The Serpent's Curse by Lisa Maxwell (read an ebook week .TXT) 📕

St. Louis. Instead, she went back into the car, rushing down the narrow corridor toward the berth she’d been sharing with North and Maggie. Before she could even grasp the handle, though, the door slid open to reveal more than six feet of irritated cowboy.

Jericho Northwood’s mismatched eyes widened in surprise at the sight of her standing there, but then they narrowed. “Where do you think—”

The train lurched with a sudden burst of braking that made the car sway, but Esta didn’t lose her footing. She pushed past North, tugging him inside the small Pullman berth and securing the door behind him. “We have a problem,” she said, brushing off his clear irritation.

“You’re damned right we have a problem,” North blustered as Maggie crossed her arms over her chest. “We woke up and found the two of you gone, right along with our necklace.”

“That’s the least of our worries right now,” Esta said, not bothering to correct him. The necklace was never going to be his, but she figured pointing out that fact wouldn’t help. Instead, she moved past Maggie to peer out from a crack in the drapes that covered the windows. The train had slowed enough that the riders had come up to escort it into town. Most of the men wore the silver stars of law enforcement on their dark lapels. All of them carried guns.

“Where’s Ben?” Maggie asked, using the name Harte had gone by in St. Louis. When Esta turned back, the other girl was peering through the thick lenses of her silver-rimmed spectacles, waiting for the answer—completely oblivious to the danger they were currently in.

“Gone,” Esta told them.

“Gone where?” North demanded, stepping toward her.

“I don’t know,” she lied. It wasn’t like she planned on taking the two Antistasi with her, anyway.

“Like hell,” North said. “There’s no way Ben went off without telling you where he was headed.”

“That’s what I would’ve thought too.” Esta let her real disappointment and frustration infuse her tone. Even knowing he’d probably been right to go, she felt Harte’s absence like a fresh bruise.

“But the necklace—” Maggie started.

“It’s gone. He took my cuff as well,” Esta told them, hoping that the bit of truth she was offering would be enough to distract them from their suspicion. She couldn’t fight them and deal with the riders, too.

“You can’t really expect us to believe you don’t know where Ben went,” North said.

“It won’t matter what you believe if we can’t figure out how to get out of the trouble we are currently in.” Esta pulled the curtain back a little.

“What is all that?” Maggie moved toward the window, her brows bunching in confusion as she peered through the split in the curtain.

The riders had come up alongside the train now. Some of the marshals rode with their eyes forward, but others looked to the train cars, clearly searching for something.

Esta let the curtains fall back across the window to obscure their view.

“That ain’t no welcoming committee,” North told them, his voice dark.

Maggie’s eyes were wide behind the lenses of her glasses. “But how could they have known we’d be here? No one saw us leave St. Louis.”

“Maybe someone on the train recognized us,” Esta said. It wasn’t like they would have been easy to miss, with her and Harte barely conscious. “It wouldn’t take much for someone to telegraph a message to the authorities.”

North cursed under his breath. A moment ago, he’d been confident. Now he looked worried—scared, even—and he had good reason to be. The news of the attack they’d launched on the Veiled Prophets’ ball would have spread quickly. Any news of the Devil’s Thief would have, but an attack on the richest men in St. Louis—on the president himself ? An attack like that wouldn’t go unanswered.

“Where are we?” Esta asked North.

“We were heading toward Dallas, so we should be deep into Texas by now,” North said.

“Texas?” That wasn’t anywhere close to the dagger.

“It was the first train we could catch. I figured it would be far enough away from the mess we left in St. Louis. Plenty of wide-open spaces and people who usually mind their own business,” North said. There was a challenge in his tone, daring her to contradict him. “It wasn’t like you were in any shape to come up with something better.”

“I didn’t say I was.” Esta barely remembered how Maggie and North had managed to get them away from the Festival Hall. “I’m grateful for all you did to get us out of St. Louis last night.”

North snorted his contempt. “So grateful you and your partner decided to hightail it out of here without so much as a word.”

“I’m still here,” Esta reminded him, letting a chill settle over her words. For now.

Maggie stepped forward. “We don’t have time for arguing. We’ll sort everything out later—after we get out of this mess.”

“There isn’t any way out of this,” North told Maggie. “Once this train stops, we’ll be surrounded. Hell, we’re already surrounded.” He rubbed his hand over the coppery stubble on his jaw, his expression tight.

“There’s always a way,” Esta said, considering their options. “Give me a minute to think.”

“Think all you want, but it won’t help any,” North said, trying to sound like he was in control of the situation, but there was a note in his voice that betrayed his fear. He swallowed hard, his throat working as his mismatched eyes met hers. “I’ve seen what happens with crowds like that. You can’t reason with them, and you can’t outrun them.”

“After what we did…” Maggie’s voice trailed off like she was remembering everything that had happened the night before. She grasped North’s arm to steady herself. “When they find us—”

Esta understood Maggie’s fear. Maggie had seen firsthand what had happened to the people they’d doused with Ruth’s serum in St. Louis. She’d watched their magic awaken, and then she’d watched them die. She had every reason to be worried.

“There’s no reason for them to find us,” Esta said. They were still Mageus,