Elemental Assassin 04 - Tangled Threads

really.
    “Well, my invitation still stands,” I said.
    Bria frowned. “What invitation?”
    “The one to the Christmas party tomorrow at Owen Grayson’s house. I’d like you to come, if you would.”
    Bria immediately shook her head. “I don’t think that would be a good idea, Gin. I just need some time to think about things. How much time, I don’t know.”
    I nodded, accepting her request. After all, I was the Spider, the assassin whose rune was the symbol for patience. I’d wait for Bria—for however long it took.
    “All right. I’ll be here, whenever you’re ready,” I said. “In whatever way that you want me to be.”
    And then there was nothing left for us to talk about, not today, so Bria slid out of the booth and got to her feet. I did the same and unlocked the front door for her.
    She put her hand on the knob and twisted it as if she was about to leave. But for some reason, she turned and faced me once more.
    “Whatever issues there are between us, whatever bad things we’ve both done over the years, I want you to know that I’m glad you’re alive, Gin,” Bria said. “I’m glad you’re alive.”
    It sounded like she was saying good-bye—forever. But before I could call out to her, before I could try to get her to stay, Bria opened the door, stepped out into the cold evening, and walked away.
    Taking the last piece of my childhood, and maybe even my heart, with her.

31
     
    That night, I couldn’t sleep. Part of it was Bria, of course, and everything that had been said between us. But mostly, I couldn’t stop thinking about what my sister had told me—about the man with the green eyes who’d found her wandering around in the forest after Mab had murdered our mother and older sister.
    So I got out of bed, headed downstairs, and went into Fletcher Lane’s office.
    I clicked on the light and stood in the doorway, staring into the room in front of me. The old man’s office had always been something of a mess, with papers and folders and pens scattered everywhere, from his battered desk to the bookcases that hugged the walls to the filing cabinets on either side of the door. Supposedly there was some kind of method to the madness, although I’d never quite gotten the grasp of it. Fletcher had always claimed that there was no need to lock his office, because if someoneever broke in, she’d give up trying to find what she was looking for out of sheer frustration. The only reason I’d been able to find LaFleur’s file was because it had actually been in one of the filing cabinets in its proper place.
    Even though he’d been dead for a couple of months now, I just hadn’t had the heart to clean out Fletcher’s office yet. I supposed that part of me wanted to keep everything the way that it had been the day he’d died, as if that would somehow bring him back. The air even still smelled faintly of him—like sugar, spice, and vinegar swirled all together.
    But the old man wasn’t coming back, and I wanted answers. So I drew in a breath, stepped into the room, and started going through the stacks of papers.
    An hour later, I was ready to give up, just as Fletcher had intended. Because I’d found nothing. No files, no papers, nothing that gave me any clue as to why the old man had rescued Bria or how he’d even known she was in trouble in the first place. Once again, Fletcher had kept secrets from me, and now, since the old man was gone, I doubted I’d ever get the answers to my questions.
    Tired and disgusted, I headed toward the door. I reached over to flip the light off to go back to bed when something winked at me from one of the bookcases. I looked over and noticed a crystal paperweight sitting on the shelf—one that I’d never seen before. Of course, I hadn’t been in Fletcher’s office for quite some time before he’d died. Curious, though, I walked over to the bookcase. It took me only half a second to realize that the paperweight was shaped like a small circle surrounded by eight thin rays.
    A spider rune. My rune.
    But the real kicker was the slim folder underneath the glinting crystal.
    Unlike the other manila folders that littered the rest of the room, this one was the same dark brown as the bookcase, which made it practically invisible, along with the fact that most of it had been shoved back and under the books on that particular shelf. It looked like something Fletcher had just put on the bookcase and forgotten about, but I knew it was more than that. The