Page 105 of Fool Me Twice

Cane smiled, flat and tight. “You wouldn’t believe me anyway.”

Fix sighed. It was the truth, after all. “Maybe we can reduce some of the risks, at least,” he muttered.

He reached for his angrily buzzing phone and accepted the call.

“Hello?”

“What the fuck!” Cyrus exclaimed, sounding incredibly pissed off. “You want me to come down there and arrest both your asses?”

“We have a plan. Meet us outside the Mechaven farm district. Just on the border with the woods. Bring a squad but stay out of sight. Can you do that?” Cane fired off, typing a message into his own phone.

“Not without details,” Cyrus said through his teeth.

“I’ll hand you over the potential key to that list and a highly dangerous caster all at once,” Cane said. “Good enough?”

Cyrus was silent for a few moments. “Fine.”

He cut the call before Cane could say anything else, but it didn’t matter. His phone pinged and he read the text Ares had sent back.

Ares: Anything you need, Boss.

He looked up from his phone to find Fix on his feet, fingers flying over his phone screen for a second before he looked up.

“Ash is coming with us,” he said. “Black will come back and wait for Damir to arrive. Midas is on Wren duty. We’re good to go.”

Cane looked at him for a moment, trying to find that irritation he’d felt toward the cursebreaker team just hours ago.

It wasn’t there. They had a shared goal now.

Find the person who’d dared to hurt Hart.

And destroy her.

Chapter 22

Cane

He’d opted to get the train instead of borrowing a car. Making himself an easier target to follow was the whole point. She was supposed to follow him to confront him so he could finally learn what she was doing to him. They needed details to break the curse.

He picked the last seat in the long row, his back protected by the back of the train. Nobody could sneak up behind him, and he had the entire front of the train in his eyeline.

He sat with his back straight and his eyes glued to the head of a man sitting in front of him, but he was scanning the train constantly. He could feel eyes on him. It was a feeling he was well used to, but now it felt more solid. Real.

Every young woman who hopped on or off the train set his alarms off. He was looking for Sarah in each of them. Trying to find her tight curls, the sharpness of her nose or the subtle crook in her front teeth. When that didn’t work he tried looking for her recognizable patterns of behavior. How she’d always had something in her fingers to stop herself from picking at her cuticles. How she’d flicked her hair off her forehead every few seconds, swearing she’d let her bangs grow but then never did. How she liked to look down on everyone else because she saw them as disposable. Insignificant.

He felt like he’d recognize it if he saw it, but nobody fit exactly right. Every single person he saw was missing something.

He drummed his fingers on his thighs before pulling out his phone and checking for any messages. There were none.

Nothing from PUMA, or Fix and Ash.

Nothing from Ares, who was following the train closely, making sure Arianna didn’t have backup of her own.

But most importantly, there was still nothing from Hart.

Black had informed them he was back at the house after finding Hart’s car abandoned in a parking lot with all the mirrors smashed and no sign of him anywhere. Cane grew more and more worried with each passing second, wishing Hart would just tell him he was somewhere safe. Wishing he’d never taken his eyes off him, so he’d know where he was.

Wishing he’d tell him Cane’s presence hadn’t ruined him completely. Because he’d be able to get through everything falling around him. He’d be okay with his kingdom crashing down again, as long as none of the damn rubble touched Hart.

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