A twinge of jealousy. “I’m not your first rival?”
“My father made us compete at everything. The prize was watching the other one get punished. I lost a lot. She’s studying medicine at Stanford, an actual prodigy.” He saw my expression and laughed. “A foster kid flourishing, without an ancient murder family coming to her rescue. Can you believe it?”
“With your genes, sure,” I said. “There was a brother too.”
“Gervais, but he always lived with our grandmother. Dad rejectedhim because he has epilepsy. I knew about culling before I became a Morton.” Sebastian was grimacing. “I knew adults could be dangerous, before Uncle Max.”
“But…” I shook my head. “It was better with us.”
“I loved the order, everything in its place. The stakes were always clear—those other Sebastians in the Little Graveyard. But sometimes I hated you all.”
“Why?”
“For not showing up earlier. With all that power, you could have saved us. The Mortons could save everyone.”
“You’re a Morton,” I said. “Who are you going to save?”
He only shrugged, so I asked the question a different way.
“If you had me as an assignment, would you warn me?”
Sebastian thought about this—too long. We passed a few more cars, then the road was dark again.
“We’re still being honest?” Sebastian asked.
“Always.”
“Then no,” he said. “I wouldn’t breathe a word.”
We pulled off the highwaybefore we got to the city.
I’d expected some lifeless warehouse district, a ruined factory by a river, the Pine Barrens—prime spots for body disposal. But this was a wealthy neighborhood. Ten-acre lots, landscaped streets, new mansions presenting multicar garages to the world.
No one would bring an assignment here.
Sebastian leaned forward to check a street sign, then pulled to a stop in front of a half-constructed house. No front-door cameras to capture our plates.
We got out of the car into suburban stillness. Somewhere in the distance, a dog barked.
He led me onto the construction site, dark piles of stone and plastic-wrapped lumber, empty doorframes. Through the half-built house, then across a large backyard with no grass, over a trench for a sewer line.
Over a wooden fence—into a fairy kingdom.
Granite statues of goddesses and angels, sculpted hedges in animal shapes. A circular fountain, the still water dotted with dead bugs and reflected stars. Winding paths through overstuffed flower beds, leading to the back of a two-story mansion.
I saw all the easy ways inside—the profusion of eaves, windows, and turrets that new money loved to flaunt.
“Remember Connecticut?” I whispered.
When we were twelve, Garrett had taken us on a field trip for Dexterity class. A few hours’ drive from home, he’d dropped us off in front of an empty house in some prosperous bedroom community. The assignment was to break in, spend the night, and slip out again the next morning, leaving no traces.
If a burglary was reported, the test was marked a failure. But Sebastian and I dared each other to disturb things. We tried on clothes, slid down the banisters, made ourselves peanut butter sandwiches (with twice as much jam as Aunt Beatrice allowed). We slept together in the master bedroom, curled up for warmth, not wanting to risk the smart thermostat reporting us.
For one night, we had a strange version of a life together, unwatched by the family, invisible to the world. An estate of our own.
“Same situation,” he said now. “Empty house.”
“No alarm?”
