I want to share what I did with the others, but they’re all still lying motionless on the forest floor. I watch the three of them breathe in and out, wondering how long until they…wake…
Threeof them.
But there should only be two. CJ and Ezra. Poppy entered the Afterlife in some Phantoms’ moritory. And Tolliver should be working on what went wrong with Juliet.
But instead, Tolliver’s lying next to CJ and Ezra. Feet and hands bound. A gag in his mouth.
I turn slowly, hoping for a reasonable explanation but knowing I’ll find none.
At the foot of the grave, Rook is bowing to his sister.
She stands tall and pale in the moonlight, arms spread as though she’s glorying in the feel of it.
“You’ve done well,” she says to Rook.
I shake my head, struggling to make sense of what I’m seeing.
My mind flies back to the con. Rook grieving his sister as I was grieving my brother. Rook opening the door covered in blood. Me falling prey to empathy. Rook, tears welling in his eyes. Me not feeling so alone. Rook kissing me. Rook making me feel seen.
Rook offering me exactly what I wanted, and I realize…
The con was never mine.
It was his.
And I—
I was the mark.
Rook’s eyes meet mine, and the corner of his mouth quirks.
“Welcome back,” he says to the person who is definitely not his sister, “Hades.”
TheBlow-Off
Thirty-Five
I’m standing in a graveyard watching a guy I just made out with in this very spot bowing to Hades, lord of darkness, whom I accidentally resurrected.
I may have made a mistake.
Credence—no,Hades—turns to me, a wide grin on her face.
“And is this our little necromancer?” she asks.
Something about the softness of her voice disturbs me. She takes a step and stumbles. Rook catches her arm like he just did to me minutes ago. Hades shrugs him off and straightens, squaring her shoulders.
“This body is so different,” she says, running her hands over her curves. “It will take some getting used to, but I like it.”
She takes a step in my direction, and I’m suddenly snapped back into reality. I have to get out of here. Now.
But not without the others.
I scramble back to where Tolliver lies in the grass.
“Wake up,” I beg, pulling the gag from his mouth and slapping my hands to the side of his face. “Wake up!”
I expect Hades to continue her slow approach, but instead, Rook is coming my way much, much faster.
