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That sound echoed through her bones.

“Gen!” she gasped, trying to stay quiet in her panic.

“I’m on it!” Nate said through the line.

There was nothing she could do about Gen, and she couldn’t jeopardize the entire mission. Still…she wanted to.

“What do you want to do?” Lyra said, fear in her face for the first time. This had all just become very real.

Kierse bit her lip. “There’s nothing we can do. We have to move forward. Four-and-a-half minutes are on the clock.”

Walter said, “Schwartz, fire at will.”

There was no answer from Schwartz on the line as he was too far from the Plaza to be online with the rest of the team. He was only directly connected to Walter, their eyes in the sky.

Kierse and Lyra glanced at each other as if any moment they would be able to feel Schwartz blowing up the Curator’s compound.

Walter was the one who had found the location in the midst of all the coded details Laz had stolen at the auction.

None of them had known what they were looking at until Schwartz had done recon to discover a residential front for some sort of warehouse drug operation.

Schwartz had made sure the building was clear of people, and then he’d detonated enough explosives to cause the diversion they needed.

It was far enough away that the explosion would only be known to those associated with him. Which meant if they were still following the protocol Schwartz had been given when he worked their security…

She tensed, waiting to hear footsteps pounding on the ground outside of the bathroom. But there was nothing.

“What’s happening?” Lyra asked.

She didn’t know. They couldn’t see what was happening on the other side. There were no windows in the tiny bathroom.

“Walter?” Kierse asked.

He was silent a moment before saying, “They’re not moving. I’m checking in with Schwartz and trying to hack their system to see if I can get them out of there.”

“Fuck,” Lyra muttered. “How long will that take?”

Walter didn’t answer. Lyra shot her a confused look. Time was ticking away. They couldn’t wait.

“Fuck it,” Kierse grumbled.

She shucked her clothes back off and changed hastily into her pretty party dress and heels.

“What are you doing?” Lyra asked.

“Someone has to make them leave,” Kierse argued.

“So it should be me ,” Lyra said.

“You’re the better actress, but you have another job.”

“This isn’t to script!”

“We’re not in a play,” Kierse countered.

Graves’s sigh was audible. “She never follows the plan.”

Kierse shot Lyra a cheeky grin and turned around so the mask could be retied. “See. He knows me.”

“Don’t die,” Lyra said as she cinched the ribbon.

“Walter?” Kierse asked.

“Security footage loop running in your section,” Walter informed them. “Go.”

Kierse pushed the bathroom door open and sauntered down the hallway.

Both men tensed at the sight of her. They were both human.

One of the problems the Curator hadn’t considered when he’d fired his band of monster mercenaries was that human men were incredibly vulnerable in this world.

They might have weapons, but none of them were prepared for monsters.

“Ma’am, the party is the other direction,” the first man said.

She executed a drunken stumble. “I thought it was this way.”

“No,” the second guy said. He pointed the other direction. “Back the way you came.”

“Oh, sorry.” She might not be as good of an actress as Lyra, but she’d nearly reached them, and that was all that mattered.

“Ma’am,” the second guy tried again.

Kierse let her Fae reflexes take over as she launched herself at the first guy.

She jabbed her hand into his throat, and as he was gasping for air, she brought her knee up between his legs.

He doubled over in pain. While he put his hand on his jewels, she retrieved his gun and slammed it down onto the top of his head.

The poor guy dropped like a sack of potatoes, unconscious.

She whirled to face the second man, who was still fumbling to react and draw his weapon, and trained the gun on his head. He raised both of his hands in horror. She ripped the earpiece out of his ear.

“What are you?” the guy asked with wide eyes.

“A goddess,” she said with a grin.

Then she stepped into the man’s guard and brought the gun down against his temple. He collapsed next to his colleague.

“We’re good, Lyra.”

The girl dashed out, and together they hauled the unconscious men into the bathroom. Kierse quickly frisked them, using their own handcuffs to tie them to the grab bar affixed to the wall in the accessible stall and removing their communication devices and weapons.

“Excellent work,” Lyra said with appreciation.

Kierse curtsied.

“Get moving. You have two-and-a-half minutes,” Walter said.

Kierse and Lyra hurried out of the bathroom.

Nearby was a loading entrance into the kitchen’s walk-in cold storage.

Laz had placed wards on those locks as well so only the team could go in and out of them.

Lyra disappeared inside and came back with the second cake box, Cake & Cake in a pretty blue font on the lid.

“Shall we deliver our cake?” Lyra asked.

“We shall.”

Lyra opened it to reveal the cauldron decoy box.

Kierse felt the gentle hum of magic as she took it out of the cake box.

It had been her idea to load an amulet with an absurd amount of magic and insert it into the center.

Since she’d known immediately that it wasn’t the real cauldron just by touching it, their decoy would be much more deceptive if it gave off at least somewhat of a magical aura, instead of being completely empty.

Lyra took the empty cake box and hustled back to the bathroom where she’d also change back into her ballgown and be lookout, or a diversion if necessary.

Kierse could see the Curator’s magic all over the door—the wards with the crossed blades at the center and a strong scent of pine and lemon.

He really didn’t want anyone in this room.

It must be draining to hold up wards like this.

Kierse reached out and put her hand on it.

Her absorption moved through it with ease, just like normal. Good.

She twisted the handle and found it locked.

Well, at least that was predictable. She picked the cheap, hotel-grade lock with ease.

She glanced back once before pushing the door open and stepping inside, tensing for an alarm.

They’d tripped an alarm last heist, and Kierse had been certain to check the plans this time.

But nothing went off. The only indication something was wrong were the red emergency lights illuminating the small space.

At the center of the otherwise empty room sat a box the exact size and shape as the one she was holding. And inside was the cauldron.

Kierse could sense the magic within before she even put her hand on the box. She mirrored the energy between the two boxes and decided it was close enough. There was no way for her to reopen it to feed it more magic, anyway.

She set the decoy on the floor and reverently reached out for the real thing.

She breathed a sigh of relief when the magic didn’t change when she touched it.

Considering what the sword and spear did upon contact, she wasn’t certain that it wouldn’t try to talk to her through the metal.

The spear didn’t, but she didn’t know if “didn’t” and “couldn’t” were the same thing.

With the real cauldron in her possession, she put her decoy back on the pedestal. A light flickered to life.

“There’s a light. I think it’s a weight sensor. Walter?”

He was silent at the word. “I don’t have an alarm on my end.”

Which was good. That meant that the Curator couldn’t see it on his end, either. She hoped.

“How much time do we have?” she asked, staying calm in the face of this new problem. If someone walked in here and saw the light, they’d know. Or as soon as the manual system rebooted, it would let them know. She had to fix it now.

“Down to a minute,” Walter added.

If the decoy didn’t work, they might get caught walking out of the hotel. The whole place could go on lockdown. Everyone would be compromised. How quickly could the rest get out of here before that happened?

No one spoke. Protocol dictated what to do in case anything went wrong. Remove earpieces. Destroy them, discard them, get out. All she had to do was make the call.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Kierse tested the two boxes in her hand. They were identical in every way, except the cauldron was in one. She didn’t think it was even a noticeable difference in weight. She dropped the decoy box back on the pedestal and ripped a pin out of her hair. She set it on the sensor and held her breath.

The light flicked off.

She breathed out. “Fucking hell.”

The last thing she wanted was to leave her hairpin behind. But it was that or immediately be discovered when the system came back online. Leave one clue, or lose everything.

The decision was made.

Walter began to countdown in her ear. “Fifteen seconds.”

She turned and fled.

“Ten seconds.”

She reached the door.

“Five seconds.”

Kierse pushed it open.

“Four. Three.”

She twisted the lock from inside.

“Two.”

The door closed behind her, and the hum of the security system came back online inside the room.

“One.”

“It’s done.”

Kierse rushed down the hallway and burst into the bathroom, expecting to find Lyra. Except there was no Lyra, only the two guards groaning faintly as they started to come to. She should have come back in here when the countdown began to prep for her next part.

“Lyra?”

“She’s holding up more guards who came to investigate when the others stopped communicating,” Walter said over comms.

“Fuck.”

“Laz is almost in position.”

Kierse fled the bathroom with the box in hand, pushing through an employee door that led to an empty hallway. She could see a back entrance to the kitchens and a bellhop walking toward her, holding a designer hat box.

“Laz,” she said with a sigh.

He opened the designer box, and Kierse set the cauldron inside. They covered it with fancy fabric, dropped the lid back on top, and Laz nodded.

“Luggage secured.”

Kierse nodded. “See you on the other side.”

“I’m on my way now,” Graves said.

They’d gotten away with it. She’d stolen the cauldron right out from underneath the Curator’s nose.

Laz would take the box to a full luggage cart and carry it out to Graves’s awaiting limo, where George would play getaway car.

She and Lyra would exit through the back door with the rest of the performers.

Already the rest of the crew were reporting in that they’d gotten out of the building.

Kierse took a deep breath and stepped out into the hallway.

“Kierse,” a voice said behind her.

She turned in surprise. For a second, she didn’t recognize the man. Then it hit her—this was the person who had known her name at Sansara. The one she couldn’t find in her memories.

“Sorry, I’m not…”

A cloth was put over her nose and mouth from behind. She struggled for a minute before her head went fuzzy, her limbs limp. She stared up into the eyes of one of her attackers, wondering how she knew him and once again coming up blank.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “The Curator has been waiting for you.”