Page 119 of Gambler's Conceit

“The cops are on their way!” I hear, but I don’t care about that either. Let them come. This is our turf, and while the Lockwoods may have influence, they wouldn’t have paid off the Calamity City PD.

At least, I hope they didn’t think that far ahead.

Havoc lays another punch into the goon, and I hear something crack. The goon doesn’t go completely slack, though, so I guess it wasn’t his neck breaking.

“Vortex!” somebody shouts.

I look up to see a familiar face—Mason, one of Caleb’s guards, who I know is part of the Spade Family.

Havoc punches again.

Mason jogs up to us, while some others are fanning out to talk to the bystanders.

“We’ll take it from here,” he says, blocking Havoc’s next punch.

Havoc growls and turns to him. “He hurt Seven!”

I’m trying to clear my head of the haze of red, trying to calm the fuck down. The mention of Seven knocks me back into the present, and I snap, “We need tofindSeven. Let Mason drag this prick back to the Roi and deal with the fucking cops. We have more important things to do.”

Havoc lets out a frustrated noise. “Fine! How do we find Seven in this fucking haystack of a city?”

“Caleb’s pulling in favors,” I say. “And?—”

My phone buzzes again, with a new photo and address. If Seven went there on foot, from here, it would have taken him at least fifteen minutes. “Come on. We’re close.”

I’ll catch him.

I’llsavehim.

And I sure as fuck won’t let him get hurt again.

TWENTY-EIGHT

SEVEN

It isn’tuntil I duck into the large shopping mall several blocks away from the Roi de Pique that I finally let myself breathe.

I know I look like a mess, with a blotchy face and reddened eyes—you don’t look very pretty when you cry, baby.

I shudder, hugging my arms against my chest as that familiar voice permeates my thoughts. I shouldn’t have cried.

Of course, I shouldn’t have run away once, let alone twice, and crying and carrying electronics will be the least of my concerns if Raymond gets his massive paws on me again.

When.

I try to work through my thoughts, to focus on the here and now instead of on what could happen.

I wipe my eyes and duck into a clothing store. There are several other people in the store, and while the attendant is busy with one of them, I grab a handful of shirts and pants from the rack and take them into the changing rooms. I change into new clothes, then pull the old ones on over them.

When I’m satisfied that the new clothes aren’t visible, I head out, placing the extras onto the rack.

No alarms go off when I leave the store. I find a bathroom and remove the Roi de Pique branded clothes, leaving me with just the new stuff.

Good thing I haven’t forgotten how to do this. It had taken me a few attempts the first time to figure out how to sneak clothes out without anybody noticing. The alarms had freaked me out early on, but I learned to avoid clothes with the electronic tags on them, and I’d spent a few hours wandering stores to see how other people behaved.

It had taken two months before I could walk into a store without anyone giving me weird looks.

At least I’d figured out that restaurants often had food in their dumpsters, and sometimes people leave their uneaten food on the tables.

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