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

“Cela is right. Before, we were more than two,” Jianyu reminded Viola. “When we went to Khafre Hall, we had an entire team we trusted, and a leader to guide us. We can’t hope to retrieve the ring as we are now. We still do not know when or where or how the ring may appear again, but clearly Nibsy and your brother know something more. We should use them as we can.”

“My brother has told me nothing,” Viola said stiffly, like she was almost embarrassed by this fact. “I doubt he will be any help at all.”

“But Nibsy Lorcan might be,” Jianyu offered.

“No,” Viola said, shaking her head. “Better we kill that snake now before he can cause any more trouble.”

“Funny how that seems to be your answer to everything,” Cela said dryly, cutting her eyes in Viola’s direction. Cela always tried to give people the benefit of the doubt. She knew too well what it was like to be judged for what she looked like instead of who she was, but Viola wasn’t making the best case against the common idea that Italians couldn’t be trusted with their tempers. “Throw your knife. Slice someone open. It’s always the same with you.”

“Cela,” Jianyu said gently, but Cela could hear the reproach in his tone.

“You really forgive her so easily?” Cela asked, her throat suddenly tight. “You nearly died.” She was more than a little mortified to hear how her voice broke.

“There is nothing to forgive,” Jianyu told her. His dark eyes held such a soft sureness, a clear conviction, that Cela realized he really wasn’t angry at Viola. More, she saw that he wanted her not to be angry as well.

Maybe he was right, but Cela was finding it awful hard to forgive Viola when she understood the truth of the matter—that knife hadn’t been intended for Jianyu. It had been intended for her, and Cela doubted that Viola would’ve cared if she’d have been the one to die.

“Don’t you ever get tired of being so…” Cela let her hand wave vaguely. “You’re so damn unflappable all the time. Don’t you ever get angry? Don’t you ever just want to scream?”

Jianyu’s mouth turned down. “Always. I am always angry.” But he didn’t say anything more. He didn’t bother to explain, only met her eyes, willing her to understand.

Then, all at once, she did. Of course he couldn’t rage and spout off. Of course. Jianyu was too visible in this city, just as she often was—even more so. Anger was a dangerous luxury when you had no one to stand with you, no safe place to fall.

“I didn’t mean—” Cela stopped short, not knowing what she could possibly say.

“Cela’s right,” Jianyu said to Viola, mercifully changing the subject. “We cannot trust Nibsy, but neither can we simply remove him.”

“Maybe you can’t,” Viola told him, but her gaze cut to Cela—a clear challenge. “For me, it wouldn’t be so hard.”

“Patience, Viola,” Jianyu said. “Death is always easy. It is what comes after that is difficult. Think… what would happen to the Devil’s Own without Nibsy’s leadership? Would they follow you? Certainly they will not follow me. You may have forgiven me for what happened to Tilly, but for many of Dolph’s numbers, it only proved that I never belonged.”

Cela heard the note of something larger than sadness in his voice, and she thought that maybe she understood what had put it there. After all, she knew what it felt like to not belong where you were supposed to belong. She’d been reminded of that during the short stay with her aunt, and she thanked her lucky stars that Abel had come back, because he was maybe the one place where she felt she always belonged.

Here, too, she thought suddenly. She shouldn’t feel that way at all, not with the strange mix of people all sitting around this table—especially not with Viola still staring daggers into her heart—but for some reason Cela felt more comfortable sitting next to Jianyu, talking through this strange business of magic, than she maybe had even with her own family at times.

Cela took Jianyu’s hand before she realized what she was doing. It seemed natural somehow to reach for his hand. She told herself that it was because she still couldn’t believe he was really sitting there, whole and healthy. She felt the need to touch him, if only to make sure the moment was real.

A flash of surprise and a question lit Jianyu’s eyes, but then his fingers tightened around hers, and Cela realized that touching him—that reaching for him so easily—had been a mistake. She’d touched him a thousand times while he was sick without even thinking about it. But this? The small squeeze of his hand, the warmth of his skin against hers, and the sure strength of him made her too aware of things she hadn’t realized she felt. Dangerous things that she had no business feeling.

She had to force herself not to pull away. She had to work hard to sit there and pretend that everything was exactly the same as it had been before.

“If we remove Nibsy now, the Devil’s Own will fracture and crumble,” Jianyu said, finally turning back to Viola. “You know this is true. The various powers in the Bowery will come for what is left, scavengers on the carcass of all Dolph built. We cannot allow that to happen.”

Jianyu released Cela’s hand then, and she felt relieved and bereft all at once. She pulled her hand back from the table, tucked it into the skirts that pooled in her lap, and ignored the way her heart felt like it might fly clean out of her chest.

“I know.” Viola sighed. “I hate it, but you’re not wrong. Even Mooch, even with what we did to help him, he doesn’t trust me. He won’t trust you, either.”

“Nibsy has already offered you a new partnership,” Jianyu told Viola. “It is a way back in.”

“No,” Viola said,