Bitter Bite (Elemental Assassin #14)(104)

was almost pitying. “You believed exactly what we wanted you to.”

I frowned, not understanding what he was getting at.

“It’s true that Mab despised Eira and was worried about your magic. Those

are some of the reasons your mother died.” He bent down so that he was at eye

level with me. “But those aren’t the only reasons. Why, they’re not even

the main ones.”

Cold fingers of unease crawled up my spine. “What are you saying?”

Tucker leaned even closer to me. “Mab killed your mother because we ordered

her to.”

I sucked in a breath, my mind spinning in a hundred directions. Every word out

of his mouth was like a grenade exploding at my feet, but I pushed aside my

shock and surprise and forced myself to think things through. Tucker was a

master manipulator. He’d been pulling Deirdre’s strings this whole time

without my realizing it. He was just playing me now, trying to confuse me and

get me to focus on his lies instead of escaping.

He hadn’t been there that night. He hadn’t seen my mother and Annabella die.

He hadn’t heard their screams as Mab’s elemental Fire had consumed them. He

hadn’t seen or smelled or touched their charred bodies. He hadn’t been tied

down to a chair and tortured by Mab. I had been, and I knew exactly what had

happened and why. Tucker didn’t know anything about my mother.

Not one damn thing.

“You’re lying,” I snarled. “Mab killed my family because she wanted to.

Because she was an evil, vicious, vindictive bitch. Mab certainly never asked

anyone’s permission for any of the bad things she did.”

“Oh, that’s where you’re dead wrong, Ms. Blanco,” Tucker said, his eyes

still on mine, a snake trying to transfix me with the depths of his black

gaze. “Mab was certainly all of those things, especially when it came to Eira

Snow. But Eira was the one making problems within the group. She wanted us to

abandon some of our more . . . profitable endeavors, just in the name of human

decency. She actually threatened to go public and expose us. So we let Mab

take care of her.”

“Right,” I drawled, my voice dripping with disdain and disbelief. “Just

like you let Mab be head of the underworld.”

“Exactly,” he replied. “Mab was always a bit . . . showier than the rest of

us. She was the perfect figurehead for all the petty crime bosses to focus on,

while we carried on with our own interests behind the scenes. But Mab knew

exactly what we were capable of doing, even to her, and she went along with us

because it was in her best interests to do so.”

Part of me wanted to laugh in his face and thank him for the great bedtime

story. But his voice, his words, his expression . . . they all held an air of

cold, cruel certainty that I couldn’t ignore, that made twin knots of worry

and doubt twist together in my stomach. Could Tucker actually be telling the

truth? Could Mab have murdered my mother for some reason other than a petty

family feud?

Could I have been wrong all these years?

But . . . but that would mean that I had been wrong about everything—my

mother, what kind of person she had been, why she’d died, even my revenge

against Mab. Every single thing that made me, well, me. It would all be wrong.

No, it would be worse than that.

It would all be a f*cking lie.

When I first found out that Deirdre was alive, I’d been worried about

shattering Finn’s world and upending everything he knew about his parents. I

couldn’t quite believe that the same thing was happening to me. That this

wasn’t all just another manipulation on Tucker’s part.

But I couldn’t ignore the possibility that he was telling the truth.

I gave him a skeptical look. “I’ll ask again. Who, exactly, is this

illustrious we?”

“You can call us the Circle. We’re the ones who run this town and everything

in it. Mab, the underworld, the crime bosses, they’re all just useful tools

to hide our activities. Unlike Mab, we see no need to let everyone know our

business.”

“So you’re telling me that some secret group, some secret society of folks,

are the true forces of power, greed, and corruption in Ashland?” I laughed.

“That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard—”

Tucker palmed a knife and pressed it against my throat, cutting off my words

and cutting open my neck. I winced at the cold sting, even as warm blood oozed

down my throat. The bastard was fast. I hadn’t even seen him move. I wondered

if his speed was a natural vampiric ability or the result of drinking other

people’s blood. Maybe both.

“You stupid girl!” he hissed. “We can reach out and crush you anytime we

want. The only reason you’re still alive is because it amuses us to watch

your pitiful struggles.”

I stared right back at him, hate blazing in my eyes. “Then do it, already.