Page 20 of Black Ledger

“You do have feelings,” Gemma added. “Rage is a feeling.”

“Exactly.”

Silence fell between us. Neeve didn’t believe me. To be honest, neither did I, but hatred had to be my only guiding light. I would ruin the entire Order. That was my only life mission. I had been given another chance to be the fury in the darkness—a monster hunting monsters.

I would end them all.

In the silence, the TV screamed, and when the news reporter said serial killer, all three of us turned our heads at once like birds spotting prey.

I hadn’t yet made it on mainstream news, but it was only a matter of time until I did.

Neeve grabbed the remote and turned the TV up.

“We’re here at the scene of a horrific serial killing,” the reporter said. ”The woman was found frozen and posed like a doll on the steps of the Met. Her lips were sewn together with thick red thread, and we’re getting reports that she also had the word DOVE sewn into her upper thigh. This is the sixth confirmed killing by the Embroiderer.”

The cameras cut to B-roll of the FBI at the crime scene. Seraphina Keres was standing on the steps of the Met, holding an evidence bag as she glanced at the reporters, then glared. Seraphina was also a previous victim of the Lethean Order—and often a thorn in my side.

She was ethereal, beautiful, with long white hair she refused to dye. She was the type of woman whose beauty should have made her an A-list movie star. But instead, she chose to join the FBI to hunt down serial killers. And I chose to become one. She once accused me of brutally killing a man who had been involved in her cell. She wasn’t wrong, but I told her to find the evidence or get out of my way.

To my knowledge, she hadn’t shared any of her suspicions with her colleagues, but it was only a matter of time.

“That’s horrific.” Neeve’s feet dropped to the floor, and her elbows went to her knees as she leaned in closer to the TV. “Xen, we have to do something.”

I chewed on my cheek, watching the images of the dead girl. Why they chose to show her dead body on the nightly news was beyond me, but people loved watching sick things.

A dull ache spread across my chest, like someone pressing hard on a fresh bruise.

Of course I wanted to stop all evil men. If I had all the time in the world, I would hunt this serial killer down. But I didn’t.

“It’s not our problem,” I said, probably too harshly.

“Are you kidding me?” Neeve jerked her head back to me. “You really can be that heartless sometimes, can’t you?”

“Neeve…” I said slowly.

“And selfish? All you care about is your trauma and your revenge.”

“Come on. You know that’s not true,” Gemma cut in.

“That’s six dead girls, Xeniya. How can you not care about six dead girls?” Neeve ignored Gemma.

“Of course I care about them, but I’m one person. One fucking person. I can’t do everything I am doing to hunt the Order and hunt down every bad person in the world.”

“No, but you could do something.” Neeve crossed her arms. “Do you think the FBI is going to be as talented as you are at hacking into cameras and following this guy’s shadow?” She shook her head. “Of course they won’t.”

I turned to Gemma. She opened her mouth, then closed it, as though every possible answer was the wrong one. If I knew Gemma, she was siding with both of us. She was the diplomatic, grounded one. Soft and calming like a wildcat tamer.

Neeve and I were both tigers—hotheaded wildcats.

I let out a slow sigh. “I’ll help you look into it when I’m done going through the Russians’ finances.”

“He could kill again before that.”

“And there are women out there right now being raped, tortured, and killed by the Order; are they less valuable to you than the Embroiderer’s victims?”

“No, of course not.” Her nostrils flared with a sharp inhale, but she gave up the fight. We were both immovable boulders, both trying to help vulnerable women.

Neither of us was right or wrong, and that was the problem.