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“Are you?” Nibsy Lorcan stepped through the still-open doorway. “Viola,” he said with a nod. “It’s been a long time.”
“Not long enough,” she said, trying not to let her fear show. Already, she could feel the creeping ice of the mark’s warning on the skin between her shoulder blades.
“Perhaps not,” he agreed. “I’m going to need you to step away from my associate. We have things to discuss.”
“Like hell,” she said, taking a step toward Nibsy. She was already directing her affinity toward him, already sensing his blood and heart with her magic.
But Nibsy was faster. Pain shot through the ink that was inscribed in her skin, pain so sharp it brought her to her knees. She couldn’t hold on to her affinity any longer, not when she felt it slipping away from her—being ripped from her.
“I don’t want to hurt you, Viola.” Nibsy continued to approach as she struggled to keep from writhing against the mark’s magic that was tearing at her skin. “You could be an asset to the Devil’s Own. To me. Just as you were to Dolph.”
She was shaking her head, trying to find the strength to refuse him even as she felt herself flying apart.
“This is just a warning, Vee. It’s just a small taste of what I’m capable of now.” He crouched down before her. “In a moment I’m going to release you, and you’re going to turn around and walk out of here. Because if you don’t, that will be the end of you.”
Tears were streaming down her cheeks, but she couldn’t speak. “And if you die here, now, who will protect your friends? Who will protect your dear, dear mother?” He stood then, looming over her. It did not matter that his build was slight or that she could have easily beaten him in an actual fight, not when he had the marks.
All at once, the pain in her back ebbed, and she gasped with the relief of it.
“It’s time for you to go, Viola,” Nibsy commanded. “Get out of here and think about what I said. Soon you’ll need to make your choice.”
But she’d already made her choice—hadn’t she? Then why couldn’t she bring herself to say it? She felt frozen, caught in a way she never had before. Cela. Her mother. Jianyu. The Devil’s Own. Dolph. The responsibility of far too many souls made it impossible to stand.
“Go,” he commanded. “Before I change my mind.”
Once again, the warning flared beneath her skin, and this time Viola did what he commanded. She ran.
SAFE ENOUGH
1983—Times Square
By the time the elevator opened onto the eighth floor, Harte was practically holding Esta upright. To his relief, when the doors slid open, the hallway was empty.
The wall across from the elevators was lined with mirrors, and he paused, shocked for a second to see just how bad the two of them looked. He still looked gaunt and pale from his illness in California. There were heavy, dark circles under his eyes, and his hair was standing up at all angles. With his jacket covered in filth from the subway tunnels, he looked like he’d just tumbled out of an opium den and was in need of his next hit on the pipe.
Esta’s eyes met his in the mirror. She was tired-looking and dirty as well.
And wonderful. Because she was there, safe and alive and still his Esta. It didn’t matter that her hair was a dark riot around her face or that her overalls were torn and dirty. But his eyes found the gash in her sleeve and the other dark patch of dampness at her side where her clothes had been ripped during her fall from the train.
“This way,” Esta said, pulling away from his examination and ignoring her reflection in the mirrored wall. “We need to get into the room before someone notices us.”
Beyond the bank of elevator doors, the hall split in either direction. Softly glowing lights hung overhead, and plush Oriental carpeting muffled their footsteps. Distant music drifted through the air from some unseen source. Harte kept his arm under Esta’s, just to be sure, until they were finally standing in front of room 803. She used the key she’d taken from the office in the lobby without any problem, and once they were both inside, she bolted the door securely behind them.
The room reminded Harte a little of the hotel they’d stayed in back in San Francisco, where he’d recovered from the worst of his bout with the plague. That room had felt miraculous with its modern bed piled with goose-down pillows, unlimited hot water, and flickering television. This room was smaller—definitely cramped in size—but somehow it still felt like more.
The space was decorated with the same gleaming dark wood, richly colored carpeting, and golden accents as the lobby, but where the lobby had been grand, the room itself felt intensely intimate. Peaceful, even. On the left wall stood a single, enormous bed covered with a heavy burgundy jacquard quilt.
Esta went to the windows on the far end of the small room, where gauzy white curtains covered the bowed panes of glass. The same rich, burgundy jacquard framed the view beyond. She pushed back the filmy curtains to look at the street below. “No sign of trouble yet,” she said, letting the curtains fall back into place. “I think we’re safe enough for now. If anything changes, we’ll be able to see from here—the entrance is below.”
Harte nodded, but the lack of immediate trouble wasn’t overly reassuring. He still couldn’t quite reach his affinity, but the muffled silence and soft luxury of the space caused the tension in his chest to unwind a little.
He lifted the strap of the satchel over his head and, for the first time since he’d left the body that looked so much like Esta in the underground station, he set the Book and the artifacts down. They weren’t really all that heavy, but he hadn’t realized the weight of them—of what they meant, of what they could do—until he was no longer carrying the burden.
Taking Esta’s arms gently, he turned her to see the tear in the side of her overalls. The fabric there had long since turned dark with her blood, and from the look of it, she was still bleeding. “We should take care of this.”
Esta grimaced. “I need a shower first,” she said, pulling away from him. “I feel like I’ve rolled through half the sewers in the city.”
He had to force himself to let her go, to turn toward the window and focus on the steady traffic of Forty-Fourth Street to give her some privacy. But Esta didn’t even bother to close the bathroom door. A minute or two later Harte heard the water starting, and he was instantly reminded of another time—it felt like a lifetime ago—when she’d installed herself in his apartment at Dolph Saunders’ bidding. She’d been damn near euphoric to discover the hot running water and the porcelain tub.
