Page 112

“I stayed.”

She leans forward, her elbows on her knees. “Why?”

“His family still needed help, and I had obligations of my own. After he was gone, leaving no longer felt like a way to save him.” I stare at my hands. “I had also become good at work I should never have learned to do.”

Cassie stays quiet for several breaths. She’s never been afraid to ask me a difficult question. The care with which she chooses this one tells me she expects an answer that will change us.

“Have you killed anyone, Andrei?”

Downstairs, Murphy yowls from his carrier as Birdie brings him inside. Cassie waits for my answer, and I find myself listening to the cat instead.

“Cassie.” I lean forward, resting my steepled fingers against my chin.

She presses her fingers into the chair arms. “That sounds like you’re about to explain why you can’t answer.”

“I won’t lie to you.” I lower my hands, but can’t give her what she asked for.

“Then answer.” She holds herself still, waiting.

I’ve faced men who would use any weakness they found. I’ve faced their weapons and their orders, and I have lived with the cost of obeying them. Cassie sits a few feet away with a cut at her temple, waiting for the truth. My throat tightens around the word she needs to hear.

“I can’t give you every detail tonight.”

She sits back. “I asked whether you’ve killed anyone.”

“I heard you.”

“Then you know that wasn’t an answer.”

“It wasn’t.”

She rises from the chair. Her injured ankle makes her hesitate before she steps toward the window. I reach out, then let my hand fall when she notices.

“I’ve been sitting here trying to understand what happened to you,” she says. “I can see that you’re hurting. You still won’t tell me whether the man I’m sleeping beside has killed someone.”

“I don’t expect you to find it easy.”

“I don’t even know what I’m supposed to accept.”

She turns back to me. Her blue eyes are bright, but her voice remains firm.

“You told me the coin was a warning used by men you worked with. Someone brought one to your stable today and started a fire while I was inside. This is already affecting me, and you keep deciding I should have less information than you do.”

“There are people from that life I never want near you.”

Cassie turns sharply from the window, her hands curling at her sides. “They’re near me now.”

I stand and step closer to her. “That’s why I’m trying to find out who did this.”

I reach for her hand, but she pulls away before I can close my fingers around hers.

“Until we have a name, I can only tell you what I know. The coin may have come from someone I worked with, or from someone who knows my history well enough to use it against me.”

“And the date someone mailed you?”

I remember the envelope on my desk, the date written alone on a sheet of paper. Twelve years have passed, but seeing those numbers brought back a room and the man inside it with terrible clarity.

“I think the date and the coin are connected,” I admit.