Bridgette found us after the first wave. “You really killed him,” she said, beaming at me. “You have no idea . . . he’s been a monster to our people. You’re a hero!”

“Okay.” That was all I could manage. I didn’t doubt what she’d said, and it wasn’t that I didn’t care so much as I just desperately wanted to go home and sleep for a week.

Only I found myself thinking of what Crash had said earlier, before the fight. Maybe I wasn’t going to get to go home. Maybe . . . maybe Crash was going to kick me out. Maybe he was done putting up with the crazy danger that came with me.

That gave me pause. “Grimm?” I made myself shout his name, and someone must have set him free from his restraints, because he heard me through the sea of goblins and found his way to my side.

“You really did it. You kept the pages from them.” He shook his head. “They are hidden still?”

I nodded. “Yes.” Which they were, inasmuch as my bag could be considered a hiding place. “I’ll keep them until the silver moon passes tomorrow night. As per our agreement, three days was the time frame. You won’t get them back until then.”

He smiled and dipped his head to me. “You mean I won’t get them back until you get paid.”

I pointed a finger at him and clicked my mouth. “You got it.”

Grimm went still and crouched, motioning for me to do the same. “The pages . . . they aren’t just a spell, they have the ability to allow the darkest powers of the shadow world to come forward. If there was a way to destroy them, I would do it. Nothing good can come from them. Do you understand?”

I stared hard at him. “Now you want me to try and burn them or something?”

His eyes were all seriousness. “What you are is unique in our world, and it means you are one of the few who could destroy them. When the chance comes, take it.”

Grimm looked over my shoulder and his face fell, and if green skin could pale, it did.

“What now?” I asked.

“The SCE is here. Roderick is with them. He wants the pages too. In the wrong hands, those pages could wreak absolute destruction on this town. Maybe even the world.”

“Yeah, I got that much. I have them hidden. You want me to destroy them if I can. What about the coin?” Again, I intentionally withheld where they were being hidden.

He tapped my hip bag, damn it, so I wasn’t so good at keeping my secrets as I thought. “Keep it, it’s a weapon and one you should probably have if you’re going to survive this world and what I think is coming.”

“Why are you helping me now?” I stared him down, feeling the weight of others coming closer and ignoring it. There were times to hold out on hurrying, and this was one of them.

He pulled me lower to the ground, which was mighty uncomfortable for my hamstrings. “Listen to me. This was one of the first moves in a game of chess where all the pieces cannot be seen, and the players are many and hidden well. We can meet later, I will do what I can to explain more.”

A throat cleared behind us.

I made myself stand, noting that the goblins had cleared the area around us.

“Let me guess,” I said, dusting myself off, “Roderick?”

“What a well-placed guess,” Roderick said. “Again, you are here. Ms. O’Rylee, you are a true meddler.”

That spun me around. “Well, that’s rather rich coming from you. Who also just happens to show up at all the places I’m at. What are you doing, following me around?”

The thought hit me like a ton of bricks. He’d been at every place of trouble I’d found. Had he been tracking me? Could it be through that damn coin-that-wasn’t-a-coin that I couldn’t seem to rid myself of?

“My job brings me here,” he said.

“As does mine,” I fired back. “But don’t worry, I’ve already cleaned up this mess.”

His one eyebrow arched and he changed the subject. “What were they fighting over?” Roderick motioned at the goblin king dead on the ground and Crash who was surrounded by jumping, jubilant goblins cheering a name I didn’t think he’d ever meant for me to find out. Guv-Na. At least that was how it sounded. Probably wasn’t spelled that way. I looked at him, and didn’t see him hating the goblins the way Bridgette had said. So was she wrong? Or was he just that good at showing people what they wanted to see?

Yeah, that last possibility was one that stuck in my craw.

I looked to Grimm for help. He nodded ever so slightly to me. “Same old. The crown that Derek wanted and Crash does not.”

Roderick sighed. “Lovely. Breena, you were pulled into this mess how?”

Think quickly, Bree. “Because I happened to be with Crash. And they thought he would be upset if something happened to me.”

Roderick’s eyebrows both slowly rose. “And would that be the truth? Would he be upset if something happened to you?”

We need to talk after this.

Are you kicking me out of the house?

The back and forth from earlier reverberated through my head, through my thoughts. Was I hot and bothered for him? Beyond a shadow of a doubt. But could I really trust him? The moments from our shower together came back to me, his hands and . . . other things against my skin. Was that even real, or had there been an ulterior motive? I wanted to trust him fully. I wanted to believe he wanted me for me.

But he wouldn’t even look at me now. Like suddenly he couldn’t be seen with me. He hadn’t even come to see if I was okay—which I was not. I was bruised and battered in body and, worse, in the part of my heart I’d slowly been giving him.

“Bree, would he be upset?” Roderick repeated the question, softer, gentler.

“I’m thinking. I . . . don’t know,” I finished lamely. “I don’t know, okay? Probably not as much as he might claim to be.”

He nodded. “Anything in particular you think they were fighting over then, if not you?”

I lifted both hands and lied through my teeth. “Not a clue.”

Roderick stared hard at me. “You aren’t a good liar. You know that, right?”

“Girl’s gotta try when she’s been sworn to secrecy,” I said.

Roderick looked from me to Grimm and back again. “Fine. For now. The council may want to speak with you again about this.”

That gave me pause, a thought rumbling through me, cutting through the aches and pains and the desire to lie down for a week. “Roderick, when I walked through the desks at the council, and all the spells were taken off me, was there a small one, something like a deterrent spell?”

My gran’s and parents’ files had—according to Tom—a spell on them that was making me not want to open them. But when I’d walked through the desks and all the spells had been lifted off me, Roderick had said I’d only had a slight glamor on me, an old spell.

He shook his head. “No, just the glamor. Why?”

Why indeed? Corb had been suspicious there was a spell, but not sure. Tom had been sure, and then he’d pulled some sort of magic slug out of me. Louis couldn’t talk to ghosts. They’d thought Suzy had no power but had brought her on anyway. I frowned. “Just how big of hacks are the Hollows? Like can they make it look like they have mad skills but really have bubkes?”

The sounds around us slowed a little and Roderick gave a sad smile. “The biggest of all the hacks. You were their best shot of moving up in the ranks, and you left. It’s why they allow Corb and Sarge to play both sides of the field. Those with any skill in their ranks tend to leave.”

The implications flipped all the switches in my head. Taking a nonexistent spell off me was a ruse then? Was that possible that Tom hadn’t pulled anything from me at all? I had sneezed, something flew through the air but . . . he’d said I’d owe him and the Hollows one immediately after he’d “helped” me. Was that how they got by? By tricking people?

Ouch. And I fell for it. I blew out a slow breath. “Great. Thanks.”

I pointed a finger at Grimm and mouthed, You owe me. He nodded and bowed over clasped hands. Best I was going to do at holding him to his word considering the shape I was in. Not like I was going to be able to grab him and give him a shake to make a point that I meant business and I expected him to pay up.

I pushed my way through the thinning crowd to the body of the dead goblin king—which now was back to his original size with super tiny balls—and found my second knife, scooped it up and cleaned it off on my pants.

A knife that Crash had made for me.

Emotions I did not like swirled up and through me as I made my way out of the slowly dissolving arena. Bridgette did not come with me.

The fake Vegas Strip reappeared, and I walked down it, limping, struggling to get enough breath. I was not going to be heartbroken over a man who’d offered me nothing, a man who had not promised me a single thing. Any heartbreak was on me. We’d had nothing more than a friendship with some benefits. The rest had been in my imagination.

I half thought Crash would follow and tell me it was okay, that we’d talk later. But he didn’t show, and the walk of shame was . . . well, it was shameful. It hurt in more ways than the obvious limping hurt and the crush of my ribs.

Robert swayed alongside me. “I wish you were really here, Robert. I could use a shoulder to cry on.”

“Friend,” he whispered to me, and slid his hand into mine. I held onto his bones for all I was worth.

“Yeah, you’re a good friend.”

We made it back to Skel without an issue, and Eric, Suzy, Feish, and Kinkly were all there waiting.

My lower lip trembled. I tried so hard to not cry when I saw them alive and well, but it wasn’t going to happen. Their arms circled around me.

“We got you, Bree,” Suzy whispered. “You don’t always have to be the strong one. Give us a turn.”

And for the first time since I’d come back to Savannah, I let them do just that.

26

We arrived at the house that had belonged to my gran, and for the first time, I saw it for what it really was.