Elemental Assassin 04 - Tangled Threads

The Goth dwarf knew just as much about running the barbecue restaurant as I did. I only hoped she wouldn’t have to work too hard today, prepping all the holiday orders, since I wasn’t there to help her.
    Jo-Jo reached for an oven mitt and opened the stove door. The mouthwatering smell of fresh-baked lasagna drifted out to me, and I scooted off my stool.
    “Here,” I said. “Let me help you with that.”
    Jo-Jo gave me a hard stare with her clear, almost colorless eyes. “You just sit back down right now, darling. I can cook for you today. I was doing it for years before you came along, Gin.”
    Properly chastised, I sank back onto my stool.
    Jo-Jo dished up the lasagna, along with a Caesar salad and some garlic breadsticks. The others had already eaten. Good thing, since I attacked the food with unrestrained gusto, going back for three helpings. Then again, it had been the better part of day since I’d last had a meal.
    When I was finished, Jo-Jo cleared everything away. In the den, Natasha had finished her cookies and milkand was now taking a nap. Vinnie snored along with his daughter. Not surprising. He’d been through just as traumatic an ordeal as she had, when he thought he’d lost her.
    “So lay it out for me,” I said, once everything was squared away. “What happened last night? And what’s been going on while I’ve been out of it?”
    Finn took a sip from the mug of chicory coffee that he’d set down on the counter. By my count, that was the third cup he’d had since I’d woken up. “After you ran back into the train yard, I told the kid to stay put and hung around for a few minutes, covering your back. Which was considerably easier to do once you started that fire. It lit up the whole depot like it was the Fourth of July. I popped a couple of the giants and dwarves who were headed your way. I looked for LaFleur and Mab, hoping to take them out too, but I didn’t have any angles on them. So I did all the damage that I could, then grabbed the girl and got the hell out of there.”
    I thought that the goons had been shooting at me last night, but it had really been Finn, picking off a few more of Mab’s men, trying to add even more confusion to the scene.
    “I got the kid back to my car,” Finn continued. “I drove around, trying to figure out where you might be, or how I could help you, but you were already gone, and I had no idea where. At least not until Owen called me. I told him where to start looking for you, while I brought Natasha over here. Jo-Jo patched her up, and Vinnie hasn’t let his daughter out of his sight since then.”
    I looked at my foster brother. “Thank you for that.”
    Finn shrugged. “You’re the one who did all the heavylifting. I just killed a couple of Mab’s men and drove the girl over here.”
    I nodded.
    “As for the aftermath,” Finn said. “Well, things have gotten
really
interesting in the last few hours.”
    “How so?” Owen asked.
    Finn stared at him. “Well, for starters, that little fire that Gin started? It completely gutted the old train depot. Mab won’t be building any kind of nightclub there anytime soon.”
    “It was just a little gasoline,” I said. “Surely, it didn’t do that much damage.”
    Finn raised his eyebrows. “A little gasoline mixed with paint and all that other flammable shit that was lying around the depot. You started a four-alarm fire. The whole place went up like kindling, and Mab’s men freaked when they couldn’t contain it. They had to call the fire department to come out and handle it. Evidently you could see the flames and the smoke a mile away.”
    I frowned. “Why didn’t Mab just take care of it herself? Fire’s her element. Surely, she could have put out the flames or at least helped contain them.”
    Finn shrugged. “Maybe, but apparently she was too busy screaming at Elektra LaFleur for failing to kill you and bring back your head to care that her building was burning to the ground right in front of her. Rumor has it that Mab was a wee bit upset with her hired gun.”
    Despite the fact that I’d almost been electrocuted and frozen to death last night, I couldn’t help but grin. Maybe it was petty of me, but I loved thwarting Mab’s best-laid plans.
    “According to my sources, you’ve become LaFleur’snumber one priority,” Finn said, taking another sip of his coffee. “Mab wants you dead yesterday, Gin. And if Elektra can’t get the job done in the next few days, then Mab’s