Accomplice to the Villain (Assistant and the Villain, #3)(7)

Woo-hoo!

“Sage, I have more pressing matters than cracking the code of whoever you have mutilated this morning. Spit it out.”

Instead of answering as he asked, she reached for the handkerchief sticking out of his pocket, the maroon fabric so deep in color that it masked the blood she was now staining it with as she began cleaning off her hands.

A gasp sounded at her actions, and Evie felt the eyes of every office worker on her back, even as they pretended to shuffle papers, using the low murmur of conversations to disguise their eavesdropping. She glanced at Trystan to see if he would reprimand them, but he was evidently too busy looking like a cornered animal, ready to snap at the next threat of attack. “Are you finished?” he asked with a bored drawl, but the slight twitch of his eyelid gave him away.

“Almost.” She smiled again but wider this time, baring her teeth. Then she finished swiping over each finger with a flourish, folding the handkerchief carefully and tucking it back into his open palm.

She waited several seconds to speak, just to see if she could make the vein in her boss’s forehead protrude any farther. Another moment of silent staring passed.

Mission accomplished.

She used her victory as a call to mercy. “I went with Keeley to the East End Slums,” she said, clipped and succinct, as if she was speaking of going for a jaunt about a meadow filled with daffodils and gumdrops, not one of the most fraught and dangerous sides of Rennedawn, where every manner of reprobate spent their time.

Her boss included.

His eyes went impossibly wide, his jaw clenching in a bite that looked like it might shatter his teeth into nothing but bone dust. It was delightful.

“And what, pray tell, were you seeking there?” He stepped closer, his gaze hard, and for the first time since Evie had entered the office space, she felt like her control wavered. Because this was the first instance in two weeks where she was close enough to smell the cinnamon on his skin and see the depth of his black eyes as they saw right through to the heart of her.

“I—um…” Suddenly, she was at a loss for words. Which in and of itself should indicate complete and total disaster. She cleared her throat, banging a hand against her chest like a bit of dust had gotten stuck. “We were looking for leads on Rennedawn’s storybook prophecy. The waning magic is worsening. There have been reports of large gray patches of land leeched of color, like all the magic is folding back into the earth.” Evie worried her lip, and The Villain averted his eyes. “If we’re to have any hope of fulfilling the prophecy before Benedict can, every lead counts. The Malevolent Guards got a tip this morning about an elderly gentleman spouting poetic nonsense about the lore. Apparently, his great-grandfather was one of the early king’s advisors and he’d read some of it as a child.” She gestured to the papers that were nearly crumpled in his hands. “We found him, and all it took was a few battings of our lashes and some helpless sighs and he was spilling everything he remembered. Which, granted, was sparse…”

Trystan’s eyes flashed to the blood on her hands once more, this time with an intensity that felt like it could touch her. “So you decided to punish him for it?”

She faltered, remembering the other men in the bar grabbing for her, the scar on her shoulder tingling in response to the dagger hidden at her thigh. “A few of the tavern’s regulars caught wind of who we were and attempted to turn me in for reward money.”

His arm tensed, and it reminded her that beneath the surface of his starched linen shirt lay a golden tattoo identical to the one circling her finger—the one that would’ve told him quite clearly if Evie had been in any mortal danger. He should’ve been aware that, an hour ago, she and Keeley had been circled like prey by a group of men. Perhaps he had known and just didn’t care…?

Her riotous emotions grasped for anything to cover the hole carving out the center of her chest.

“I stabbed one of them,” she blurted.

Perfect.

The Villain’s brows shot skyward, his gaze returning to her hands as he asked with lethal quiet, “Only the one? What of the rest of them?”

Closing the distance between them, her face tilting up to angle closer to his, she watched in satisfaction as his throat bobbed and his hand flexed at his side.

She pushed further, annoyed that he was brushing past her first true violent act since her promotion. “I stabbed him in the neck. Is that not enough for you?”

He shook his head, his face hard. “Not if he touched you. Not if any of them did.”

Her lips parted in surprise, and she blinked. “Does that matter?”

Anger flashed in his dark eyes but then winked out to nothing seconds later, and with a small sigh of defeat, he closed them. “Of course”—he said the words carefully, like if they landed too hard, they would shatter something—“it matters.”

Her head tilted as her hand brushed lightly against where his heart lay, an unwanted burn flaring where they touched. “Why?” she whispered.

He did not open his eyes, even as his head tilted closer, like he couldn’t resist the pull between them, like it was agonizing. His shoulders rolled in an apparent attempt to shake away pain. “Because, Sage—”

In a flash that knocked them both apart, his dark-gray death magic, the magic only she and Trystan could see, started to come off him in waves, swirling about her feet before extending out to the rest of the room.