The Dream Thieves (The Raven Cycle, #2)(8)

“Come on, man,” Ronan said.

In a dismissive, sleepy voice, Adam said, “I don’t know why you think that would work out. Pig’s got a load of five people —”

“Noah doesn’t count,” Ronan replied.

Noah said, “Hey.”

“You’re dead. You don’t weigh anything!”

Adam continued, “— we’ve got our air-co on, and he’s probably in his Evo, right? Zero-to-sixty in four seconds. What’s this do, zero-to-sixty in five? Six? Do the math.”

“I’ve beaten him,” Ronan said. There was something dreadful about seeing a race dissolving in front of him. It was right there, adrenaline waiting to happen. And Kavinsky, of all people. Every inch of Ronan’s skin tingled with useless anticipation.

“Not in that car you haven’t. Not in your BMW.”

“In that car,” countered Ronan. “In my BMW. He’s a shitty driver.”

Gansey said, “It’s irrelevant. It’s not happening. Kavinsky’s a dirtbag.”

In the other lane, Kavinsky lost patience and pulled slowly ahead. Blue caught sight of the car. She exclaimed, “Him! He’s not a dirtbag. He’s an *.”

For a moment, all of the boys in the Camaro were quiet, contemplating where Blue might have learned that Joseph Kavinsky was an *. Not that she was wrong, of course.

“You see,” Gansey said. “Jane concurs.”

Ronan caught a glimpse of Kavinsky’s face, looking back at them through his sunglasses. Judging them all cowards. Ronan’s hands felt itchy. Then Kavinsky’s white Mitsubishi charged ahead in a faint cloud of smoke. By the time the Camaro had reached the Henrietta exit, there was no sign of them. Heat rippled off the interstate, making a mirage of the memory of Kavinsky. Like he’d never been.

Ronan slumped in his seat, all the fight sucked out of him. “You never want to have any fun, old man.”

“That’s not fun,” Gansey said, putting on his turn signal. “That’s trouble.”





The Gray Man had not always intended to be a heavy.

Point of fact, the Gray Man had a graduate degree in something completely unrelated to roughing people up. At one point, he had even written a not-unsuccessful book called Fraternity in Anglo-Saxon Verse, and it had been required reading in at least seventeen college courses across the country. The Gray Man had carefully collected as many of these course reading lists as he could find and placed them in a folder along with cover flats, first-pass pages, and two appreciative letters addressed to his pen name. Whenever he required a small burst of fireworks to his heart, he would remove the folder from the bedside drawer and look at the contents while enjoying a beer or seven. He had made a mark.

However, as delightful as Anglo-Saxon poetry was to the Gray Man, it served him better as a hobby than as a career. He preferred a job he could approach with pragmatism, one that gave him the freedom to read and study at his convenience. So here he was in Henrietta.

It was, the Gray Man thought, quite an agreeable life after all.

After chatting with Declan Lynch, he checked into the Pleasant Valley Bed and Breakfast just outside of town. It was quite late, but Shorty and Patty Wetzel didn’t seem to mind.

“How long will you be with us?” Patty asked, handing the Gray Man a mug with an anatomically incorrect rooster on it. She eyed his luggage on the portico: a gray duffel bag and a gray hard-sided suitcase.

“Probably two weeks to start,” the Gray Man replied. “A fortnight in your company.” The coffee was astonishingly terrible. He shouldered off his light gray jacket to reveal a dark gray V-neck. Both of the Wetzels gazed at his suddenly revealed shoulders and chest. He asked, “Do you have anything with a hair more spine to it?”

With a giggle, Patty obligingly produced three Coronas from the fridge. “We don’t like to appear like lushes, but … lime?”

“Lime,” agreed the Gray Man. For a moment, there was no sound but that of three consenting adults mutually enjoying an alcoholic beverage after a long day. The three emerged from the other side of the silence firm friends.

“Two weeks?” Shorty asked. The Gray Man was endlessly fascinated by the way Shorty formed words. The most basic premise of the Henrietta accent seemed to involve combining the five vowels basic to the English language into four.

“Give or take. I’m not sure how long this contract will last.”

Shorty scratched his belly. “What do you do?”

“I’m a hit man.”

“Hard to find work these days, is it?”

The Gray Man replied, “I would’ve had an easier time in accounting.”

The Wetzels enjoyed this hugely. After a few minutes of home-baked laughter, Patty ventured, “You have such intense eyes!”

“I got them from my mother,” he lied. The only thing he’d ever gotten from his mother was an inability to tan.

“Lucky woman!” Patty said.

The Wetzels hadn’t had a boarder in several weeks, and the Gray Man allowed himself to be the focus of their intense welcome for about an hour before excusing himself with another Corona. By the time the door shut behind him, the Wetzels were decided supporters of the Gray Man.

So many of the world’s problems, he mused, were solved by sheer human decency.