Arthie had known from the moment Flick stepped inside Spindrift that the girl was eager to orchestrate a plan of her own. It wasn’t difficult to figure out what that plan was, not when Arthie was privy to Flick’s circumstance. Arthie hadn’t tried to discourage it, no; she’d done the opposite, bringing up her mother often, dropping hints to remind Flick of whatever plan she had concocted—keeping the door open for whenever Arthie needed quick access to the head of the East Jeevant Company.
Like she did now.
Slowly but surely, Flick grew more and more jaded, but that was the cost of the truth.
“I am sorry for dragging you into a fight that isn’t yours.”
Arthie turned to find Penn in the doorway. It was the Ram’s fault though. All of this was the Ram’s fault, and she didn’t even know who the Ram was. But until she put a face to the one behind it all, the shadowy figure she met in the carriage would be the one she bloodied in her thoughts.
“Red suits you, little lion,” Penn said, and she warmed at the compliment.
It felt fitting, taking down the Ram in a red sari. The same red as her mother’s death shroud.
“I heard about what happened between you and the high captain,” he said. “Matteo told me.”
“Of course he did,” she said, unsurprised.
“You’re different, Arthie. Half vampire, half human. When a person is drained of blood, they die. And if they’re turned into a vampire in those precious seconds before the brain and heart cease to function, they’re subdued. Hungry, yes, but too weak to do a thing. You were still very much alive when you were turned, weren’t you? You had the means to act upon that hunger, an amplified hunger, almost hungrier for the life you had just left than for sustenance. You barely even feasted as much as massacred.”
He reached for her hand. “But that part of your life is over.”
“Yet I spent the last ten years afraid I would do it again,” she said quietly.
She spent half her life fearing herself, fearing what she was capable of, peering into the dark alleys of White Roaring and looking for others like her. It was why she’d opened the bloodhouse, wasn’t it? So that a vampire like her wouldn’t have to brutalize the streets but could pay to drink from a cup.
“You and Matteo have more in common than you might think,” Penn said.
Arthie laughed at that. “Have you seen the man?”
Penn chuckled and then turned pensive. “I think often of the day you lifted your pistol from White Roaring Square. The girl who was doomed to greatness.”
The choice of his words was not lost on her. This was a burden and not a blessing. She suffered more than she reaped.
“When all this is over,” he said, locking his gaze on hers, “we can return to Imperial Square. You and me. Your crew. Make it your new Spindrift.”
He gathered both her hands and held her close, pressing a kiss to the top of her hair. She lingered there a beat, allowing herself to feel small, to feel sheltered in his large body, allowing herself to feel her youth in the way White Roaring didn’t allow.
He spoke of the same comfort and safety he’d promised a decade ago, but Arthie knew how such things ended, even if she still longed for them.
The voices in Penn’s office fell silent when she entered. Flick wasn’t here. Arthie looked at Jin first, because that was easiest.
“Oh, Arthie. I can’t say I’ve ever seen you in a dress before,” Jin said. “You look beautiful.”
Arthie bared her teeth. “How many of your teeth would you like to keep? Two or four?”
Jin laughed, and she could almost imagine this to be Spindrift, slick counters behind him, the smell of tea warming the room.
“Most certainly Arthie under there.” He started for the entrance, patting the top of her head with something like pride. “I should get ready too.” He gave Matteo a look. “Behave, Andoni. Or we’ll have some words.”
“Is everything in order?” she asked.
Matteo blinked at her as if he hadn’t heard a word she’d said.
Arthie scowled. “I don’t take well to being stared at. I believe I’m called exotic in your tongue, if you didn’t know.”
“My tongue is quite capable, darling,” Matteo assured her. Something prickled in Arthie’s chest. “And I’m more than happy to demonstrate.”
He leaned down, green eyes ablaze as they dropped to the exposed stretch of her collarbone. He worked his jaw, and she caught a peek of his tongue between his parted lips.
“You are utterly dazzling, Arthie. Exquisite. A sight to behold because of that brilliant brain of yours.”
It was rare to hear praise for her intellect. It was only ever treated as something that was overgrown to the point of recklessness; she was always told she was too cunning, too corrupt.
Never brilliant.
He gave her one last look, adjusted the fold of the sari over her shoulder while searing her bare skin with liquid fire, and left.