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My knees bend, my head droops onto his shoulder. He holds me upright.
“Stay with me,” he says. “Just a little longer.” The dance is coming to an end, and people are making way as we move toward the stage where I see Mira and Ethan ascending the stairs. Once we get there, Sly leans in as if to hug me. “You will stay away from SilasCruz, or there will be consequences that will make tonight look like a child’s game.” He draws back, grins. “Am I perfectly clear, dear?”
He looks down at me and I hear the murmurs around us of how he treats me like his own daughter, how generous given what happened, what my father did.
“Am I?” he prods.
I nod because I need this over. I’m going to pass out. I want to pass out. I want oblivion.
“Good girl,” he says and somehow, we ascend the stairs. Ethan wraps his arm around me. Sly makes a joke about handing me any more champagne. He announces our engagement to the sound of cheers as everyone in the room raises their glasses to toast our engagement.
21
SILAS
“We’ll be filing charges,” Nigella throws over her shoulder as we walk out of the police station as dusk falls. “You had no right to hold him for three days without a single charge.”
“Ma’am, we were conducting?—”
“Bullshit.” She stops and turns. “Start packing up your desk, detective. I’ll have your job for this.”
I walk quickly out of the station and into the parking lot where Nigella’s car is double parked at the front doors.
“I can’t believe what they were able to get away with,” Nigella seethes. She’s been trying to see me for three days, trying to understand what the hell was going on.
“Welcome to Sinistral. That’s the kind of influence Fox wields.” I’d become complacent over the years. I’dforgotten what he is capable of. That was my fault. But never again. “I need to get her,” I say, holding out my hand. “Give me the keys.”
“No.”
I look down at her, surprised. “Give me the keys, Nigella.”
“You’re in no state to drive.”
“I need to fucking get to her.”
She shakes her head and stomps off to the driver’s side, unlocking the car and getting in. Irritated, I get into the passenger seat.
“Fine. Let’s go. I’ll give you directions to the Fox house.”
But she doesn’t even start the car. Instead, she turns to face me. “She’s gone, Silas.”
It takes me a minute. “What do you mean, gone?”
“Gone. Ethan left Sinistral with Ophelia the night of the gala. They’ve vanished. Sly is in Boston as of yesterday. Only Mira Fox is at the house. Hamish is in Boston, and we’re tracking Sly. I have another man stationed near the Fox house in Sinistral.”
“What the hell do you mean she’s gone?”
“Just what I said. I’m sure they’ll turn up. Either way, you can’t go near her.”
“Like hell I can’t.”
“Thought you’d say that,” she says and starts the car.
“Where the fuck are we going?”
“I’ll explain at the hotel. You need a shower, and we need to talk.”
“Talk now,” I tell her.
