Doug shakes his head. “All the household employees and security guys are too happy to care about much of anything right now.”
This gets my attention, at least. “You took out the whole house?”
Doug shifts, obviously uncomfortable. “I told you I wasn’t defenseless. Sean kept me near-starving, but now that I’m healthy, I’m back in fighting form. My spit is hyperconcentrated, and I have this, uh, muscle? It lets me spit at great distances with startling accuracy.”
“Eew.” Maricruz twirls her hair around a finger. “But also rad.”
Doug shrugs. “I don’t like using it. But it comes in handy.”
“Where did you find Leo? What kind of cell did this monster have him in?” I want to know the details, need to know them. They feed the churning black mass in my chest, and it’s easier to be furious than think about Leo lying there unconscious because of me, again. To think of all this time I spent in bleak despair over being the reason he was dead when this human had him. Rage is simpler. Cleaner.
“About that.” Doug eases himself more in between Von Alston and me. “Leo wasn’t in a cell. He was in a sitting room, near a fireplace. Reading.”
“Wait, what?”
“Leo is my guest,” Von Alston says. “I was friends with his mother. She belonged to an organization I traded information and favors with for many years. Young Leo showed up at my gate a few months ago. I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do for him, but I’ve done my best to keep him comfortable out of loyalty to his mother.”
I shake my head. None of this makes sense. Why would Leo come here instead of coming back to us? Why would he stay, knowing we would all assume he was dead? Knowing how much it would hurt?
He let me think I was responsible for his death all these months. Maybe I don’t feel so bad about accidentally shooting him with a tranquilizer. Maybe I want to shoot him with another one. But what Von Alston said needs more explaining, since Leo himself can’t explain it right now.
“What do you mean, there’s nothing you can do for him?”
“He’s dying.”
I push past Doug and throw Von Alston to the ground, my hand around his throat. “Don’t lie to me.” Leo can’t be dying. He was dead, and now he’s not, and my heart can’t take any more.
Von Alston’s voice is strained. “I’ve been nothing but truthful with you this whole time. Without his mother, he’s starving to death. Take him, if you wish.”
“Nina.” Doug tugs on my shoulder until I release Von Alston. “Let’s talk.”
“No. I don’t want to talk. We need to finish up here. You owe me a prize,” I snarl, yanking Von Alston to his feet. “I take cash.”
“We should go.” Chao-Ahn eyes the dark grounds nervously.
“Can’t leave until Leo wakes up.” I know from deeply painful experience that Leo cannot be budged or carried. I stalk toward the house, my hand around Von Alston’s wrist. I’m probably squeezing too tight. I can’t care. Von Alston hurries to keep up and avoid the indignity of being dragged. “Might as well make our time here worthwhile.”
“I am a man of my word,” Von Alston huffs. “I suppose you did win, even if it was unconventional. The prize is fifty thousand pounds.”
“Bully for me.” Although it’s a massive windfall for the castle, I can’t begin to feel giddy over it. We’ve gotten to the porch, and I can see Leo now, bathed in the warm yellow light from the house. He looks … awful. His jawline, always strong, stands out in stark contrast now, his cheeks hollow and the circles under his eyes so dark they look more like bruises than anything else.
But he’s here. He’s alive. And I’m so angry my vision is pulsing at the edges.
“Should we take him inside?” Taylor asks, trembling like a purse dog.
“Literally impossible. Hopefully he wakes up fast.” I try not to look at Leo’s prone body as I step around him. It’s too close to my nightmares of when I had to leave him behind.
I follow Von Alston into a study where he retrieves a leather satchel. He opens it to show me neat stacks of pound notes. “If you get a chance before he dies, you should ask Leo to train you,” he says, his tone sneering and pedantic. “He’s a Watcher. Pity they’re all gone now. You could certainly use one.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I’ve known rogue Slayers. No control, all violent instinct without any training. Like feral animals without Watchers to direct them.”
My hand finds the place on his neck already marked by my fingers. I push him against the dark-wood-paneled wall. “Do I seem like I don’t have control right now?”
His eyes are wide. He shakes his head.
“Good. Are you the nameless threat demons are terrified of?”