Chapter 31

Vincent dropped the wooden box as soon as my hands wrapped around it and stalked to a chair pushed in front of the desk. His breaths were heavy, like he'd just ran clear across the Row to get here. My chest still heaved for different reasons. He glanced at Milla, giving her no more than a nod.

"Address my wife properly," I snapped as I dropped the box on my desk. I didn't care if we were no longer legally married. Milla was mine until she turned me away. And no one, no matter the dire situation we might face, would treat her as anything less than what she was.

She sat with her legs crossed in that chair and her graceful arms draped over the armrest. Her hair had already returned its luster from her time in Hightower, falling in golden-brown loops over her shoulder. Forget princess, she looked like a damn queen. And I'd just fucked her across this desk five minutes ago.

"Good morning, Mrs. Attano."

"Morning, Vincent, and please, call me Camilla." She gave me a look, addressing me silently to relax. "Did something happen?"

He nodded as my fingers pressed against the polished wood, reaching for the air inside to assess its contents. I worried if the Watch had left something behind, it could be rigged, but my remnant showed nothing as sinister as my first assumption. Paper rustled inside. A slight resistance of an object that had the distinguishable shape of a pocket watch.

"We found this during the clean-up," Vincent explained. "Thought it was just something from one of the offices in the warehouses, but it was too clean. Like someone had just left it there."

"Have you opened it?" I asked.

He shook his head. "Sabina wanted you to check it out first."

The bleeder queen was well acquainted with the unique abilities of all kinds of remnants. She knew as a bender I could sense the shape of the air inside something concealed and decipher if it was a threat or not. In the past, she'd requested the help of my men who had a similar ability, controlling the wind.

Unconcerned, I unlocked the brass clasps and opened the box. Inside, I found exactly what I'd felt with my remnant. A gold watch was placed on top of a stack of papers. Setting the jewelry aside, I went first to the folded parchment.

Milla took the watch to inspect it while I read the note, written with fine penmanship.

"What does it say?" Milla asked.

"It's a warning. They're going to kill Regulus tonight," I told her. "It says if I can find him before the time runs out, I can take him back to the Row with no repercussions. No backlash. The Watch will stand down until then. After, if we are still on their side, they'll assume our business is hostile and will respond to the threat of our trespassing accordingly."

A knot formed in my throat. I barely knew the Mirth remnant, and yet I still felt responsible for what would happen to him, for leaving him behind. They were playing me as my uncle claimed they would. I couldn't look the other way if I tried. The OIC had sent a challenge, but I had to wonder... Why?

I read the bottom line out loud to her. "What time is it?"

With the flick of her finger, she opened the gilded covering and read the clock face. "The needles point to nine o'clock."

"It's nearly noon already." The bleeder pointed out. "Do you plan on playing their game?"

"Of course he does," Milla murmured. A small sigh left her. "The problem is, will the OIC play by their rules? Will they let you through the Districts without retaliating?"

My last conversation with Regulus in the carriage replayed itself in my head. He'd accused me of only caring about my family, that my choices had inadvertently affected countless others, including his own people. He'd called me selfish, and I had owned that title, knowing it was the only way I'd get Milla back.

But was it for Milla now that I did nothing? Or was it my fear to face the other side of the river without the security of my Row behind me? This man had sacrificed himself for all of us. Had proven he had twice the brawn than I could claim. If the OIC was giving us an opportunity to take him back, perhaps we owed it to him to at least try.

No. We couldn't leave him. Not when a door of opportunity had cracked open.

"If we do this," I said, "there are no rules. We do what it takes to find Regulus and bring him back."

"He could be anywhere," Vincent said with his hands gesturing wide. "You only have until nine if the watch indicates his final hour."

"And we're only allowed after dark," I mentioned. One of the few rules I'd left out on the initial reading. Along with, "They've also stated we are to stay out of the residential areas. Business strips only."

"That narrows it down," Milla said. "The only place for business would be the Capital Grounds. Though even then, there are a hundred businesses with a hundred basements and just as many stockrooms. There truly is no telling where they've hidden him."

She turned the watch over in hand, thinking. But we could keep guessing until the sun went down. Meanwhile, I needed to prepare for the evening. There'd been no rule specifying how many men I could take with me, only that we were to be gone when time ran out. I'd need guns with me to search the Grounds, guns to watch the train, and hells knew my wife wouldn't let me do this alone. I'd need the family around her, people she trusted in case she lost control of her remnant.

"We can speculate later," I said, sharper than intended. Just thinking about letting her near the Districts pulled the leash on my temper taut. "I need to get home and meet with the family. We'll need to notify Marcus as well that we'll need him after hours. Your brother will need to prepare the train."

Pocketing the note, I reached for our coats. Vincent stood and muttered something about seeing himself out. Milla watched me light my cigarillo as she grabbed her coat.

"I'm coming, you know."

Deep breath.

"I know," was all I managed to say.

She smiled, and it somehow lit up all the darkness haunting my soul. "The safest place for me is by your side, Nicolai."

"Not if they keep using me as bait to get to you," I clipped. "We could very well be walking into a trap. They want to take you back, Camilla. This morning was evidence of that enough."

"Then I won't leave the train, but I will not stay across the river, too far to help you should something go seriously wrong. Besides," she crossed her arms, "I know the Grounds better than anyone. You need my expertise."

I wanted to say I needed her alive above all else and out of the hands of the Firenze who seemed interested in her in more way than one, but I'd learned to pick my battles with the spoiled little heiress. She'd sneak on the train if I forbade her. Better to take her bargain and at least know she was contained and guarded.

"You don't leave the train," I repeated her words.

"You have my word."

If that's all she would give me, I'd have to take it. Slipping her hand around my arm, I led us out the office, asking Luther to gather the family at home. They'd be easier to brief all at once.

"I need to make a stop on the way home," I told them.

"Where to?" Bellamy asked as we reached the carriage, still parked in front of the offices.

"The old industrial park." Milla shot me a look, but I beckoned her inside the car before I explained. Some things were better left to speak for themselves.

Among all thebusinesses and homes on our payroll, there was one street gang that had grown despite our influence, making their own name in the Row. A group of young men that had banded together in the skeleton of the old foundries that had moved when the Row was given to descendants and the natives moved south.

Milla was understandably confused as we pulled up to the long-abandoned park still standing on the edge of town. I helped her out as we came to a stop.

"What are we doing here, Nico?"

Instead of answering right away, I whistled a particular pattern and waited.

Moments later, the buildings groaned. Metal shifted and scraped; concealed entryways formed as makeshift walls rolled out the way. My gaze lifted to the roofs, to the guns aimed at the road. They lowered when they realized it was me.

"Mr. Attano." A young man appeared from the gap in the building, with a dozen of his cadre following behind him. Each wore a gold handkerchief somewhere on their person. Some in the faded jackets they wore over a worn-out suits, others in their back pockets or in a band around their caps.

"It's good to see you, sir," the leader of them greeted us as they flooded the broken road.

"Rook." I shook the hand he offered to me, though his green eyes were no longer looking my way, but to the woman perched at my side. Letting go of his hand, I placed it on the small of her back. "This is my wife, Camilla."

"Rook Canary, leader of the Canary Boys, at your service, ma'am." He bowed slightly, taking her hand in his to kiss it gently. "It's a great pleasure to meet you."

Camilla smiled. "The pleasure is all my mine, Mr. Rook."

I could have sworn the tips of his ears turned pink.

"Easy, boy," I said with a smile, to insist my threat was light. "Where's Finn?"

Rook looked around at his boys. "Don't know. Must be out spending all that money you paid him for the Hightower job. You're welcome, by the way. Would you like to come inside while you wait for him?"

"We're actually not here for a visit. I need information, and in exchange, I'll have some jobs for your boys to do in the Row. Pays well."

"They always do." Rook smiled and rubbed his hands together. The skin around his nails was peeling, dry as bone from the cold and laborious work.

"A few months ago, I asked you for information that would give me leverage over a deal I was working against the Firenzes." I glanced at Milla and found her brow raised in a silent question. I nodded to confirm her suspicion. "You told me you knew they were experimenting on children in the Wet District and gave me evidence and first-hand accounts."

Some of the swagger in his shoulders faltered. "Look, sir, none of us are proud of selling ourselves to the alchemists, but we had to survive—"

"I'm not judging you, Rook, and I understand. I promise, I've done far worse for money even when I didn't need it. I just need to know why the Firenzes were experimenting on descendants?"

At first, I'd just assumed it was glint stuff, but if they had discovered a way to create a Siphon like Vesper had described, if they were manufacturing remnants, then perhaps Rook and his crew had been involved in something far more sinister than I ever imagined. Perhaps that was why Lavern backed off so quickly that day I wed Milla in her courtyard.

Rook sucked his teeth and ran a hand over the stubble covering his jaw. "They made us use our remnants in different ways to study the spectrum of our gifts. They'd take blood samples sometimes, plug us up to these machines that made odd ticking sounds, nothing painful or invasive. Then they'd pay us and send us back across the river. They'd pay us for referrals as well."

"Was the Society ever involved?"

"All the time. It was one reason I felt safe doing it, knowing a member of the law was there."

I cursed to myself silently.

"Do you remember what kind of remnants you sent them, Rook?" Milla asked.

"All of them," he replied.

His answer was a punch to the gut. Hells knew what they had discovered by taking advantage of mere children. The ones who didn't have families to ask questions, the ones desperate for coppers. I'd done bad things, things that kept me awake at night, but this was a different kind of evil.

I reached in my coat for a cigarillo. "Thank you, and as promised, I'll be in touch with a job for your boys. I've got weapons I need distributed to the river businesses. Can you handle it?"

He tipped his cap at me. "Just tell us when and where. You know where to find us."

I nodded and murmured a farewell to the rest of his boys who had been listening. Rook treated Milla with a parting kiss on her hand. Making a show of my sigh, I walked back to the carriage to open the door for her.

"If he ever does you wrong, Mrs. Attano, you know where to find me."

"Rook!"

A mischievous smirk flashed my way before he retreated to the safety of his home. Milla grinned, amused by my irritation.

She laughed. "He's quite brave. I'll give him that."

"Sometimes idiocy disguises itself as courage." Noting her wide smile, I asked, "Should I be worried, princess?"

She shrugged. "It's good to know I have options."

Spoiled little heiress.