Bitter Bite (Elemental Assassin #14)

by Jennifer Estep

  “Useful for what?” I asked.

  “Once I realized that Fletcher was an assassin, it was easy enough to wait, plan, and set things up. I went ahead with the pregnancy, even though it was the longest, most miserable nine months of my life, pretending that I was excited about the baby.” She rolled her eyes. “But Fletcher never even suspected what I was really up to. Not until it was too late.”

  Deirdre started walking up and down in front of the cage, trailing her long red fingernails over the metal bars like a cat sharpening her claws. I made sure not to look at the padlock, even though I was holding my breath the whole time, hoping that she wouldn’t jar it loose and make it drop to the floor. If that happened, I was dead. Deirdre and her Ice magic were dangerous enough, but Dimitri, Santos, and Tucker were still here, standing behind her. One of them could easily pull a gun and put a bullet in my head while I was battling her.

  She ran her nails along the bars a final time, then stepped away from the cage and faced me again. “After I had the baby, I told Fletcher that I wanted to reconcile with my parents. So I said that I was taking Finnegan to see them.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I took the money I got from the diamond in that pathetic ring and paid a homeless bum to slap me around. I also ripped up Finnegan’s clothes, as if he’d been attacked right along with me. Then I rushed over to the Pork Pit, crying my eyes out, and told Fletcher that my father had hit me and that my mother had tried to take the baby away from me. He never even questioned me.” She let out a dark, satisfied chuckle. “As for what happened next, well, you knew Fletcher. You knew all about his savior complex and exactly how far he would go to protect his family.”

  My heart plummeted into my stomach. “Fletcher killed your parents.”

  “Just like that.” Deirdre snapped her fingers, the sound as loud as a gunshot. “With my parents dead, I got my trust fund and what was left of the Shaw fortune. I wanted to leave right away, but of course, I had to wait for the estate to be settled. Three months was better than a lifetime of waiting, though, so I stuck around and pretended to be the grieving daughter and doting new mother. I’ll admit that the thought of all that money made me a wee bit impatient and that I didn’t play the parts as well as I should have. I think that’s when Fletcher first suspected that I had set him up. But I didn’t care. He was nothing but a tool, and I was done with him.”

  “What happened?” I asked, wanting to hear the rest of it, even though I could guess how bad it was going to be.

  “As soon as the estate was settled and all the money was mine, I went to that monstrosity that Fletcher called a house and packed up my things. I’d been planning to disappear without a trace, but he came home and caught me right before I left. He was devastated at the idea of my leaving him. He begged me to stay, if you can imagine that.” She laughed again. “Told me that he knew how much I was hurting over my parents’ deaths but that Finnegan needed me, that he needed me, and we could work things out. What a blind fool he was.”

  “What did you do?” I whispered.

  She looked at me, her blue eyes colder than I had ever seen them. “I told him the truth. About how I’d used him to get my money. You should have seen the look on his face. It truly was priceless. One of my fondest memories.”

  My heart dropped again, like an elevator that just kept plummeting down, down, down. I’d once killed an innocent man, been tricked and manipulated into it much the same way Fletcher had been, so I could imagine how he’d felt. The anger, the guilt, the shame at how completely Deirdre had fooled him. The icy sting of her betrayal would have eaten away at him the rest of his life.

  “Once he’d realized what I’d done, Fletcher actually tried to stop me. Pulled one of his little knives and came at me as if he thought he had a chance against my Ice magic.” Deirdre shook her head. “He put up more of a fight than I expected, and we beat each other up pretty good. Fletcher even had a chance to kill me.”

  “So why didn’t he?” I muttered.

  She shrugged. “Because I grabbed hold of Finnegan’s cradle. I threatened to freeze him to death if Fletcher didn’t let me go.”

  Despite all the bad things I’d done, all the people I’d killed, all the gruesome torture I’d endured and dished out in return, even I sucked in a ragged breath at that. Dimitri and Santos both winced and shifted on their feet. Tucker kept messing with his phone, as bored as ever. Fletcher had warned me that Deirdre didn’t care about anyone other than herself, but the casual, matter-of-fact way she talked about killing her own son . . .

  She wasn’t coldhearted—she didn’t have any heart at all.

  “Of course, Fletcher let me go. I told him that if he ever threatened me in any way, I would kill Finnegan, along with those two Deveraux busybodies. Then I walked out the door and never looked back.” She shook her head again. “Although the same can’t be said for Fletcher. I knew that he kept track of me, crept around in the bushes and took pictures from time to time. As if there were ever any reason for me to come back to Ashland.”

  “Not even for your son?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

  “Finnegan?” She shrugged again. “He’s just another tool that I happen to need.”

  “And once you’re done with him?”

  “Then I’ll dispose of him, just the way I did Fletcher all those years ago.”

  Her words chilled me to the bone, because I knew she meant every single one of them.

  But she still hadn’t told me the most important thing: exactly what she needed Finn for. I opened my mouth to ask, but Tucker cleared his throat, cutting me off. Deirdre looked over at him, and he waggled his phone at her, reminding her that it was time to wrap up our little tête-à-tête. Whatever was going on, whatever their plan was, it was starting now.

  “Santos,” she called out. “I believe you have an appointment to keep.”

  The giant nodded and pivoted on his heel. The sudden motion caused his coat to fly out from his body, revealing his dark gray clothes again. I frowned. I’d been right about him wearing some sort of uniform, complete with a company name stitched on the breast pocket, but the coat dropped back into place, and he walked away before I could make out what it was.

  “And I also have my part to play.” Deirdre fixed her icy blue gaze on me again. “Good-bye, Gin. Say hello to Fletcher for me when you see him. And do tell him that I’ll be sending Finnegan along shortly to join the two of you.”

  “You bitch!” I hissed, my hands clenching around the cage bars. “If you so much as touch Finn, I will rip out your heart with my bare fucking hands.”

  “Oh, I doubt that, since you’ll be dead long before Finnegan will be. He is still useful, while you are not.” She tilted her head to the side, studying me as though I were some odd specimen. “You really are just like Fletcher. So protective and so predictable. He couldn’t see the big picture until it was too late. And you? You’ll never even get the chance.”

  “Well, enlighten me, then,” I snapped.

  “I’m not that foolish.” She smiled. “I only indulged your whim about Fletcher because it amused me, and I knew how much it would hurt you to knock him off that pedestal you’ve put him on. Besides, I rather like the idea of you going to your grave knowing that you failed to protect your so-called brother.”

  “I’m more Finn’s family than you are, you coldhearted bitch.”

  “As if I would care about something as silly as that.” She looked at me again, that cold, cold smile still on her face. “The only thing your precious family has gotten you is dead, Gin. Think about that when Dimitri starts torturing you. I’ll be sure to remind Finnegan of it when I do the same to him.”

  Her smile widened at my horrified expression, and she threw her head back and laughed, the light, pealing sound ringing like a death knell as she turned and left the warehouse.

  21

  Tucker didn’t even glance at me as he slid his phone into his jacket pocket and trailed outside after his boss. S
antos was already gone, so that left me alone with Dimitri Barkov. He snapped his fingers a couple of times, and the guard standing at the door stuck his head outside and let out a loud whistle.

  A minute later, two more guys entered the warehouse, and the three of them swaggered over to the cage. All were giants, seven feet tall, with big, beefy bodies, and I recognized them as some of the enforcers in Dimitri’s crew. The kind of guys tasked with breaking arms, knees, and even necks when the occasion called for it. They were all carrying long, heavy tire irons, one of which they handed over to Dimitri.

  The Russian mobster grinned and slapped the tire iron against the palm of his hand several times, trying to intimidate me. Idiot. He was already dead. So were his men. They just didn’t know it yet. I could have busted out of my cage anytime I wanted to, but I intended to give this canary a chance to sing first.

  “So you wanted your revenge on me, and you threw in your lot with Deirdre to try to get it.” I shook my head. “That’s the last mistake you’ll ever make, Dimitri.”

  He chuckled. “Not just Deirdre. Her entire group. They offered me a very nice compensation package to help them.”

  My eyes narrowed. “What group? Who else are you working for?”

  He clucked his tongue at me. “Dead women shouldn’t ask so many questions. I told you that I’d kill you when you humiliated me on the Delta Queen. You should have believed me.”

  “You haven’t managed to do it yet.” I mocked him. “Don’t get too cocky, sugar. I’m still breathing, which means that you’re still going to wind up dead before this is all said and done.”

  He growled and whipped his hand forward, trying to smash his tire iron against my fingers. I lurched back out of the way of his strike, but the tire iron still slammed into the cage, hard enough to shake the door—and make the open padlock slip out of its slot and drop to the floor.

  Dimitri stared at the lock, his bushy black eyebrows drawing together in confusion. Then his eyes widened with realization. “Get her, you fools—”

  Too late.

  Even as the three giants converged on the cage, I rammed the door open with my shoulder, reached for my Ice magic, and sent a spray of daggers shooting out of the palms of my hands. The sharp, deadly needles caught the giant closest to me square in the throat, and he went down, choking on his own blood. I darted forward and snatched up his tire iron.

  The second giant came at me with his own tire iron, but I held my weapon out in front of me and parried his blows.

  Clack-clack-clack-clack.

  Our makeshift swords banged together again and again, each of us determined to break through the other’s defense and brain them with the metal.

  “Don’t just stand there!” Dimitri barked at the third giant, who was watching our fight with wide eyes. “Shoot her, you idiot!”

  The giant fumbled for the gun under his jacket, yanked it free, and aimed it at my head. Just as he pulled the trigger, I ducked down and plastered my body up against my attacker’s.

  Crack! Crack! Crack!

  The guard shot his friend in the back, making the other giant bellow with pain. While he was distracted, I yanked his tire iron out of his hand and cracked both pieces of metal against his head, one after the other, like I was playing a drum set.

  Crunch-crunch.

  He whimpered and dropped like a stone to the floor, blood spurting out from the cracks I’d opened in his skull.

  But I was already whipping around toward the guard with the gun and using my Stone magic to harden my skin.

  Crack! Crack! Crack!

  Bullets pinged off my body and thunk-thunk-thunked into the surrounding crates. The guard kept pulling the trigger, even as I charged at him. He ran out of ammo and threw his gun at me, but the weapon clattered off my Stone-hardened skin just like the bullets had. The guard yelped in surprise and turned to run, but I raised my tire irons and slammed them into his skull before he had a chance to take a step.

  Crunch-crunch.

  He collapsed onto the floor, his body twitching from the massive trauma.

  That left Dimitri.

  Instead of doing the smart thing and running away while his guards died, Dimitri stood his ground, yanked a gun out from against the small of his back, and started firing at me.

  Crack!

  Crack! Crack!

  Crack!

  But his bullets were as useless as all the others had been, and I was on top of him before he’d even finished firing. This time, I went low, ducking his awkward punch, and slammed one of the tire irons into his left knee.

  Crack!

  His kneecap shattered on impact, and Dimitri staggered back and flopped onto his ass. His gun slipped from his hand and tumbled away, and he clutched his knee and screamed curses.

  “You bitch!” he yelled. “You broke my fucking knee!”

  I tossed away one of the tire irons and dropped to my own knees, straddling Dimitri. He tried to fight back, so I grabbed his ear and slammed his skull against the concrete floor, stunning him. His toupee slipped off his head.

  But I had to give him credit. He blinked away his daze and raised his fists to punch at me again. So I laid the tire iron across his throat, putting my weight behind it, cutting off his air. Dimitri’s dark eyes bulged, and his face turned beet-red, but he didn’t dare try to hit me again. He knew how easily I could crush his windpipe.

  “Start talking,” I hissed. “What is Deirdre up to with Santos? Where are they going? How is Finnegan Lane involved?”

  Dimitri glared up at me, a mulish expression on his face.

  I eased the pressure on the tire iron, even as I dropped one hand down to my side. I reached for my Ice magic, creating a dagger, then stabbed him in the thigh with it.

  Dimitri screamed, and I yanked the dagger right back out again, making him scream even louder.

  “Do you want to start talking now? Or should I make you my own personal pincushion?”

  “I—I don’t know!” he screamed. “I don’t know what she’s up to! I swear!”

  I scraped the cold, bloody dagger down his cheek, making him shudder. “So what do you know? What is she doing with Santos? What kind of uniform was he wearing?”

  “It’s—it’s a security guard uniform!” Dimitri sputtered. “I import them for lots of businesses! That’s one of the reasons they came to me for supplies!”

  “Which businesses? What was the name on his uniform?”

  “I don’t know! It’s just a generic uniform! I never saw what name Santos had put on it or any of the others!”

  I stopped, the Ice dagger right next to Dimitri’s left eye. “Others? How many uniforms did you give him?”

  His eyes flicked to the dagger, so I bore down with it, digging the cold tip into his face, deep enough to draw blood.

  “How many uniforms did you give him?” I asked again.

  “A—about a dozen!”

  “And what businesses employ guards with those kinds of uniforms?”

  “Some jewelry stores, museums, the Posh boutique, all the downtown banks . . .”

  Dimitri kept rattling off businesses, but he’d already said the magic word: museums.

  As in Briartop.

  I cursed. Deirdre was planning to rob her own jewelry exhibit, just like I’d thought. Of course she’d had an ulterior motive for getting all those gems in one place. But I still didn’t understand how she thought she was going to pull it off. Even if she had a dozen men, including Santos, there were twice as many museum guards, along with at least a couple of cops. The only thing the thieves were going to get was dead. Not that I had a problem with that, but it was such a big, stupid risk to take.

  According to Silvio, Deirdre was skimming millions from her charity foundation. So why would she need to steal the jewelry? Sure, it was a big enough payday to tempt anyone, but everyone knew that Deirdre was the driving force behind the exhibit. Why make enemies out of all the people who’d donated their jewelry? Folks in Ashland had long memories a
nd enough cash and connections to hunt her down and make her pay for stealing from them. And I still didn’t see how Finn fit in with all of this. Something else was going on here. Something I just didn’t see yet.

  Dimitri’s hand crept across the concrete, his fingers inching toward the tire iron that I’d dropped earlier. I snapped up my Ice dagger and drove it all the way through his hand. He screamed, but I pressed the tire iron against his throat again. He swallowed down his screams, although tears streamed out of the corners of his eyes.

  “Tell me about Briartop. When exactly are Santos and his crew planning to hit the museum?”

  His eyes twitched, and his tongue swiped across his lips in a nervous gesture. “I—I didn’t say anything about Briartop. They don’t use those uniforms there.”

  I shook my head. “I hate it when people lie to me, Dimitri. Makes me want to stab them. But since I’ve already done that to you, I guess I’ll just have to settle for this instead.”

  I sent out a small burst of magic and shattered the Ice dagger still in his hand, making him scream again. But Dimitri was tougher than I’d given him credit for, because he surged up, grabbed the tire iron against his throat, and tried to wrest it away from me. Fool.

  I thought about questioning him some more, but that would take precious time. It was enough that I knew where Deirdre was headed, so I decided to put Dimitri out of my misery. He didn’t even manage to get a good grip on the tire iron before I had formed another Ice dagger and rammed it into his throat.

  The mobster fell back, his blood sluicing across the floor and mixing in with the greasy strands of his black toupee. He let out a few wheezing breaths before his head lolled to the side and he was still.

  Silvio would have been proud of me. I’d finally scratched one enemy off my to-do list.