Eammon swayed where he stood and then sat with a thud on his stool. “Go run. We will talk when you get back.”

The other trainees had already taken off, and I realized then that I was the only one left with the five trainers. I looked to Corb but couldn’t read the look in his eyes. Tom and Louis were not laughing anymore, and Sarge looked green around the gills.

As I pulled my sorry butt up the stairs, he was already apologizing. “Eammon, she said she needed girl stuff. I left her on River Street. I didn’t think she’d be pulled down Factors Row.”

I didn’t understand the fuss about the weapons. Crash seemed perfectly normal, and far more helpful than any of the men here. Sure, he was probably shady as hell, but he’d done nothing to me.

A deep breath and I broke into a slow jog. The other four were well ahead of me. I didn’t bother to catch up. I just ran. If experience had taught me anything, it was that you couldn’t be the best at everything. It had to be two miles around, easily, and I wasn’t even halfway through the first lap before I slowed to a walk. A tap of bones to the right of me caught my ears.

I didn’t have to look. “Robert.”

“Friend.”

“You scare that spider away at Centennial Park?”

“Yessss.”

“Thanks.”

“Friend.”

I gave him a thumbs-up. “Friend. One of few, I’m sorry to say.” I didn’t have many friends in Savannah. My gran had been the center of my world here, and I’d never really socialized with kids my age. I’d been too busy learning about the shadow world when I wasn’t at school.

I looked over then, feeling a sudden gush of fondness for Robert, but he was gone, and I knew why as one of the boys lapped me. He didn’t bump into me, but the next little turd did—on purpose.

Just a bump of shoulders. Enough to throw me off balance—physically.

He flipped me off as he ran backward. “You’re going to fall pulling a stunt like that,” I said.

Robert crawled out behind him and the kid yelped as he went flying backward. Robert melted into the ground, and I winked in his direction.

Lapped again, and again, I kept jogging and walked only when I couldn’t do it anymore. It was of mild consolation that the leather was comfortable, and about as breathable as leather would probably ever be.

I finished an hour after the other trainees, and things just went downhill from there.

They did rope climbs.

I hung from the ropes and prayed I could just hold on.

They sparred with each other, using their weapons.

I wasn’t allowed to touch mine.

They did squats holding weights; I just squatted and prayed I wouldn’t pee my nice new pants. Part of me wished I’d been doing Kegels more regularly—or at all. Weren’t Kegels supposed to make it so you didn’t pee yourself?

Six hours rolled by, and at two in the morning, the physical part of the training was finally over. I lay flat on my back on the floor, staring up at the underside of a graveyard. I’d only puked twice. Go me.

Corb leaned over me. “You ready to give up?”

I looked straight up his nose. “You missed some hairs in the left nostril.” His nose flared. I pointed. “That flaring business is just making the long ones flutter. I mean, if you care about stuff like that.”

Eammon cleared his throat. “We will break early for the night. Be here at six p.m. tomorrow.”

The others cleared out. None of them were limping. Their names were muddled up in my exhausted head, but I forced myself to name them as they walked by my carcass on the floor. Brick was the one who’d bumped me and then gone down—shaved head, tattoos up his neck. The girl was Suzy and she barely looked like she’d sweated at all, her hair still perfect. The one whom I’d stopped from shooting Sarge was Luke, and he gave me a quick thumbs-up as he walked by. The last guy was too quiet. He had dark blond hair and bright blue eyes that were super intense. Something about him made my skin crawl.

“What’s your name?” I made myself ask as he went by.

“Chad,” he answered with barely a look in my direction. Chad it was, then.

I noticed the two people who’d watched over the group the previous night, who were presumably full-patch members of the Hollows Group, were not there. Maybe out working cases?

Crash’s words came back to me. Based on what he’d told me, they could be doing basically anything, so long as it was both weird and dangerous. I rolled to my side and put a hand on my hip, fingers resting near the handle of the knife.

“Don’t touch those,” Eammon barked. “Maybe we can get you out of the contract.”

“I’m telling you, I didn’t sign anything!” I snapped. “Eammon, perhaps you forget that I’m not a child like the other trainees you brought in here.” I pushed up to my feet, mostly so I could look down at him. I put my hands on my hips. “So, unless you’re willing to tell me why I should exchange these perfectly good weapons for the crap those twins were selling, you can just knock it off!” I paused. “Maybe because you think you should have gotten more out of Crash for returning a broken item?”

Eammon threw his hands in the air. “I was wrong. She’s going to be dead before the week is out!” And he stormed off. He damn well stormed off!

I looked at Corb, who just shrugged. “I warned you not to get involved.”

Anger lanced through me which made my eyes burn. “Well, maybe if your cousin wasn’t so busy trying to screw me out of my gran’s house, I wouldn’t have to whore myself out to a group that basically wants to use whatever life I have left to chase around critters!” My voice snapped through the air with a sharpness that Gran would have indeed been proud of.

Corb stared at me, and there was just a small amount of softening in his gaze. “He’s trying to take your gran’s house?”

I blew out a breath, and some of the anger went with it. Not all, but some. “He transferred my signature onto papers that made it look like I’d willingly signed over everything—Gran’s house included—and taken on all of our combined debt. Because, according to him, I stepped outside the marriage with a man he took to calling ‘Harry’ in the paperwork.”

Tom and Louis hadn’t moved a step. Sarge, on the other hand, was cringing. “And were you?”

I shot him a look, thinking that at least the irony of what I was about to say would not be lost on him. “Harry was a chihuahua I worked with. So basically, he was accusing me of cheating on him with a dog.”

Sarge grinned. “Maybe I know him.”

“He shouldn’t have been able to move your signatures,” Tom said. “Any lawyer worth their salt—”

“I tried,” I said, shaking my head. “He’d had it notarized and everything. Either he has more friends in high places that I don’t know about or he found someone to put a spell on the paper, so I didn’t know what I was signing.” Which didn’t make sense, because he didn’t believe in magic. But what . . . what if the person he hired was from the shadow world, and was just that good? Maybe Himself didn’t even know? Because what other possible reason could there be to have a judge and every lawyer who looked at the paperwork for me say I had no recourse?

As soon as the words flipped out of my mouth, my jaw dropped. “Oh my God. That’s it. He had someone spell the paper.” But who would do that, and who would he trust? I spun and stared at Corb.

He held his hands up. “Don’t look at me. My cousin doesn’t believe in anything that isn’t tangible in his world. You know that.”

“You were there when this was all going down,” I said, trying not to freak out.

Corb looked up at the ceiling of the training room. “And I did that all because I wanted you to move in with me? Because I wanted you to try out for a job that I don’t want you to have? None of what you’re saying makes sense, Breena. Alan has—”

I held up a hand. “Don’t you dare say his name in front of me.”

He sighed. “Look, I’m sorry he’s such a dick. I really am. But he does have lots of friends who would help him with this. And with you out of the picture, no one is challenging his right to anything.”

I held both hands in the air. “Never mind. I’m here now and I’m not going anywhere.” I paused and changed directions. “Look, will anyone tell me what the issue is with the weapons? I swear I didn’t sign anything. Is this all because of the fallout of the bounty the group did for Crash?”

Tom approached me slowly. “Did you agree to anything?”

I nodded and the four of them groaned in unison. I touched the handles of the two knives attached to my thighs. “I agreed to a ten percent cut of my first bounty to pay for the blades. I gave him four hundred as a down payment.” Or something like that. I mean, honestly, a lot had gone on. I didn’t think this was the time to tell them we’d agreed to the deal over tea, while Crash was wrapped in nothing but a sheet, and then I’d ended up pretty much naked in his bed. No. I’d save that for another day.

“Crash is . . . temperamental.” Tom seemed to be picking his words carefully. “I can only think that you caught him on a good day.”

“I woke him up,” I said.

Tom pulled a face. “And he still gave you the weapons?”

I thought back to the few quiet moments I’d spent with the big blacksmith. “Yes. He said I’d need them. And he agreed with me that the twins have shoddy work, and really, why would you send us all there?”

“The twins’ work is fine for someone just learning,” Louis said. “We all have weapons from Crash. But on a bad day, he can exact a terrible price from those who bother him. I think Eammon was just worried about you.” He smiled, which did a lot to lighten the severity of his face. “And you are right, at the moment Eammon and Crash are not friends. Eammon has banned all of us from going there until Crash pays up. No doubt he thinks Crash is using you to get to him.”