I panicked at the thought of what they would do to Jack, wondering just how many of his “associates” had been killed over the past few months, and trying not to think about which ones had met their deaths at the end of Nic’s gun. “So you’re going to kill him.”
“Yes.” Felice eased himself into the chair like his bones would snap if he weren’t careful. “And that, lovely Persephone, is where you come in.”
I bristled. “That’s not my name.”
“I don’t see why you have chosen to cast it off.” He paused as if expecting me to justify something that seemed so unbearably trivial to me now. When I didn’t answer, he continued with obvious bewilderment. “Why wouldn’t you want to associate yourself with the majestic and beautiful Queen of the Underworld, the wondrous and infernal Goddess of Death? Sophie is so plain in comparison.”
“Do you really expect me to answer that?”
“The significance of such a name is amusing to me. You have even found your Hades.” He smirked, and I got the feeling he was expecting me to be impressed by his knowledge of Greek mythology. I wasn’t.
When I didn’t reply, he continued. “It was Dominico who found out who you were, when he was with that trivial British waitress, trying to gather information on Jack. By the time Nicoli realized that you were, in fact, Persephone Gracewell, he tried to pull away from you, but it was too late. Suddenly you had become the most viable way to lead us to our intended target at a time when we were running out of patience.”
I thought of Nic and frowned. All this time he was fighting his desires for my safety, and he was losing. And lying.
“But you didn’t see the danger, did you? Because you see only the parts you want to see, and you are blind to all else.”
I glowered at him. “I’m not blind to anything.” Except my uncle’s secret life as a drug kingpin. And my crush’s secret life as a killer.
“Of course, of course,” Felice replied dismissively. “How would an old fool like me know anything about that? I have no doubt you are perfectly in love and that you’ve counted all the notches on his trigger hand lovingly.” He leered at me and I hated him for it; but most of all, I hated him because he was right. I hadn’t reconciled myself with that part of Nic; I had tried to ignore it. I had even tried to justify it.
“So you see,” Felice purred on, “when Jack fled, he foolishly left you behind, the very thing that will cause his undoing. We expected you might lead us to him.
“However, since your uncle is smarter than your average deck chair and has inexplicably been able to outrun us thus far, we must move on to a more improvised plan, in which you are bait.” He clapped his hands together. “If Jack doesn’t present himself to us at the abandoned auto parts warehouse in Hegewisch before midnight tonight, then things will take a very unfortunate turn.”
“So you’re going to kill me?” I asked, feeling completely hollow inside. Was this really how it was going to end? I had fallen down a tunnel of lies, and now there was a gun to my head?
Felice stared at me impassively. “The idea of killing a teenage girl just doesn’t appeal to me, but I think you’ll really have to ask someone better qualified to answer, Persephone.”
“Like who?”
Felice rose to his feet again. “Our boss.”
My mouth dropped open. “You’re not the boss?”
“Me?” A shadow passed across his face, but before I could focus on it, he lit up, until he looked like a children’s cartoon character. “I am not. But thank you for assuming so. I’m flattered.”
“What are you, then?”
“Me? I’m just a simple beekeeper.” As he said it, one of his bees droned into my eyeline, just a foot away from my face, as though he had programmed it to do so.
“And a murderer,” I reminded him.
“I do feel we can all be defined by more than one thing.”
“Unless you’re a killer. Then that’s pretty much all you amount to.”
“Maybe you should tell that to your father. Or to your handsome Hades, between kisses.”
If I could have jumped out of my seat and ripped his face off right then, I would have.
“In any case,” he continued in his patronizing way, “I’m just the Falcone consigliere. I offer advice, which is usually ignored. I’ll find someone more equipped to answer your question. Frankly, I’ve grown weary of your teenage sarcasm.”
I heard him before I saw him — the hardwood floors rumbled as he glided into my eyeline, his hands barely touching the wheels to make them move. He turned with a series of expert flicks and then he was facing me. His frame was narrow, but not hunched as I’d remembered; he was dressed in black pants and a crisp black button-up shirt that pulled across his shoulders. The occasion? My doom.