That line ought to be my theme song. All I had to do was set it to music.
“You did what you thought was right to save the lives in your charge.” Bishop jabbed me in the shoulder with his pointer. “The rest, as much as I hate to say it, goes with the territory. Sacrifice for the greater good sucks. That’s why there’s not exactly a waitlist to fill Linus’s shoes.”
“I lied to Midas about who I am.”
“No, you lied to him about your name.” He kept poking until he got me out the door. “You watch too many B movies to be a great actress.”
“They’re classics.”
“They’re just old.” He locked up behind us. “Black-and-white doesn’t equal quality.”
The brutal assault on the one thing holding me together struck me mute.
“Besides, no one getting paid as little as you do would do what you do to maintain a cover.” He shepherded me onto the sidewalk. “You’ve got your own reasons for doing this, but so did everyone else who ever held the title.”
“I don’t mind getting outed.” Karma had circled back around for me again, and I had to live with that. “I do mind my family getting dragged through the mud for it.”
The Pritchards had disowned me, so they didn’t have to worry about me bringing shame to the family. I did, however, worry about the Whitakers. Addie wasn’t immune from gossip, and her reputation would take a serious hit if my cover got blown.
The Ambrose-fueled killing spree I went on in Savannah, as Amelie, was the whole reason she wound up engaged to Boaz in the first place. He needed her last name to wash his clean. Now here I was, splashing mud on the Whitakers and endangering Addie’s best shot for an advantageous marriage.
“We’ll shield them as best we can,” he promised. “You’ve got the funds now to take care of yourself and your family, if it comes to that.”
The click in my head as the pieces fit together left me wary. “Do you think Linus knew?”
“That you and Midas would split?” Bishop watched me to see how I took the hit, but I let it slide off me. “I doubt his actions have much to do with that possibility. It’s not how he’s wired. He’s more logical than emotional, which is not to say he doesn’t care. He just thinks linearly for the most part.” He shoved his hands into his pockets. “More than likely he anticipated your identity would leak one day, and he wanted to protect you as best he could from the fallout.”
I was being paranoid. Probably because I wasn’t sleeping. The king-size mattress was propped in the hallway, free to anyone who wanted it, but the new futon I had hauled up into the loft smelled like plastic and made weird crinkling noises when I shifted my weight. The tub in my old place was more comfortable.
And there I went again, letting my thoughts circle the drain. I really ought to invest in a stopper.
“You want even or odds?” We no longer hit streets in order. “I have a good feeling about evens.”
The hot spots, as Milo called them, were businesses or apartments that weren’t what they appeared to be. Not all of them were sinister, as I found out after charging in the first few with swords blazing. But others left me with an overwhelming sense of darkness, and those were the ones we labeled and patrolled. Not that it had done us much good so far.
“Evens it is then.”
Bishop and I hit spots two and four without any luck. Two got marked off the list when we bumped into the Unseelie fae couple who lived there. I’m not sure which shocked them more—that I could see their true faces or that I could tell their home from the brick wall it pretended to be.
Ambrose got antsy near our last stop, and his stomach grumbled. Daring to hope we were finally making progress, I dipped a hand into his core for a sword, just in case, and as I drew it, he glanced over my shoulder.
“Hadley.”
Heart thundering in my ears, I whipped my head toward the voice. “Ares.”
Mouth tight, she stepped into the streetlight. “Can we talk?”
“Kind of busy here.” I indicated the sword. “Can this wait?”
“You’ve been avoiding my calls, and you don’t use the lobby at the Faraday.”
“I’ll watch your back,” Bishop offered to me then warned her, “Talk fast.”
He drifted away, not that it made a lick of difference given his sharp hearing, but it did the trick.
“This is all my fault. I’m the one who put the idea in Midas’s head that he had to choose.” She yanked a tired hand through her hair. “I warned him you were bad for the pack. I convinced him giving you up was the best thing for us all. It came from a selfish place, and I’m sorry.”
This unburdening went a long way toward explaining that day in the lobby, and his comment.
As much as it hurt to hear her say those things, I couldn’t let her keep thinking she was to blame.
“Our breakup wasn’t your fault,” I assured her. “It was mine.”
Ares wasn’t listening. Neither of us were. We were too busy shouting over one another to be heard.
“Liz is pregnant. We’ve tried for years, years, and it finally happened.” She wiped her eyes. “I got protective, overprotective, and I let my fear get the better of me.” Her eyes pleaded with me. “I’m—I’m sorry. So sorry. Please, give him another chance.”
“Congratulations,” I said, and I meant it. “You’re wrong, though. Trust me. I screwed this up all on my own. Midas doesn’t need another chance. He needs to forget he ever met me.”
Bishop cleared his throat, and Ares deflated on the spot.
“I have to go.” I backed away from her. “I really am happy for you.”
Turning away from her, from that chapter of my past, I rejoined Bishop, and we plodded on toward our last stop.
“Do you feel better
