“What is this?” I asked. “A setup? I kill Giles, then you kill me?”
“That was the plan, but since you were taking your sweet time, I decided to do you first.”
My gray eyes narrowed. “Why? I was going to finish the job. Going to kill Giles. I’m a pro. I don’t take jobs unless I plan to follow through with them.”
Brutus shrugged. “The accountant’s death will raise some tricky questions, so my employer decided it would be better if his assassin was caught. Immediately.”
“So you’re going to make me the fall guy to protect your client.” My voice was as flat as his.
Brutus nodded. “This way, there’s no manhunt, no drawn-out trial, no awkward questions. But there will be a shootout with one of the opera house’s security guards. When the smoke clears, you’ll be the only one not breathing. The trail starts and ends with you.”
“So you’ve got someone on the inside then. Someone helping you.”
Brutus didn’t say anything, but I didn’t need him to confirm my suspicion. My gaze went back to the box, but no one had joined Donovan Caine and Gordon Giles. Brutus must have someone stationed outside the door, standing by in case Giles got jumpy and tried to leave.
“What’s my motivation?” I asked, shifting my weight onto my right foot.
“Nothing too elaborate. Just a poor, no-class hooker pissed at Giles for promising to marry her and make her an honest woman. A deranged woman enraged by love and jealousy who decided to take matters into her own hands.”
“A hooker killing for love? In this city?” I sneered. “You couldn’t come up with something more creative than that?”
Brutus shrugged. “Not my call.”
I nodded. “Of course not. Well, I have to admit it’s a solid plan, Brutus. Your client should give you a bonus. By the way, who is your client?”
Brutus shook his head. “You should know better than to ask me something like that, Gin.”
I did know better, but asking gave me the opportunity to move my left foot closer toward the crossbow.
“I’d love to keep chatting, but I have a schedule to keep.” Brutus’s grip tightened on the gun. “You’re a decent assassin, Gin. Almost as good as me. I really am sorry—”
I kicked out with my left foot, jiggling the trigger on the crossbow. The bolt shot out, catching Brutus above his right ankle. The other assassin grunted and fired a shot as I threw myself to the right. The bullet from his gun just clipped my shoulder, spinning me around. I hissed as a ribbon of hot fire erupted in my muscles. But that was better than the projectile piercing my heart.
I pushed the pain away, hit the ground rolling, grabbed my pseudo cello case, and got back up on my feet. I brought the case up over my chest. Two more bullets thunk-thunked into it. I shook my left arm, and a silverstone knife fell down my sleeve and into my hand. Another bullet slammed into the case, and I staggered back as though I’d been hit. Then I pivoted, slung the case to one side, and threw the knife at Brutus. The blade caught the assassin in his right shoulder. The gun slid from his twitching fingers and plopped onto the floor.
“You and those fucking knives,” Brutus muttered and yanked the blade out of his shoulder socket. “Get a real weapon. Get a gun.”
“Guns are for people who don’t have the guts or skill to use a blade.”
I threw down the bullet-laden cello case and palmed the knife hidden up my right sleeve. Brutus shifted his weapon to his right hand.
And then we danced.
We circled round and round on the narrow catwalk, kicking, punching, slashing with our knives. Brutus sliced my left bicep, adding to the hot fire on that side of my body. I slammed my elbow into his mouth. He punched me in the kidneys. I kneed him in the groin.
We were evenly matched professionals. Trained, skilled, efficient, deadly. But the bolt in Brutus’s ankle hindered him more than the bullet graze in my shoulder did me. He stepped back to get out of the way of my slashing dagger, and his ankle went out from under him. He stumbled to the floor. All the opening I needed.
Before Brutus could recover, I yanked the crossbow bolt out of his ankle and threw myself on top of him. This time, Brutus couldn’t stop the whimper of pain that escaped his lips. He tried to grapple with me, but I shoved my knife against his neck. The blade just cut through his skin. He froze.
“Now,” I said, raising the bolt up and pressing the bloody tip close to his left eye. “You’re going to tell me exactly who hired you and why he wants Gordon Giles dead so badly. Or I’m going to put this bolt through your fucking eye and into your brain.”
Brutus smiled, his teeth red with his own blood. “You’ve got two options, Gin. You can kill me or save yourself — or try to.”
I touched the top of the bolt against his eye. Brutus might be as cold as stone, but even he shuddered at that. “What do you mean?”
“I told my client you were good, that you might get away. So we devised a backup plan. Even if you kill me, you’re still going to get blamed for Giles’s murder. I’ve got another man standing by ready to take him out. The paper trail leading back to you has already been set up. Threatening letters and the like. It’s all in place—”
I raised my knife up and slammed it into Brutus’s heart. The first time, he gasped in surprise and pain. The second time, his brown eyes bulged, and more blood trickled out of his mouth. By the third time I stabbed him, he was dead.
“Arrogant prick,” I muttered, climbing to my feet. “You should have just shot me. Not talked yourself to death.”
Brutus’s body spasmed a final time in agreement.
I was already stepping over him and gathering up the weapons. Because Brutus was right about one thing. I had to save Gordon Giles’s life instead of taking it — if I had any hope of saving my own.
I stuffed the crossbow back into the cello case, sprinted down the catwalk stairs, and shoved through the exit door. My wounded shoulder hit the doorjamb, and I hissed. Being shot, even just grazed, always felt like someone had shoved a red-hot metal poker into my flesh. Like a Fire elemental had put her hands on me and let loose with her incendiary magic. But I ignored the discomfort. Compartmentalizing pain, learning how to block it out and keep going no matter what, had been one of the first things Fletcher had taught me.
Fletcher. My thoughts turned to him. He was in this, too. If Brutus’s client wanted me to take the fall for Gordon Giles’s death, killing Fletcher would be next on the to-do list. They couldn’t afford to leave him alive. Finnegan Lane either. I had to get to them. Soon.
I hurried through the executive floor, dropped the cello case by the unlocked balcony door, and went on into the stairwell. I pounded down the stairs to the second floor. Intermission was still several minutes away. No one crowded into the hallway yet, and I had a clear path to Gordon Giles’s VIP box. I didn’t need people to start screaming when they realized a woman dressed in black was holding a bloody knife in one hand and an even bloodier barbed bolt in the other.
Up ahead, a man pulled open the door to the box seats and stepped inside. Brutus’s backup. And I realized he wasn’t just going to kill Giles. A dead-end trail and no witnesses meant he’d have to take out Donovan Caine, too. Killing Giles and blaming me was one thing, but I didn’t need the heat of a dead cop on top of that. Especially an honest one like Caine, who was something of a folk hero in Ashland. The cops, even the crooked ones, would lean on everyone they knew to get Caine’s killer. The insatiable appetite of the press and public pressure would force them to. Donovan Caine and Gordon Giles definitely needed to keep breathing tonight.
I quickened my pace and charged through the door. Gordon Giles squatted half in, half out of his seat, his blue eyes wide with panic and fear. Donovan Caine stood tall and erect. He just looked furious.