He made a sound in the back of his throat. “You are, infact, an idiot. But that’s a different discussion.” He walked over to thecounter, setting his hands carefully on top of it. “We should talk for real.”He glanced over his shoulder.
I was torn between interrogating him and covering myears with my hands and running away before he could say anything else. The oldCaro jerked to life inside me. This was my opportunity. Gus had never been agood liar. It was why he’d moved to technologies when we were kids, and lateraccounting. Sayer was a locked box and a master manipulator. I couldn’t trustanything he said. But I might be able to get something out of Gus.
“All right, Augustus, let’s talk. Have you beenfollowing me around town?”
He tugged at his stocking cap and shrugged. “I got abusiness to run, Caroline. I don’t have time for that.”
“What about before you launched your bar? I mean, youknew we were here, right? That’s why you came. You came to interrupt our livesfor some stupid reason. So how long did you follow us around and dig into ourshit?”
His eyes bugged. “Do you know what you did to Sayer?When you left? Do you know how much you fucked him up? Caro, he went outside ofhis mind. He did things that he should never have done. Made a lot of enemies.Because of you. Because you disappeared.”
This was not where I wanted this conversation to go.“So that gives you the right to stalk me?”
He pulled back, staring at me incredulously. “Hethought someone took you. The Italians… theUkranians…Fucking Irish retaliation or some shit. That’s the only explanation he wouldaccept for two years. Think about that for a second. Stop thinking aboutyourself and put yourself in his shoes—in prison. He went fucking berserk inthere. He went after each family until he’d exhausted his resources. He had mego after them on the outside. He tapped Roman’s resources all over the city. Hegot desperate and started trading his collection. Priceless pieces. Trophies.All of that fortune you two had amassed over the years, dwindled to what yousaw in our office.”
“Everything in your office was mine.”
He made a face. “Exactly.”
“You’re saying Sayer only sold his pieces? Not mine?”
“Dingdingding. Maybe you’re not a total idiot after all.”
“Why would he do that, Gus? It doesn’t make any sense.That was his future. He only had to get out of prison, and he was set forlife.”
“Are you clueless? He thought someone had taken you.He was going to move fucking heaven and earth to find you.”
“Why did he give up?” At the look Gus gave me, Irephrased the sentence. “I mean, why did he stop thinking I was taken? You saidhe looked for me for two years.”
Gus looked away. His casual shrug wasn’t as convincingas he probably wanted it to be. “You’ll have to ask him that question. I justknow the plan switched.”
“And you do whatever he does?”
He pulled back, shaking his head at me. “You’ve knownsince we were kids that I wanted nothing to do with that hell hole. I’ve alwayswanted out. I finally got my chance.” His snarl was cruel, tortured andcompletely honest. “Sayer and I got out together. He wouldn’t have left withoutme. And I wouldn’t have left without him.”
Guilt. So much of it I nearly choked on it. “Goodthing you waited until he got out of prison then.”
He made a humming noise. “Good thing.”
We noticed Sayer at the same time, walking up thegravel drive. I only had seconds left with Gus to get what I could out of him.“Hey, answer a question for me.”
“What?”
“If your dad’s dead, how are you here?” His expressiondidn’t give anything away. “I mean, how did you get out? Don’t they need youback in DC?”
His expression softened, turning curious and more…gentle. It was disconcerting. I immediately put my guard up.
“Caro, the operation in DC was shut down.”
My spinning mind screeched to a halt. The earth andtime and all of space tripping over their feet, slamming to a stop right behindme. One colossal rear-end collision after another. What? What did he say?
“Say that again?”
“The entire upper echelon of management was arrested.Did you not see it on the news? Roman,Dymetrus,Aleksander, the two spies… all of them. It was a giant FBItakedown.”
“H-how is that possible?”
“There’s nothing left in DC.”
