“I didn’t say that.” Anzu smiled, lazy and malicious. He reached out a hand and touched Sin, trailing a finger along her arm, too close to her baby brother, then letting his hand fall away. “I have no interest in them.”
Demons only ever touched people for one of two reasons. Sin’s stomach did a slow roll of horror.
But she had no time for horror.
“Well, I am fairly interesting,” she murmured, determinedly calm. “But I have these children to think of.”
“Oh, they can stay too,” Anzu told her carelessly.
He could afford to be careless: She had her two vulnerabilities out in the open, and if she provoked him or Nick did, it would be the easiest thing in the world for Anzu to take revenge.
Sin caught Nick’s eye and tried to convey that to him. She had no way of knowing if her message got through to him, but he stayed perfectly still as she stroked Toby’s hair, desperately trying to hush him. Anzu could crush Toby’s skull like an eggshell and still have Lydie’s life to bargain with for her good behavior.
She had to get the kids out, before he stopped thinking of them as a minor inconvenience to put up with and started thinking of them as leverage.
“I really think it would be best if I took them away. You can’t possibly want them here.”
Anzu touched her arm again, this time not lightly. He did not mind how tight he grasped, or if it hurt her.
“Have I been unclear? You’re not leaving.”
She had very little choice, then, except to do the one thing she had promised herself she never would, and go beg for help.
“No,” said Sin, holding her head up, keeping her voice perfectly serene. “I’m just going to drop the kids off somewhere else. Then I promise you, I will come back.”
She moved forward, calm and sure, not allowing her self-possession to falter for a moment and projecting the absolute conviction that he would step out of her way.
And he did, moving back until he hit the wire mesh wall. He stood against it, black eyes intent. At that moment he looked like nothing so much as a bird of prey escaped from its cage, burning to return to the hunt.
“Where are we going?” Lydie asked when they were on the Tube, in one of the old trains with fuzzy orange benches rather than separate seats. Her voice was a bit muffled because she was pressing her face into Sin’s arm.
It was hard to say the words because it still seemed unreal that she was doing this, the thing she had tried so hard to avoid doing for so long. But if she could do it, and she had to, she could say it. “I’m bringing you to my father.”
“Jonathan?” Lydie asked, surprising Sin, though she supposed it was natural Lydie knew. Mama had talked about him a lot, which Lydie and Toby’s father had hated. “Is he nice?” Lydie inquired, sounding a little afraid.
“Yes,” Sin said firmly. “Yes. He’s very nice.”
Lydie seemed to be trying to burrow her way into Sin’s side.
“Maybe I should stay with you. Toby should go to your father, of course, because he’s only little. But maybe I could help.”
Toby turned at his name and helpfully pulled Lydie’s fringe.
“Thank you for offering, but I’d only be worried about you and do stupid stuff,” Sin said. “You understand what’s happened to Alan, don’t you?”
Lydie nodded, head-butting Sin in the arm.
“I want you guys safe,” Sin whispered as their train rattled into Brixton.
It was a long walk to the house, and they had to sit down on the pavement a few times. A blond woman gave Sin a silent, reproachful look as she passed them, obviously thinking Sin was the worst babysitter in the world.
The fallen leaves along Dad’s road had been rained on and had turned into soggy solid brown banks.
Sin held on tight to Lydie’s hand so Lydie couldn’t slip, and they made their way through the gate and knocked on the blue-painted door. At this hour of the morning, Sin figured Grandma Tess would be catching up with the news and Dad would be in his home office. It was fifty-fifty on who would go for the door.
When the door opened, it was both of them. Grandma Tess was on the stairs, but Dad was at the door, right in front of her.
Sin was shocked to find herself shaking.
“Thea, honey,” Dad said. “What’s wrong?”
“Whose are those children?” Grandma Tess asked from the stairs, her voice accusing, and Sin had had enough.
“They’re mine!” she shouted, and then stopped, horrified at herself. She had meant to come here and bargain and beg, Toby and Lydie’s safety depended on it, and instead she had started by yelling on the doorstep so all the neighbors could hear. “I’m sorry,” she said immediately, squeezing Lydie’s hand. “I’m sorry for yelling. But they’re mine.”
Dad was looking at Lydie.
“They’re Stella’s,” he said, soft and a little sad. “Aren’t they? Come in.”
“Stella’s?” Grandma Tess said from the stairs.
“They’re mine,” Sin said fiercely. “My brother and sister. This is Lydie, and this is Toby.”
“Come in,” Dad said for the second time. “All of you.”
