Page 373 of Lodestar

“Was it romantic?”

“She never said. I didn’t task her with seducing him if that’s your question.”

“Good to know you didn’t pimp her out on that occasion,” I mocked.

His eyes narrowed upon me, the papery skin crinkling between his brows, but he stayed silent.

“I spoke with Eamonn Keegan,Dagda, before we flew to England. He confirmed that Mom’s death was related to Jorgmundgander.” When he didn’t say anything, I demanded, “Well?”

“I wasn’t aware that you asked me a question.”

“Why have you gone to such lengths to avenge your son but not your daughter?”

“Isn’t that obvious?”

“Not to me. I’m not a child and I deserve to know what happened to her, dammit.”

“She does, Anton,” Conor rumbled softly. “She only went down this path and ended up where she did because she needed to understand what happened to her mom.”

Anton appeared to ponder that before, eventually, conceding, “The reason I don’t need to avenge her is because she’s already avenged.”

“Dagda’s living and breathing in New York City.”

“And you yourself told me that Troy should not be erased for killing Aleks.”

“Who was behind her death?”

“He’s currently sitting in a shipping container in the Catskills listening to his colleagues being eaten by the local fauna.”

“Sheridan Reinier was behind my mom’s death?” I cried, digging my nails into the leather armrests to hold me back. Conor’s hand slipped over mine, and I knotted my fingers with his, clenching down so hard that it undoubtedly hurt us both.

Anton rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Your mother was a beautiful woman. She was memorable. Too memorable. Reinier met her when he and Davidson came to Moscow. When she was a part of my guard,” he clarified.

I swallowed. “He recognized her.”

“Yes. And used it as a hold on her.” His mouth tightened. “I suspected for many years that she was… that she’d turned. Had become a Sparrow. It was one of the reasons why I kept my distance. Not just from the investigation into her passing but from you too. I only waded in once I knew what they’d done to you, and like always, I was too late.”

“I wondered what prompted your involvement,” Conor mused. “Now, and not back then, I mean. What changed?”

Anton shot me a pointed look. “My granddaughter waded into the fray and began killing my colleagues then targeted me.”

“Don’t expect an apology out of me.”

“I expect nothing from you apart from a bad attitude,” he sniped.

I grunted.

“Wasshe a Sparrow?” Conor asked.

“Temperance Black has spoken with Reinier while under our custody. I’ve been assured that Galena wasn’t a Sparrow, nor a double agent.”

“So why kill her?”

“Because Reinier spoke with her personally. She had to die because she could implicate him as a Sparrow.” He rubbed hischin. “As long as there are Sparrows, there will be Brothers. I like to think we are better, but in this, I’m as bad as one of them—my satisfaction in knowing of their suffering knows no bounds. Those men killed my children. I’m glad their pain will be excruciating before they are robbed of their lives, just as they did with my Aleks and Galena.” His gaze was measured as he leveled me with a verbal blow: “Your mother does not deserve to be hated.”

“You acted as if she?—”

“Do you know the pain of losing two children, Star?”

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