“MY FATHER WAS SHOT by a black man with an English accent. A hired killer.”
Minerva trembled as she spoke. She had begun to shake, though that could be the blood loss. Her eyes remained hard on Micah throughout. “My father owed debts. To a bookie, mainly. Thelonious Skell was the bookie’s name.”
“Thel . . . Skell?”
She nodded. “It was Skell who hired the Englishman to claim the debt. My father—” She gritted her teeth as a wave of pain flooded through her. “My father owed him five thousand dollars. I don’t entirely blame Skell. My father owed him. But what did Cort owe? Debts should not carry forward that way.” She paused, spat a sac of blood. “It was the Englishman who did it. He stole Cort’s life by stealing my father’s . . . He would have saved us. If he was still alive, my father . . . he would have. But the Englishman killed him, and wrecked my life in the bargain. And that is the which of why I aim to kill him.”
Micah nodded. “You are sure it was him?”
Minerva said, “You figure there’s a bunch of British Negro assassins out there?”
Micah had only ever heard of the one. “You have been chasing him a long time.”
“Until that man is dead, I cannot rest. So. Will you let me end it?”
“No.”
Minerva bared her teeth. “Piss on you.”
“We are hurt,” Micah told her. “Our best chance is to band together. Once we have made our way clear, go ahead and finish matters with the Englishman.”
Minerva said, “I don’t need your goddamn permission.” Then, betraying some worry: “If I don’t kill him, he’ll kill me.”
Micah shook his head. “He will not.”
“How do you figure? I tried to kill both of you. But I tried to kill him a lot deader than you.”
Micah knew men just like the Englishman—he himself was a lot like the Englishman. Ebenezer killed because he was good at it, and because the killing didn’t trouble his soul. But he did not kill without reason or without a clear threat against him. Unless Minerva made a move, he’d bear no grudge against her for trying to flatline him back at the stables. That was just business.
“He kills for money,” Micah said simply, “and you are not worth anything.”
She silently digested this. Micah laughed real soft.
“Did you ever consider the sweetness of the moment? If you were to draw him in, gain his confidence, and then . . .”
Minerva bit her tongue. But Micah could tell she was pondering it.