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I take her straight instead, pushing open a panel to reveal….

“The solarium,” she whispers, a smile lighting up her face.

It’s a glass room full of weeds and dirt, so personally, I don’t see the appeal. Or I didn’t. Not until she came in here and started growing things, making it green and lush. There are new plants popping up from each planter and urn, and the old, wiry vines are almost gone from the stone floor. Up above, the recent rain has washed the ancient panes of glass, amplifying the late May sun, brightening every corner.

Pace would never admit it, but I found him down here a couple of times while she was locked away, standing in the middle of it all with a drawn, broody expression.

“Oh,” she gasps, darting to a pot by the door. “My begonias are blooming!”

Basically, over her time in West End and down in the dungeon, the solarium has exploded with color. Flowers and ornamentals are springing up all over the place. “That’s not all that’s bloomed,” I say, cramming my fists into my pockets. At her confused glance, I nod toward a planter in the back, watching as she shuffles her way across the distance.

She freezes when she sees it, a hand coming up to cover her mouth. “Oh my god, Wicker.”

I smirk, having seen the flowers bloom four days ago. When I got the seeds, I didn’t know what color they’d turn out to be. Annoyingly, they’re a creamy white, a lot like the roses around here. “Surprised?”

“You gave me dahlia seeds?” She spins to fix me with a disbelieving stare. “Ashby is going to flip.”

Seeing the alarm in her eyes, I wave a hand. “I doubt he’ll even notice, but don’t worry. He’ll know it was me.” I slide up to sit on the low stone wall behind them, pulling her between my legs. “I’m the only one with the balls to bring the Barons’ flower into his precious garden.”

She sighs, winding her arms around my waist. “They’re beautiful.”

Pressing my nose into her hair, I pull in her scent. “Better than roses?” When she doesn’t answer, I duck my head down to look at her face, realizing her eyes are fixed elsewhere. Following her gaze, my face hardens. “Better than those, at least.”

She’s staring at the big bed of nettles in the corner, her jaw going taut. “I should cut them down.”

“It doesn’t matter.” I don’t tell her that in four days, nothing about this place will matter.

We’ll all be gone.

Sparing the dahlias a glance, I don’t let myself feel any sort of way about it. It was a joke to grow them here. A way to get a jab in with Father. A taste of irony, knowing that Clive Kayes’ favorite flower is growing in this cursed place, just like I did.

One day, these flowers will wilt and die.

But the five of us won’t.

* * *

Lex still looks like shit.

I watch him as he hands over a folder, the tremor in his hand obvious before I take it. “You good?” Most likely, he can barely hear me over the music blaring from Pace’s speakers, but the three of us are leaning in close.

He shakes his hand out, scowling at his wrist. “I’m fine. So we’re solid on the embezzlement, but we need more for the wire fraud.”

Pace’s knee is bouncing, jaw tense as he surveys what Lex has obtained over the afternoon. “They had enough for my conviction,” he mutters.

“That’s the problem,” Lex says, palming his clammy forehead. “A lot of it leads back to you, so we can’t use it. Just like Wick and the solicitation, or me and the maiming. There’s no proof he made us.”

Nodding, I muse, “We need to keep it to direct involvement. The stuff he hides from us.” There’s plenty that happens behind closed doors in this palace—shit that even we’re not privy to.

“That’s going to be the best leverage,” Lex agrees, looking between us. He hasn’t bothered to put his hair up today, and it keeps falling into his eyes.

I watch as he rakes it back, offering, “I can get into his office.”

Pace groans, flopping back onto his couch. “We’ll have to save that for last. No way to obscure any surveillance trickery for more than a day or so.”

Lex takes this in, brow creased. “Okay. Morning of?”

With that super risky plan, we start gathering up all the folders, documents, and memory cards we’ve been collecting. It’s late, and I can tell that we’re all run ragged, even more than usual. Lex has been at it all day, and Pace hasn’t had more than fleeting moments of respite since we decided to enact a plan to leave.