The Art of Stealing Time

better off with our boss.”

I was a bit confused by which boss was which, but managed to sort it out enough to ask, “Ethan, you mean?”

“Naw, he’s not badass like the hen’s boss.”

“We like Ethan, don’t we, Irv?” Frankie said, apropos of nothing in particular. “We were helping him.”

“He had the wrong idea about how you wage a war,” Irv confided. “He didn’t once think of using a car bomb, or offing the competition’s family.”

Horror filled my veins. “You guys are hit men, aren’t you?” Really stupid hit men, but still, obviously, professionals in the art of killing.

“Not us,” Frankie said at the same time Irv answered, “Yes, but we don’t always do that.”

“That’s right. It’s only sometimes we take care of the boss’s bigger problems.” Frankie didn’t even blink over his sudden change in story. “Mostly we’re the boss’s right-hand men.”

“And enforcers.”

“Sometimes we do a hit or two, just to keep our hands in.”

“It doesn’t pay to get rusty,” Irv agreed.

“Messy.” Frankie nodded sagely. “It can get messy if you don’t keep your hand in.”

I was tempted to run screaming away from them, but given this new and more deadly light on their characters, I felt a little subterfuge was in order. Subterfuge and distraction. “So who is this woman’s boss if it’s not Ethan?”

“Badass,” Irv said, giving me a little shove forward. To my relief, he didn’t try grabbing my arm again.

“Really badass. Badder than the boss, and he’s pretty bad.”

Just the thought of Baldwin had me squaring my shoulders. “Yes, well, you haven’t seen my ass. It’s going to whup your boss’s.”

They both looked at my butt. I made an annoyed sound and charged forward through the woods. I would deal with this woman once I had vented my spleen on Baldwin. “Where is your boss? I want to get him taken care of quickly so I have time to see my moms before I’m due for my shift.”

“Boss is in Cardiff,” Irv said.

I stopped and looked at him. “Cardiff? You mean the town? He’s not here in Anwyn?”

“Naw,” Frankie said. “Boss can’t come into Anwyn.”

“He was banned for trying to sue the boss of Anwyn. Boss said our boss can’t come back. So he sent us to fetch you, said we wasn’t to come back unless we had either you with us or your head in a duffel bag.”

“Now that was a great movie.”

I stared at them both in horror.

“What movie is that, then?” Irv asked his buddy.

“Eight Heads in a Duffel Bag. Don’t you remember? We watched it right before the night we had to take care of those trolls what were making a stink about the boss forcing them to plague folks in Manchester.”

Irv shook his head. “Six heads, that was.”

“Eight. It had that American bloke in it. What’s his name? Italian, he is.”

“It was six troll heads that we collected that night in Manchester,” Irv insisted. “I remember because I thought if we had one more, we could play that dice game with them.”

I took a deep, deep breath, my mind spinning with all sorts of thoughts and plans. I wasn’t going to end up with my head in a duffel bag, that was for sure. I had to leave, to get away . . . but I couldn’t leave Anwyn—not with my mothers and Gregory still here. Plus, there was no telling if the Watch was outside just waiting for me to pop back to the mortal world. I hadn’t asked Gregory about that, but I had a feeling that they might be. And yet, if I told these two that I wasn’t going to leave Anwyn with them (head firmly attached to the rest of me), they’d most likely go down the duffel bag avenue.

I weighed the likelihood that I would be able to escape them once we left Anwyn, decided it had no potential for success, and pointed behind them, saying loudly, “Oh my god, look at that! It’s a head in a duffel bag!”

When they turned to look, I bolted, racing through the trees and hurdling both small shrubs and large rocks, well aware that both men were only seconds behind me.

Crashing noises followed me—the sounds of two large men shoving their way through the forest, both shouting for me to come back.

I was fleeter of foot, however, and more agile, and what’s more, I had motivation to give me strength. I stayed in the forest as long as I could before I broke cover and raced for the camp. If I could just get to my mothers, they could cast a spell to protect me from Irv and Frankie. . . . That thought died a cruel death when I glanced over my shoulder and saw that Frankie was about twenty yards behind me, and Irv the same distance behind him.

“Change of plan,” I panted to myself as I swerved around the fringes of the camp and dashed for the downed log bridge. I had a feeling that the two men would not be welcomed in Aaron’s camp if they were helping Ethan, and I pulled every last ounce of strength I had to get myself across the log and into the camp before Frankie caught me.

It was a close thing. He’d eliminated the gap between us, but as I suspected, pulled up short as soon as he crossed the log bridge. I raced down one aisle of Aaron’s camp and up another, losing myself in the confusion of tents and people. It wasn’t until I burst into Doug’s tent and bent double, my hands braced on my knees as I tried to catch my breath, that I realized just where I was.

Doug was taking a bath in a large wooden tub. He cocked an eyebrow at me. “Changed your mind and decided to dump your thief boyfriend?”

“No,” I panted, trying to straighten up. A stitch in my side had me clutching my ribs. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to interrupt you. Two guys chasing me. Helping Ethan.”

Doug sat up from where he had been lounging against the sloping back of the tub. “Who is helping Ethan?”

“Two men. Chasing me. Big guys. Tattoos. They want my head.”

“Don’t we all.”

I stared at him.

He sighed. “And these men followed you here to this camp?”

I nodded, swearing to myself that I was going to start jogging again.

He stood up, water and sudsy bubbles sliding down his body.

“Eep,” I said, and turned around when he yelled for his squire.

“Tell the guards to capture two of Ethan’s spies who have chased Lady Gwen into our camp. They are located at—Lady Gwen?”

“The log bridge. Or they were a minute ago. You can’t miss them. They’re big guys. One’s named Irv and the other is Frankie.”

The squire nodded and trotted out. I waved a hand behind me at Doug. “Sorry about interrupting your bath. I was a bit panicked.”

“I don’t suppose I could entice you into the tub with me?”

“No,” I told the entrance of his tent and started moving toward it. If he got too pushy with me, I’d simply run out and go to the nearest group of people.

“I thought not. You appear to be quite smitten with the thief. Of whom, it need not be said, I have no knowledge.”

Smitten? Me? I thought about that while Doug made rustling noises behind me that I took to be him dressing. Was I smitten with Gregory? So much so that other people could tell?

“I don’t know about smitten,” I said slowly. I certainly wasn’t going to go into the details of my blossoming relationship with Gregory, let alone analyze my feelings to Doug. “We get along well.”

“Ah. I suppose if you are willing to settle for that, then you will be quite happy.”

“I don’t think I’m settling for anything,” I answered, annoyed.

He strolled past me, now fully dressed, and shoved aside the tent opening. “I see it is almost vespers.”

I followed him out of the tent, ignoring his change of subject. “‘Settling’ implies that I can’t find anything better. I don’t know that I want to spend the rest of my life with Gregory, but I do know that—” I stopped suddenly,