“Hm. That’s sensible of you.”
She shot him a look across the dark interior of the car that he must have sensed.
“I’m being serious, love. There’s those who genuinely believe they can stop their other half from doing something with a command. Very ‘because I said so,’ and all that. But you know better: that’ll stand you in good stead romantically.”
She blinked. “Areyougivingmeromantic advice?”
“Just because I never adopted it myself doesn’t mean I don’t know it.”
Raven shook her head. “The nerve of you,” she murmured.
“Blame it on crown and country, darling. But,” he said, “you’re right: if he was going to betray you, he was going to do it anyway, no matter what he said to you.”
“He’s notbetrayingme,” she said, because she wanted badly for that to be true.
He hummed a disagreeing note.
“He’s not,” she insisted. “He’s not – not cheating on me. He’s not leaving me because he’s a tosser who can’t commit to someone.” Pointed look at the side of his head that he ignored. “But he’s bloody convinced he has this whole situation well in-hand, and he doesn’t. Which is why we’re following.”
A text arrived, before Devin could offer morewisdom.
Melissa:can u talk?Coming in after midnight. She was still on the clock.
Raven called rather than text back, and Melissa’s, “Hey,” had the same, echoey bathroom quality as before.
“You found the body?” Raven asked, and put the call on speakerphone for Devin’s benefit.
“Yeah. Folded up in a chest freezer in the carriage house,” Melissa said. “Hers was the only full corpse, but we found parts of others. A lot of parts. ID’ing them is gonna be a mess.”
Raven’s stomach cramped hard.Oh, Toly. Misha had sold him a tale of the Butcher’s son being an enemy in common…when the Butcher’s son had been working under his direction all the time. Devin’s grim little nod said he’d figured as much, too.
“Still no Morozov?” Raven said.
“No. We made a dozen arrests, mostly older, saggy-assed hangers-on, if you ask me.” Melissa sounded frustrated. “There were girls in a van, and two guys up front, so we got them. But Morozov himself wasn’t there, and neither were the three young guys you mentioned. Basically, I think he knew we were coming, and sacrificed a skeleton crew of idiots he could afford to lose to keep us busy the rest of the night.”
“Bollocks,” Raven sighed. “What about that old Mustang Kat spotted him driving? Can you track it down?”
“No traffic cams have picked up the plates. He could have swapped them – that’s what he’d do, if he’s smart. But there’s an APB out for it, and him.” Squeak of a door, and Melissa took a fast breath. “Look, I gotta go.”
“Take care,” Raven said, and the call swiftly disconnected from the other end.
“That the cop?” Devin asked.
“The one who got you to the hospital, yes,” Raven said. “You might even say she saved your life.” Nomightabout it, and they both knew it.
“It’d be lovely to thank her in person,” he said. And then traded hands on his wheels so he could cup one in front of his chest. “If I remember correctly, didn’t she have a great set of–”
“Ugh. Just drive, you old lech.”
Ahead of them, the bike taillights glowed like two red eyes in the dark. Raven wondered where Tenny would lead them first; wondered, once she told him about Melissa’s update, where they could possibly look next.
Dread pooling in her belly, she checked the GPS on her phone. Another twenty miles to the city, and the clock was ticking.
~*~
Hands held dutifully before him, cuffs held closed and pulled tight in a convincing way, Toly stumbled on the edge of a pothole and was grateful for Misha’s bruising grip on his biceps as he righted him and shoved him forward. The stumble had sent his hood slipping back, and the fine, freezing mist that was lapping across the parking lot in waves stung his face, forced his eyes mostly shut. The dark maw where a roll-top door had once stood yawned before them, the interior of the cannery a lightless void that Misha marched him straight into, without pausing. He’d pulled his gun, as they left the car, and every few steps, its cold muzzle bumped into the side of Toly’s head.Have to make it look convincing,Misha had said, and they did.
The building swallowed them, a deep, echoing black save the places where ambient light fell like searchlights through the old skylights, bright, glowing squares on the floor; glinting off bits of dusty old catwalk and second-floor balconies. The catwalk ran around the whole interior of the place, a platform from which foremen had been able to survey the work that went on down on the factory floor. Any number of predators could have lain in wait up there. Toly had the sense of fish going willingly into a barrel.
