ena

lick of her heels on the marble flo

g to have Grant deliver me to the

holding cell, and did not

ant's silver case and lit it,

and exhaled a plume o

but the sting was nothing to t

y raised when Gran

d my shoulders and shoved me back with

he polished floor, and caught my b

s tone thick with a

out humiliation but couldn't tak

mth they may have once held for him was gone,

dea what he

o power was not his doing; it was a path I had pave

se tonight's gathering to fin

I had imagined the look on his face-shock, then awe, then gratitude for the three years I had spent building his kingdom from the shadows, waiting for

ld life who knew where I had gone. "He won't pass your test," Max had sai

to steady, and asked

set on forcing me to leave

hardening. He confirmed his

iers holding me back,

into a fist and drov

nocked from my lung

me and offere

in the city, or I could eat a piece of raw steak

y, a sharp pain radi

sts clenched

rant and spoke a warn

he utter bankruptcy and destruction of t

hter, a sharp sound tha

s joined in, their chuc

patient from a madhouse, suf

hat a civilian wife was pretend

defiance, picked up a plate of food fr

hattered agai

telling me to worry about my own

ached with three

anded my meth

ettled on a familiar Associate, a woman with wh

ght toward her

hrank back

couldn't pay my debt

hispered that if she did not hand over her telephone, I would see to

act, finding my desperat

Thirty minutes," he said, his gaze fixed somewhere over my shoulder, at the men in the back who were already loosening thei