Map of Fates (The Conspiracy of Us 2)

Jack frowned. “I’ll take care of it tomorrow. Or Avery can help me.”

Stellan sniffed. “You know she’s not strong enough. And that’s . . . Ça va faire mal toute la nuit unless you fix it,” he said.

From where I sat leaning against the headboard, I watched, surprised, as Jack sighed and lay back gingerly. And I was even more surprised when Stellan climbed on the bed, too, and leaned over him.

“The usual?” he said.

Jack nodded, grimacing as Stellan’s slim fingers prodded his skin. Then Stellan planted one knee on Jack’s chest, and Jack held out his right arm, squeezing his eyes shut.

The scene was so odd, I had to wonder for a second whether I was hallucinating. Interesting, I thought clinically, that this is what my brain conjured up under stress.

With his palm at Jack’s collarbone, Stellan wrenched hard on his elbow.

Jack tried to stifle a groan. His shoulder moved in an odd, sickening way, and he was breathing hard as Stellan set his arm back down by his side and pressed both palms to his shoulder again, then nodded.

“You’re welcome,” he said. He climbed off Jack and leaned heavily next to me.

I stared as Jack sat up, rubbing his collarbone.

“His shoulder. The bone, it—” Stellan made an exploding gesture with his hands. “I have to—” He gestured the other direction, putting his hands back together.

“Pop his shoulder back in?” I said.

Stellan pointed at me. “Yes. Done it many times.”

“You used to be better at it,” Jack said through clenched teeth.

“You used to be tougher,” Stellan said cheerfully. He leaned his head back against the headboard. “Tired. But cannot go to sleep. The concussion.”

Jack surveyed him warily. “Can you go back to Elodie’s room now?”

Stellan opened one eye. “She wants to talk. The bracelet. Heist. I do not want to talk. You go talk.”

A giggle tried to bubble up in my throat, even though there was nothing funny about any of it. Not quite knowing what else to do, I patted the spot on the other side of me, gesturing for Jack to sit. I wasn’t going to kick the painkiller-drunk guy with a head injury out into the hall of a moving train right now.

Stellan grabbed the remote and clicked on the ancient TV bolted to the corner of the cabin. As far as I could tell, it was on a French infomercial selling a blender, and the marketers seemed entirely too excited about it.

After a second’s hesitation, Jack crawled up the bed on my other side. I saw him glance at Stellan over my head, but all he did was settle back against the headboard. After a second, he took my hand, firmly, like a proclamation. I was surprised at first, but I let it stay. And the three of us sat there, shoulder to shoulder to shoulder, me and these two boys who turned out to be just about all I had left in the world.

CHAPTER 23

A short time later, Stellan’s eyes were at half-mast and falling.

I elbowed him gently in the side. “Wake up.”

He blinked hard and muttered something in Russian.

“You’re supposed to stay awake,” I said, but I wasn’t really paying attention. I was watching the news that had come on after the blender infomercial. Every story was still about Eli Abraham, and me holding a dying Takumi Mikado. And my father sitting next to me, Lydia one seat down, both frozen, eyes wide like they had no idea what was going on. A small, disbelieving laugh escaped my lips. They were such liars.

My hand clenched Jack’s, but he didn’t respond. I looked down to see his head loll into the bookcase next to the bed, his face slack and, if not quite peaceful, at least more relaxed in the flickering blue of the TV. I dislodged my hand gently from his, and he kept sleeping.

“He’s always been able to sleep so well.” There was more than a hint of jealousy in Stellan’s voice. “Would be nice. But I wish right now I could lie down with him.”

I took a deep breath. “You guys snuggling would be cute,” I said. “But really, don’t fall asleep yet, okay? I don’t want you dying on my watch.”

He leaned against me, his head heavy on top of mine, his skin warm against my bare arm. “Keep me awake, then,” he murmured. “Tell me stories.”

I shoved him gently, and when he gave me a woozy grin, I noticed red running down his forehead. I reached across and handed him a tissue from the bedside table. “I thought Elodie bandaged your head.”

The TV was casting a dim blue flicker over Jack’s sleeping form. Now they were talking about Prime Minister Mikado, and the anguish on his and his wife’s faces made me clench my teeth. I couldn’t think about this anymore tonight.

Stellan was dabbing ineffectually at his head.

“You’re going to bleed on my bed,” I said crossly. “Get up. Bathroom.”

I took one last glance back at the news and then followed Stellan. He stood squinting at his head in the mirror. He leaned closer, trying to see the wound, and smacked his forehead right into the glass.

“Ow,” he said, indignant, like the mirror had come out and hit him.

I stopped in the doorway. He was so tall. His head nearly brushed the train’s low ceilings. Tall and intimidating and carved like a statue of a beautiful half-naked Viking prince, and here he was in this tiny train bathroom, with blood running down his forehead, in ladies’ pajama pants and with a pout like an angry toddler’s. I ducked my head to conceal another inappropriate giggle.

Stellan rubbed his eye with the back of one hand. “What?” he said petulantly, and I bit down hard on my lip. What was wrong with me? I threw a hand over my mouth, but a snort escaped, and all of a sudden, the giggles that had been trying to come out for the last hour burst the floodgate and I was hysterical.