Tristan pulled the truck behind a warehouse, just one in several rows of such buildings, all left in the last two decades when the Perraults tried and failed at expanding their empire from Beaulac into New Bristol. The area had been grand once, a dozen large rectangles climbing several stories and painted in Perrault blue. But the paint had peeled, the tin siding had warped, and the iron beams holding up the structures had rusted. Weeds peeked out from cracks in the sidewalk and vines obscured the broken windows.
The city had never followed through on its promise to develop the land, and Chairwoman Randolph had not yet convinced them to sell it to her at a fair enough price.
Tristan parked, and he and Lila slid behind the buildings. Usually drug addicts took over such places, but Lila saw no evidence of squatters on the abandoned block.
“It’s too quiet,” Tristan whispered, staring at every window they passed, his fingers on his gun.
Lila did the same.
Finally they reached a warehouse in the middle of the block and slipped through the back door. The inside had been gutted and cleared. Only dust, leaves, small animals, and echoes made it their home.
They heard muffled voices and shifting boots. Lila slipped on her hood, and the pair followed the noise until they spied Dixon and Fry, peering from a window tinted with dust and grime.
A smaller form in a large coat stood between them, ponytail smooth and shoulders stiff.
“You were supposed to take her back to the shop,” Tristan said, frowning at his brother and Fry.
The large man dropped his binoculars, letting them swing at his chest. “She threatened to give us a poke if we tried to take her back. I thought I’d let you make the final call. It seems the little mouse has teeth now. Remind me to give Shirley a piece of my mind, will you?”
Maria did
not turn around nor surrender her spot at the window. She’d fixed her gaze on the warehouse across the street, her binoculars pressed up against her eyes so hard she likely had a bruise. “I don’t see him.”
“We had a deal, Maria,” Tristan said patiently. “You were—”
“Fuck you, and fuck the deal,” Maria said absently, still refusing to turn away, all traces of the demure little girl gone from her voice. “I’m going in there for my brother, with or without you.”
Lila blinked.
So did Tristan.
Crickets chirped in the corners of the warehouse.
“Do you see now?” Fry said. “Came out of nowhere. It didn’t help that she stole my backup tranq. She said that she didn’t need us anymore after you sent us the address. Said she’d shoot us both, steal the truck, and drive herself.”
Lila and Tristan blinked again.
Maria turned away from the window. “They’re all fools. Workborn and lowborn and highborn alike. But you and Hood are useful fools. You want my brother, and I want my brother. We have the same goal right now, and I figure you’re the safest of the lot that wants him, even though you nearly killed my father. From everything I’ve heard so far, you’re the only ones who don’t want to send us somewhere he doesn’t want us to go. So far,” she repeated, before resuming her watch on the window. “I still don’t see him.”
Lila checked her palm once again. The score flickered between forty-five and fifty. “He’s got to be in there. The numbers are a bit fuzzy, but I suspect it’s because both he and Rebecca are inside. The program doesn’t know which one to focus on. Or perhaps the signals are fading.”
“Who’s Rebecca?” Maria asked.
“A girl the Germans took. Your people, I suppose.”
“They aren’t my people. I don’t have a people. I have a brother and a father, and that’s it.”
“What about your mother?”
“My grandmother beat her half to death after she found out that she’d slept with a dirty German slave. The moment their contracts ended, they moved far, far away. My father found us on his doorstep nine months later. At least she did him the courtesy of leaving a note.”
“And birthing you and Oskar. I hear it’s a little uncomfortable.”
Tristan joined the group at the window. “Are you sure your father is really—”
“I know who my father is. He was so damn proud and happy that he hung the certificates on the wall in our room. Bullstow did the DNA test themselves, you know. Twice. They didn’t believe anyone would sleep with the dirty German slave. They redid the test when Oskar and I were five years old. Stupid assholes.”
Tristan looked helplessly at Lila. “I got nothing.”