Chapter 309: What is taking them so long?

Aria had not meant to look for her. She had come down to get coffee, a blanket, and a moment to breathe. But as she turned the corner, she saw a small, gray shape against the wall, half hidden behind a tall clock.

It was a woman in a torn maid’s uniform. Her hair was cut short. Her face was thin and pinched, and her hands were wrapped around her elbows as if she were cold. She stood very still, with her eyes on the floor, in the corner of the great hall, like a servant waiting to be dismissed.

As if she had never walked these halls. As if they had never belonged to her. Aria stopped.

She knew that face. She had seen it at a hundred dinners, in pearls and silk, with a cold smile and a glass of wine. She had heard that voice call Sienna every name in the book. She had stood behind a pillar and listened to that woman plan her friend’s ruin over dessert.

And now she was standing in the same house, shaking, in a borrowed uniform. "I don’t understand," Aria said.

She said it loudly, to the empty hall. Elena flinched. "I do not understand why you would save her."

She had said it to Viktor, in the end. He had come down the stairs a few minutes behind her, and she had turned on him in the middle of the marble floor, pointing at the thin woman by the clock with a shaking finger.

"After everything. After everything she did." Her voice cracked. "She tried to ruin Sienna. She helped Capri. She helped Aliya. She called my friend a gutter rat to her face. And you pulled her out of that house."

"Aria," a voice said softly. It was Manuel.

He had come in behind her, a tall, quiet man with kind eyes and a rumpled coat. He had been standing at her shoulder since the chopper landed. He did not speak much, but when he did, she listened. He put a hand on her arm now, and tugged, very lightly, as if he were turning a child away from a hot stove.

"Stop," he said. "I am only saying the truth."

"I know."

"It is the truth!"

"I know." He did not let go. "But not now." Aria pulled free. She folded her arms and glared at the wall.

"I would understand if it were Sienna," she said, more quietly. "Sienna would help anyone. She would help a snake. That is just who she is. I would understand why my friend would want to help her." She turned her eyes on Viktor. "But you. You, not after everything she has done to my poor friend."

Viktor did not answer.

He stood at the foot of the stairs with his hand on the rail. He was too tired to argue, and too frightened to be angry. He had heard her. He had understood every word. But his mind was upstairs, in a blue room, behind a closed door, and there was no room left in him for anything else.

Aria did not stop.

She could not seem to. The words came tumbling out of her, one on top of another, as if somebody had pulled a cork. She walked back and forth across the marble, with her hands in the air. She talked about the pilot, and the fuel, and the way Marcus had bled all over the seat of her chopper. She talked about the Bandesh, and how many ships they had, and how she was going to find out who had hired them.

Viktor let her talk.

"And what about Aliya?" she said suddenly. She had stopped in the middle of the floor.

"And Don Capri. What happened to them? You said they were in that house. They had Sienna’s name. Do they still..."

Viktor let out a deep breath. It came out slow and ragged, from somewhere very low. "Both dead." Aria’s mouth fell open.

"Both?"

"Capri was shot in a cell. By the Don himself." His voice was flat. "Aliya was shot in a stone hallway, by a man who was aiming at me."

Nobody said anything.

The big clock ticked. In the corner, Elena’s shoulders shook once, and were still. Manuel put a hand over his mouth. Aria stood frozen, with her arms hanging, and for the first time in an hour, she had nothing to say.

Aliya.

She had hated that girl. She had spent nights wishing her ruin. She had dreamed of the day it would finally come. She had not imagined it would sound like this.

"Oh," she said, very small.

Viktor turned. He put his foot on the first step and started up. He moved fast and stiffly, like a man walking into a wind.

"What is taking them so long?" he said. "Damn them. It has been eight hours."

"Boss."

"I am going back up."

"Boss, please." Marcus stepped out of the shadows by the door. His face was gray, and one eye was swollen almost shut. He caught Viktor’s arm. "They said an hour at least. Let them work."

"I am not asking."

"Please."

Viktor stared down at the hand on his sleeve. For a moment, his whole body strained against it. His eyes were bright and wild.

Then something in him gave, and his shoulders slumped. "Fine," he said hoarsely. He sat down on the bottom stair. He put his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands.

Marcus waited a moment. Then he cleared his throat. "I have called Marcel," he said.

Viktor’s head came up.

"To come and pick up his mother." Marcus nodded toward the corner, where the thin gray figure stood by the clock. "He is on his way. He should be here by the evening."

Viktor looked at him for a long moment. Then he nodded. It was a short, tired nod, but it meant thank you, and Marcus understood it.

In the corner, Elena had lifted her head.

She was looking at Marcus. Her eyes were red and hollow, but there was something in them now, a small, wavering light. Marcel. She whispered the name without a sound. Her hands came loose from her elbows and hung at her sides, trembling.

"Speaking of Marcel," Aria said.