I wondered what order she’d just given, and whose life it would ruin. Just because the Tower syndicate knew nothing about me didn’t mean I knew nothing about it. I hadn’t been able to find many day-to-day specifics online, but the overtones of greed, violence and corruption came through loud and clear, even in vague articles citing anonymous sources, who may or may not have disappeared shortly after they were interviewed.
My birth family was dangerous and evidently unburdened by scruples. I’d come to the right place.
My aunt focused on me again, as if she’d never been interrupted. “What do you want?”
“Couldn’t I just have come to meet the rest of my family?”
“Of course you could have.” Still standing behind her desk, she stared straight into my eyes without a hint of doubt. “But you didn’t.”
That’s when I realized I was being tested. My mother was right; Lia Tower never did anything without a reason. Lying to a Reader—someone who could scent dishonesty in the air, the way the rest of us might smell meat on the grill—wasn’t going to get me anywhere.
“No. I need a favor.”
“Of course you do.” Her slow smile made my skin crawl. “Let’s sit and chat.” She gestured toward a chair in front of the desk and when I sat, she sat behind the desk, clearly establishing our roles—my aunt and I would begin our relationship on opposing sides.
“First of all, who are you?” she said, and I realized that our chat would actually be an interrogation.
“I’m Sera Tower. Your niece.”
When she glanced at the open laptop on her desk, I wondered if she’d spent the past half hour researching me. Or maybe she had some faster, Skill-based method of finding information.
Lia waved one hand, dismissing my reply. “Your full name.”
Right. Like I was going to give her that kind of power over me. My mother had been unSkilled, but well-informed, and she’d taught me well. With my full name, Julia could have me tracked. Or bound against my will. At least, she could try.
I shrugged and tried on a lighthearted smile. “I’ll tell you mine, if you tell me yours.”
Her forehead wrinkled in a frown. “Fine. Your full first name, at least. What is Sera short for?”
“Serenity.”
Lia’s brows rose in surprise. “I’d guessed Seraphine. And Cecily actually gave you my brother’s surname?”
My chest ached at the memory of my mother, and at Julia’s acknowledgment that they’d once known each other. The truth was that they’d been friends back in high school, before Lia’s brother had come between them. My mother hadn’t gone into detail beyond that, but I’d gathered that the end of their friendship was neither swift nor painless. At least, not for my mom.
If Julia’d suffered from the loss, I saw no sign of it twenty-three years after the fact. However, I could see one small truth behind her eyes, but only because my mother had warned me of it. Lia had said my mother’s name on purpose, hoping to draw more information out of me than she’d actually asked for. More than I should be willing to give.
She wanted to know how much my mother had told me about her. About Jake. About the family and their business.
But I was desperate, not stupid.
“Yes,” I said, holding her gaze. “It’s not on my birth certificate or anything, but I’m officially a Tower.”
What many people—mostly the unSkilled—didn’t know was that it doesn’t matter what’s written on some stupid form a new mother fills out, while she’s still high on painkillers. It’s what she names the baby in her heart and head that counts. And for some reason, the day I was born my mother was thinking of me as Jake Tower’s daughter.
“Why would she do that?” Lia looked privately puzzled for a second, then she directed her confusion toward me.
“My guess is because I’m a Tower.”
“And you’re willing to submit to a blood test?”
“Hell, no.” She could do more damage with my blood than she could with my full name. “But I’ll take the cheek-swab DNA test. From a disinterested third party.”
Her brows rose again. “It’s adorable that you think there’s any such thing.”
I wasn’t sure how to respond to that.
Lia folded her arms on her desk. “Needless to say, I won’t be doing anything for you until I have proof of our alleged genetic connection.” She set her drink on her desk blotter again, then leaned back in her chair, arms now crossed over her chest. “But for the sake of expediency, what is this favor you want?”
I glanced at each of the guards, one of whom stood behind Lia and to her left, while the other was posted at the closed door behind me. Their short sleeves covered their upper arms, hiding their binding marks so that I couldn’t tell whether or not they were Skilled, and if so, what those Skills were. But they obviously had ears and mouths. “Will you ask the gentlemen to step outside?”
Lia shook her head slowly. “I can’t do that. What if you’re an assassin sent here to kill me?”
“Why would an assassin walk through the front door?”
“That would be a very good question for the man who killed my brother,” she said. “He did that very thing.”
Right. But he wasn’t an assassin, at least, not according to the newspapers. The official story was that Jake Tower and several of his men had been killed by an angry, mentally unstable employee, who’d also died in the tragic shooting.
“Why would I want to assassinate you?” I asked, but she only watched me, waiting for me to draw my own conclusions. “I don’t want to hurt anyone here. I just need a favor. A private favor. Can’t you hear the truth in my words?”
Something fierce flickered behind her eyes, and I realized the game had changed. I’d changed it, by admitting I knew her Skill.
“Out,” she said, and at first I thought she was kicking me out of the office, or maybe off the property. But then her bodyguards silently filed into the foyer, and I realized the order wasn’t aimed at me.
When the door closed behind them she studied me again through narrowed eyes. “What is your Skill, Serenity Tower?” She said my name with a special emphasis, as if it was the punch line of some joke I would never understand.
“I don’t have one.” I’d been saying that for so long I almost believed it myself, and it didn’t occur to me until the words were already hanging in the air between us that a Reader would be able to hear the truth, even in such a tiny lie.
Her brows rose again, and she seemed to be tasting my words on the air, and for a moment I couldn’t breathe, certain she’d caught me in a fib I’d been living for so long it felt like a part of me.
But my lie was practically true, which must have made it taste true, because when she met my gaze again, hers was much less guarded. She was no longer threatened by me. “You’re a long way from home for a little girl with no Skill.”
“And you’re hiding out in your home behind your Skill,” I shot back, bolstered by my small, secret victory. I enjoyed the anger that settled into the thin lines of her forehead. What was she hiding from?
“I’m not hiding. I’m in mourning,” she insisted, but I didn’t have to be a Reader to see that there wasn’t a single note of truth in those words. “So, why I should do this favor for you?”
I hesitated, momentarily stumped. I’d expected a