AllFreeNovel
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I freeze.
Today he’s dressed differently from the hoodie and jeans I saw him in when I chased him through the streets of Queens. He’s got on a purple motorcycle jacket over jeans, and has tapered gold plugs in his ears. He’s wearing eyeliner.
Gage. That’s the name he gave me.
Zacharov must see the look that passes between us. “Do you two know each other?”
“No,” I say quickly.
I expect Gage to contradict me, but he doesn’t. “No, I don’t think it was him.” He circles me, lifting a gloved hand to my chin, tilting my face toward him. He’s a little shorter than I am. I pull back, jerking free of his grip.
He laughs. “Hard to believe I’d forget a face like that.”
“Tell Cassel that story you told me,” Zacharov says. “Cassel, take a seat.”
I hesitate, glancing toward the elevator. If I ran, I think I could make it, but who knows how long it would take for the doors to open. And even if I got to the ground floor, I’d probably never get out of the building.
“Sit down,” Zacharov says. “I asked Gage to come over because the more I thought about your brother working for the Feds, the more I was sure that if it was true, you’d try to cover it up. Especially since I threatened his life. I take that back. But after Philip turned out to be a rat, I think we both understand that we have a lot to lose if your other brother started squealing.”
I suck in a breath and sink onto one of the sofas. Flames flicker in the fireplace, filling the massive room with eerie shifting shadows. I can feel my palms start to sweat.
Lila looks over the edge of the railing. “Dad? What’s going on?” Her words echo through the big room, bouncing off the wooden ceiling and stone floors.
“Gage stopped by,” Zacharov says. “I understand he ran into some complications the other day.”
Gage looks up at her and grins. I wonder how long they’ve known each other. “I did that job like you wanted. It was quick. He was in the first place I looked.”
Lila’s face is shadowed. I can’t read her expression.
“Charlie West didn’t give you any trouble?” Zacharov asks.
Lila starts down the stairs.
Gage sucks his teeth, making a dismissive sound. “I didn’t give him a chance for trouble.”
Lila walks onto the black and white marble. Her bare feet make almost no sound as she pads across the floor. “Should Cassel be hearing this?”
It strikes me that once upon a time I thought of her as part of the class of people with magic. I knew that there were regular people and there were workers, and workers were better than regular people. That’s what everyone in Carney believed, or it’s at least what they told me. When I was a kid, Lila’s cousin, my own brother’s best friend, didn’t even want me to be around her, because he thought I wasn’t a worker.
But even among workers there are different roles. Lila is inheriting Zacharov’s position, where you order murders but don’t actually have to carry them out. She doesn’t hold the gun, she just calls the shots.
“Let Gage tell his story,” Zacharov says. “We trust Cassel, don’t we?”
She turns her head toward me. The fire highlights the curve of her jawline, the point of her chin. “Of course we do.”
Zacharov once asked me whether I would mind taking orders from his daughter. At the time, I said I wouldn’t. Now I wonder what it would really be like. I wonder if I would resent it.
Gage clears his throat. “After I tap him, some psycho do-gooder decides to chase me through the streets and nearly breaks my arm.” He laughs. “Guy picks up a plank and knocks my gun right out of my hand. If I was a couple of seconds faster, he would have got himself shot.”
I concentrate on not reacting. I try to keep a vaguely interested expression on my face.
“You described him looking a lot like Cassel, didn’t you?” Zacharov asks.
Gage nods, his gaze on me. He’s laughing with his eyes. “Sure. Black hair, tan skin, tall. Cute. Stole my gun.”
Zacharov crosses to where Lila is standing and puts his gloved hands on her shoulders. “Could it have been his brother? They look pretty alike.”
“Barron is no do-gooder,” I say.
