Devil s Due Page 0,50

I know that you will get another red envelope tomorrow."

She said nothing to that. He might very well know it to be true.

"I also know that tomorrow, the Cross Society has arranged that someone close to you will die. Possibly you do not care that your new friend - her name is Jasmine, yes? - suffers an accident, but I know you well enough to know that you do care about your own survival. I have seen in the past how hard you will fight for it."

"How do you know what's going to happen tomorrow?"

He shrugged. "How does any of this become known? They tell me. Simms tells them, or they calculate it on their little machines. I don't know which it is and I don't want to know. The process is unimportant. What is important is that their information is rarely wrong."

"And they sent you to tell me this."

He didn't answer.

"They didn't send you. You came on your own." She felt something curdle in the pit of her stomach, "What's going on?"

"A very large game. A game of the world, and men trying to control it. Villains and heroes, but my love, which are you? Do you know?" He shook his head. "You stop a killer here, abet a killer there. It's no different than the game you hated before. Don't you see?"

"We stopped a child killer not long ago. We stopped a pair of potential mass murderers today. I wouldn't say we're not doing good."

"Yes, of course. There should be statues in the square in your honor. But you have no idea how small your victories are, or how many killers the Society decides not to stop, for its own purposes. Once you play God, how do you decide where to halt? Who to kill? Who to allow to live?" He gave another shrug, this one more heartfelt. "This is why I go where I am told, and where I am paid. It is easier than trying to be moral and upright." In his own way, Gregory Ivanovich was pouring out his heart. Lucia sat very still, listening, watching him, not quite believing the experience. His hand had, after all, been on plenty of triggers; he'd seen more than enough cruelty and blind stupidity in his life. He'd been lauded, and betrayed, often enough to be realistic and cynical about both.

He'd stood in the dark and hurt her for money, once upon a time. And then he'd cut her bonds and whispered in her ear, "Run for your life," and fired over her head...

"What are you trying to tell me?" she asked. Her voice, despite her best efforts, wouldn't stay steady.

"I have told you. Unless you take steps to prevent it, someone close to you will be killed tomorrow. And sooner or later, it will be your turn. You are a Lead, they tell you, and yes, there is importance to what you do, or do not do. But not only importance. Power. And power corrupts what it touches."

"I don't - "

"You and your partner, Jasmine. You become one of the key points on which events turn. And you can't be controlled. They are learning this. It is not a lesson they like."

The sick feeling in her stomach grew worse. "And if we can't be controlled..."

"This is about power. Power requires control." Gregory put his hands flat on the arms of his chair and settled down in it more comfortably. His eyes fell half-shut, and his smile - she remembered it. Remembered that rare expression of approval.

"The Cross Society wants us dead? But the Society put Jazz and me together in the first place! We never would have met if - "

"My beloved, you're not that stupid. They put you together for a reason. Now they want to take you apart for a reason. You're just tools to them. And given our similar histories, I'm surprised that you didn't consider that from the beginning."

She was silent, staring at him. Aware of a lot of things, suddenly - of the fever still burning inside of her, a heavy feeling in her lungs, the carefully hidden trail behind the FedEx that had delivered something deadly to her offices. It could have been Eidolon, trying to throw suspicion on the Cross Society. It could just as easily have been the Cross Society using a double-blind. They hadn't sent it through Borden. Maybe Borden was still too valuable to them. Maybe James Borden, with his heart lost to Jazz Callender,