that had loved her brother, admired him as a hero for his commitment to upholding the law. The part of her that had mourned him these past five months alongside her parents.
“How long, Harry? When did Opus get their hooks into you?”
He shrugged, approaching a couple more steps. “Does it matter?”
“It does to me. Were you already on their side when Reginald Crowe tried to detonate his bomb at the summit earlier this year?” He didn’t answer, which was answer enough. Devony scoffed. “What happened? How did they brainwash you?”
“Brainwash?” He chuckled. “I’m seeing clearly for the first time because of Opus. They want peace—true and lasting peace. But they know it won’t come to fruition without war. A big war, one that can reset the balance of power and put better minds in charge. Stronger minds.”
“You mean, like Reginald Crowe? Things didn’t work out so well for him, as I recall.”
Anger flared in her brother’s dark eyes. “Reginald Crowe was a brilliant man. All the members of Opus’s inner circle are the best minds this world has ever seen. I didn’t realize that until Crowe took me into his confidence. I was working a covert op, assigned to help break up a corrupt network of government officials on the take. Instead, I met Crowe and a few of his associates. They showed me what could be, what we could create together.”
Devony scoffed quietly. “And then the covert agent became the convert.”
He smiled, and this time it was genuine. “The summit was only the beginning. The Order got in the way of that. They killed Reginald Crowe, but we’ve gotten stronger since then. The Order won’t be in our way for long.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Opus can’t be stopped. We will not be stopped.”
“You’re crazy, Harrison. You’re out of your mind.”
“And you’re always so fucking self-righteous,” he hissed, the tips of his fangs glinting in the low light of the foyer. “You and our parents. Especially them, always preaching about higher purpose and duty. Trying to tell me about honor when my Opus brethren and I are doing the noblest work right under everyone’s noses.”
“Is that why you killed them that night at headquarters?” Her voice was wooden, her heart heavy with the understanding of what her brother must have done. “The reports after the bombing all speculated that it was an inside job. No one could’ve placed the explosives and executed their precision detonation without intimate knowledge of the building . . . and of who was likely to be there that night. It was you.”
He released a beleaguered sigh. “Why couldn’t you just stick to your music, Dovey? What the hell were you thinking, going after LaSalle? Or fucking that warrior from the Order?” He practically spat the words, his face contorting with barely restrained rage. “You’re an embarrassment to both of us. I’m so disappointed at what you’ve become.”
She arched a brow, fury igniting in her blood. “Right back at you, brother.”
“Opus wants you dead now,” he announced blandly. “I don’t want that. I knew you’d come running back home after they blew up the Boston Darkhaven. They’ve given me a chance to show you the way, Devony. I hope you’ll be smart enough to take it.”
“Smart enough to become one of Opus’s pawns, like you? That’s not smart, Harry. It’s weak. And that’s never going to be me.”
He laughed as if she were the crazy one. “Do you understand what I’m offering you?” He held up his hands the way he would show off precious treasures. “With our power, you and I working together, we could be unstoppable. We could run Opus together one day.”
Devony inched back on her bare feet as he began to approach once more. “You’re out of your mind, Harrison.” He was clearly, dangerously, insane. No longer the brother she grew up with, but a tool of Opus Nostrum. And their parents’ killer. “Our father was getting close to the truth, wasn’t he? I think sooner or later, he was going to figure out you were the enemy.”
Harrison smiled, lifted his bulky shoulder. “Probably. I wasn’t going to let that happen, you understand.”
“Of course not,” she said. “I think he knew that too. I think that’s why he left behind months of research for me to find. I think that’s also why he hid a photograph of you and Crowe and another man in the hopes that I would come across it after Dad was gone.”
“What photograph? What other man?”
“That’s what I