“You come back to me in one piece.” Declan takes his hand off my leg and opens his book, returning his attention to the pages. I lean over and kiss his forehead, brushing his hair out of the way with my lips. His lashes flutter closed and he smiles, but doesn’t look away from his reading.
I stand up and put my phone into my pocket and jog down the stairs. Jedidiah and Elijah are lounged on one of the couches, watching television. Elijah’s head is cradled in the safety of Diah’s lap, and Diah strokes his fingers mindlessly through Elijah’s hair.
“Declan is upstairs,” I say, and Diah looks my way and nods.
“Where are you off to?”
“Greenleaf. Council meeting. And I’m meeting with Walter Stregorian.”
“Did you want us to come with you?”
“No. I’ll be fine.”
Elijah looks from the television to me. “Are you gonna ask him about the thing?”
“Yeah.”
He pushes out his lower lip and nods approvingly, then turns his attention back to the show they’re watching.
“Do you want anything while I’m out?” I ask.
“No. We’re fine,” Diah answers.
I chuckle at his reply. I’m fine. They’re fine. Declan’s fine. Everyone in this house is really fucking fine.
“You haven’t been out for over a week.”
“Nope,” Diah agrees, looking away from me and back to the television.
I recognize when I’ve been dismissed, so I let myself out and climb into my car. Everything in the house has been off since Liz was killed, since Declan was taken, since Franklin almost murdered me. I want things to go back to normal, but all of that is out of my control. The only thing I can do is try to do this for Declan and me, then hope for the best about everything else.
The hour drive to Greenleaf goes quickly. Finding Walter’s house is easy. It’s an entirely too ostentatious mansion at the end of a long street. Our house is overstated, sure, but this reeks of old money. The list of things I dislike about this man are growing longer by the second and I haven’t even met him yet.
I get out of the car and plod up the stone walkway, then bang a ridiculously cherubic looking bronze door knocker against the heavy wood front door. A man who looks to be about nineteen years old opens the door and scans me from my beaten up leather boots to the top of my head.
“You must be Ezra,” he greets, stepping back.
I stand on the porch and wait for an invitation. He stares me down and, after a full minute, the corner of his lip twitches into a smirk.
“Come inside then, stubborn child.”
I walk into the house and he closes the door behind me. I follow him silently into a well-appointed study, filled with ornate fabric everywhere and built in mahogany shelves that take up an entire wall. He sits in a worn leather chair behind his desk and gestures for me to take a seat across from him.
There’s a flash of sympathy, when I think about how difficult it must be for him to maintain any sense of control or power when he looks like he’s barely out of puberty, but it passes when he leans back in his chair and folds his arms over his chest.
“You must be Ezra,” he repeats, like I didn’t hear him the first time.
“I am.”
“And you know who I am?”
“Walter Stregorian.”
“Mr. Stregorian,” he corrects.
I clench my teeth and force a tight smile. He doesn’t say anything, just studies me and what undoubtedly are noticeable tics and twitches in my jaw. After another long minute, he sighs and pushes the chair back, crossing one leg over the other.
“What do you want, little boy?”
