Page 157 of The Wild Charge

Now…she had to be suspicious of everything. That was what her family had taught her.

“Your dad really came all the way fromLondon?” he asked now, as the three of them sat waiting for orientation to begin.

She didn’t answer right away, reviewing what she ought to say.It’s okay to talk about me, Dad had said back at the hotel.I’m walking you in, so it’s not like I’m a secret.

She hesitated long enough that Brandon frowned. “Cass, you okay?”

“Oh. Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. He did come from London.” She made a show of rolling her eyes. “He’s not around half the time, and suddenly he’s all worried about me and shit. Ugh.”

Kaitlin made a face. “God, my dad’s the same way. He doesn’t listen to anything I say, but I go on one date and suddenly he’s all, ‘that’s my little girl.’”

Our dads are nothing alike, Cassandra thought bitterly.You’re not here right now as part of a fuckingmission.

“What does your dad do?” Brandon asked, too eager. “’Cause he’s away for work a lot, right?”

“He’s a contractor.”He just gets contracted to kill people, is all.

“Cool.” His face was all friendly interest – big smile, sparkling eyes, the works – and all she could see was a threat. Someone who wanted to know too much about her; someone who wanted to use her against her family. Was he even eighteen, as he claimed? Or older. An undercover cop? A gangster?

His smile slipped. “You sure you’re feeling okay? You look a little pale.”

See? That was suspicious, right? Grandmothers said “you look a little pale,” but not teenage dudes!

She hated this. She hated itso much.

“I’m fine,” she gritted out.

The door flew open, a sudden rush that snatched everyone’s attention. Cassandra twisted around in her chair to see a woman in a black dress wearing a gallery lanyard come skittering into the room, slam the door shut, and lean back against it. “Hi, everyone.” Her smile was strained. “There’s been a slight delay. We’re dealing with a bit of a security issue.”

Oh God.

“Not to worry, though. It’s being handled. If you’ll all just stay here and–”

Cassandra stood. “What sort of security issue?”

“It’s fine. The guards are–” When Cassandra strode forward, all pretense of a smile fell away. The woman looked petrified. “Miss. Please take a seat. Our security personnel are handling things.”

Then she heard the crack of a gunshot.

~*~

There was a moment, in the melee between the statue and the staircase, between kicks, and ducks, and strikes, when Devin was laughing wildly behind him, that Fox found himself grinning.

He was havingfun. With hisdad.

Maybe more like adjacent to his dad. But.

After all the stress of the past few weeks, all the upside-down bullshit, it felt damn good to flex his muscles. To do what he did best, and fight people. He had his stealth, and his instincts, his training, his accents and his charm and everything else…but nothing filled him with joy quite like beating the ever-loving shit out of people.

No museum employed dozens of guards. The dumb muscle that rushed toward Fox and Devin belonged to someone else – and weren’t a match for them besides. Clearly Waverly, or Abacus, had assumed two men could be overwhelmed by sheer numbers.

It was always a good thing to be underestimated.

Fox chopped a guard in the throat with the edge of his hand, and he went down hard, choking and wheezing. A meaty thud behind him said that Devin had dropped another one. They’d reached the foot of the stairs, finally, and the guards that had dogged them the whole way had fallen; a few were moaning, one was trying unsuccessfully to gather himself.

“Charlie,” Devin said, and his tone sent a chill skittering up the back of Fox’s neck.

He looked first at his dad, who’d gone oddly stone-faced. Devin nodded up the stairs, and Fox thoughtfuck, already knowing what he’d find when he turned his head.

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