And then Sonia screams.

It’s muffled, but there’s no denying that it’s a scream of pain. Then the trunk is slid away. Risa feels more than hears it: a vibration in the wood of the stairs that resonates in her bones. She scrambles down to the bottom of the stairs, backing into shadows with everyone else.

Beau steps away from the basement window. He was able to remove only one nail. “This is it,” he tells Risa “This is the end for all of us if we don’t play this right.”

She wants to challenge that fatalistic view—but she can’t, because he’s right. Maybe Connor will come back just in time, she thinks. He’ll see what’s going on upstairs and do something about it. After all, Connor does have a talent for falling smack in the middle of bad situations.

“Whatever it is, we’ll fight,” Beau says.

The trapdoor opens, shedding harsh yellow light from above down the stairs, so much brighter than the single dangling bulb. And then up above, Sonia says the strangest thing.

“Lev!” she calls out. “Lev, can you come up? I need your help up here.”

It takes a moment for Risa to even process what she’s said. Lev? Why would she be calling for Lev? Beau looks at her, shaking his head, not getting it either.

“Lev! Get your ass up here!” Sonia calls, much louder. “I don’t have all day.”

And then it dawns on Risa exactly what Sonia is doing. I’m giving you the advantage, Sonia is saying. Something is horribly wrong, but I’m giving you the advantage. Take it!

Risa searches the group, and zeroes in on Jack, the blond, mousy kid who could pass for Lev for a whole of five seconds. She grabs him, and his eyes go manga-wide in surprise.

“Tell her you’ll be right up!”

“What?”

“Just tell her!”

Jack clears his throat and calls up the stairs. “Coming! I’ll be right up.” Then he looks at Risa, begging with his eyes, pleading, but Risa puts her hands on his shoulders. “You’ll be fine,” she tells him. “I promise. I’ll be right behind you!”

Beau nods to her and signals to all the others to stay hidden in shadows, then he gets behind Risa. “You’ve got his back, and I’ve got yours,” he says.

With Jack in the lead, they go up the stairs to face whatever is in store for them.

36 • Nelson

He has every intention of honoring their bargain. He is, after all, a man of conscience. A man of his word. As the boy he assumes is Lev comes up the stairs, Nelson allows himself a small moment to relish this half victory. He will tranq Lev, then he will take Lev to a place where no one will hear him scream, and he will make him divulge where Lassiter has gone, because he surely knows, even if the old woman doesn’t. Then, once Nelson has the information he needs, he will kill Lev in a most painful way—one he has yet to devise, because vengeance is best when experienced creatively and in the moment.

“You called for me, ma’am?” the boy says—and when he turns to face Nelson, Nelson immediately realizes he’s been duped—just as someone else coming up from below swings a wrench at his legs. Pain explodes in his shin the moment the wrench connects with it, and Nelson immediately realizes his mistake. Of course they would have known it was a ruse! They must have heard the gunshot. His pain is a measure of his miscalculation.

He reaches down to disarm the girl attacking him, but she pulls her arm back and swings again, this time catching the back of his hand. More pain, but Nelson can handle pain, and the damage isn’t enough to impair him. The third time she swings, he succeeds in grabbing the wrench from the girl and hurling it away—but there’s someone else coming up the stairs behind her, and he’s swinging a hammer. Nelson deflects the blow, backs away, and kicks the trunk toward the hammer-wielding AWOL to block him, but the trunk flips open and dumps at least a hundred envelopes on the floor. The kid takes one step forward, and begins slipping on the envelopes like they’re banana peels. It’s just the opening Nelson needs. He thrusts his palm to the imbalanced kid’s chest, and it sends him tumbling down the hole and into the basement. Nelson quickly kicks the trapdoor closed behind him, then tugs on a heavy bookshelf, which comes crashing down over the trapdoor, spilling its load of books. No one’s coming up that way anymore.

Now it’s just him, the girl, the blond kid, and the old woman, who’s telling them to run, but they’re not smart enough to save themselves. The girl scrambles on the floor for the wrench, and the blond kid is parrying toward Nelson with a letter opener he found on the desk. Nelson pulls out one of his guns, taking aim at the blond kid, because he’s closest, and because Nelson is profoundly pissed off at the kid’s lack of Lev-ness.

He meant to pull out the gun loaded with tranqs, but in the commotion, who could blame him for pulling the wrong gun?

He fires, and the kid’s chest shreds into a screaming red Rorschach. Blood splatters everywhere. He’s dead before he hits the floor.

“No!” yells the girl. “You bastard!”

It’s in that moment, with Nelson holding his gun, and her ready to strike with the wrench, that he realizes who she is. In spite of the hair, in spite of the eye color, he recognizes her—and knows he’ll have a new prize today. A very useful one. He wonders how much Risa Ward will be worth to Divan.

Risa comes toward him just as he reaches for his other gun with his free hand. She gets in a swing at his head. It connects with his ear. A solid strike, but survivable, just like all the other blows. He shoves the tranq gun into her gut and pulls the trigger, and she grunts as the tranq embeds deep. He holds her as she slips helplessly from consciousness, the wrench falling from her hand, thudding onto the floor.

Nelson gently eases her to the ground beside the dead boy. Then he turns to the old woman, who sobs from the chair to which she’s chained. “Your fault,” Nelson tells her. “Entirely your fault. That boy’s life is on your head for lying to me!”

The woman can only sob.

Now that the battle is over, he assesses the damage from the wrench. His shin may be fractured. It’s swelling and he can feel his pulse in it. His right ear is hot, and the back of his hand is turning purple and swelling. All in a day’s work. The pain will be good for him. It will release endorphins. Make him more alert.

“Please go . . .” wails the woman. “Just go . . .”

And he will . . . but not until he finishes his business here.

There’s a torn envelope on the desk and a cigarette lighter in his pocket. He notes that everything around the basement, from the felled bookshelf and its pile of books, to the stacks of paperwork on the desk, to the various wooden antiques—everything in this room—everything in this shop, in fact—is highly flammable.

He grabs the envelope, takes out the lighter, and flicks it until it releases its tiny controlled flame.

“Stop!” yells the woman through her tears. “I’ll give you Lassiter! I’ll give him to you if you stop this and let the others go!”

He hesitates. He knows this is just another game, but he’s willing to play, if only to give him a moment to contemplate the severity of what he’s about to do.

“God forgive me,” she says. “God forgive me. . . .”

“At this moment,” Nelson reminds her, “it’s my forgiveness that you need.”

She nods, unable to look at him, and that’s how he knows she’s going to tell him the truth. But will it be truth enough?

“He’s in your hand,” she says. “He’s in your hand, and you don’t even know it.” Then she lowers her head in defeat, and perhaps some self-loathing.

Nelson has no idea what she means . . . until he looks at the empty envelope he’s holding and reads the handwritten address: