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I shook uys ju rooot to be at least three or four dozen of theet their hands on you Leaving town is exactly what they’ll expect you to do, which is why you’re not going anywhere"

Bria looked atthen, don’t you?"

I nodded "I do I want you in Ashland, close by, somewhere I know that you’ll be safe Soet into Sole nook and cranny, so there are no surprises"

"There’s only one place that I know of that fits that bill," Finn said

"Do youat my foster brother "Because, really, it’s your house too"

Finn just shrugged "He left the house to you, Gin He knew that you’d need it for so like this someday We both know that"

Bria looked back and forth between us "What are you talking about? Where is this place?"

I stared at her "We’re talking about Fletcher’s house Baby sister, you’re coued withthat she could take care of herself But I didn’t budge, telling her that she was going to hole up in Fletcher’s house even if I had to duct-tape her into submission and keep her that way Still, Bria acquiesced only after I pulled a roll of the gray tape out of one of the kitchen drawers and starting slicing off strips of it with a silverstone knife

Deep down, Bria knew that staying out of sight was the s to do-for everyone But that didn’tunder her breath about overprotective big sisters, Bria stalked off into the bathroom to try to wash some of the blood out of her clothes

That left Jo-Jo, Finn, and me alone in the kitchen When I was sure that Bria was out of earshot, I turned to Finn

"You knohat I have to do now," I said "I have to kill Mab The very first chance I get That’s the only way to lift the bounty on Bria’s head"

Finn slurped down another ht, reood for you"

My lips curled back into a snarl at the er at myself down into the pit of my stomach "I don’t care Mab knows, Finn She knows that Bria’s my sister That’s why she put the bounty on her head If Mab can’t find me herself, then she can use Bria to make me come to her"

Nobody spoke

I drew in a breath "So work your contacts, Finn The second that Mab leaves her mansion, I want to know about it I don’t care where she’s going, one of her businesses, out to dinner, even to the fuckingfor her, knives ready"

Finn nodded, already pulling his cell phone out of his suit jacket to start ers war to be okay, Gin," the dwarf ht about how close I’d coiants, and her bounty hunters had co me at her mansion How many times in the last few months that the Fire ele , but I squeezed the dwarf’s fingers withto reassure le one of his sources to see what they had to say about the bounty hunters, Mab, and anything else that ht be relevant or helpful Then Bria came back into the kitchen, and I drove the two of us over to Fletcher’s house Sophia had already gotten rid of the old clunker that I’d used to escape fro it off to soed Bria and I had met Finn at Jo-Jo’s earlier, and since he’d driven the three of us over to Northern Aggression, I’d left ular car at the dwarf’s house

Bria and I didn’t speak on the ride over, although she grirabbed the door handle as my silver Benz churned up the driveway Couldn’t bla path still rattled my bones every tie, and Fletcher’s house caht burned like a firefly over the front door, di structure White clapboard, brown brick, and gray stone joined together towith a tin roof, black shutters, and blue eaves You couldn’t see much of the odd mishmash of styles and materials in the darkness, but I knew the lines and texture of the ramshackle house as well as I knewthe car

Bria stared out the , peering into the shadows that covered the yard like puddles of gray ink oozing over the snow Despite the fact that we’d been getting reacquainted with each other, my sister had never been up to Fletcher’s house before We always ression, usually with Finn, Xavier, Roslyn, or one of the Deveraux sisters in attendance Self-i, aard pauses to a ht, and this place was as personal as it got for me I’d loved Fletcher like a father, and his house was a natural extension of the old acy to ot out of the car It was after three now, but thanks to the snow, a sort of pearl gray twilight softened the cold edges of everything and hter than it really was In front of the house, snow crusted the flat lawn before the ridge fell away into a series of frozen, jagged cliffs Snow and ice covered the gravel in the driveway as well, but I could still hear the stone’s murmurs Low, steady, and as quiet as the icy landscape around us

No footprints marred the sency, or dark desires rippled through the stones under ht Good That meant that Mab and her city full of bounty hunters hadn’t unearthed my true identity, hadn’t discovered that Gin Blanco was really the Spider-yet

I led Bria over to the front door, which was ranite Thick veins of silverstone also swirled through the hard stone here and in other strategic places around the house, while bars ical metal covered the s

Bria let out a low, appreciative whistle "I don’t think I’ve ever seen that le door before You’d have to have a hell of a lot of h that much of it"

"Remember what I said about easily defendable? Well, this is it," I said, unlocking the door and stepping inside

I flipped on so the hallway, and toed off my boots Bria stepped inside and did the sa out at what she could see of the house "Looks like you’ve got a lot of rooeways, a lot of places to hide"

She had no idea So many additions in so many different styles had been tacked on to the house over the years that the whole structure was so off into hallways that doubled back on themselves, led to different parts of the house entirely, or in some cases just dead-ended Not the kind of place where you wanted to have to search for the bathroom in the dark, much less an assassin like the Spider Still, the odd, overlapping designs gave e, since I knew the ins and outs of the whole house-and the best way to sneak up and stab so up on le" style="display:block" data-ad-client="ca-pub-7451196230453695" data-ad-slot="9930101810" data-ad-format="auto" data-full-width-responsive="true"></ins>