For a week, Jericho had avoided this. She’d walked past the stairs that led down to the interrogation cells and didn’t make eye contact with them. She’d ignored the looks from her coworkers as she became steadily more agitated. A week with no new information meant her report sat half-finished, and that bothered her far more than any other part of this fucked-up situation.

So, here she was, doing the thing she told herself she wouldn’t do. Boots trod softly on the stairs as Jericho made her way down to the interrogation cells.

A young man slumped against the wall outside the interrogation room, fidgeting with his phone.

Jericho could have been kind. She could have cleared her throat to alert the guard to her presence. But instead, she just narrowed her eyes on him.

“Bracken, what are you doing?” she asked, voice sharp.

“Jericho!” Bracken jerked his head up, dropping his phone with a harsh clatter. He crouched quickly to pick up the device, tucking it into his back pocket with a guilty expression.

Jericho shook her head. “Just don’t let the captain catch you at it.”

“What are—” Bracken cleared his throat when his words came out too high and nervous. “What are you doing down here, sir?”

“I’m going to talk to the prisoner. Isn’t that obvious?”

“You can’t—” Bracken rushed, reaching to stop Jericho before she could touch the scanner just outside the door. Jericho saw Dusk perk up on the other side of the glass, his eyes narrowing in interest as he took in the scene. “Sir.”

“Why not?” Jericho tilted her head, not taking her eyes off Dusk’s assessing dark gaze. They had certainly piqued Dusk’s interest. Jericho could see that dimple on his freckled cheek growing the longer the exchange went on, amusement dancing across his face.

“The captain said all interrogations were to cease until a translator can be procured.”

Ah. That was why no new information had come to Jericho’s desk. The captain was keeping people away until he could find someone willing to translate for a banshee. Jericho knew well enough that it wouldn’t be hard to find someone who could sign amongst their ranks; there was more than one species of fae who wound up deaf or mute from their abilities. The issue was that Dusk was a banshee, and they were, by nature, terrifying, with screams capable of leveling entire city blocks and making one’s brain melt out through their ears. Far scarier than any siren who could wiggle their way into one’s subconscious.

“Everyone is too scared he’ll attack them,” Jericho murmured.

Bracken wilted. A look of shame flickered over his own face, but he didn’t argue.

“Well, I don’t need a fucking translator. I can sign just fine.” Jericho’s fingers moved in quick, deft motions along to her words.

“Good to see your pronunciation is still sloppy at best!” Dusk shouted from inside the room, a slow smile splitting his lips.

Jericho lifted one hand to flick him off.

“Ah, but that one never did give you trouble. Did it?” Dusk laughed, eyes glittering in delight.

“Banshees can hear all right if you don’t scream at them. It’s mostly the higher volumes and pitches he has trouble with. And he was always pretty good at lipreading. Honestly, it’s like they don’t teach basic fae physiology in schools anymore.” Jericho scoffed, then turned back to Bracken. “They took his hearing aids?”

Bracken merely nodded before adding, “We weren’t—”

He was cut off by another delighted shout from inside the room. “Awww. You’re no fun, Lettie! I had a good thing going there.”

Lettie. It’d been so long since someone had used that name. Dusk had said it the other night too, but Jericho had been too caught up in everything to notice. Once, that name had made her laugh and smile. Once, it had made her feel warm and cared for. She wasn’t sure how she felt about it anymore. Jericho’s eyes jerked back to Dusk, who was slumped back in his chair, arms stretched across the table in front of him lazily, his lower lip poking out in a pout. Little shit.

“They were worried about a communication device,” Jericho finished for Bracken with a scoff. “I know all that, it came across my desk. Now let me in there.”

“Yes, sir.” Bracken hurried to press his palm to the scanner, and the door opened with a soft whoosh. “And sir, be careful. Without the glass between you, you’ll have nothing to protect yourself from his Voice.”

“Worry about yourself, Bracken. If he’s going to attack anyone, it’s going to be the guy standing outside his room.”

Bracken’s face paled, and he backed away from the open door. Jericho didn’t spare him another glance before entering. The door shut behind her softly.

“Soliel.” Jericho spoke softly as she approached, sitting in the acrylic chair across from the villain. She arranged the long sweater she’d thrown on over her leggings that morning in a motion that was distinctly not a fidget. Her eyes flicked over the man across the table from her, taking in the way the muddy-gray jumpsuit fit Dusk a little too tightly in places.

Dusk smiled softly at the name, as if perhaps he hadn’t heard it in a long time.

“What happened to you?” Jericho continued to keep her volume low but her words clear so that Dusk could hear her. If they were going to get anywhere, they had to be able to understand one another.

A roll of the eyes told Jericho that Dusk wasn’t going to make this as easy as she’d hoped. Some stupid, sentimental part of herself had thought she could fall back on their old relationship to get everything she wanted from him. But this wasn’t Sol. Not anymore. He was Dusk now, and he had a list of crimes as long as Jericho’s arm.

Dusk didn’t wait to start on his diatribe. “Every hero needs a villain, right?” The words fell from his lips, accompanied by his fingers as he spoke. He kept his own voice low, matching Jericho’s volume. “Isn’t that what you used to say? Remember? You always made me play the bad guy, or the damsel in distress. I was never allowed to be the hero; that was your job. Well, here I am, Lettie. Your self-made villain.”

Lettie. It didn’t feel as uncomfortable as Jericho thought it might for her to hear that name again. Dusk had been the only one she’d ever allowed to call her that. A sign of their friendship, their closeness, when Jericho couldn’t express her emotions any other way. But now there was no closeness. Still, the name left her feeling . . . nostalgic. For a life that was long gone, back when things had seemed simpler. When her parents had been there to patch her up every time she fell on the playground. Before . . . Before . . . Before the guilt had settled in and broken everything.

Jericho stared at Dusk for a long time, her eyebrow twitching in irritation and disbelief. “Seriously? That’s what you’re going with? My best friend never let me play hero when we were little, so I decided to become a villain? That’s the most cliché shit I’ve ever heard.”

Dusk held the look for a moment longer before snickering, as if they were both in on some age-old joke. Maybe they were. But it didn’t feel like it would have all those years ago. This felt brittle, strained. “Nah.”

“Then what?” Jericho blew out a breath, rustling the loose blond strands fluttering around the opposite side of her undercut.

Dusk made a noncommittal noise in the back of this throat. His fingers moved over the cool acrylic tabletop he was chained to. They’d left him enough chain to move his hands in the familiar intricate patterns but not enough to stand. How long had he been sitting there?

“What’s on the thumb drive?” Jericho pressed on, vowing not to think further about what Dusk had gotten himself into. That was his problem, not hers.

Dusk lifted his eyes, a smile unlike any Jericho had ever seen on his face before—cold, calculating—curling his lips. Suddenly, that dimple on his cheek didn’t look quite so charming. Despite the smile, he remained silent, lips and fingers unmoving.

“Damn it, Sol! Tell me!” Jericho growled, jaw clenching around the words as her anger flared.

“What’s that? Can’t hear you.” Dusk leaned forward so he could hold a hand up to his ear.

With a deep inhale, Jericho lowered her voice again, although she couldn’t keep the heat out of her tone. “You should be thanking me, you know. If it weren’t for me, you’d have been shipped off to Evening Isle already. Locked away and forgotten until the day you died.”

Dusk snorted, the manacles on his wrist jingling as his fingers started moving again. He let his fingers do the talking, moving in slow, sarcastic motions that Jericho recognized all too well. “Ah yes, ever the hero. Just had to prove that one more time, didn’t you? Well, thank you, Lettie, for everything. Thank you for leaving me behind when you went off to be a hero. For forgetting about me. For locking me in a cage where the only sun I see is through a two-by-two-foot window. But hey . . . at least I’m not withering away on an island somewhere, right? You’re a real sport.”

“Hey!” Jericho shouted, her own fingers working along to her angry words to make sure Dusk would understand her. “Don’t get shitty with me. You did this to yourself. This was your choice. Actions have consequences, Sol.”

“Yeah, they do. But I guess Seelie don’t have to think about that, do they?” Dusk asked, fingers moving slowly, as if he wanted every word to hurt. To chip away at something inside of Jericho.

It didn’t work. Jericho held firm. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Why don’t you ask your captain? I’m sure they’d be more than happy to enlighten you on all of the ‘choices’ I’ve made that led me here. They probably have a file on me somewhere,” Dusk signed, still refusing to speak to Jericho with his voice, and shrugged. “And while you’re at it, take a trip down memory lane. Try to think of how your actions have affected others.”

“What?” Jericho spat.

“Actions have consequences, hero.” With that, Dusk lowered his hands to the table and looked away from her.

Jericho was being dismissed. She didn’t appreciate the connotation that Dusk was the one in charge, but she didn’t have the patience to sit there any longer.

“I’ll be back.”

Dusk didn’t look away from the window, but he did speak. “Whatever tickles your fancy, hero.”

Jericho didn’t bother hiding her irritation as she stormed out of the room. Nor did she pay any mind to Bracken when the young man called after her. No. She didn’t stop until she was outside the captain’s door, hand poised to knock. She and the captain had never been friends, or even on good terms. That tended to happen when someone got promoted simply because of their lineage. And Bim Oakfur had most certainly risen through the ranks as quickly as he had because he’d been the previous captain’s snot-nosed brat.

Even still, he was Jericho’s superior. So, she took a moment to compose herself, swallowing the rage that threatened to take over and force a shift into the wolf. It wouldn’t do to wolf out right there in the middle of the bullpen. Not after all those anger management seminars she’d been forced to attend. After a quick count to ten, Jericho rapped her knuckles on the door.

“Enter,” the nasally voice of the leprechaun called. The door opened with a soft creak, and there behind the desk sat Bim Oakfur, looking for all the world like a petty king ruling his kingdom, chin tilted back and upturned nose in the air as he looked down it at Jericho. Jericho swallowed down an annoyed snarl.

“Captain.” She bowed her head in a respectful nod.

“What can I do for you, Jericho?” Oakfur spoke in a tone that sounded benevolent, like anything he did would be a favor.

Jericho ground her teeth to keep from saying something she might regret. Her plan was to request Soliel’s file and get some answers on what had happened to her friend over the years. She wasn’t going to get personal, because this wasn’t personal, this was her job. Jericho was going to remain completely professional.

But what came out of her mouth was, “Why isn’t Dusk wearing his binder?”

“She’s on suicide watch.”

That was it. The rage returned full force, gripping Jericho’s insides and making her nails grow long and sharp against her palms. “First off, Dusk is a he—”

“He,” Oakfur amended. Although he didn’t sound apologetic. His dull brown eyes flicked over Jericho’s twitching features with interest. The sick bastard was getting off on pushing Jericho to see what her feelings were about this whole thing. She was being tested, and she didn’t like it. Fuck. “Never formally filed a change of gender form. In the eyes of the law, Soliel Tsuki is female.”

“I don’t give a flying fuck what the law says. Sol is now, and always has been, male. When you talk about him, when anyone talks about him, they will do so correctly. Or do we want the Prisoner Rights people involved in this?” Jericho hissed, a knowing look in her eyes. It was a low blow, a threat that she’d probably pay for later, but she didn’t care. “We all know what a pain in the ass they can be.”

Oakfur’s eyes narrowed in annoyance, and for a moment, Jericho thought perhaps there would be some kind of retaliation, but then he blinked and moved on. “Very well. His binder will be returned to him. Was there something else you needed, Jericho?”

“Yes. I want his full file. I need everything we have on Soliel Tsuki and his alias Dusk, from birth till his recent capture. If I’m going to be interrogating him, I need to know his mental state.”

Oakfur raised a brow in question but nodded. “It will be on your desk by this afternoon. And since you’ve taken an interest in him, we want the location of his lab facility. We believe he may have more information stored there, plus whatever harmful tech he’s been working on. All of which will need to be recovered and neutralized. I expect results, Jericho.”

“Yes, captain,” Jericho muttered through a clenched jaw. Then she turned on her heel to head back to her desk. She’d worry about the ways Oakfur would punish her for her outburst later. For now, she had more important things to do.

Like tracking down Mrs. Tsuki.