Chapter Forty-Two
LOLA
Magnus St. James whips around. His eyes widen, and his mouth drops open. Behind him, Nic gapes. Enzo’s heart is a stunned numbness.
I hold my jaw, set my shoulders, and tamp back the tears already rising to the surface.
I’ve faced my father dozens of times in the past few months as Nocturne. Spoken to him, shaken his hand, come nose to nose with those features that are so like mine. But I was always in a mask. Always shielded from the possibility of rejection—or worse, acceptance—by the magical illusion I wore.
But now there is no smoke, no theatrics, no ethereal voice or snake-like tendrils of hair. It’s just me.
Magnus blinks, then his jaw hardens, and he turns back to Nic. “Nice try, kid, but I don’t fall for your party tricks anymore. Where’d you get the voratium?”
“No party tricks,” I say, voice quavering, stomach churning so intensely I might vomit. “It’s me.”
“Prove it,” he says through gritted teeth over his shoulder.
“When I was little,” I say, “you would visit for a few days at a time, and every visit, on the last night, I would get this nightmare that the next day, your motorcar would dissolve as you drove away. By the time you’d reach the end of the drive, you’d be completely gone.
No trace of you, your driver, or your vehicle. ”
My father’s hand goes slack on the pistol as he shifts toward me, skepticism bleeding into something I cannot name. Sadness? Joy? Confusion? His eyes are glassy as they search for the seams on this disguise and find none.
“And, in that dream, when I would scream for you, the nursemaid would say, ‘You have no father, child.’” I swallow the thickening lump in my throat, blink away the tears warping my vision. “I always woke up sobbing. Do you remember what you did?”
“I took to making the last night of my stay a sort of party,” he croaks. “We’d push the sofas together in the living room and drape sheets over them.”
“You’d bring in sweets from the city, and we’d stuff ourselves sick. Then I’d fall asleep while you promised me over and over that you were real. That you’d come back. That you’d never, ever disappear.”
“Lola-girl?” he whispers, and gone is the terrifying crime lord brandishing pistols and barking orders. His expression is one of brokenness and vulnerability, the lines around his eyes tired and drawn.
“It’s me, Daddy.”
He stuffs his pistol into his belt and takes four slow, measured, careful steps toward me, pressing a gentle thumb to my chin to raise my face. He scrutinizes my features as a tear slips from my lower lashes and trails hot down my cheek.
“Your hair is darker,” he murmurs.
“We dyed it.”
“And your nose . . .”
“Salazar’s chap broke it.”
His jaw hardens. “He’s going to regret that.”
“I’m sure he already does,” I say, glancing past my father to Nic. “The Liar had him arrested when he learned of it.”
My father’s eyes narrow, following my gaze and scowling at Nic. “I still want to put a bullet in you.”
Nic nods. “Duly noted.”
“Please don’t,” I say, grasping my father’s arm. “He’s not as bad as you think he is.”
“Don’t tell me you’ve gone and forgotten your senses, Lola. He’s a criminal.”
“So are you.”
“Are you giving me lip, young lady?” He chuckles.
My heart aches at the sound of that pretend-scolding voice he always used when he would catch me sneaking cookies behind the nursemaid’s back.
He’s put on the mask again—the one that looks like the father who loved me. Seeing him again—having that version close enough to touch—makes the hurt so much rawer.
I squeeze my eyes shut. Tears leak between my clenched lids. A strangled sob chokes out.
His arms come around me, so familiar and warm and comforting, and suddenly I’m crying harder than I have in years. As hard as I did the night I finally allowed myself to believe he wasn’t going to save me. The night I gave up waiting for him.
I suck in the scent of oranges and coffee and cigar smoke—the scent I’ve smelled in my dreams for four years that is so much warmer and stronger and realer now that he’s here wrapped around me, crushing me against him the way he did when I was small.
But all those happy memories sour when the more recent ones rise to the surface. Him threatening me in the dark. Killing men for petty annoyances. Speaking about me—his daughter—like a possession.
I push him away with shaking hands. “I’m sorry. I can’t do this.”
“Do what?”
“It’s . . . nice to see you again,” I say, grasping Nic’s arm, “but we’ve got to get out of here. We’re on a time crunch.” I pull him up the stairs. Enzo joins us, still noncorporeal.
“No.” The word is brutal and hard, and it stops my heart.
“Excuse me?” I look over my shoulder as my father raises his pistol once more, aiming straight at Nic’s heart.
“You think I’m going to let you walk out on the arm of one of the men who brainwashed you?”
“I’m not—”
Invisible, Enzo bolts down the stairs. He slams back into corporeality and rams into my father, knocking him backward. The pistol goes off.
“Enzo!” I scream as the bullet hits the ceiling.
“Run!” Enzo shouts, barreling up at us, grasping both our arms with voratium and drawing us into his ghostly state at the very instant my father squeezes off another shot. The bullet whizzes through the air where Nic’s heart was.
We pelt through the walls as my father raises a ruckus behind us. Soon, a siren shrieks to life, and maids and butlers and security personnel sprint down the hall in every direction.
We reach the front drive, shoving into the car still parked at the entrance.
Enzo releases us and crouches under the dash; maneuvering wires like this is another one of our heists as I help Nic into the passenger side before sliding into the back seat.
The engine roars to life just as several security guards spill out of the front door brandishing pistols.
“Hang on!” Enzo cries, and we blaze down the driveway, crashing through the gate and tearing back toward Waterside.
Worry spirals inside me, and I knot my clammy hands in my dress, jiggling my leg to keep from coming apart. Enzo glances back a few times, as though to assess why I’m so wound up, but anytime I meet his gaze, he averts his as a fresh wave of shame flows through him.
In the past, I might have reassured him, but not tonight.
No, he needs to feel this. To witness my grief over the loss of my relationship with my father. I don’t have the emotional fortitude to be strong for both of us right now.
Nic reaches into the back, pressing his hand to my knee. Even though he doesn’t share my heart, he knows. Even though he’s likely still upset with me, he cares.
Aethera swims past, a multicolor fever dream of streetlights and city blocks, motorcars and neon. Enzo does not speak as he drives, nor does Nic. The only sound in the car is the echo of my father’s cry of joy in my ears.
Then Enzo pulls around the corner toward the Liar’s Den, and what looks like an army of several dozen statues awaits us, silent and watching. He slams on the brakes, skidding to a stop in front of the first row. They don’t even flinch.
“Hello,” they all say in eerie unison. Then they raise their hands as one, sending goose bumps prickling down the back of my neck. “How nice of you to join us.”