Page 42 of Heart of Thieves

Steeling my nerves, I rise and retrieve my fedora from the back of the chair where I set it earlier. As I reach for the door, an awareness prickles up the insides of my cheeks, hovering behind my eyes like the faint pressure of a sneeze. They flick of their own accord ever so slightly to the right, and a stone drops in my gut.

I turn slowly. “Are you using my eyes again?”

“If you’ve got nothing to hide, then you won’t mind me watching, right?” She pulls a couple voratium dice from her pocket and tosses them to me. “I figure it’ll be entertaining.”

“Entertaining . . .” I keep my voice light and my expression smooth as every hair on my arms rises. “But not very restful.”

“Maybe not for you.” She blows me a kiss and disappears into the bedroom.

My fingers curl around the voratium, and I let the chill of the metal bite into my palm, grounding me for several long, slow breaths. Is this what it’s like for Lola with her heart in my brother’s pendant? Never alone, never fully able to make her own choices because she’s carrying him around with her everywhere she goes?

Trying to ignore the feeling of Laurel in my eyes, I slip out and take the stairs two at a time.

Ten minutes later, I rap my knuckles on Ostena’s door. Inside, footsteps shuffle over floorboards, and I move back, fastening one of the buttons on my tuxedo jacket and straightening the orchid in my lapel.

If Laurel is watching, I need to play the part. I cannot be anything but her devoted servant. She told me this afternoon to play up my role as the Liar, use my reputation to our advantage, so that is what I will do.

One day soon, she’ll trust me fully. She’ll let me loose. When that day comes, I need to know how to undermine her. Which means playing her game for now.

So I paste on the Liar’s charming, cocky smile. She wants a show? I’ll give her one.

The door opens, and Ostena pokes her head out. “Can I help—?” Her pale eyes fly wide. She slams the door, and the lock scrapes.

I chuckle. “Ostena, darling, is that any way to greet me?”

“I’m not your darling,” she snaps, her voice, though muffled by the wood, sharp as knives.

“Open the door.” I weave magic along my words so they ring like music. “Please.”

“Go away.”

I place my palm against the panel, my snake-eye ring winking in the light. “A secret was returned to you that shouldn’t have been. You’re going to give it back.”

“No, I’m not,” comes the barbed reply.

“Oh, trust me, you’ll want to return it.”

“Why on the gods’ green earth would I want to do that?”

“Because, unluckily for you, the memory of your secret lives on.”

There is a sharp intake of breath.

“What a shame it would be if I were to share that secret with the wrong people . . .” I go on, tracing my forefinger down the lines in the wood. “Like, say, the police, perhaps.”

A moment passes, then the lock scrapes again. Ostena steps out, her bare feet curling on the matted brown carpet. She tightens the knot on her dressing gown and glares at me. “If you remember my secret, why do you need it back?”

My hand, still poised midair where the door just was, is now barely a centimeter from Ostena’s sharp cheekbone. I draw my finger lightly across her flawless skin down to where the artery pulses in her throat, angry and terrified. “Firsthand accounts are always more powerful than secondhand ones.”

“Why would I want to give you more power?” She jerks away, eyes flashing.

I smirk, crossing my arms. “Your dear lover came home upset last night, didn’t he?” Her glare intensifies, and I cock my head deliberately to make my scar catch the light of the flickering bulb overhead. “Did Forsyth tell you what I did to him?”

Ostena’s lips thin.

“Do you think,” I say, leaning in and dropping my voice to a throaty whisper, “that’s all I’m capable of ?”

I wonder how Laurel is taking this—if she’s loving the performance, or if it’s making her worried for my soul. I pray it’s the former as I hold Ostena’s glare with a grin.