➵ Chapter 54-7

Lee flinched, his brother's trepidation rubbing off on him. "Which one?" "To the left of it. And then, after that, cut the first one you touched." I pulled the knife that was still strapped to my waist, slicing the first wire. As the blade cut through the second wire, the timer jumped from one and a half minutes to just half. "Run!" Eric gasped, his eyes wide. "All of you, go!" 0:25 "He's right. Jace, take Lee and get out!" I looked desperately at the mess of wires, trying to think. "Damn it!" "Not without the both of you." 0:20 Reckless and out of ideas, I stood and nocked three arrows, letting them all go at once. They pierced through the wires and switches simultaneously, and the time display paused. 0:15 Eric let out a whimper that was dangerously close to a sob, and Lee pushed me aside, tearing the bomb off his brother's chest and flinging it impetuously to the ground without a second thought, yanking him into a hug. "What now?" Jace asked me. "Where will Polk be?" "The apartment where I lived with my parents." I turned around to look at him. "Will you get them home?" "You think after this, after everything, I'm just going to let you go off alone?" He set his jaw stubbornly, in a way that made it known that he wouldn't budge no matter I said. "No bloody way." I looked back at the twins. "Can you two get yourselves home?" "I'm coming," Eric said immediately. "You're done. You go home. Go to Hannah." "Hannah wouldn't want me to abandon you." "She would also want the father of her child alive." "This isn't your choice to make. Besides, you need me. I have a way to get rid of Polk and make sure everybody knows what he did to your family." ➵ After all the terrible things we'd done, Lee swore that this would be the one that would send us to hell. Not the lying or stealing or killing or plotting murder, but the fact that we stole a church van. It was nothing extravagant - just a regular van that they used to parade kids to the church's annual summer camp. We made a couple stops before parking in the alley behind my old apartment complex, one stop at the twins' place so Eric could grab his things, and another at Keen's farmhouse so they could all restock on weapons. Upon arriving where we needed to be, Eric finally began filling us in. Eric held up sphere the size of the marble for everyone to see. "I remodeled the... the... Lee?" "Grenades," he supplied. "Grenades. I remodeled the grenades so that they're small enough to hide, and we can carry more. I have a pouch for everyone. They work the same way as the old ones." "Is the password different?" Jace asked, almost hopeful. "No." Slipping the grenade into his pocket, Eric turned toward me and opened the palm of his other hand, displaying a drone so tiny, it could pass off as an insect. "This drone will send live feed to the NYPD, delayed by a few seconds so that I can edit whatever might incriminate you. Just get him to confess what he did to your parents, that he tried having you killed, and then do what you have to. It's going to be self-defense. I've been developing Bug for quite a while. He's fully functional." I couldn't help grinning. "You named your drone 'Bug'?" "Yes." "You should let Hannah name the baby." Eric smiled, setting Bug down. "And you can't take anything with you. You need to be unarmed. Using your bow or just having it on you is a dead giveaway to the police. But you can keep that knife on you. Just don't pull it out unless you have to." The door to the van slid open as a worn out Logan sauntered in, dropping onto the ground. "The man had me dumped in an ally with an apology note. Can you believe that? What am I? His girlfriend?" When Tyra had made contact with the Sect, she learned that they had already found him unharmed. That he was already back at their Headquarters, gathering his forces to retaliate against Darren Polk. Now he had a reason to involve them that didn't have anything to with me - the Sect was under the impression that Darren Polk's very existence had come to endanger the secrecy they liked to live in. "Why'd he let you go? For Matthias?" Tyra asked. "No. Because he doesn't want the Sect to hunt him down for killing their king. The Sect had already killed his son when they didn't hear from me. Not that I think Polk would care." Jace grimaced, still thinking about what Eric had said. "I don't like this. You're going to walk in there virtually unarmed, Lia. It's too big of a risk." "If I shoot an arrow through him, I may as well confess to being the vigilante. Hell, I might as well turn myself over to the NYPD right now." "Then take my gun." "Jace, you might need it. I'll be fine." "Yeah, Acardi," Logan snorted. "As long as she doesn't get killed, of course." "I don't care who you are, Logan. I will shoot you." Tuning them out, I leaned toward Eric. "Do I need to worry about civilians walking into that building?" "No. Nobody lives in that complex anymore. The building was sold to some company that wants to knock it down to make a farmers market. Everybody was forced to leave. And construction doesn't start for six months." I let out a breath. "Nobody there yet?" "In the building, yes. They're armed. But there's nobody in the apartment yet. I think he wants you to go in there first." "Once they show themselves, the Sect will keep his men busy," Logan added. "Just get the confession and kill him, okay?" If I spoke, my voice would have shook, and they would have known that I was not nearly as calm as I seemed. So, I nodded, shooting them all one last crooked smile before climbing out the van. Jace grabbed the comms I'd forgotten and slipped out before I shut the door. "I'm walking you as far as I can." Instead of telling him how potentially detrimental that could be to our plan, I took his hand. We walked toward the old brownstone in silence, with me clinging to his hand as if it were my sanity. Stopping at the back door to the building, he didn't let me go in right away. "I want you back alive, Lia. After this the first thing we're doing is going on a date. A real one."