Still, as I watched and listened to the crews shout updates and directions to each other, I couldn’t help but think back to the last time I’d been so close to the mansion, the night that I’d tried to assassinate Mab by sneaking onto the grounds, climbing onto one of the mansion roofs, and sniping her with a crossbow through a dining room window. What I hadn’t known was that Mab had been hosting a dinner party for the group of bounty hunters she’d hired to track me down. Instead of killing Mab that night, I’d ended up getting shot and running through the woods for my life.
Then again, that’s how a lot of my nights ended.
So I wasn’t eager to risk another assassination attempt at the mansion. Not yet, anyway. Knowing my bad luck, I’d get spotted before I even got close enough to try to kill Madeline. Also deterring me were the giants who patrolled around the mansion, keeping an eye on the construction workers. All of them were armed with cell phones and guns, along with their massive fists.
More gun-toting giants marched back and forth across the lawn, coming all the way down to the edge of the grass. But they didn’t venture into the woods beyond, much less come close to where I was perched. There was no point to it, not during daylight hours anyway, since they would have a crystal-clear view of anyone slipping out of the tree line and trying to cross the lawn to get to the mansion—and be able to shoot her down before she got halfway across the grass.
Still, I thought it was a bit sloppy of Madeline, not extending the security net farther out. When Mab was alive, giants had roamed deep into the woods at all hours of the day and night, and nasty things like sunburst rune traps had been carved into the tree trunks, ready to spew elemental Fire in your face if you were unlucky enough to trigger them. Not to mention the trip-wires, bombs, and other deadly surprises that awaited anyone stupid enough to try to breach Mab’s outer defenses.
But Madeline seemed content to just secure the mansion itself, along with the landscaped grounds surrounding it. I wondered if she was really that confident in Emery Slater and the giant’s ability to protect her. Or perhaps Madeline was that confident in her own acid magic, along with the giant blood running through her veins, courtesy of her father, Elliot Slater.
So I leaned back against the tree trunk, peered through my binoculars, and munched on a chocolate granola bar, since I’d only had a liquid lunch at Northern Aggression. Truth be told, keeping watch in the woods was a pleasant enough way to spend an afternoon. It reminded me of many a hike that I’d taken with Fletcher. And at least I felt like I was actually doing something to figure out what Madeline was up to, instead of just twiddling my thumbs and waiting for her to crush me under the sharp, pointed heel of her white stiletto.
Still, while I kept my tree house lookout, I texted all my friends, checking in and making sure that they weren’t dealing with any sudden, suspicious problems like Roslyn was.
Owen was going into a meeting, while Eva Grayson, his baby sister, and Violet Fox, her best friend, were at their usual classes at the community college. Violet’s grandfather, Warren T. Fox, was running his store, Country Daze, up in the mountains above the city.
Jolene “Jo-Jo” Deveraux was busy perming, cutting, teasing, dyeing, and styling her clients’ hair at her beauty salon, while her sister, Sophia, was manning the Pork Pit for me, along with Catalina Vasquez, my best waitress. Catalina’s uncle, Silvio Sanchez, was off doing whatever personal assistants to assassins like me did.
Phillip Kincaid and Cooper Stills, respectively Owen’s best friend and mentor, were playing poker on Phillip’s Delta Queen riverboat. And Detective Bria Coolidge, my sister, and her partner, Xavier, were dealing with the never-ending paperwork that came with being some of the few good cops in Ashland.
So everyone was busy and distracted with their own lives, and I was the only one obsessing about Madeline and what she might have planned.
Then again, that’s the way it usually was.
Finally, an hour, two granola bars, and a bottle of water into my vigil, I was rewarded when the back doors of the mansion opened, and Madeline strolled out onto the patio, followed by Emery and Jonah. Madeline looked like she’d been working out, given her tight, white yoga pants and matching tank top. Her auburn hair was pulled back into a ponytail, while a white towel was draped around her neck, obscuring her silverstone crown-and-flame necklace. Emery and Jonah both still had on their suits from the dedication.
Madeline tossed her towel aside and settled herself in an oversize, white wicker chair that overlooked the pool. A maid wearing a white shirt and black pants with a bright red bun of hair brought out a silver tray with a pitcher of lemonade and several glasses. Emery and Jonah both waited until Madeline had a tall, frosty glass of lemonade in her hand before sitting down in matching chairs across from her.
I was pleased to note that Jonah didn’t look particularly comfortable, his briefcase sitting square and upright in his lap as if it would shield him from Madeline’s acid magic should she decide to unleash it on him. Jonah also tugged at his tie as if it were strangling him and eyed Emery with open suspicion, as if he expected her to try to beat him to death at any second.
It would serve the weaselly lawyer right if Madeline killed him. After all, he’d tried to steal her inheritance and had embezzled from Mab for years before that. Madeline had as many reasons to want him dead as I did, if not more. I doubted that she would do the deed for me, though. Not while she thought that McAllister could still be of some use to her.
Madeline and Emery sipped their lemonade, so I put down my binoculars, picked up the directional microphone, and flipped it on. Silvio had purchased the toy for me a few weeks ago. I’d told him what I wanted, and he’d shown up with it at the Pork Pit the very next day, with only a mild, chiding raise of his eyebrows as he handed me the bill. I would never admit it to him, but I kind of liked having an assistant, especially one as quiet, discreet, and efficient as Silvio.
Once I turned the microphone on, I started fiddling with the knobs, trying to maximize the range and clarity of sound. Mostly, what I heard was the steady, high-pitched whine-whine-whine of the power saws that the dwarven workers were using, along with the heavy thwack-thwack-thwacks of nails being hammered into boards. Whatever the crews were doing inside the mansion, it sounded big, loud, and impressive. Exactly what I would expect, given what a splash Madeline had made when she came back to Ashland.
After about ten minutes, some of the workers took a water break, and the sounds of the sawing and hammering died down to more muted, manageable levels. I leaned forward and adjusted the microphone a bit more, trying to get the most out of it that I could, before I pointed it at the patio again. It took me another thirty seconds, but I finally found a sweet spot that let me hear their conversation. I also raised my binoculars back up to my eyes and peered through them.