Page 22

I sigh, wondering how much I should tell him about my plans with Adrian. It’s not like he’s going to go to the cops, given what he is. “I needed to stay off the main roads,” I finally say. “Avoid cameras.”

Victor laughs. “You didn’t do that at the Gas and Go.”

I glare at him. “Yeah, thanks for the reminder. Maybe you could delete the footage of me?”

He stops at that, his expression falling into one of genuine curiosity. “Why?” he asks. “What are you running from?”

“I didn’t kill anyone, if that’s what you’re thinking.” I know it is, and I take a big bite of my sandwich to decide what I’m going to say next. Victor just keeps watching me with his patient, curious eyes. When I swallow the sandwich down, I take a big drink of water. He’s still watching.

“I wasn’t running from anything,” I finally say. “I’m meeting someone in Clifwell.”

“Clifwell!” He leans forward, studying me with renewed intensity. “Interesting choice.”

So he’s heard of it. Most people haven’t, which is by design of the wealthy assholes who live there part-time. But then, he does live only five hours or so away.

We stare at each other for a beat longer. Then he breaks into a grin.

“Don’t tell me you were going to rob someone,” he says, and there’s genuine delight in his voice that gives me a kind of warm, uncomfortable feeling in my belly. Because it makes me like him, that the first thing he thinks of is that I’m going to rob some rich douchebag.

“Not exactly.” My thoughts whir around. I shouldn’t trust a Hunter, I know that. But they operate outside the law, and I do need to get to Clifwell before Halloween. It’s not in my nature to leave a comrade high and dry, even if I do have an excuse.

“Well, what, then?” Victor seems genuinely interested in what I have to say, which is a rare enough quality in a man that I find myself softening toward him a bit. “You know I’m not going to rat you out, Penelope Noble.”

He stresses my last name like he’s pretending we have some Hunter bond. And I know I shouldn’t trust him. I shouldn’t. He’s an unkillable murderer who kept calling me Mary until I fucked him. Who knows what he had planned for me. That cabin was suspiciously clean for a charnel house.

I shove the thoughts aside. It doesn’t matter. What matters is I’m alive, that he has had ample opportunity to kill me since bringing me into his home, that he clearly believes me about being raised by Hunters. I guess we have that link, even if I wouldn’t call it a bond.

“There’s a guy who lives in Clifwell,” I say. “His family owns this big pharmaceutical company, Vas Biologics, that my friend Adrian has been trying to expose for years. Anyway, this asshole throws this huge Halloween party every year, and this year, Adrian had a contact who works at the house.” I shrug. “She got us tickets, and we’re going to infiltrate the party.”

“Why?” Victor tilts his head in confusion. “To rob them?”

“Oh my God, why do you think we give a shit about money? Nicholas Wolrath is a complete piece of shit, and we⁠—”

Something changes on Victor’s face when I say the name Wolrath, like a storm cloud moving over the sun. I falter at the sudden intensity of it. The recognition. Even people who despise Vas Pharmaceuticals—and there are a lot of them—don’t know the name of the billionaire family that owns it.

Victor smooths his expression over as quickly as it came on, but I saw it. I know I did.

“What?” I demand.

“Nothing,” he says, a clear lie.

“No, you reacted when I said Wolrath’s name.” Anxiety twists in my chest, and I think back to my earlier suspicion that Victor might be working for them. Hunters don’t usually sell out their talents, but the Wolraths have a lot of money. What evil billionaire wouldn’t want a personal assassin at their beck and call?

“Hey, what I said earlier? About my mom and sister hunting you down if anything happens to me? I meant it. So if you’re reporting to the Wolraths⁠—”

“Reporting to them?” The words explode out of Victor’s mouth. “Why would you think that?”

“Why’d you react to their name like that? Because you fucking recognized it.”

Victor’s expression darkens, and he’s quiet for a long time, long enough that I’m not sure if he’s going to respond at all. “I knew a Wolrath a long time ago,” he finally says. “It was not a friendly relationship.” He hesitates. “I was not expecting to hear the name. I haven’t heard it in decades.”

I breathe out, my curiosity flirting with my suspicion. “What’d he do?”

“Hurt me,” Victor says. “What are you going to do at the party?”

I stare at him for a long time, and I realize, as my paranoia slowly evaporates away, that I don’t actually think he’s employed by the Wolraths. Vas Pharmaceuticals has always been based in Colorado, going back to the 1800s, when Albert Wolrath opened a tuberculosis sanatorium. I have no idea how old Victor is, but it’s not outside the realm of possibility that he had a run-in with them at some point in their storied history of fucking people over.

I really do have no idea about Victor at all, other than that he’s a Hunter, he’s a Demario, and he fucked me instead of killing me.