Chapter 73
My old reflexes settled over me.
Mary had grown six inches in the last year, a spurt of sinew and muscle. But I still outweighed her, outmuscled her, with ten years’ more training.
Also, she appeared to be unarmed.
Maybe there was something in the pockets of that raincoat, or a needle up her sleeve. But with my longer reach, I could land cut after cut without her touching me.
“This seems unfair,” I said.
“Yes, but I’m me. And you’re a bunny.”
I sighed. “That’s getting old.”
“You’re old.” She tipped back in her chair, precarious, imperious. “You don’t want to think about me never eating breakfast again. Never getting another present on Quilting Day. No more good-nights from Mama. You’re scared of me getting wrapped in old blankets, worm food in the cold ground.”
Something trembled in my stomach, but I pressed it down.
You’re just meat.
“Grandmother handed me this knife,” I said. “So worm food is the plan for you, whatever happens here. You’re too unstable for a Morton.”
Mary laughed, the chair almost falling backward. “I’m the same as always. You’re the one who changed.”
“I’m better than I used to be.”
“Then do it,” she said, her voice suddenly soft in the dark. “I won’t fight you.”
The chair landed flat again as she leaned forward, offering her neck.
I took a step closer, eyes locked on that raincoat. A taser? A flash grenade?
“Come on, Aunt Jess. Pretend I’m Peter.”
My knife wavered, but it was only leftover burn from hours of knitting.
“Pretend I don’t matter,” she said. “That I’m not real inside.”
I could see my attack—a quick sweep, no warning, across the throat. Blood and breath would leave her body over a slow minute, gurgling on the floor. I wouldn’t even have to watch.
Sebastian would’ve done it without thinking. Slay the rabbit.
“Except you know I’m real,” she said softly. “Because you are too.”
“Be quiet,” I said—a mistake to ask, to plead, to need silence.
Mary didn’t gloat about her small victory, just obeyed me, falling silent.
But then she stood up from the chair…and began to dance.
First a pirouette, arms out, the hem of the purple raincoat flaring as she twirled. Then a second spin, a third.
I took a step back to give her space.
The whispers of her ballet shoes echoed in the cement-walled holding cell. The rubber squeak of her raincoat accompanied the dance, building as her steps grew furious, settling when she became graceful and deliberate.
I kept my knife ready in case she attacked, but the focus on Mary’s face was too perfect—this was no simple ruse.
She moved for the pure joy of it, for the sparks along her muscles, the current down her spine.
She took up every inch of that small, dark cell.
Magnificent to watch, like some hidden waterfall stumbled upon deep in a forest.
Finally the music in Mary’s head played itself out, and she came to a halt within arm’s reach of me, in third position, hands at her sides.
Defenseless.
The cold part of me understood it now—Mary would become a fine Morton. A prolific one. The fearlessness, the cunning, the sheer guile on display here. No nerves. No weakness.
Just meat, just dangerous.
I could save a dozen lives by taking hers. A hundred? A thousand? Some number starting with one, as per Benford’s Law.
But to cut her from the world was too much for my trembling hand. Mary’s dancing, her surrender, had somehow woven strings between us.
Change of plan.
I held the knife by its blade and offered it to Mary. She took the handle, grinning, her fingers tight.
I expected a thrust to my stomach, a snick across my throat, but all she did was slip the blade into her pocket.
“They made you a bunny,” she said. “You’re still a bunny.”
With those words, she reached out and tapped me on the nose.
“I’m going to be taller than you.”