Tock turned around to peer into the back seat. “He’s asleep.” She sighed and leaned her head against the window. “Was that the only person you’ve killed besides Chez?”
“No,” he answered quietly. “I was the one who killed the Chancellor, not Enne.”
Levi wasn’t sure why he told her that. Even if Semper had been despicable, now Levi’s actions had begun to feel like a pattern. Each time, he’d killed those who’d tried to kill him. But with his reputation growing and the bounty on his head up to ten thousand volts... This probably wasn’t the last time an incident like this would happen.
Tock let out a hollow laugh. “My father saved Malcolm Semper’s life. When he blew up the National Prison, Semper had been next on death row for treason to the Mizer kings.”
Narinder told Levi part of that story the first time he’d met Tock, but Levi had forgotten it until this moment. Tock’s father ignited the Revolution that destroyed his own father’s life. Levi felt that ought to symbolize something, but everything about the world suddenly felt meaningless.
“How did it feel to blow up Revolution Bridge, then?” he asked her. “Wasn’t that part of your family’s legacy?”
“My father was a mercenary. He wasn’t some hero.” Tock crossed her arms. “Heroes are overrated. That’s why I never wanted to be one.”
Maybe their family histories did have more in common than he’d thought.
Levi parked the car where the road gave way to sand. The ocean lay in front of them, its water black in the night. The city line was ten minutes behind them, and Levi suddenly realized, in his six years living in New Reynes, he’d never once left it.
“You don’t have to help if you don’t want to,” Levi told her.
“But I will,” she answered, and he breathed a sigh of gratitude, even if he probably depended on her too much.
They made two trips, the woman first and the man second. Levi did his best not to look at them, not to think about them, and so his mind wandered. He’d grown up on the beach, along this same ocean. He tried to focus on those memories rather than the one he was making right now. The bottom of his pants soaked as they rested the bodies face-down in the water. They sank slightly into the sand and broken shells, and waves lapped at their clothes.
Tock and Levi didn’t linger. By the time they returned to the museum, Levi thought Tock had actually drifted off, as well. But as they passed through the darkened streets of Olde Town, she murmured, “The first person I killed was by accident.”
Levi was about to ask how it had happened, but then realized he didn’t need to. He’d watched a car burst into flames tonight. He’d seen the entire structure of Revolution Bridge collapse into the Brint as though it had snapped in two. If Tock wasn’t careful, everyone around her could become collateral damage.
“I just wish it hadn’t been,” she added quietly.
Levi tried his best to give her a comforting smile while still navigating the narrow streets. “Don’t let your fallen heroes stop you from wanting to become one.”
“You always talk so highly of the old lords, like Veil and Havoc. Do you feel like a hero now?”
Levi remembered the weight of the man’s body going slack on top of him. He hoped the prize of the Iron Lord’s bounty had been worth it, to that man.
Then he thought of his view tonight from the top of Martingale Casino, and he hoped it was all still worth it to him.
ENNE
Lola pulled a stack of files from the metal cabinets and fanned herself with the manila folders. “I thought you said you had someone for us.”
Harvey pursed his lips. “Yes, we suggested Vito. But you said no.”
“Well, we’re still only taking girls.”
Harvey shot Enne an exasperated look. “You’ve hired all the female counters we had. How many more could you need?”
Enne perched by the windowsill of the warden’s office, hoping to catch a breeze. It was the hottest week in New Reynes on record.
“More organizations have expressed interest in investing,” she told Harvey, all businesslike. She was even dressed like a financier, with a pink button-up and a sleek skirt to match the ladies who worked on Hedge Street. Complete with her mask, her gang’s white satin gloves, and her favorite black lipstick, this had become her uniform. “We need more girls.”
“If you give us time, we’ll recruit more,” Bryce told her. He bent over his desk, his dark hair plastered across his forehead with sweat. For as many times as Enne came to visit, Bryce never looked pleasant. His clothes always hung on him, his eyes were always bloodshot, and despite all this sun, he actually seemed to be growing paler.
“How much longer?” Enne asked. With their stock market expanding by thousands of volts every day, Enne finally had the resources to begin digging up information on the Phoenix Club. But without new workers, she didn’t have the time to spare.
“Soon,” Harvey answered. “I’ll make the rounds at all the pubs and cabarets, where workers tired of their jobs go to unwind. That’s when they’re most receptive.”
Enne clicked her tongue in disgust. “You don’t need to poach them, Harvey.”
