Illusive (17 page)

W
elcome to Endicott, New York,” Devon announces as they pull off the freeway.

The town of Endicott doesn’t look like much—mostly some fast-food restaurants and the usual small-town businesses. Beyond the concrete and steel, green hills rise up to form a verdant horizon. “The address is a little out of town,” Devon says. “Which makes sense. If you’re going to hide a super-secret formula, do it where no one would look: the middle of nowhere.”

He’s right—the address takes them to an off-yellow house with a large porch and a lot of dead flowers. “Homey,” Devon says, slowing the car. “You reckon it’s safe?”

Ciere glances around. There is no obvious sign of surveillance—no cop cars, no eyes peering through nearby windows—but she’s not taking any chances. “Keep driving,”
she says. “Pull around the corner and park somewhere out of sight. We’re going in the back.”

The backyard turns out to be surrounded by a six-foot wooden fence, brambles, and a tangle of rusted wire.

Ciere runs her hand over the fence and squats, trying to see if there’s a place to slip underneath. No luck. The fence is solid, leaving no room for thieves.

They’ll go over instead.

“It’s a good thing I’m tall,” Devon says, coming to the same conclusion. He flashes a grin at her. “Otherwise you and your five foot nothing would be screwed.”

“Five foot two,” Ciere replies, too used to short jokes to be offended.

Getting over the fence is a matter of being boosted up by Devon. Her hand falls on his shoulder and he cups one of her feet in both of his hands. When he hoists her upward, she teeters in the air, supported only by her grip on Devon’s shirt and his own strength. She can smell him—there’s that faint odor of smoke, but there’s a hint of something clean beneath it, like soap or clothing detergent. Before it has time to register, she nears the top of the fence and steadies herself by latching on to the rough wood. She hauls herself up and over, scraping her shins, and drops over the other side. Her feet hit the ground and she surveys the backyard for possible threats. It looks like any normal yard—overgrown grass, a birdbath, and a few
discarded garden tools. The porch wraps around the side of the house and there is a small back door with a screen.

She hears the sound of running feet, then the fence shudders as Devon vaults into sight. His strategy of running and scaling the fence is anything but graceful, but it is effective. He hits the ground with a small yelp and falls to his knees.

“You’re lucky this place looks empty,” Ciere says, “and there are trees all around. Could you be any louder?”

He rubs his palms together. “Not everyone spent their childhood scaling fences and breaking into bank vaults.”

“I’ve never broken into a bank vault,” she replies. Stealing a bank teller’s keycard doesn’t count.

Getting inside is laughably easy. The door is locked, but the window isn’t. Ciere pops the screen out and squeezes through.

A quick search proves that Ciere’s assumption was correct: the house is empty. The interior is like any other middle-class dwelling. There are scuffed floors, worn carpets, knickknacks on the shelves, and mismatched furniture. A print magazine sits on a coffee table, and Devon looks at the date. “Four weeks old,” he says.

“People sometimes keep old magazines,” she answers.

Devon isn’t dissuaded. “Did you see the kitchen? There’s still toast in the toaster—burnt, too.” He surveys the room again. “Whoever lived here must’ve legged it.”

Ciere shivers. This whole situation feels eerily familiar.
Leaving behind a house, trying to hide information about its occupants. She remembers fleeing through the woods, leaving behind her childhood home in flames. At first, Ciere didn’t understand why her mom would set their house on fire. Later, she realized it was for her own protection. There were papers in their house: birth certificates, social security cards, medical records, and titer tests. Setting that fire was her mother’s final attempt to hide her daughter.

When she ventures upstairs, Ciere finds more evidence to support her theory. There is a room that must have been an office. It is completely gutted—the shelves empty, the computer desk tipped on its side, and a broken safe on the floor.

“You think someone pinched all of this?” Devon asks, leaning over the computer desk. “Or was this a quick-moving job?”

Ciere isn’t listening. She strides across the room and kneels beside the safe. It’s made of layers of metal, boxes encased in more boxes, with a heavy lock punched through the door. It’s small and bolted to the wall, its door pulled wide open. The sight makes her draw inward, an instinctive need to make herself a small target.

“This place was searched,” she says. “Whoever lived here didn’t do this.”

“How’d you figure?”

Ciere studies the safe’s broken lock. “If the person who lived here took all of this stuff, they wouldn’t have needed to break their own safe open.”

“Oh.” Devon sounds as if he’s trying to stay calm. “So who got here before us?”

She opens her mouth to answer, but in the silence between her words and Devon’s, there is the sound of a door being forced open. It isn’t quiet or subtle—the crash of someone hitting into the back door, followed by the distinctive crack of shattering glass.

Someone else is in the house.

It could be a fellow crook, here to steal what they can. Or maybe a member of TATE. Or a fed. Or Pandora Marton herself. No, Ciere corrects herself. Pandora Marton wouldn’t break into her own house.

Ciere freezes in place, her senses straining downstairs. Listening through the walls and floor isn’t easy, and she spends a furious moment wishing to be a dauthus rather than an illusionist.

It is almost a relief when Ciere hears the creak of floorboards. Someone is definitely downstairs.

She considers opening the window and crawling onto the roof. The sound would draw the attention of whoever is downstairs, but she would escape. Devon couldn’t follow, though. The window is too small for his lanky arms and legs.

Don’t let anyone see what you are, understand?

For one horrible moment, Ciere still weighs the option. Open the window, run, leave Devon behind, get as far away as she can—

No.
She squeezes her eyes shut and forces herself to slow down, to think. Isn’t that what Kit has been trying to instill in her for years?
Listen
, she tells herself.

The intruder is moving through the house slowly, deliberately. The fact that this person isn’t simply rushing through from room to room implies they’ve broken into houses before. And by breaking open the door, they’ve indicated they do not fear repercussions.

Feds. Or one of Guntram’s agents. She isn’t sure which is worse.

Silently, Ciere raises a finger to her lips, then points at the closet. Devon, his face tight with fear, gently pulls at the closet door. Inside are coats and shoes.

A squeak comes from the direction of the stairs.

Devon eases in among the coats, folding his long limbs into the confined space. The closet looks too small, but Ciere grits her teeth and squeezes inside.

This closet was obviously used to house winter clothes that won’t be used for months to come. The scent of old wool and dust make Ciere’s nose itch, and she begins pawing at the hanging coats, trying to arrange them so they’ll block the two teenagers.

The footsteps pause at the top of the stairs, and she waits, her heart thumping, trying to listen for the direction that the intruder will go.

Something touches Ciere and she flinches before realizing it’s Devon’s hand. She grips it hard and he does the same, his sweaty fingers a comfort in the dark, stuffy space. She can feel his heartbeat, quick against her own skin. Footsteps grow nearer. The air is too close, the walls too near, the space too small; bitter fear floods her mouth, and she can’t slow her breathing.

There is no warning.

The closet door is wrenched open, the coats thrown aside, and a hand appears. It seizes Ciere by the shoulder, fingers digging into her skin and shirt, the grip painfully tight. Devon lets out a shout.

She sinks her teeth into the hand, and there is a shouted curse, a snarl of pain, and the hand moves, trying to shake her off. Ciere doesn’t let go. The intruder steps backward, dragging Ciere into the light. She blinks her eyes into focus, staring up for the first time into the face of her attacker.

Kit.

It’s Kit.

They simply stare at each other, Kit’s hand between Ciere’s teeth. Slowly, never taking her eyes off of him, she loosens her jaw and releases him. When she runs her tongue over her teeth, her mouth floods with the taste of copper.

Kit glares down at her, cradling his bleeding hand. “I thought we got that biting tendency of yours under control
when you were eleven,” he says in a scarily calm voice. Ciere expects him to start shouting, but he keeps looking at her.

Something like a sob grips her throat, and she chokes it back. The sight of Kit, with his long hair and waistcoat and shiny shoes, has never been so welcome. “How’d you know where to find us?”

“You left the will in your room,” says Kit. “You drove away in a car that you had to get out of the garage, which makes a particularly loud clanking noise when opened.” His jaw works, and when he speaks, it is through gritted teeth. “How—do—you—think—I—found—you?”

In hindsight, it’s not the most brilliant plan Ciere has ever pulled off.

“Sorry?” she offers, but her words are the spark that sets his temper ablaze.

“Do you know how dangerous this could have been?” Kit snarls. “You had no idea what was waiting here—there could have been more TATE members, there could have been feds, there could have been mobsters—”

“No one here, though,” Devon pipes up. He remains half in, half out of the closet. “We’re pretty sure the place has already been stripped. Whoever did it must have moved on.”

Kit rounds on him. “I can’t believe you went along with this! Aren’t you supposed to be the smart one?”

“Hey,” Ciere says, offended.

“You—hush.” Kit jabs a finger at her. “You,” he aims that finger at Devon, who is still half in the closet. “Where did you park my car?”

“Out back.”

Kit’s nostrils flare and he seems to be making an effort to control his breathing. “All right. Magnus is in a station wagon down a side road.”

Ciere blinks. “How…?”

“We borrowed a car,” Kit says tightly.

So he hot-wired one.

“One of our neighbors is under the impression I had a fight with my niece,” Kit continues, “and that she ran away in my car. They kindly offered to lend me their spare vehicle so I could retrieve her.”

“Oh, you mean you actually
borrowed
one?” Ciere asks, startled.

Kit bares his teeth. “Sometimes being a criminal means
being smart
.”

Ciere winces.

With a muttered curse, Kit walks to the door. Ciere can tell he’s already focusing on the next task. She can imagine the gears turning in his brain:
Idiot kids found. Must get home now and bake a soufflé to calm my nerves.

“We can’t go yet,” Ciere calls.

Kit pauses in the hallway and gives her such a venomous
look that she bites down on her lip. “And, pray tell, why not?”

Ciere raises an arm, holding it out to encompass the room. “There could be something valuable here. Isn’t that why Frieda Fuller and TATE wanted the will? So they could get this address? Something… something to do with Pandora? And the formula?”

Kit’s face changes—his hot temper seems to harden, to coalesce into something sharper and more focused. “That’s what you two came here for?” he asks. “The Praevenir formula? You think Richelle Fiacre hid it here, like this is some sort of scavenger hunt with a magical prize at the end?” His steps lengthen and abruptly he’s in front of Ciere, looming over her. “Do you think this is a game?”

Ciere forces herself to meet his gaze without blinking. “Of course this isn’t a game,” she says, her own temper rising to the surface. “Why do you think I did this? I knew exactly what kind of danger could be here, but I thought it was worth the risk!”

“You thought it would be—”

“I’ll go to jail!” The words burst from her, and she claps a hand over her mouth.

Kit rocks back. It’s rare to see him so startled. “What?” he says, and draws the word out to twice its normal length. “What are you talking about?”

She tells him. She tells him everything—Guntram finding Ciere and Devon at the train station, the picture, about how Guntram threatened to take proof of her theft to the feds if she failed to pay him, and how her deadline of one week is nearly up. She tells him about the bracelet, about the note, and for a second, she sees something like concern flicker across Kit’s face. He can’t like that the Syndiate knows where he lives. When she finishes, the look he is gives her is undecipherable. His hand goes to the bracelet and he runs his thumb over the smooth metal.

“You kept this from me?” he says.

Ciere manages to shrug. “I—I—” She doesn’t know what to say; she feels limp and exhausted, ready to sit down on the floor and not get up again. “I didn’t—” She doesn’t know how to say,
I didn’t want you to hate me. I didn’t want to lose you.

Kit’s hand rests on her shoulder. “You should have told me.”

“I know,” she replies, miserable. “I just couldn’t.”

“No,” says Kit, “I mean you should have told me, because I could’ve paid your debt and this would all be over. I have a Francis Bacon in our basement—trust me, it’s not like we can’t afford to pay off a crime syndicate. And even if I didn’t have the money, you still should’ve told me.”

“You said it yourself,” she says, suddenly feeling tired. “Those who are stupid enough to get caught should be left behind.”

Kit’s eyes narrow. “You’re talking about Daniel? Ciere, that’s different.”

“I don’t see how.”

“Because Daniel has been compromised by a very dangerous man,” says Kit, and his voice lowers. “Daniel is out of our reach now. Aristeus will go to any lengths to achieve his ends.”

“How do you know that?” The question slips out before she can stop it.