Page 195 of Ashes of Sin and Stardust

All of this ran through my head in a matter of milliseconds as the door opened, and two figures stepped inside. I recognized one of them instantly: Michael Lewis, my former play partner who had disappeared when he’d gone on the run for being a serial killer. The other was a tall, muscular girl with dark brown hair and bright green eyes, a sly crooked smile on her face, maybe about my age.

“Hey there, Alice,” the girl said, stepping into Reuben’s house. Michael followed her and shut the door behind her, his eyes staying on my breasts and stomach, naked except for the leather harness and skirt I wore. My hands flew up to cover my breasts, but he raised an eyebrow at me as if to say,why hide? I’ve seen it before.His handsome face seemed like a lie, now that I knew his crimes, and knew he worked with Agent Smith Smith.

Wait.Hold on a damn minute.I backed up as I looked at the girl. Her twisted smile intensified. “A pleasure to finally meet you. Never got around to it back in the day.”

“You... you’re...” I took another step back, feeling my limbs start to burn hotter with the urge to run. The famed terrorist was agirl?

Maybe I could lock myself in the bathroom? No, that would never work. How many girls had tried to escape Michael and Agent Smith Smith before? How many had they killed?

“Relax,” the girl said, attempting to dismiss my fears with a waved hand. “We’re here for business, not pleasure.” She waltzed into the dining room, brushing past me and heading to the cabinet. She held a crystal goblet up to the light, inspecting it as if she were a jeweler, then opened one of the cabinet doors near the bottom and rifled through the contents.

“He keeps the good shit hidden,” she said, extracting a heavy decanter and pouring herself a shot. “Has he taught you to make his favorite drink yet?”

“N-no,” I stuttered.

“Ah. Well, I’m sure it’s coming. He’s picky as hell. I’m pretty sure hecan’t actually tastethe difference between three drops and four drops of bitters, but damn does he like to stress the recipe.”

I rocked from foot to foot, still wanting to run but knowing I probably couldn’t escape. I was freaked out and couldn’t feel my limbs. I could see a gun on the girl’s hip, and I knew from experience that Michael did not need a weapon. Hewasthe weapon.

My eyes darted between the terrorist in the dining room, and the serial killer who was currently untying his dress shoes and making his way into the living room. He kept his eyes focused on me as he settled into Reuben’s armchair, crossing one leg over the other, his smile growing slightly as he settled down.

“Hello, Alice.”

“Uh.” I swallowed and looked back at the girl. She was making her way into the living room with two glasses of whatever she’d stolen from the decanter, and a bottle of beer. Handing one glass to me and another to Michael, she set the bottle of beer in front of herself before sitting on the floor in front of the coffee table.

“Sit,” she said, nodding to the table. I carefully lowered myself down to the ground. I mean, what else could I do?Argue? I wasn’tthatsuicidal.

I tried to dig my phone out now that my hands were hidden from both of them by the coffee table, but before I got a chance, the girl extracted a folder of papers from inside her leather jacket, setting them on the coffee table.

“Okay,” she said, opening the folder. “So here’s what I’ve got. First of all, your marriage to Pete Woodrow has been annulled. I tried to delete it, but he’s been telling everyone that you’re married, including the cops who were looking for you. With too many people knowing about it, it would be a problem to just make it look like it never happened. You still have the copy of the certificate I stole for you?”

“Uh...yeah.”

“Cool. Keep this with it. This is a copy of the annulment.

“Second. I’ve changed your name back. That was...surprisingly difficult.Unfortunately I had to reissue you a new driver’s license and social security card, so you should use these from now on.” She slid the before mentioned paperwork across the table and flipped to the next page of her folder.

“Wait. You’re... you’re...”

She paused, cocking her head and steepling her fingers while she waited for me to reconcile what was happening.

“You’re Agent Smith Smith.”

“Yeah. Third thing, that money he stole from you? Unfortunately Mister Dick-drow withdrew it as cash and closed the account after you disappeared, so I don’t know where it’s gone. We’re keeping an eye on him.

“I’ve opened a new bank account for you. Here’s all the paperwork. Sadly, I can’t just make sixty-thousand dollars reappear in your account.” She stopped and cocked her head. “Well, actually I could. But I’m not going to, because you’re tied to Reuben now, and he gets audited by the IRSevery flipping year, so it’s probably best to avoid financial fraud for now...” she held up a finger. “But I did fix your credit score! You have a solid eight-fifty.”

“You... you’re... you stole the...”

The girl looked over to Michael, a sarcastic look of exhaustion on her face. “Dude, she’s really struggling with this one.”

Michael looked unimpressed, and almost bored. “Well, Lindsay, Reuben did tell you to wait. He probably hasn’t explained everything.”

“How do you guys... hold on...”

I held up a finger, trying to process what was happening.

I knew the girl was Agent Smith Smith. Reuben said his friend Lindsay had stolen my stuff back. But he said he knew Michael Lewis because he was a work associate, and that Lindsay was the name of the girl who he worked with to recover the stolen sex slaves... and that the group was aprivate military group...

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