“You sure you want to do this?” Fletcher asked for the third time since we’d left the house. “Vaughn has a lot on his mind right now, with the terrace collapse and the impending lawsuits. Not to mention his meeting with Mab at Dawson’s party. He’s bound to be jumpy and on edge.”
I thought of the wariness in Charlotte’s eyes earlier today at the Pork Pit and the way she’d scanned the restaurant again and again, as if she expected someone to hurt her at any second.
“I’m sure.”
“You got everything you need?” Fletcher asked.
After finishing my shift at the restaurant, I’d traded my jeans and blue apron for my other work clothes, the ones that only came in one color: black. Now I wore them from head to toe—a long-sleeved black T-shirt, black cargo pants, and black boots. A black vest lined with silverstone covered my chest. In addition to absorbing all forms of elemental magic, silverstone was great at stopping bullets, and the vest would help keep me safe from any blasts of magic or bursts of gunfire that Vaughn might send my way. Despite the sweltering heat, I’d also pulled my hair back and tucked my ponytail underneath a snug black toboggan. As a final measure, I’d smeared a bit of black greasepaint under my eyes to break up the paleness of my face and help me blend in with the gathering shadows.
“Gin?” Fletcher asked again. “It never hurts to do a final check to make sure.”
He was big on being as prepared as possible, especially when it came to being certain that you hadn’t forgotten any important supplies. Sometimes Fletcher would check and re-check his weapons two, or three, or even more times before he was satisfied that he was ready to go, and he’d taught me to do the same thing.
So I shifted in my seat, doing one last mental inventory of my knives. Two up my sleeves, one tucked against the small of my back, and two in the sides of my boots, just like usual. I wasn’t carrying a gun. I didn’t need one. Not tonight.
Not for this job.
“Yeah, I’ve got everything.”
Fletcher nodded and stared through the windshield at the compound again. Vaughn Construction took up its own fenced-in block in the downtown loop, although it was situated closer to Northtown than to Southtown. Several businesses lined the street across from the compound. Fletcher had parked the van in a restaurant lot with a dozen other cars, and no one had given it or us a second look. He was good at picking just the right spot to blend in with his surroundings.
“Sophia told me that boy came into the restaurant today,” Fletcher said. “Sebastian.”
I tensed. I’d been so concerned about Finn ratting me out that I’d never considered that Sophia might do it instead.
“Yeah. So what? It doesn’t matter.”
“Sophia said that the two of you looked awful cozy together.”
“Not that cozy,” I said. “Considering that he brought his baby sister along with him.”
“Don’t be a smartass. That’s Finn’s thing.”
I shrugged.
Fletcher shook his head. “There’s still something that I don’t like about this job. And it’s not just the boy’s interest in you.”
I bristled. He said “interest” like it was the worst thing ever that Sebastian liked me.
“Don’t worry about that,” I said, my voice harsh. “After I kill his father, Sebastian will forget all about me. He’ll have too many other things to deal with. He won’t even remember some random waitress he was supposed to go out with. Even if he does, I doubt that he’ll come knocking on my door anytime soon. So see? You have nothing to worry about. Problem solved.”
The words were as true as they’d been when I’d said them to Finn earlier. And once again, they shot an arrow of hurt straight into my heart. Fletcher stared at me, his green eyes bright and searching.
I returned his gaze with a cold, flat, impassive one of my own. No matter how I felt about Sebastian, this was no time for any sort of soft sentiment.
After several seconds, he nodded. “You’re probably right.”
He drew in a breath, like he was going to say something else. I waited, expecting him to ask me yet again if I really wanted to go through with this, but he didn’t. Instead, his mouth turned down with a hint of sadness, although I had no idea why.
“Just be careful,” Fletcher finally said.
I nodded. “Always.”
I got out of the van. Fletcher stayed where he was behind the wheel, in case things didn’t go as planned and I needed to make a quick getaway. But I didn’t anticipate any problems—I was too motivated to fail.
I lowered my head, tucked my hands into my pockets, and strolled down the street, heading away from the main gate of the compound. I kept my pace slow and easy, as though I were out for a late-night walk, instead of getting ready to murder a man for money. I thought about whistling to add to my cover but decided against it. Finn might have indulged in such theatrics but not me.
I made it to the end of the block and risked a quick glance around. Farther up the street, close to Fletcher’s van, folks laughed, talked, and smoked underneath the red awning of a restaurant that stretched all the way out to the curb. The name Underwood’s flowed across the awning fabric in an elaborate gold script. Some fancy new place that I’d heard Finn talk about, the kind of highfalutin joint where they charged you ten bucks for a glass of tap water. A few cars also drove by on the street, but no one so much as looked in my direction.
Good. That would make this easier.
When I was sure that no one was watching me, I crossed the intersection so that I was on the street that fronted the construction compound. I paused again at the corner, as though I were going to head on over to the next block, my gaze scanning over everything. Satisfied that I was still in the clear, I rounded the corner, stepped off the street, slid behind a tree, and wormed my way through a few patches of weeds until I reached the chain-link fence that surrounded Vaughn Construction.
I crouched down, looking left and right for any foot or vehicle traffic on the sidewalk or street and listening for any sounds in the compound. Any whispers of clothing rubbing together, the scuff of boots on the hard-packed ground, even the soft padding of a guard dog loping this way.
Nothing—I saw and heard nothing.
I unzipped one of the pockets on my vest, pulled out a small pair of wire cutters, and quickly snipped a straight line up the metal links. Despite all of the expensive equipment that lay beyond, Vaughn thought that the fence and all the lights strung around it were enough to keep people out, and he hadn’t bothered to have the metal electrified. Fool. I was mildly surprised that members of some Southtown gang hadn’t made their way over here, climbed the fence, and hot-wired some of Vaughn’s pickup trucks, driving them right back out through the metal links.