The chief bristled, his heavy jowls wobbling as his cheeks turned red. “I have the utmost faith in our people to make sure everything is secure when the president arrives. Hey, Hendricks, come on over here,” the chief called.
Across the room, a ruddy-faced man with a high forehead and a mop of honey-colored hair lifted his head. “I’ll be done in a second.”
“You’ll be done now,” the chief snapped forcefully enough to draw the attention of everyone in the room. He turned back to Jack and huffed in annoyance. “The Guard thinks that because the city council has given them free rein, they’ve got some standing, but they’re still just amateurs.”
“Hendricks, meet Mr. Jack Grew,” the chief said once the other man had come over. “He’s here to help prepare for the president’s visit at the gala. I was just assuring him that we have everything under control.”
Hendricks kept his hands tucked behind his back and his chin lifted. Up close, the man was younger than Jack had expected. He couldn’t have been more than twenty, but he had the kind of broad shoulders and lean, strong features that made Jack puff out his own chest a little more.
“Hendricks here is a colonel with the Guard,” the chief explained. “He can explain everything we have set up. I’ll leave Mr. Grew with you, Colonel?”
“Yes, sir,” the guy said, his expression never flickering.
“Right, then. You’ll be in good hands.” He gave Jack a rough pat on the arm before he walked off to find another of his officers.
“You have questions about our security measures?” Hendricks asked.
“This Guard . . . What is it?” Jack asked.
“The Jefferson Guard is tasked with protecting St. Louis from illegal magic,” Hendricks said, reciting the words as though from memory.
“What does that entail, exactly?” Jack asked, eyeing the man.
“We do what the normal police can’t.” The colonel’s eyes were emotionless when they met his. “We use a specific set of skills and tools to hunt Mageus who refuse to assimilate themselves as productive members of society.”
Even with the haze of morphine dulling the brightness and noise around him, Jack felt his attention peak. “Really? You hunt Mageus?”
Hendricks nodded. “We show them back to the gutters and the prisons where they belong. We eliminate the danger they pose to proper society.”
“Excellent,” Jack said, reaching for the vial of morphine cubes. “Absolutely outstanding.”
DELMONICO’S
1902—New York
The boning of the new corset was digging into the soft flesh of Viola’s hip, but there wasn’t a thing she could do to adjust it, not so long as her brother’s scagnozzo had her by the arm. And also not so long as she was supposed to be playing the part of a lady. It had been four days since Viola had accepted her brother’s beating as the cost of using his protection. In four days, the split in her lip had healed itself enough for her to be presentable in public. In those four days, she’d bided her time and done everything her brother had asked of her, no matter how insulting. She’d played the part of the dutiful, penitent sister, but she’d kept her eyes and ears opened and she’d started to plan.
The maître d’ was checking over his ledger, searching for their reservation. Occasionally, he’d glance up at Viola and her escort with a questioning look, as though he knew that neither of them belonged. The longer they stood there, the more Viola felt the eyes of other people on them. She wished the stuffed-shirt fool would hurry up. She was more than ready to have a table between her and her escort for the night. Already he’d been too free with his eyes . . . and his hands.
Paul didn’t fool her one bit, arranging all of this just so she could dispose of one stupid journalist for an important friend. There were a hundred ways to kill a man, maybe more, and not one of them required a fancy dress, with her tette pushed up to her chin and her breath pressed out of her lungs. Nor did they require her to have dinner at a fancy restaurant with John Torrio, the man all the Five Pointers called the Fox. No, her brother had set this up because he didn’t trust her yet. Torrio, or John, as he’d introduced himself, was nothing more than a nursemaid—though she doubted he’d appreciate being thought of as such. He was only there to keep an eye on her and to make sure she did what Paul had asked of her.
So what if a lady needed an escort to dine at a restaurant like Delmonico’s? Killing a man in the middle of a crowded restaurant was a fool’s errand. She could have killed him in the streets just as easily.
But Paul didn’t want this Reynolds killed easily. Her brother was making a point. With so many witnesses, Viola would be forced to use her affinity—and in doing so, she would have to break the vow she had made to herself years ago. As long as she could get a clear view of this man, it would be easy enough to make it look like he’d died naturally, and with no obvious attack, it would be impossible for anyone to see the man’s death as anything but a tragic misfortune. In the blink of an eye, Paul’s friend would be rid of his little problem and Viola’s soul would bear another black mark that could never be erased.
Even so, the act didn’t require a fancy restaurant. Viola knew exactly what Paul was up to. It was no accident that he’d sent Torrio with her—her brother was matchmaking. His plan to marry her off had been the last straw to drive her away before. Now that she was back in the bosom of the family’s control, he was testing her. The old goat he’d tried to tie her to the last time was probably dead by now, so it only made sense for Paul to try shackling her to the man he was grooming to be his second—all the better to keep them both under his control.
Out of the corner of her eye, Viola studied Torrio as they were shown to their table. He wasn’t bad looking—a tall, striking boy from just outside Napoli with dark eyes and dark hair combed straight back from his face. He didn’t have the characteristic crook in his nose that most who ran in the gangs wore as a badge of honor, but even dressed in a fancy dinner jacket, he didn’t have Paul’s polish. Torrio still looked like the streets.
And like all men, he walked through the world as though what he had in his pants was enough to make him a king. But then, she thought, watching Torrio snap out orders to the waitstaff, who all jumped to meet his demands, maybe it is.
Dinner was interminable. Viola tried to keep her mouth drawn into what she hoped was more smile than snarl as her escort droned on about all his accomplishments, but the task wore on her. He didn’t stop his bragging to eat the first two courses. Instead he talked around the food in his mouth. When the steaks came, huge slices of meat that were dressed with herbed butter and creamed spinach, Torrio finally—thankfully—shut up.
Better he focus on his steak than continue to imagine that he had a chance with her. Men never took that news well, and she couldn’t afford to maim or kill the guy when she was trying to convince Paul she could be trusted. He and Nibsy were planning something, and gaining Paul’s trust was the first step in finding out what it was.
Viola shifted in her seat as she picked at her bloody steak and the gelatinous oysters, hating the entire situation she’d found herself in. The food was too rich for her, right along with everything else in the restaurant. Her whole life, she’d stuck close to what she knew—first her mother’s kitchen and then the Strega, where she worked behind the bar, serving people of her own class and station. She had never really gone much farther than the streets of the Bowery, even when she left her family. But all around her, the dining room was filled with brilliantly white linen and gleaming crystal, candlelight and brightly polished silver. Delmonico’s, with its gilded opulence, was evidence of how big the divide was between what she was and what the rest of the world held.