Nora Sakavic

"Ninety percent of the time the very sight of you makes me want to commit murder. I think about carving the skin from your body and hanging it out as a warning to every other fool who thinks he can stand in my way."

"What about the other ten?" Neil asked.

Andrew ignored that. "I warned you not to put a leash on me."

"I didn't," Neil said. "You put that leash on yourself when you told me to stay no matter what. Don't be mad at me just because I was smart enough to pick up the other end of it."

"If you pull it again I will kill you."

"Maybe when the year is up, you will," Neil said. "Right now there's not a lot you can do about it, so don't waste our time threatening me."

"I don't think it was the money," Andrew said, and elaborated at Neil's questioning look: "Why they chased you so long. I imagine at some point they realized it was far more important to hurt you than to recoup anything they'd lost."

"So you say, but you still won't hit me."

Andrew stubbed his cigarette out between them. "The time is fast approaching."

Neil studied his face, looking for a hint of the earlier fathomless anger and finding nothing. Despite Andrew's unfriendly words, his expression and tone were calm. He said these things like they meant nothing to him. Neil didn't know if it was a mask or the truth. Was Andrew hiding that rage from Neil or from himself? Maybe the monster was buried where neither of them could find it until Neil crossed another unforgivable line.

"Good," Neil said at length. Tugging a sleeping dragon's tail sounded like a good way to die a painful death, but Neil would be dead before Andrew's protection wore off. "I want to see you lose control."

Andrew went still with his hand halfway to the vodka. "Last year you wanted to live. Now you seem hell-bent on getting killed. If I felt like playing another round with you right now, I would ask why you've had a change of heart. As it stands, I've had enough of your stupidity to last me a week. Go back inside and bother the others now."

Neil feigned confusion as he got to his feet. "Am I bothering you?"

"Beyond the telling."

"Interesting," Neil said. "Last week you said nothing gets under your skin."

Andrew didn't waste his breath responding, but Neil counted it as a victory.

Andrew refused on the grounds he wouldn't wish you on anyone except a mortician."

"Drama queen," Neil muttered

Yes or no?" Andrew asked.

"Yes," Neil said

There was nowhere for Neil to stand except up against Andrew, but somehow Neil didn't mind. They'd been apart for seven weeks but Neil keenly remembered why he'd stayed. He remembered this unyielding, unquestioning weight that could hold him and all of his problems up without breaking a sweat. For the first time in months he could finally breathe again.

"The next time someone comes for you, stand down and let me deal with it. Do you understand?"

"If it means losing you, then no," Neil said.

"I hate you," Andrew said casually. He took a last long drag from his cigarette and flicked it off the roof. "You were supposed to be a side effect of the drugs."

"That isn't fair."

"No," Abby said, and cupped his face in her hands. "This isn't fair. None of this is."

Sometimes I think this job is going to kill me," Abby said. "Seeing what people have done, what people continue to do, to my Foxes. I wish I could protect you, but I'm always too late. All I can do is patch you up afterward and hope for the best. I'm sorry, Neil. We should have been there for you."

"I wouldn't have let you be,"

She wouldn't have held him like he was a hard breath away from shaking apart.

"Oh, to be young and filthy rich," Nicky said. "Must be nice."

Allison considered her manicure with lofty boredom. "It is."

If I wanted to remember, I wouldn't hide the knives in my closet like a shameful secret I couldn't revisit or let go of. They weren't doing me any good, so he said he would carry them until I needed them again.