notice one extra splash of liquid on his clothes. I lowered my hand, palming the broken ampule, and Ramirez didn’t notice a thing.
Why would he?
He was a friend. He trusted me.
I felt sick.
“Are you sure you can pull that off on another wizard, Dresden?” Lara asked, her voice intent.
“No reason it shouldn’t work,” I said. “And if I do it to anyone but another wizard, I’m definitely crossing the line, just like that stupid bastard with the violin.”
“If you’re caught—”
“If any of us are caught, we’re all screwed,” I said. “No risk, no reward.”
“Point,” Lara said. “What next?”
“Next is plausibly getting you both out of the reception,” Murphy said.
“What do we use to do that?” Lara asked.
Murphy smiled grimly. “Expectations.”
We passed by Childs and his security dog again, to reenter the great hall. Once more, the room had been arranged by camps, borders subtly marked by style of furniture and swaths of overhead silk, giving the whole place a bit of a circus atmosphere, with a single difference—in the exact center of the room, at the focus of all the camps, a small circular speaking stage had been erected.
Music was playing, violins again. Evidently Marcone had managed to replace the offending Sidhe fiddler from the night before. Or maybe the guy lived. I had the same emotions either way.
Speaking of which, the man himself was present tonight, sitting and speaking with Etri on a deep green and dark carved-redwood old-world leather sofa, stuffed thick with cushioning, with gold studs as upholstery pins. Baron Marcone was a handsome man of middle years dressed in an immaculate grey business suit. Perhaps slightly taller than average, he had barely changed in all the years I’d known him. The few marks of age that had come upon him only made him look more reserved, severe, and dangerous.
He was flanked by Sigrun Gard and Hendricks, like always. Gard was a woman who was tall enough to play basketball and built like a powerlifter, visibly girded with muscle. She wore a suit that was every bit as nice as Marcone’s, and her golden blond hair was held back in a tight, complicated, neat braid that left nothing much to grab onto. The lines of the suit were marred by the axe she wore strapped to her back, but it didn’t look like the fashion police were going to have the courage to give her a hard time about it.
Hendricks, who stood at the other end of the couch, was a ginger Mack truck wearing a suit. He had a heavy brow ridge and had grown out a short beard that had come out several shades darker than his hair, and he had hands like shovels. His suit had been custom-made, but not to fit him—it was spending all its time trying not to show off the weapons he was doubtless carrying underneath it.
Marcone glanced up as the White Council’s delegation entered together, and he looked at me for a moment, his expression neutral. The last time I’d taken a big case, I’d done considerable damage to his vault’s exterior, if not much to the contents inside, and one of his people had been killed by the lunatics I’d been working with. I’d paid the weregild for the man’s death—but appeasing someone and being at peace with them were two very different things.
I returned the look with as much of a poker face as I could, and we both looked elsewhere at the same moment, as if we’d planned it. I clenched my jaw. Jerk. I couldn’t think of a time when I hadn’t wanted to punch the guy right in his strong-jawed mouth.
I briefly toyed with the image of Marcone, with several missing teeth, reclining in a dentist’s chair for repair work while Gard and Hendricks menaced the poor DDS with their glowers, and it made me smile. There. Who says I can’t put on a proper party face? I knew the outfit had doctors. Did they also have dentists?
If any underworld boss in the world had a dental plan for his employees, it would be Marcone.
Which reminded me, I should probably be looking into a checkup for Maggie before she went to her new school in the fall, and—No, wait. Focus, Dresden. Survive the evening now; plan Maggie’s dental appointments later.
So I plunged into the party. I exchanged brief words with River Shoulders as he spoke to Evanna. Across from Winter’s blue and purple silks were Summer’s golden and green colors, and I stepped up