“Fucking clients,” Barbecue Man muttered. “Always wanting to double-cross you just so they can save a little money.”
He dropped the brick and wiped his bloody hands on his blue apron, further staining the greasy material. Then he turned and walked over to me. I shrank back into my crack, my hands tightening around the brick in my lap.
Barbecue Man leaned down until his eyes were level with mine. Not for the first time, I noticed how bright and green his gaze was. Like the lights on a Christmas tree. It would be Christmas soon, but I wouldn’t have a tree this year. No presents, no family, nothing. All of it gone, burned to ash by the Fire elemental.
“Thanks, kid,” Barbecue Man said. “You helped me out of a tight spot there. What’s your name?”
Barbecue Man wasn’t doing anything threatening, but I could still sense the strength in his body. He was a dangerous man. I didn’t want to do anything to upset him.
“Gen… Gen…” It was all I could get out. My full name was too much to say right now.
“Gin?” he asked. “Like the liquor?”
I nodded, too afraid to do anything else. Barbecue Man studied me, taking in my ripped jeans and the too-big shoes I’d dug out of the trash.
“Where’s your family?” he asked in a not-unkind voice, considering the blood on his hands and apron.
“Dead,” I whispered. “Everyone’s dead and gone.”
Barbecue Man studied me for a moment longer, then nodded, as if he’d decided something. “You look hungry, Gin. Would you like to come inside and get something else to eat? Maybe clean up a bit? It’s warm inside the restaurant.”
Oh, to be warm, if only for a little while. But I wasn’t stupid. I didn’t trust Barbecue Man. Not after what I’d just seen him do. But I had my magic and my will to survive. If he tried anything, well, I supposed one more death on my conscience didn’t much matter at this point. How much hotter could they make hell?
I nodded. “Yes, sir.”
Barbecue Man straightened and held out his hand. I took it, and he pulled me to my feet, leading me inside …
“Gin?”
A pair of fingers snapped in front of my face, breaking through my memories. I jerked back and looked at Finn.
“Are you still with us?” Finn asked.
I shook away the rest of the old memory. “I’m sorry, what did you say?”
He nodded his head at the casket. “I was asking if you wanted to throw your flower in now. Before they start covering up the casket.”
Sometime during my trip down memory lane, the preacher had finished speaking, and the service had ended. A couple of guys in dirt-stained coveralls leaned on shovels in the distance, impatient to get on with their grungy work.
“Of course,” I murmured.
I stepped forward. Finn had already tossed his flower in, and a white rose rested on top of the golden wood. So did two others, a pink rose from Jo-Jo and a black one from Sophia. I clutched my red rose. The thorns dug into the spider rune scar on my right palm, pricking my skin, drawing my blood, but I didn’t care. I let out a deep breath and threw my rose on top of the others.
The petals spread out when they hit the surface of the casket, kissing it like I had the old man’s face just before they’d shut the lid on him.
“Good-bye, Fletcher,” I whispered.
32
One by one, the other mourners came over to Finn to pay him their respects and tell him how sorry they were about the old man. A few offered me their condolences as well, but most of the attention focused on Fletcher’s son, not the stray girl he’d taken in off the streets. As it should be, I supposed.
During a lull, I wandered over to Roslyn Phillips. The vampire wore a somber black suit, but the subdued fabric did little to disguise the lush curves of her body. A matching pillbox hat perched on top of her head, and a faint breeze made the lacy veil flutter against her cheeks. I moved to stand beside her, and we both watched Finn talk to a dwarf bent double with rheumatism, arthritis, and old age.
“Good of you to come,” I said in a soft voice. “I know it means a lot to Finn.”
Roslyn nodded. “I wanted to be here for him. The least I could do.”
“You mean since you inadvertently got his father killed?”
The vampire stiffened like I’d just stabbed her with one of my knives. Her shocked eyes met mine. “How did you—”
“How did I figure it out?” I shrugged. “I’ll admit it took me awhile. The whole time Alexis James was chasing me, I couldn’t figure out why she’d picked me to set up or even how she’d found Fletcher in the first place. But she told me that night in the rock quarry. You heard her. She got the information from one of Gordon Giles’s hooker friends, the one whose daughter was raped, the one I killed Cliff Ingles for.”
I stared at Roslyn. “Gordon had a whole stack of photos of himself with prostitutes, most of whom wore the heart-and-arrow necklace that’s the signature for your club. The hooker Alexis squeezed for information, she was one of your girls, wasn’t she?”
After a moment, Roslyn jerked her head in confirmation. No use denying it now.
“I imagine the hooker came to you, wanting time off to take care of her daughter, who’d been so brutally raped and beaten. You told her about Fletcher and Finn. That they could arrange certain … accidents for people. When Alexis James had Stephenson pick her up, the hooker had to give them something to save her own skin — and she picked Fletcher and Finn.”
“I thought I was doing her a favor. I never dreamed this would happen. If I’d known how it was going to turn out—” Roslyn started.
“Save it,” I snapped. “It’s done now. There’s no changing it.”
We stood there, side by side, and watched another mourner come up to Finn. Tension radiated off Roslyn’s body like cold did mine.
“Are you going to tell Finn?” she finally asked.
I waited a few seconds, letting her sweat. “No. There’s no reason for him to know, and it would only sour things between the two of you.”
“I really do care for him,” Roslyn murmured.
I stared at her with my cold, gray eyes. “I know you do. And he cares for you, which is why I’m letting you live. That, and Catherine.”
Roslyn frowned. “Catherine?”
“She needs you. I know what it’s like to be without your family. That little girl deserves better.” I turned so Roslyn felt the full force of my hard stare. “But if you ever mention what Finn and I do to anyone else, I will slice you up and burn the leftovers. And anything, anything, Finn or I need that you can provide, you will from now on until I say otherwise. No questions asked. Understood?”
After a moment, Roslyn slowly nodded. Relief shimmered in her eyes. She knew she’d made a mistake — and that I was letting her off easy.
“Good,” I snapped. “Now go pay your respects to Finn, before I change my fucking mind.”
I drifted away from the crowd and headed toward the very top of the cemetery. Fletcher Lane wasn’t the only person buried here that I’d known.
A series of five graves lay atop the ridge, shaded by a massive maple that seemed to pierce the sky with its arcing limbs. A stone statue had been mounted above the five plots, marking them. Even though thick curls of kudzu covered the stone and the rest of it had been pitted by the rain and wind, the shape was unmistakable. A giant snowflake. The rune of the Snow family, my murdered family.