“You’re asking me to call the winner,” Levi said slowly. “I don’t have the means to do that. I still owe the Torren Family ten thousand volts that I have no intention or ability to repay. I can’t give you more than fifty-fifty odds.”
“Well, it wouldn’t beyou. You’ll send someone inside the Torren empire, someone you trust.”
Levi could count the number of people he trusted on two fingers: Enne and Jac. Vianca was certainly already concocting her own plans for Enne as Séance.
Which left Jac.
Levi’s stomach churned. There was no way he could send his best friend, barely two years clean, into the very narcotics empire that had nearly destroyed him.
Levi couldn’t manage even a smile of false confidence. “Surely you have someoneyoutrust?”
“I don’t want this traced back to me,” Harrison answered. “The monarchists—somewhat correctly—believe the First Party is corrupt. The other advantage I offer as a candidate is my blank slate. I might be able to bribe some whiteboots for what appear to be business ventures, but I can’t be caught rigging power struggles in crime Families or making deals with the person who killed the Chancellor, can I?” His smile looked uncomfortably wide.
Levi took a deep breath and swallowed his nausea. He knew what Jac would say, of course. That Harrison was too great of an opportunity to lose. That Levi always had too little faith in him. That Jac was ready for it.
Levi wasn’t so sure.
“These are my terms,” Harrison told him. “Will you accept?”
“Can I think on it?” Even if this opportunity meant everything and then some to Levi, it meant asking a lot of Jac—Levi needed to speak to him first.
“There’s no time for that. I have campaign strategy meetings in a few hours. I need your decision now.”
The car was coming to a stop. Harrison flicked what remained of his cigar out the window.
What Harrison was offering Levi was invaluable. A chance to escape Vianca. A level of protection while Levi built his empire. An opportunity to ally with power instead of merely playing with it.
Harrison was offering Levi his destiny.
But it meant throwing Jac into an assignment that could set him back years—or worse. It meant lying to Vianca for however long it took Harrison to carry out his plans. Those were dangerous risks. Levi preferred gambling with volts—not his best friend’s life, not his own.
Harrison peeked out the crack in the window. “You don’t have much time. The whiteboots are all over Olde Town.” His lips curled into a smile. “But give me the word and a few hours. They’ll be gone before this evening.”
Everything Levi had ever dreamed of versus throwing Jac into a dangerous assignment. He knew exactly what he wanted, of course: to play the game. He wanted it so badly he ached.
A relapse would be Jac’s fault, not Levi’s, but that didn’t mean Levi wouldn’t blame himself if it happened.
He knew he wasn’t being fair to Jac. If his friend were here, he’d be furious that Levi thought so little of him. Jac would tell him to worry about making them rich, and Jac would worry about himself.
Jac would tell him to take the offer.
At least he hoped that was the case, and not just his own selfishness swaying him.
“I accept,” Levi said, nearly choking on the words.
Harrison opened the door for him and handed him a business card. The only thing written on it was a phone number. “Contact me when you have something.”
Levi nodded, adjusted his felt homburg hat, and painfully climbed out of the car. Outside, the Street of the Holy Tombs was a grim lane of gothic cathedrals, sharpened spires, and ghostly remnants of the Faith. They’d traveled to the quiet eastern quarter of Olde Town, the most historic neighborhood of the city, where even the shadows were prickly, and where darkness reigned over the day.
It was home.
“I’m glad we met, Levi,” Harrison said. With that, he closed the door and the car sped off.
Collar popped, hat shielding his face, Levi ducked into Zula’s quaint shop front ofHer Forgotten Histories, humming a ragtime tune and drowning out his nerves. He’d made his decision, and whatever dangers he faced as a result, from this moment on, his life was changed.
Yesterday he was Levi Glaisyer, a card dealer famous in niche circles.
Today he was Levi Glaisyer, accomplice in the greatest political assassination since the Revolution, survivor of a notorious execution game, and ally with a soon-to-be powerful force on the South Side.
