Same anonymous “friend” who’d been creepy enough to send it.
I looked back in the envelope, wondering what “this” was, and my blood turned cold.
I pulled out a pendant on a leather thong. And it took only a moment for realization to strike. This was Blake’s necklace—the one he’d worn at my door and the Grove.
Nausea rose, and I squeezed my eyes closed against the wave of it. Someone had killed for me. I dropped the pendant back into the envelope.
“What is it, Lis?” Connor must have felt my fear and magic from across the room, as he left his post by the windows and came closer.
I held the card out to him, fingers shaking with disgust, with violation, with fear.
Someone had killed for me.
Connor’s expression darkened, and his eyes went dangerously flat. “‘This’?”
“Blake wore a leather pendant,” I said. “It’s in the envelope.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.” I cursed, put the envelope down, the card on top of it. I didn’t want to touch them more than I already had. “But I don’t think it’s the first time they’ve contacted me,” I said. I pulled a clean kitchen towel from a drawer, used it to pick up the note I’d tossed aside after the party, brought it back to him.
He looked at it, then lifted his gaze to me. Anger percolated now. “You didn’t tell me about this.”
“It’s not my first fan mail,” I said. “I didn’t even think about it. Do you tell me every time someone sends you underwear?”
Connor blinked, narrowed his gaze. “Do people send you underwear?”
“Only once,” I said, then shook my head. “Not the point. The person who killed Blake says they did it for me.”
“Or it has nothing to do with you, and they’re trying again to drag you into it.”
Either way, sickness and anger settled low in my belly. I didn’t know Blake, didn’t like the AAM. But I wouldn’t wish death on any of them.
“He was killed—murdered—in my name.”
“No,” Connor said, voice firm. “He was murdered because someone wanted him dead. You didn’t ask for it, and it wasn’t for you in any possible way. This is about the killer.”
I nodded, because I understood the words and the sentiment. But the killer had made it about me. And I didn’t want that. I didn’t want any of it.
“Whoever it is knows you didn’t go to Paris,” Connor said, looking over the first note. “They’ve been following your career.”
“I was on-screen,” I said. “Especially after Cardona’s Master was killed.”
“I remember. You got a lot of airtime.”
“And he was watching.” That thought put a line of sweat at the small of my back.
“There’s no postmark. There is on the first envelope,” Connor said, comparing them, “but not this one.”
“So it was hand-delivered,” I guessed.
“Yeah.”
Creep factor increasing. “I have to tell Theo.”
“Do you?” Connor’s voice had gone tight again. He was still angry.
“You know I do,” I said, softer than I might have under different circumstances. “Maybe he can use the building video to see who delivered it.”
He growled, but relented. And returned to watch the street while I sent Theo pictures of the notes and Blake’s necklace, then put them all into a plastic zip bag to be picked up by a CPD unit when we’d gotten somewhere safe.
I started when my screen buzzed, and I found Theo’s concerned face. “Have you noticed anyone following you?” he asked.
“No,” I said, squirming a little that someone might have been and I hadn’t even noticed. So much for my training.
“When did you get the first one?”
“The night of the party.”
“The night the AAM came to visit?”
“Yeah,” I said, and didn’t like that coincidence, either. I walked through the apartment, checking that the other windows were locked as discreetly as I could. No point in advertising to whoever might be watching that we were checking our security.
“No unusual calls? Contacts? Other emails? Or for Lulu?”
“I’ll ask her, but I don’t know of anything. She’d have mentioned it. We’re going to stay somewhere else for a little while.”
“That’s a good idea,” Theo said. “And I’m sorry. About all of this.”
“I know, Theo. I’m sorry, too. Let me know if you have any leads—or if there’s anyone I need to avoid.”
“Let me know if the AAM contacts you, or if you get another note. And if the AAM tries to confront you, we’ll step in.” He paused. “We’ll miss you over here.”
I’d miss them, too. But even if I understood the choice they had to make, the impartiality they had to