me when I settled down next to him. A minute later, Betty and Stacy walked into the living room. Stacy seemed surprised for a moment at the sight of me and Tobias together, then shrugged and sat down on the other side of me.
"All right," Cain said once everyone was settled. "Here's the plan. Davina's gonna be weakened for a while, but I say she makes a move tomorrow night, Friday at the latest. She's angry, she's desperate, and she's running out of cards to play, so the play's gonna get dirty."
I tensed up. "The play hasn't been dirty?"
Cain looked at me, but didn't answer. "She's strong at night, so during the day, we won't find her if she doesn't want to be found. The only way to end this thing is to draw her out when she's feeling secure." Cain looked at me. "That means, at night."
My heart clutched in my chest. "But I don't have any power at night."
"Do what I tell you, you won't need it. She needs to come after you when she thinks you're weak. That's at night. We send you out on your own to someplace, she follows you, tries to make her move and then..." He looked grimly around the group. "Then you let me take care of it."
I felt a chill at the coldness in his voice. "What do you mean, take care of it?"
He met my eye. "That's my concern. Your job is getting her to me."
"So you can do what?"
Cain stayed quiet, and Stacy said, "You're going to kill her." Cain turned his icy look on Stacy and she held it for a moment, then looked at me. "Yeah, he's definitely going to kill her."
"You can't," I said automatically. "No."
Cain looked at me, annoyed. "She'd break your neck without a second thought if it'd get her what she wanted. What are you protecting her for?"
"I'm not protecting her. But I'm not a killer, either."
"You don't have to be," he said. "This is my thing, and I'm gonna get her with or without you. Be easier with you, but either way, that woman is getting put down."
The hardness in his eyes scared me. Cain had never been exactly fluffy, but all the rage simmering underneath was coming to the surface now, and I felt like things were getting quickly out of control. I looked at Betty.
"Is it just me who thinks talking about killing people is insane?"
Betty took in a deep breath and shook her head carefully. "It's not just you."
Stacy shrugged. "I say the bitch started it, but then, I wanna kill someone at least twice a day, so..."
Betty looked at Cain. "I know Holly was important to you, and I'm sorry about what happened, but isn't there a way to protect Liv without killing anyone?"
Cain's cold eyes met hers. "No."
"I don't believe that," I said. "If she could steal Holly's magic, maybe we can just ... I don't know. Steal it back. Then she'd be relatively harmless."
"She'd still be a conjurer, and a damn powerful one at that," Cain said. "Soon as she healed up, she'd be back for you. You wanna spend the rest of your life with her on your tail?"
"No, but - "
Cain slammed his hand down on the coffee table, sending a sharp report throughout the room.
"She killed Holly!" His voice was full of rage and heartbreak, and while he pulled the emotion back in quickly, it was clear what his dog in this fight was, and it had nothing to do with protecting me. The room went quiet, and I had no idea what to say, but Tobias did.
"Have you ever killed anyone, Cain?"
"No," Cain said, a sharp bite in his tone as he turned angry eyes on Tobias. "You?"
"Yes," Tobias said, and the room went silent.
Chapter 17
I felt the breath cut out of me as I watched Tobias, but his eyes were fixed on Cain, who stared back at him.
"You don't come back from it," Tobias said. "Circumstances change, and sometimes, killing someone is even justified, but once you've taken a life, it changes who you are. It doesn't matter why you did it; you'll never be the same person again."
There was a moment of tense silence. Tobias walked over to Cain, stopping next to him by the fireplace. Betty, Stacy, and I stayed quiet, just watching.
"Look, if the only way to protect Liv is to kill Davina, I'll do it. I don't have as much to lose as you do. But