Page 145 of Villains Series

THE DAY BEFORE

EON

STELL stood before the bay of screens, arms crossed, watching it all fall apart. Radio chatter crackled from the speaker on the desk.

“No sign of target.”

“Soldiers down.”

“Seal the perimeter.”

What a goddamned catastrophe, thought Stell, sinking down into his chair.

Eli’s trap had succeeded, but his own agents had failed. Three of them were dead—two bleeding from their ears and noses on a sublevel, one knifed in the throat on the first floor—the rest had been fucking useless.

Whether Victor had seen past the bait to the hook, or simply wriggled free, one thing was clear—he hadn’t done it alone.

Several of Stell’s agents had been shot at by a male orderly, a receptionist, and a female doctor—but Stell had a feeling they were all the same person. One of his men had shot back, caught the doctor in the shoulder. At that same moment, halfway across the hospital, a doctor matching her exact description had collapsed, bleeding, in the middle of scrubbing in for surgery.

The shapeshifter—Marcella’s shapeshifter—had been there.

And she’d helped Victor escape.

Stell took up his phone and dialed.

“Joseph,”

said that smooth voice.

“Where is Victor Vale?”

demanded Stell through gritted teeth.

“You were cheating.”

“This isn’t a game. You agreed to deliver him. Instead, you are the reason he’s still free. When do you intend to uphold your end of the deal?”

Marcella sighed.

“Men are always so impatient. Perhaps it comes from a lifetime of being given what you want, when you want it. Sometimes, Joseph, you just have to wait.”

“When?”

“Tomorrow,”

said Marcella.

“Before the party.”

Stell’s chest tightened.

“What party?”

“Didn’t you get my invitation?”

A stack of mail sat forgotten on the edge of Stell’s desk. He began rifling through it.

“I considered holding on to him until after…”

Stell found the card, crisp and white, with a gold M embossed on the front. It was unstamped. Someone had delivered it by hand. Stell broke the seal.

“It would certainly keep you out of my way,”

Marcella was saying.

“but then again, I wouldn’t want you to miss the show…”

Marcella Morgan and her associates …

Stell read the invitation once, and then again—he couldn’t believe what he was looking at. He didn’t want to believe it.

… Merit’s most extraordinary venture.

“This is the opposite of lying low,”

he growled.

“What can I say? I’ve never been understated.”

“We had a deal.”

“We did,”

said Marcella.

“For two weeks. Beyond that, we both knew it wouldn’t last. But I have appreciated the ceasefire. It gave me time to print my invitations.”

“Marcella—”

But she’d already hung up.

Stell swept a mug from his table. It shattered, dark drops of coffee painting the floor.

In seconds, Rios was there.

“Sir?”

she asked, surveying the broken cup, the papers displaced in his search for the card, the crisp white invitation crumpled in his hand.

Stell slumped back in his chair, Eli’s voice playing in his head.

You made a deal?

Someone this powerful belongs in the ground.

Send me.

Stell’s gaze went to the slim silver briefcase the board had given him, the collar nested inside.

Agent Rios was still standing there, silent, waiting.

Stell rose to his feet.

“Prepare a transport team for tomorrow.”

Rios raised a brow.

“For which prisoner?”

“Cardale.”

* * *

STELL found Eli sitting on the edge of his cot, fingers laced and head bowed, as if he were praying.

Or simply waiting.

At the sound of Stell’s approach, his head drifted up.

“Director. Has my trap yielded any results?”

Stell hesitated. “Not yet,”

he lied. There was no reason for Eli to know about Vale’s escape, and a dozen reasons to keep him in the dark. Especially considering what he was about to do.

“Have you been considering the problem of Marcella?”

Eli rose.

“My assessment hasn’t changed.”

“I’m not asking for your sentence,”

said Stell.

“I’m asking for your method. How would you dispatch her?”

“How would I?”

“You do still believe you are the best equipped for the task.”

A ghost of a smile. “I do.”

“Let me be very clear,”

said Stell.

“I don’t trust you.”

“You don’t have to,” said Eli.

Stell shook his head. What was he thinking.

“We still don’t know if you can even defeat Marcella.”

Eli smiled grimly.

“Haverty spent a year trying to find the limits of my regeneration. He never succeeded.”

“Her power isn’t the only problem,”

said Stell.

“After all, Marcella is not acting alone.”

“Neither am I,”

pressed Eli, gesturing at the cell, at EON.

“The hard part isn’t killing three EOs, Director. It’s collecting them in one place, and then separating them so they can’t work together. Do that, and your agents can take care of the other two EOs while I see to Marcella. I assure you, under the right conditions, defeating them is more than possible.”

Conditions.

Stell slid Marcella’s invitation through the fiberglass slot.

“Will this work?”

Eli took the card, his eyes dancing across the words.

“Yes,”

he said.

“I think it will.”