Page 29

We make good time to the club, but Artemis stops dead when we step onto the sidewalk. I almost bump into her, and Reese into me, but we both manage to avoid the collision.

“What is it?” he asks.

I spot it a second before she says, “There’s no line.”

The front of the club isn’t empty —there’s just no one stopping people from entering.

She throws her shoulders back and heads for the front door. We join the masses slipping in, and I try to keep track of both her in front of me and Reese at my side.

What’s normally a relaxed-but-energized crowd is… not .

“Come on,” she calls over her shoulder. “I need to find Antonio.”

I reach out and grab the back of her shirt, covering the handgun stuffed in her leggings. No need to freak out her patrons, right? Although from the look of it, no one is paying a cover. Definitely not the people who’ve followed us inside and are dispersing.

She immediately turns for the stairs that lead to the rooftop restaurant.

Reese and I are at her heels. She bursts through the door, then cuts across the empty space and into the kitchen.

It seems like they all left suddenly—the normally spotless kitchen has remnants of food, utensils, and pots and pans spread out.

The dishwashing rack is full of dirty plates.

It may as well be a ghost town.

“What the hell is going on?” Tem murmurs.

She steadies herself on one of the counters. I eye her. Her face is pale, almost green-hued. She wipes her brow with the back of her hand, but doesn’t say anything about it.

I trade a look with Reese. He’s more looking around than at Artemis.

I don’t know what happened—but I do know it’s probably not good.

Tem’s people are loyal. They wouldn’t leave unless they had to.

“Antonio!” Artemis suddenly calls.

Her volume makes me flinch. She rushes down the hallway and stops at his office.

The door is open, the desk wiped clean. Literally—there’s nothing on it.

“He had a computer,” Reese mumbles behind me.

Artemis whirls around. “How do you know?”

“I was here… an hour ago? Maybe two. I sat in that chair.” He points to the one across from Antonio’s. “We had a conversation and then I left. When he called me back, I figured it was in regard to… that.”

I narrow my eyes.

Artemis seems to be of a similar mind, because she crosses her arms. “What was the conversation?”

His expression blanks out. “Don’t ask me that.”

“Why not?”

“Leave it, Tem.” I pull her from the office and close the door. “Check yours.”

When she twists the knob, the door swings open under her hand. Not locked. And similarly cleaned out.

“We just replaced my computer and his.” Her voice is tight. “The sheriff failed to return what he seized.”

From the warrant…

“Nadine wasn’t much help,” she adds. “I went to her office to try and get some answers, and she was pretty vague. The warrant itself was for our hard drives, but there wasn’t a clear answer why that would be related to one of my brother’s informants. Or his murder.”

“When did you see her?”

“Before…” She gestures vaguely at her collarbone.

The tattoo.

Ah.

“Oh!” She perks up. “I did take photos of her recent emails. And the deleted ones. I don’t have my phone on me, but we can check it later.”

Reese looks like he’s going to say something. He opens and closes his mouth and finally shakes his head. “Never mind.”

“That doesn’t help us find Antonio now,” I point out.

She frowns. “Maybe he’s trying to find someone in the club. We should search it.”

Unease snakes through me. “There’s no one manning the doors, Tem?—”

“I know that.” She flicks her hair over her shoulder. There’s a tightness to her that I didn’t see before, but it seems like she’s stiffer than ever. “But he wouldn’t leave. And he said something about the Cyclopes? In Bow & Arrow?”

“He said something strange was happening in North Falls on our voicemail,” I say.

“And yes, he mentioned Cyclopes to me,” Reese adds.

She pinches the bridge of her nose.

“You okay?” I stare at her.

I mean… we just had a moment. A long moment. To go from that to this, rather abruptly, has got to be unsettling.

“I just have a headache. It’s fine.” She glares at me. “Help me find Antonio.”

Reese sighs. “We will.”

“If we had cameras…” She casts another glance at Antonio’s office, then grimaces. “No, it’s fine. We can find him the old-fashioned way, right?”

“Right,” we echo.

We go out into the club, and she yells over the music, “I’ll take this level!”

Then she’s gone, worming through bodies and disappearing from sight.

What the fuck?

“Keep an eye on her,” I bark at Reese.

Then I continue down the stairs and into the mob on the dance floor.