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Kami’s brows drew together, dark eyes firing. “Monkshood Abbey is a derelict manor house outside of town,” she said. “About twelve miles. It’s been empty for years.”
Jared raised his own brows. “Kids must go there all the time.”
“No,” Kami murmured. “No, I don’t think they ever do. We never did.”
“I think it might be an idea to effect our getaway,” said Rusty, appearing by Kami’s side. “Your friend chose an unfortunate time to make an entrance,” he said in her ear. “People are looking for someone to blame for what happened to Holly. And he’s a Lynburn.”
“And what does that mean?” Jared demanded. “What do you know?”
Rusty glanced up at him and the alertness was wiped away from his face, blurring his features like someone breathing onto a mirror. It was replaced with the usual lazy good humor. “Nothing,” Rusty said in his slow, pleasant voice. “But then, we’ve only been here six years. The Vale doesn’t give up its secrets that easy.” He looked around for his sister. Angela advanced on them, Holly rushing after her and wobbling slightly. She seemed to have broken her heel.
Jared grinned at Holly. “Hey, Warrior Princess.”
Holly beamed back at him, gorgeous and flirtatious with it, as if looking the way she did it was easier to flirt than not. She stepped up to him and Jared hugged her lightly, her cascade of curls tickling the bare skin of his arm. “Sorry I’m all wet,” he said.
Holly smiled up at him. “It’s a good look on you.” Her eyes slid around the room, making sure that everybody had seen the tearstained victim hug the Lynburn. Holly was a great girl, Jared thought as she drew back and went to hook arms with Angela.
“What’s our next step?” he asked Kami.
“Leave the pub,” Rusty said, urgency creeping into his drawl. “Now.”
They went out into the rain, the girls pulling on their coats as they did. Kami flipped up her hood, which had teddy bear ears on it. She walked beside Jared, four inches of rain-dashed darkness between her hanging wrist and his.
“Next we get answers,” Kami said. “Nicola Prendergast knows something. I can get her to talk to me.” Her voice was practical and cheery, but Jared felt a ripple of wistfulness go through her. “We used to talk all the time.”
“Can I get you to talk to me, Cambridge?” asked Rusty.
Jared gave Rusty a look, and then congratulated himself on being the stupidest man alive when Rusty’s sleepy hazel eyes went sharp again. Kami wasn’t going to like him antagonizing Rusty.
Jared slowed so he was behind the rest of the group, bowing his head against the rain. This close to Kami, able to feel what she felt, he might just as well have been sitting on her shoulder. He was able to gather what Rusty was saying, a few of the actual words floating over to him through the rain.
“—I’m older than you,” Rusty said. “I know guys like this.”
“—introduced me to Claud,” Kami said.
“—worse things than Claud,” said Rusty. “—just an idiot. When some guy gets all silent and obsessed—I’ve seen some really bad situations. Kami, watch yourself.”
Kami’s voice cut clearly through the sound of rain. “You don’t understand.”
“I’ve heard girls say that before now too.”
“You haven’t heard me say it,” said Kami, his girl, and the chill sluicing through his shirt, the chill of knowing someone decent like Rusty could simply look at him and know that he was somehow irredeemably twisted, none of it mattered. “Trust me to know what’s best for me, Rusty Montgomery, or I’ll beat you up.”
“Oh, please no, help, mercy,” Rusty said, his voice lifting now he was no longer whispering warnings.
“Besides,” said Kami, “it’s not like that. It’s never going to be like that.”
They walked in silence together for a little while before Kami pulled her hand out of his. Rusty pressed Kami’s hand before he let her go. It was as scary to see Rusty clinging as it was to see Angela trembling, Kami thought. She wanted to protect them both, let them relax and be detached the way they liked to be, so that they would not be hurt.
She was not as scared about being hurt herself, so she walked back to Jared through the rain falling light as petals on her hair.
She crossed the wet cobblestones of the town square, past the statue of Matthew Cooper. Jared looked up at the sound of her footsteps, eyes bright and pale under the streetlights.
“What do you want?” he snapped. He had drawn back from her in his mind: she could not reach most of his emotions. The only thing she could catch was wariness, like having a wild bird in her hands, all beating heart and wings.
Kami said, “I want to know the truth.”
“Do you also want to be a little bit more specific?”
