“Why should I believe you?”
“Because I make it a priority to uncover the yearning of every sinful heart,” he said. “I do not promise what I cannot deliver.”
I stood. “Then deliver. Take me to him.”
Pure delight glinted in his eyes. He’d gotten what he wanted out of me. And while it rankled, I didn’t care what I’d have to do to save Quinten.
He stood and stretched out his hand, palm upward. In his palm was a silver coin with the image of wings pressed into it. There was a small hole at the top of the coin, as if it were intended to be worn on a chain.
“This is a personal token. It entitles the owner to one favor granted unconditionally by me, House Silver. You can use it now or keep it for the gathering. People want you, Matilda. People will do anything to have you. While I, on the other hand, am offering you my assistance.”
He tapped his wrist.
The wall behind his left shoulder became a screen.
An image of a white-walled room pulled into focus, though the recording was shaky.
“This is a room in House Orange,” Reeves said, as he watched me. “A room Slater Orange thinks is unable to be tapped by any House or device. He is wrong, of course.”
The recording device panned from the ceiling down to the center of the room.
“Oh,” I said, the sound escaping me as if I’d been punched.
My brother sat on the edge of a bed, cuffs on his wrists and ankles connected by chains to the walls. He was tapping his fingers, two fingers together in the signal for House Brown. Morse code.
S.O.S.
He really was in trouble. A prisoner.
“Do you know where that room is?” I asked, my mind racing through solutions, options, resources.
“I do.”
“Can you get to him? Can you free him?”
He hesitated. “It wouldn’t be easy.”
I met his gaze and held out my hand. “I won’t get in the way of your House games.”
He tipped his hand and dropped the silver coin into my palm.
I stood and pushed the coin across the desk with one finger. “Free my brother and bring him to House Gray alive, by the time the gathering is over.”
His eyebrows shot up.
“That is the personal favor I want from you, Reeves Silver. If you want me to stand aside and let your games play out, you bring me my brother.”
“If I agree,” he said, not touching the coin yet, “you will say nothing of our agreement. You will say nothing of anything that has transpired between us.”
“And if I do?”
“I will tell Boston Sue to kill your grandmother, Lara Unger Case.”
His smiled like a fox that had just caught dinner by the throat.
Boston Sue was working for him too. My stomach hit my knees, but I didn’t let it show.
“I agree to say nothing of our agreement to anyone.”
