Jules thumbed his collar to loosen it. His interactions with Cecile had rarely gone deeper than basic pleasantries, but he knew she’d been important to Zaria. “Do you have a way to get in touch with her? If we can find that source, it won’t matter what Ward’s errand boy wants you to create.”
Zaria rotated the sheet of paper, as if looking at the writing from another angle might yield more information. “Why do you think I’ve been combing through all this stuff? Problem is, I haven’t a clue where Cecile might be. I haven’t seen her since the day she left, and she didn’t tell us where she was going.”
“I thought you two were close.”
Zaria wasn’t sureclosewas the right word. Regardless of the timethey’d spent together, she knew little about Cecile and hadn’t offered much about herself in return. Their closeness had been, if anything, a quiet companionship. “I think she was too afraid of my father to tell me much,” she admitted to Jules. “But also, I was a child. Perhaps she feared I’d go looking for her.”
“You wanted to,” he reminded her. “You told me as much.”
A hollow sensation gnawed at Zaria’s stomach. It was true. She remembered feeling guilty when, after Itzal’s death, she realized she’d been less upset to lose him than she had Cecile—and Cecile hadn’t even died. Of course, Zaria had grieved in both cases, but the loss of her father was more about fear. The sensation that the world had abruptly been placed on her shoulders, and her not knowing what the hell to do about it.
“I wouldn’t have known where to start,” Zaria said eventually. “I still don’t.” How could she know so little about the woman who had taught her so much? With Zaria’s luck, Cecile might have gone all the way back to France.
“We could ask my father,” Jules suggested. “Itzal might have mentioned something to him at the time.”
Zaria glanced at the clock in the corner of her room. It was late, but George Zhao kept strange hours. She’d been avoiding the man these past couple of days, knowing she wouldn’t be able to help confronting him if they were in the same space for too long, but that didn’t seem to matter anymore. She wouldn’t be able to sleep until they spoke with him.
For years, she’d told herself not to bother with futile hopes. If even her father couldn’t find a primateria source, how could she? Now, though, shewondered. If Itzal had allowed Cecile to assist with his research, maybe it didn’t matter that he had burned the results. Maybe some of what he’d learned still existed in the mind of his firstand only assistant. And maybe, if Zaria could find her, she would finally have a lead.
“Yes,” she said. “Let’s ask your father. Right now.”
The stairs creaked as they slunk upstairs, the sound ominous against the fragile silence. Jules’s candle was a bloom of light in the corridor outside George Zhao’s office, and he paused outside the door, twin flames in the depths of his eyes as they met Zaria’s. “Try not to be upset if he can’t help.”
She blinked in impatience. “I don’t get upset.”
“No, you don’t always getvisiblyupset,” he corrected her. “It’s not the same thing.”
“Don’t be absurd.” But Zaria knew Jules was right. She was too reactive, too emotional—Itzal had always told her as much, and thus she’d spent years learning to push it down. To hide her excitement, her misery, her frustration. She was quick to anger and even quicker to snap unkind words. When she was disappointed, it dropped like a stone in the pit of her stomach and hollowed everything else away. Better, she had learned, not to let anyone know what she was feeling at all.
And yet Jules had always been able to see through her. At times, he arrived in Zaria’s room before she’d even fully realized she was sad. She didn’t knowhowhe knew—how his emotional intelligence was so many leagues above her own—and sometimes she feared she was failing as his friend. Steady Jules, who wasn’t afraid to express himself and took everything in stride. Who was always there to be her comfort yet rarely seemed to require anything in return.
Zaria couldn’t help but feel it was a lopsided relationship. It was why she was so desperate to give him the world. A better one than this, preferably.
With that thought, she knocked on George’s office door.
“Come in.”
So Georgewasawake. Good.
He was at his desk when Zaria and Jules entered, poring over what appeared to be a ledger of numbers. Something to do with the shop, no doubt. He was very like an older, balding version of Jules. He had the same searching gaze, the same thin build, the same melancholy smile. But one of his incisors was missing and there were crow’s-feet stamped on the corners of his eyes. A clay pipe was poised between his teeth, though no smoke emanated from it—he claimed he simply liked the feel of it in his mouth. Besides, tobacco cost a fair bit of money.
“What are you two doing awake at this time of night?” George grunted, motioning for them to enter the office farther. He seemed utterly at ease, which set Zaria’s teeth on edge and only reinforced that she’d been right to accept Kane’s offer.Someonehad to take the kingpin’s threat seriously. How could George look his son in the eye, knowing what was at stake?
Jules shut the door. “We could ask you the same question.”
“Lots to do in preparation for redemption day.”
“Hmm.” Jules led Zaria over to the other side of George’s desk. “We wanted to ask you something.”
George set down his pen, which Zaria took as assent. Jules shot her a look, indicating that she should be the one to speak. She cleared her throat.
“Cecile Meurdrac. You must remember her.”
George frowned at them. “That’s not much of a question.”
“Do you know where she went when she left us?”
George set the pipe down, and Zaria was struck by how long it had been since she and Jules’s father had engaged in direct conversation. They occupied the same space, yes, but rarely bothered interacting. George Zhao was simply a fixture of the pawnshop. Zariaaccepted his presence, and he accepted hers. Their silent point of contention, she knew, was Jules—George wanted his son to take over the shop. Zaria wanted Jules to get as far away from it as possible.
