My body was on fire. Every nerve, every inch of skin—even the blood in my veins was boiling.
On the ground. Seizing. God, help me— Someone, help me—
My fingers scraped against my throat. On some level, I was aware that I was tearing at my own flesh. On some level, I was aware that I was bleeding.
On some level, I heard the screams.
My throat closed around them. I couldn’t breathe. I was suffocating, and I didn’t care, because all there was—all I was—was pain.
On some level, I was aware of the sound of footsteps rushing into the room.
On some level, I was aware of someone saying my name. On some level, I was aware of arms hoisting me upward. But all there was…all I was…
Pain.
I dreamt of dancing in the snow. My mother was beside me, her head tilted back, her tongue darting between her lips to catch a snowflake.
The scene jumped. I stood in the wings of the stage as my mother performed. My gaze fell on an old man in the audience.
Malcolm Lowell.
Without warning, my mother and I were back in the snow, dancing. Dancing.
Dancing.
Forever and ever. No matter what.
I woke to the sound of beeping. I was lying on something soft. Forcing my eyes open, I remembered—
The poison. The pain.
The sound of footsteps.
“Easy.”
I turned my head toward the voice, unable to sit up. I was in a hospital room. The beeping machine beside me tracked the beating of my heart.
“You’ve been unconscious for two days.” Director Sterling sat next to my bed. “We weren’t sure you were going to make it.”
We. I remembered the sound of footsteps. I remembered someone saying my name.
“Agent Sterling?” I asked. “Judd. Dean and the others—” “They’re fine,” Director Sterling assured me. “As are you.”
I remembered the poison. I remembered gasping for breath. I remembered the pain.
“How?” I said. Beneath the covers, my body shook.
“There’s an antidote.” Director Sterling kept his answer direct and to the point. “The window during which to administer it is small, but you should be back to your full strength soon.”
I wanted to ask where they’d gotten the antidote. I wanted to ask how they’d found me. But more than anything, I wanted the others. I wanted Dean and Lia and Michael and Sloane.
Beside me, Director Sterling held up a small object for my inspection. I recognized it instantly—the tracking device Agent Sterling had given me. “This time my daughter had the foresight to activate the device.” He paused.
For reasons I couldn’t quite pinpoint, my breath caught in my throat. “It’s a shame,” the director continued slowly, turning the device over in
his hand, “that the tracking software that would have led the FBI here had been tampered with.”
A chill slid down my spine.
“Dean,” I said suddenly. “If he knew where I was, if they’d found me…” “He’d be here?” Director Sterling suggested. “Given what I know of
Redding’s whelp, I tend to agree.”
I surged upward and winced as something bit into my wrists. I looked down.
Handcuffs.
Someone had tampered with the tracking software. Someone had cuffed me to this bed. I looked back up at the director.
“This isn’t a hospital,” I said, my heart beating in my throat. “No,” he replied. “It’s not.”
“There’s an antidote to the Masters’ poison,” I repeated what Director Sterling had told me earlier, my chest tightening. “But the FBI doesn’t have it.”
“No. They don’t.”
The poison the Masters used to kill was one of a kind. It was, I’d been told over and over again, incurable.
Because the only people who have the cure are the Masters.
I flashed back to the room with the shackles, to the poison, to the pain. I’d heard footsteps. I’d heard someone saying my name.
“For some of us,” the director said, his voice low and smooth, “this has never been about murder. For some of us, it was always power.”
There are seven Masters. And one of them is the director of the FBI.
Agent Sterling’s father stood and stared down at me. “Imagine a group more powerful, more connected than any you could possibly conceive of. Imagine the most extraordinary men on earth, sworn to one another and a common cause. Imagine the kind of loyalty that comes from knowing that if one of you falls, you all fall. Imagine knowing that if you could prove yourself worthy, the world would be yours for the taking.”
“How long?” I asked the director. How long have you been one of them?
“I was young,” the director said. “Ambitious. And look how far I’ve come.” He spread his arms out, as if he could gesture to all of the FBI, all of the power he held as its head.
“Masters only have a seat at the table for twenty-one years,” I said. My voice was hoarse—from screaming, from hoping, from knowing that this was about to get worse.
“My time as an active member had come to an end,” Director Sterling admitted. “But the Pythia rather obligingly slit my successor’s throat.” He withdrew a knife from his jacket pocket. “I can’t say I mind. Certain privileges are only afforded to those with a seat at the table.” He lifted the knife to the side of my face. I waited for the pain, but it didn’t come. Instead, he lifted his free hand to the other cheek, trailing it gently over my skin. “Other privileges aren’t impossible to obtain as an emeritus member.”
I shuddered beneath his touch.
“Scarlett Hawkins.” I fought the only way I could, cuffed and held at knifepoint. “You knew that she’d been killed by one of your brethren.”
The director’s knuckles tightened around the hilt of the knife. “Scarlett was never supposed to be a target.”
“Nightshade killed her,” I shot back. “He didn’t care that she was one of yours.”
Director Sterling angled the blade at the underside of my chin and pressed just hard enough to draw blood. “I made my displeasure known—at the time, and again…later.”
He lowered the knife. I could feel the blood dripping down my neck. “You killed Nightshade,” I said, the truth coming into focus. “Somehow,
you got past the guards—”
“I chose the guards,” the director corrected, a light in his eyes. “I arranged the shift changes. I oversaw the prisoner’s transfer myself.”
I saw what I should have seen before—the kind of access he’d had, the
fact that as soon as we’d had a break in this case, he’d sent us on a wild goose chase after Celine.
“You knew where Laurel was being held,” I said, my voice cracking. “The child is back in the proper hands.”
I thought of Laurel staring at the chains on the playground. I thought of the way she’d said the word blood.
“You monster.” The word ripped its way out of my mouth. “All this time, you treated Dean like he was less than human because of what his father had done, and the whole time, you were worse.”
“The whole time, I was better.” Director Sterling surged forward, his face inches from my own. “Daniel Redding was an amateur who thought himself an artist. And his son dared to lay a hand on my daughter?”
Show your hand, Director. Show me your weaknesses.
I saw the exact moment he recognized my strategy for what it was. His eyes were cold and assessing as he leaned back. “I watched the tape of your interview with Redding, you know.” He let those words sink in. “And he was right. Your mother is the type of person who can be forged in the fire.” He stood and began walking toward the door. “She’s everything we could have hoped for—and more.”
YOU
Cassie is here. They have her. That’s hardly a surprise. You’re the one who gave the word, the one who told the poison Master to take Cassie and let the FBI director use his resources to lay a false path for her team to follow—far, far away from all of you.
“It’s not that I want to kill her,” you murmur as Lorelai fights weakly for control. “But if it’s her or us…”
The door opens. Nine enters. Malcolm. He stares at you, then glances over at Laurel, who’s asleep in the corner. The child was born to replace him. He’ll see her dead first.
“The first test will come when she’s six,” the old man comments, his voice eerily calm. “It’ll be a kitten, perhaps, or a puppy. She’ll need to take it slow. When she’s nine, it will be a prostitute, bound and strapped to the table of stone. And when she’s twelve…” His gaze flickers from Laurel back to you. “We’ll strap you to the table.”
You read between the lines. “You killed your own mother.”
“And embalmed her corpse so that she could continue to sit at the table, perfectly preserved, for decades.” He shook his head. “Eventually, she was replaced. Woman after woman, child after child, and none were worthy.”
You can feel the blood thrumming in your veins as you remember the feel of the knife in Five’s flesh.
You are worthy.
“It’s been too long since you’ve been tested,” Nine continues. “There’s something poetic, don’t you think, about the nature of this one?”
He thinks you’re Lorelai.
He thinks Cassie is your daughter.
He thinks there are some things you wouldn’t do to survive.
