkness reaching for us, cold and hard, like Father’s fingers around the back of my neck when he was angry.

  Carly was stumbling along, whining for the kittens we’d left behind, Ana was carrying Seph, her lip stuck out, both of them about ready to bawl because Carly was sad. I looked up, my own lip trembling to see the moonlight flickering over my mother’s strained, white face. It hit me that if my sisters lost it, she would, too.

  And tears weren’t going to save us. So I grabbed Seph out of Ana’s arms and ran away. Laughing even though I wanted to cry, too.

  But no one cried, not that night.

  We played tag through the midnight forest as Mom wove the spell that would separate us for the next three hundred years. Ana went to King Louis’s court. Myself to Victorian London. Carly to 1940s Los Angeles, and Seph here, a future and place so far away from medieval Normandy I couldn’t have imagined it back then, even with all the magic in the world.

  So, instead of just five years between me and Seph, there are now over a hundred and fifty. A literal lifetime, even between Carly and I, though technically I am only three years her senior when it comes to birth order. I consider Carly as I step into the room.

  We’re the middle children. Supposedly, that makes us the peacemakers. It’s true that neither of us likes drama and we both have a penchant for drawing, but otherwise Carly is nothing like me. She favors Mom more than the rest of us. Taller, slimmer, with that touch of red in her hair and green in her eyes. She’s also flightier, dreamier and sweeter. Is that a good thing? I’m not sure. But I am damn sure not letting anyone hurt her. My eyes narrow as I turn my focus to Styx.

  I’ve always been good at distractions and getting to the bottom of things. I’m even better now. Until I’ve got the dirt on him, Carly won’t even know I’m looking.

  Neither will he.

  They’re making muffins. At least they were. Right now, she’s sitting on the kitchen island, her legs wrapped around the aforementioned lake monster.

  It’s too early for fresh blueberries, but she’s got a bowlful of them next to her. Wild, too, by the looks of things. As per usual, Carly has half of whatever she’s doing all over herself. Along with her sprinkling of freckles, flour and sugar dust her nose. Her curly, strawberry-blond hair is twisted into a messy braid. Her shirt is unbuttoned a couple buttons too far. There’s a handprint outlined in flour on her ass. A big hand. She jumps when my boots hit the red-tiled floor of the kitchen.

  Sweet little Carly getting busy in the kitchen. What is the world coming to?

  Styx isn’t looking at me now but at her. And whatever issues I have with this man, one thing I am dead certain of is that he is beyond gone on my sister.

  “He was hungry,” she says with a blink and a blush, as if just noticing the mess she’s made.

  “Mm-hmm.” I decide not to point out I know exactly what her pet monster was hungry for. Instead, I skirt the island counter and grab a handful of blueberries. “Have you seen Seph yet?”

  “Yeah.” Carly’s eyes light up as she unwinds her long legs from Styx’s waist. “She looks great. You’d never know—” Her blush intensifies.

  “That I stabbed her in the back? I know, right? It didn’t even leave a mark.” Except on my soul.
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  Carly blinks at my tone. “I told them to trust you.”

  Something tightens in my throat as I stare at Carly. I hadn’t expected anyone to stand up for me—not with what I had to do. But maybe I had hoped.

  “Did you?” I do my best to sound bored as I swallow the blueberries along with unshed tears. Styx looks pissed, but my sister’s eyes with their touch of green are gentle.

  “I know it’s difficult,” she says with a tiny smile. “But could you try not to be such a bitch, big sister?”

  “Yes, that would be a welcome change,” Styx snaps.

  “Fine then. Let me remove my bitchy self so you two can carry on with your ‘baking.’” I wave a careless hand and try not to bolt for the hallway.

  I hurry around the corner, eyes stinging, to nearly collide with a tiptoeing assassin. He’s got his boots in one hand, his sword in the other. My eyes narrow, all trace of tears gone.

  My sister Ana’s room is right at the top of these stairs.

  Walk of shame, assassin-style.

  How come everyone in this house is getting laid but me?

  Tyr takes a step back and smiles. There is a thread of caution in that smile. As well there should be.

  “My, my, fancy meeting you here, love.”

  Tyr is a genuine asshole, but I’ve met worse. Still, he’s not at the top of my favorite people list. (It’s a very short list.)

  “I live here, dickhead.”

  “Small world, isn’t it?” He sets his boots down and steps into them one at a time, never letting go of his sword or taking his eyes off of me. Smart man. But he knows me better than most.

  We go way back, Tyr and I.

  5

  Last November

  I stare at T&T’s basement door, making my breathing slow and even, even though my pulse is thundering along, loud in my ears like Poe’s tell-tale Heart. I dislike thinking about the past. But when it’s being dragged unconscious down a hallway by your baby sister, sometimes you have to bite the bullet.

  Seph is still passed out in her office. I made sure of that already, but just in case, I whisper a tendril of rhyme and let it unfurl in front of me. The blue and gold strands dance back and forth as I weave them quickly into a simple trigger spell and loop it around the knob. Anyone touches this door after me, and I’ll know instantly.

  I don’t creep down the stairs, I stomp. There isn’t a sound below except the pipes giving the occasional grumble. When I get to the bottom, the makeshift jail cell Seph threw up glitters with golden threads, like my own magic. It’s the Gosse family signature, only instead of my cobalt blue, her spell has a lavender glow. It could be worse. She could cast in pink.

  The weaving she’s done is pretty impressive. I take a step back, examining it from top to bottom. Damn impressive. She’s getting stronger with Jack back, just like Mom predicted. But I don’t want or need to undo my sister’s magic. Instead, I find the biggest gap, lift the remnants of my cast to my fingertips and blow.

  Magic balloons outward, sneaking through the hole and widening it more and more until I can step through Seph’s wall.

  The man she ‘caught’ isn’t asleep, just pretending to be. I kick him with the toe of my boot. Hard. He doesn’t stir. As soon I draw my sword, his eyes snap open. Black eyes, glittery and amused.

  “Is this a jail break? Jett, I didn’t know you cared.”

  “I don’t, but we need to talk. Outside.”

  “Fine. As long as I get some smokes out of it.” He stretches lazily as if he’s woken up at the Ritz-Carlton instead of a stained concrete floor with a discarded couch cushion for a pillow. At five foot nine inches and maybe 160 pounds, Tyr shouldn’t be an overly intimidating guy. But as he gets to his feet, it takes everything I have not to step back. I know too well what he’s capable of. Wrapped in my magic, he’s effectively neutralized, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to drop my guard entirely.

  Once outside, I walk him down to the corner market and let him buy his damn cancer sticks. I know I won’t get anything out of him otherwise. As soon as we’re out the door, I’m in his face.

  “I kind of lied to Seph while you were out. I acted like I didn’t recognize you.”

  “Well, that would be awkward, wouldn’t it?” He’s unwrapping cellophane as carefully as someone’s maiden aunt with a present at Christmas. “Seeing as they don’t know you and I are old school chums. I am thinking you want to keep the why and where of that to yourself.”

  I glare and he chuckles.

  “Why are you hunting my sister, Tyr? Or should I say, pretending to?”

  “No idea what you mean by that, love.” He finishes opening his smokes without looking at me, shaking one out to lift it to his lips.

  Without further preamble, I throw him up against the wall. My elbow keeps about a hundred psi on his Adam’s apple while my knee slams his balls somewhere into the vicinity of his lungs.

  He gurgles nicely, dropping his precious cigarettes all over the sidewalk.

  I let him go. Mostly because I don’t want to be puked on. Tyr spins away, bent over and gagging. I don’t feel even a twinge of remorse. Money and pain are the only ways to make an assassin of the realm realize you mean business. I’m a tightwad, so pain it is.

  Tyr dry heaves once, twice, then leans his head against the wall. After a second, he twists around to face me, keeping his back to the wall as he straightens his legs carefully. I’m pleased to see they’re trembling.

  “I forgot how charming you can be, Jett.” Sweat gleams at his temples, but there’s a twisted smile on his lips as he gathers up the scattered smokes.

  “Funnily enough, I didn’t forget anything about you—including the fact there is no way in hell my baby sister and her human friend took you down.”

  “Appreciate the vote of confidence in my abilities, but even the best of us have our off days.”

  “Not you.”

  He extends one of the slightly bent cigarettes to me. I wrinkle my nose and shake my head.

  “Living the clean life these days, eh? I wouldn’t have thought it of you.”

  “Cut the shit, Tyr. What’s going on?”

  “Well, I could tell you . . .” He takes a drag and lets it out. “But then I’d have to kill you.”

  I laugh. “You’ve tried, remember?”

  His lips tighten and for the first time he looks pissed.

  I could always get under his skin, even when no one else could. It made for some interesting times when we were at assassin academy together. Tyr here was the star student. Top of the class.

  Unlike me.

  It wasn’t anything like an actual school, of course. More boot camp than Hogwarts, if boot camp included twisted Valkyrie drill sergeants with a raging case of eternal PMS. A passing grade meant you got to live another day. Hell of an incentive to maintain the old GPA.

  No one in my family knows what I did. Well, my mom might. It’s hard enough keeping secrets from a normal mother, let alone one who is a witch that can travel through time and has more tricks up her sleeves than a Cthulhu card sharp. I was gone for two years, so she probably missed me at some point.

  Tyr lifts his hands when I take a step closer. I may have dropped out, but I made an impression first. He’s not scared of me, but he’s not stupid either. “Okay, okay. Someone’s trying to kill your sister. I’m pretty sure you know that much. But I’m betting you don’t know someone else hired me to save her.”

  It’s like a one-two punch to the gut. I know who’s going to kill Seph. Now-familiar nausea grips my gut. But who would hire an assassin to save her? And why? “Who is it?”

  He wags a finger at me. “We’re keeping things anonymous.”

  “Sure. Like you’d be barmy enough to take a job without knowing your employer.” Even if he never requested a face-to-face meet, it’s Assassin 101 to know who you’re working for and why. Tyr doesn’t break those kinds of rules. This motherfucker doesn’t do anything without knowing why.

  “What
can I say? They made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”

  I don’t believe this crap. “Really? How much?”

  He shifts his weight. “It’s not always about the money.”

  My eyes narrow. “For you? It’s about nothing but the money.” I have to blink twice because I swear the son of a bitch is blushing. And he won’t make eye contact. What the fuck? “Tell me, or I’ll find out where Seph hid your sword and drop the damn thing down the Mariana Trench.”

  He grimaces. I’m pretty sure the only thing Tyr has feelings for in this whole wide world—besides his own skin—is that sword.

  “My current employer has . . . information. The incriminating kind, if you get my drift.”

  “They’re blackmailing you?” I can’t help my grin because, if it’s true, this is hilarious. Tyr always claimed to be half gypsy. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but he definitely has the soul of a grifter. It’s part and parcel of what makes him one of the best. His reputation among our classmates was this legendary thing. Getting taken by Tyr was a rite of passage. I know for a fact he got one over on Freya herself.

  And survived.

  That someone successfully turned that shit around on him is too perfect.

  “Yeah.” He frowns at my amusement. “Karma’s a bitch. And very probably a witch, too.” His look turns sly.

  “What does that mean?”

  “One of the perks of this job is it comes with as much spellwork as I want. Custom-made. It’s good, too. Best I’ve ever seen. Even better than yours.”

  Internally, I scoff. Tyr hasn’t seen better than me. And honestly, there isn’t better than me. Except Mom, of course. And—

  I know my face is a mask, expressionless and blank, but Tyr is the best for a reason. His eyes widen in satisfaction. “You know who my employer is,” he breathes. “Isn’t that interesting?”

  I yank on my magic and shove him down the street. “Back to the clink for you, asshole. Share time is over.”