I wondered which one of us would make it out of here alive tonight.
I kept my face calm, serene, blank, as Mab stared at me. The Fire elemental frowned, as if something about me bothered her, and I wondered if the moment that I'd been waiting so long for was here. If Mab had finally recognized me as the Spider.
Like everyone else in Ashland, Mab knew me as Gin Blanco. In fact, the Fire elemental had been there the night that Jonah McAllister had ordered Elliot Slater to beat me at Ashland Community College to try to find out what I knew about Jake's death. Mab knew exactly who I was and what I looked like as Gin-especially when I was covered with my own blood.
The door swung open again, and two more women stepped inside. After another second of staring at me, the Fire elemental turned her attention to the two women, giving them the same sharp perusal.
I dried my hands, left the bathroom, and stepped out into the hallway. But I didn't go back to the ballroom. If I did that, I would lose whatever chance I might have to kill Mab. The Fire elemental wouldn't expose herself again. Not tonight.
So I meandered down the hallway, my eyes scanning the rooms that branched off either side, looking for a spot for a potential ambush. Mab had been expecting someone to come at her in the bathroom. In those tight quarters, the odds were in her favor-she could easily fry her attacker with her Fire magic before she had time to retreat or mount any kind of defense. It was exactly what I would have done if I'd been in Mab's position.
But maybe luck would finally smile on me, and the Fire elemental would lower her guard and be careless enough to let me take her by surprise on her way back to the ballroom.
More than a few folks moved back and forth in the hallways, going from the ballroom to the bathrooms and back again, or outside for a quick smoke or an even quicker f**k. They were all wrapped up in their own little dramas, so no one saw me slip into a room and close the door almost shut behind me. No lights burned in the chamber, which was a sitting area, but I could still make out the crouching shapes of the thick, heavy furniture. I stayed in the shadows by the door and palmed two of my silverstone knives. Then I waited.
More people came and went in the hallway in front of me, laughing, talking, drinking, gossiping. Normally, I wouldn't have dreamed about doing a hit in a place like this, one that was so open, so exposed, and with so much foot traffic. But I didn't have a choice. Killing Mab was the only way to get the bounty off Bria's head, and I'd be damned if the Fire elemental would ever get her hands on my sister.
I started counting off the seconds in my head. Ten... twenty... thirty... But Mab was being just as patient as I was, because I stood in the shadows five minutes before the bathroom door down the hall opened, and Mab stepped outside. The Fire elemental stopped where she was a moment, surveying the scene around her. Her mouth thinned out into a flat, ugly slash in her face. Whatever she'd expected to happen in the bathroom, the fact that I hadn't taken the bait infuriated her. My hands tightened around my knives. Not for long, though. Not for long.
Mab rapped on the next door down the hallway, and two giants slid outside. Ah, so that's where she'd stashed her backup, in the next room over, ready to come in behind me if I somehow got away from her in the bathroom.
"Anything?" Mab snapped. Her anger made her normally delicate voice rasp almost as badly as Sophia's.
The giants both shook their heads.
"Nothing, ma'am," one of them rumbled. "We've checked everyone on the guest list. There's no one on the grounds who wasn't invited and identified when they came inside. No missing waiters, no extra workers, nothing like that at all. None of the regular staff even called in sick. If the Spider's here, we can't find her."
The Fire elemental glared at her two men. "Incompetent fools," she snarled. "Go check again. The bitch has to be here. She wouldn't pass up a chance like this."
The giants nodded and scurried away to go do their mistress's bidding. They passed my hiding spot and made the turn to go back toward the ballroom.
Mab paced back and forth in the hallway, muttering something under her breath. I imagined it wasn't very complimentary to me, though. A few people started to wander down the hall toward the bathroom, but one look at Mab had them backtracking the way that they'd just come. Good. I didn't need an audience for this.
I stood there and waited, just waited for her to come closer, close enough that I could leap out of the shadows and bury my knife in her back with one swift, fatal blow.
Finally, the Fire elemental dampened down her anger and quit muttering. She turned on her heel and stalked down the hall toward me. My hands tightened around my silverstone knives that much more. Thirty feet. Twenty... ten... five... Mab walked past my hiding spot, not even bothering to glance at the partially closed door.
I drew in a breath, slipped out of the room, and fell in step behind her, gathering my strength for what was to come.
I'd spent years learning how to be quick, quiet, and invisible, so Mab never heard the door open, and she never sensed my creeping up behind her. She was moving quicker than I'd anticipated, but five more steps and I'd be in range. Five more steps, and I could finally kill her.
Four... three... two... one... I raised one of my silverstone knives, ready to strike-
And that's when Jonah McAllister rounded the corner and entered the hallway in front of us. He spotted me at once-along with the knives in my hands.
"Behind you!" McAllister yelled.
Fuck. Just-fuck.
If I could, I would have slipped back into the shadows. But I was too committed now to turn back or wait for another opportunity. There was nothing else to do but go through with my strike.
McAllister's warning tipped off Mab, and she threw herself to one side. So instead of punching into her back, my knife only nicked her shoulder. Mab hissed with pain, and she went down in a heap on the floor. I started to throw myself on top of her to finish the job with my other knife, but some sense of self-preservation, some subconscious whisper of warning, some sense that it just couldn't be that f**king easy, made me pull back at the last second.
Good thing, since her fists burst into flames.
The elemental Fire flickered around her fingers and spread outward, snapping and cracking against her skin. I bobbed and weaved, trying to duck the arcing flames and stab her, but Mab managed to stay just out of arm's-and knife's-reach. Meanwhile, McAllister started bellowing for the giants who'd just left the hallway.
"Guards!" the lawyer roared. "Guards!"
I had maybe fifteen seconds before someone answered his frantic call, and I planned to make the most of them. This time I didn't hesitate. I reached for my Stone magic, used it to harden my skin, and threw myself on top of Mab, all in one motion, my first silverstone knife slashing through the air again.