The Wrap-Up
We returned to the Special Collections Library empty-handed. No book. No imposters. Just a four-hour drive’s worth of ways I could have played it differently. We didn’t win every time, but damn, these losses hurt.
We’d made one more call to Dru to let her know we were coming home. All she had said was, “Okay.”
The drive home, after we’d helped Jerome clean up and check for bruises, had been quiet, both of us lost in our own thoughts. Raven kept insisting I shouldn’t blame myself, that he was taking responsibility for the mission’s failure, but I couldn’t bring myself to agree or argue. I was too tired for either.
Jakin Crutchfield, the bad boy of the priesthood, brushed past us on the stairs on his way out of Dru’s domain. He gave me a nod. Sharp, unreadable. Then Raven, before heading down in full leather attire. Other priests wore black suits, black shirts, and black ties like Raven. Jakin preferred buckles and attitude.
“Hey, Jakin?” I called over my shoulder from the landing.
He paused without turning around, one hand tightening around the banister. “She’s in her office,” he said. Then, after a beat: “Might want to knock first.”
He didn’t wait for a reply. He didn’t ask how the mission went, either. His boots hit every step on the way down. He already knew.
Samantha and Sierra, the new assistant, were huddled over a nineteenth-century book on manifestation at the front counter in Gate 1 when we walked in an hour before closing time. They glanced up, and Samantha’s pencil stopped moving. We were supposed to be spending the night in Savannah, after all. We hadn’t even stopped for fast food sandwiches on the drive back.
“You’re back!” Samantha jerked her head up. With her pastel shirt and pinker-than-usual makeup, it took me a second to recognize her. I’d seen her in Goth attire for so long that this new version of her was still taking some getting used to. At least she wasn’t being a bad influence on our newest employee or researching vengeance spells again.
Technically, Sierra was off the clock, but hanging out in an occult library tended to blur the lines between work and obsession. Sierra was a college freshman and still had that fresh-off-the-farm sparkle in her eyes. Like every other woman I’d ever met, she beamed at Raven, then at me. “How was the romantic—”
Samantha elbowed her sharply, giving a pointed nod toward Charlie, who sat at the main desk near the entrance to the Gate 2 vault behind a non-descript door most people assumed was a janitor’s closet or stairwell. A new wedding photo—one with Rune draped over him in that ridiculously poofy white dress—gleamed in its silver frame. He didn’t move as we approached. Just lifted his gaze, watching us pass like he was waiting for a sentence he knew he deserved.
My empathic senses picked up the emotions rolling off him in waves: shame, frustration, and something more complicated. Jealousy, maybe? Though whether it was directed at Raven or me, I couldn’t tell.
The rest of Gate 1 was empty. No sorority girls looking for love spells. Not even Godfrey digging through potentially forged Christian gospels. And no Rune lurking outside the glass wall she was no longer allowed to breach.
She doesn’t need to be here. Her message came through loud and clear.
Across the room, Professor Drusilla Saint Augustine appeared in the doorway leading to the break room, extra storage, and a hallway to her office. She waved us in without ceremony. Her office adjoined the English Department, where she occasionally taught Medieval Literature seminars, and the mix of modern academia and ancient occult knowledge seemed to follow her everywhere she went.
I took a deep breath and followed Dru. Just before the door closed behind us, Raven’s hand settled briefly on my shoulder. It was a gesture that wasn’t lost on anyone. Especially not Charlie, whose energy spiked sharply at the casual contact.
I wished I could say I didn’t care. I wished I could say it didn’t sting to walk past him, to feel his eyes on me. But denial had never been my strong suit, at least not with myself. At least Charlie got the pleasure of feeling that sting, too.
At the hallway’s end, Dru closed another door behind us with a decisive click, then moved to her desk. From a drawer, she retrieved a tablet and turned it to face us. “Guess what turned up on the dark-market forums early this afternoon?” she said, tapping the screen to reveal a listing with blurry photos of the familiar wrapped package I’d seen clutched in Lovey’s arms at the bookstore.
My mouth fell open. “That’s—”
“Threshold Passages. Yes,” she confirmed, zooming in on one image where the embossed spine was just visible. “After your call, I was monitoring all the usual sites when it appeared on Rune’s preferred fence forum under a dummy account. She always uses the same dropphrase in her metadata. Sloppy move! Like signing your name with invisible ink and thinking no one would notice.” Dru’s fingers swiped to show a completed transaction. “There was quite the bidding war. I had to go to thirty-eight thousand in cryptocurrency—well above her reserve price—just to lock it down before the other three serious bidders could counter.” She glanced at the clock. “I pushed the crypto transfer this afternoon and paid another ten thousand to an intermediary to secure immediate pickup. The seller dropped it at a used bookstore tucked inside an antique market in Jacksonville.”
“So we can still get it back?” Raven asked.
Dru grinned. “Already have. Matrease is driving back from Jacksonville as we speak. Rather than bringing it to the library where Rune—or Charlie—might spot it coming in, she’ll deliver it directly to my home later tonight.” Dru showed us a text message exchange with Matrease confirming pickup. “It will be disguised in a hollowed-out atlas until I can personally secure it in Gate 6, and tomorrow, I’ll authenticate it and get it processed before Charlie comes in. He and Rune will never see it return.”
Raven moved closer, examining the listing details. “I’m sorry, Drusilla. We failed you.”
“No,” she said firmly. “This mission shouldn’t have gone the way it did. If anyone should apologize, it’s me. I should have anticipated this.”
I shook my head. “We should have been faster, more careful—”
“You were up against people who don’t care about priesthood codes or moral guidelines,” she said. “And you nearly stopped them. Maybe you would have if I’d been more careful with my instructions. Lilah, sometimes the fault lies in the blueprint, not the builders.”
Dru took the tablet from Raven and scrolled through several screens. She landed on a grainy photo of a blonde woman next to two men with dark brown hair. I recognized the woman and the man next to her instantly. The other man looked similar but had a fiercer nose.
“That’s Lovey.” I tapped the screen for emphasis, but it immediately enlarged under my touch, showing only her face.
“Correct.” Dru pinched the screen, and the size returned to normal. “Or Catherine Simmons, as she’s also known.”
Raven leaned forward to squint at the faces. “Marco and Rafe’s sister?”
“Rune’s half-sister. Younger by maybe two years. They married the Torrelli brothers, Rafe and Marco.”
I held my breath as I studied the face of the man who had died in the explosion at the Darbyshire Memorial Scholar’s Library in the heart of Dublin, where Raven had been the primary protector of the institution named after his parents. I’d never seen a photo of Marco, even in the news. Finally, the threads were beginning to show their design.
“But I thought Lovey was her sister-in-law.”
Dru shrugged. “Rune also told Charlie at one time that Marco was her brother and Lovey was his wife. And that Lovey was dead, and Marco was abusing her. I swear, every word out of her mouth is a lie to get what she wants.”
Raven zoomed in on the two men, then back to Lovey. “They keep changing their looks somewhat.”
“That’s because Rune is the brains behind their operation—always has been, even when Marco was alive—but Lovey gets sent to make the physical appearances when Rune won’t leave Charlie for long. Lovey may not look that much like her half-sister, but with the red hair, she can pass for Rune. I’ve been monitoring the surveillance you set up in Charlie and Rune’s house, and she had some very strong words for Lovey and Rafe.”
“Oh?”
“Yes, they were to play it safe but as you thought when we talked earlier, they got greedy. Rune isn’t in complete control of her, um, family. They had an hour’s lead on you. They could easily have departed Savannah without ever risking running into the two of you.” Dru frowned suddenly. “That is, if they even knew you would show up. I’m inclined to think that Rune failed to mention that the real Lilah and Raven were on their way. Otherwise, they might not have risked coming back. Stop blaming yourselves.”
Despite her absolution, the guilt didn’t lift. I’d let the feather and Charlie and my conflicted feelings for Raven do exactly what Rune wanted them to do — cloud my judgment right when I’d needed it clear.
“What about Rune?” I asked, trying to focus on the next steps rather than the missteps behind us.
“We’re getting closer to closing in on her network,” Dru said, leaning back in her chair.
“There’s more? Besides her family?”
“Maybe. She’s been building contacts for years. Charlie’s still useful as a conduit, but he’s being watched more closely now. The surveillance you two planted at his house hasn’t yielded much, but enough to know that Rune was on a burner phone for quite some time while Charlie was here tonight. She was both angry with her allies for venturing off script and gloating about their win.”
“So how did they know?” I asked, pacing the length of Dru’s office. “About the pickup, the password, our names? Small talk that convinced Jerome? All that?”
Dru sighed. “They had almost half a day to prepare and all night to get to Savannah. Rune learned the travel plans yesterday afternoon, and she got her hands on the itinerary sometime after that.” Her expression tightened. “Charlie didn’t know. He was never in the loop. The new girl handled the travel arrangements. I asked her to do it but was interrupted before I could warn her about privacy protocols prior to a mission.”
“And let me guess,” Raven said. “She mentioned it to someone.”
“Called it a ‘romantic getaway’ when she was talking to Samantha,” Dru confirmed. “Rune happened to be within earshot.”
“Of course she was,” I muttered.
“It’s my fault for not taking the time to explain to Sierra on her second day on the job. The original itinerary disappeared while Rune was hanging around the library with Charlie. Sierra simply reprinted it, thought nothing of it.” Dru rubbed her temples. “I’m certain Rune got her hands on the information through her presence here, and I’ve made it clear that won’t happen again. I still don’t know if I can trust Sierra, but I’m positive I can’t trust anyone under Rune’s influence.”
“It wasn’t Samantha,” I pointed out. “She hates Rune.”
“Agreed. I’ll find the mole within the week,” Dru promised.
I couldn’t stop picturing the feather, lying so perfectly on that hotel bed. That was Rune’s quiet sabotage — calculated, aimed squarely at undermining my confidence. Nothing petty about it.
And it had nearly worked. I may have stolen the batteries out of Rune’s TV remote and considered that petty but minorly satisfying revenge for stealing my would-be husband, but Rune had just taken things to the next level, getting a full step ahead of us to steal a book right out from under us and then flaunt it. We’d been completely unprepared.
“Raven,” Dru said suddenly, “would you mind waiting outside for a moment? I need a word alone with Lilah.”
He nodded, giving me a quick glance before slipping out the door. Through the frosted glass, I caught a glimpse of him standing guard with his arms crossed while Sierra approached him, no doubt asking how “romantic” Savannah had been.
I knew exactly why Dru had asked him to wait—so I wouldn’t have to walk past Charlie alone afterward. Charlie had despised Jakin, but Jakin had been the bad guy in my life while Charlie had pretended to be my hero. Raven, on the other hand, intimidated Charlie in a way that even Dru couldn’t manage, and we all knew it.
“Lilah,” Dru said once we were alone, her voice softer than her usual professorial tone. “I can see you shutting down. Guarding your heart. It’s okay to enjoy someone’s company.”
I laughed bitterly. “Yeah, you said that about Charlie.”
“Charlie was…” She hesitated. “A gift. You were broken after Jakin, after everything that happened. You needed grounding. So I arranged a few opportunities for the two of you to get to know each other better.”
“Is that what you’re doing now with Raven?” I asked, unable to keep the edge from my voice. “Trying to make sure I don’t run away or fall apart?”
There was a part of Dru that still saw herself as more than a mentor, something between a handler and a mother hen. She didn’t just advise; she worried. Sometimes too much.
This time, Dru shook her head slowly. “Raven isn’t Charlie. Or Jakin. Or—” She cut herself off. “You’re not the same woman you were at the end of any of those relationships.”
“I’m still broken,” I said quietly. My stomach growled loudly, filling the silence like an uninvited opinion on the matter.
“Okay, well, technically yes.” She smiled the way she always did when a plan came together—quietly, and with menace. “But you can be broken and still mend. You have been mending. Slowly. And Raven’s been a big part of that. Think of the progress you’ve made in the last year. Don’t let the cracks and sharp edges keep you from the happiness you could have with him. He doesn’t have to be the putty that holds you together, but he can help you put it in. I mean—” She blushed.
“That metaphor took an awkward turn at the end there, Professor,” I said, my tone deliberately light. “Might want to workshop it before the next pep talk.”
She rolled her eyes, but the tension had broken. “Go have dinner. With Raven. That’s an order.”
I walked out of Dru’s office to find Raven waiting exactly where I’d seen him last, Sierra and Samantha both mercifully gone. He fell into step beside me as we headed toward the exit, silent but present.
Charlie was still at his desk as we passed. This time, I didn’t even look at him, focusing instead on Raven, allowing myself a small, genuine smile.
“Hungry?” Raven asked within earshot of Charlie. “We could grab a late dinner at Lucrezia’s.”
My favorite bistro, where the pasta was perfect and the lighting just forgiving enough to make me believe in my own second chances. And open until midnight, every night.
“I’d like that,” I said, surprised by how much I meant it.
A part of me felt almost giddy at the prospect, but I refused to show it. Though I suspected my eyes gave me away. They always did.
I’d followed every line of the blueprint, right to the edge. Now it was time to redraw.
And maybe, I thought two minutes later as Raven held the main door of the library for me with his usual quiet courtesy, trust didn’t come easy. But it was starting to come anyway.
I hadn’t realized how much I’d been bracing — watching for the moment a man’s words turned into something else — until Raven. As we stepped out into the night air, I let the bracing go.
“The night was cold and black,” I whispered to the stars.
Raven finished it for me. “But the fire is in your eyes.”
THE END
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