Venom in the Veins_An Elemental Assassin Book Read online

  Venom in the Veins

  Copyright © 2018 by Jennifer Estep

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual or fictional characters or actual or fictional events, locales, business establishments, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. The fictional characters, events, locales, business establishments, or persons in this story have no relation to any other fictional characters, events, locales, business establishments, or persons, except those in works by this author.

  All rights reserved by the author.

  ISBN: 978-0-9861885-5-8

  Cover Art © 2018 by Tony Mauro

  Interior Formatting by Author E.M.S.

  Published in the United States of America

  Table of Contents

  Copyright

  The Elemental Assassin series

  VENOM IN THE VEINS

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  About the Author

  Other Books by Jennifer Estep

  The Elemental Assassin series

  featuring Gin Blanco

  Books

  Spider’s Bite

  Web of Lies

  Venom

  Tangled Threads

  Spider’s Revenge

  By a Thread

  Widow’s Web

  Deadly Sting

  Heart of Venom

  The Spider

  Poison Promise

  Black Widow

  Spider’s Trap

  Bitter Bite

  Unraveled

  Snared

  Venom in the Veins

  E-novellas

  Thread of Death

  Parlor Tricks (from the Carniepunk anthology)

  Kiss of Venom

  Unwanted

  Nice Guys Bite

  VENOM IN THE VEINS

  by

  Jennifer Estep

  An Elemental Assassin Book

  To all the fans of the Elemental Assassin series who wanted more stories, this one is for you.

  To my mom, my grandma, and Andre—for everything.

  Chapter One

  “Tonight is going to be awesome.”

  I looked over at Finnegan Lane, my foster brother. “Really? Why is that?”

  He grinned. “Because we’re eating at the most expensive restaurant in Ashland, and I’m not paying for it.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Only you would judge the quality of a meal by how much it impacts your wallet.”

  Finn’s grin widened. “What can I say? I’m a total food connoisseur that way.”

  In keeping with his so-called connoisseur status, he grabbed a roll out of the bread basket in the center of a table, slathered it with honey butter, and shoved the whole thing into his mouth. Finn sighed with happiness as he chewed and swallowed. Then he grabbed another roll and slathered even more butter onto it than he had on the first one. He was probably wishing the butter was melted so he could dunk his entire roll into it.

  Being a fine Southern gentleman, Finnegan Lane considered butter a dipping sauce, rather than a mere garnish, and he felt the exact same way about ranch dressing, honey mustard, sour cream, and even mayonnaise on occasion. And I agreed with his assessment one hundred percent, being a fine Southern lady myself.

  We were dining at Underwood’s, the city’s most expensive and highfalutin restaurant, the sort of fancy, froufrou place that frowned on treating butter and other common condiments as dipping sauces. Their loss.

  Pristine white linens covered our table, along with gleaming crystal wineglasses, polished silverware, and the sterling-silver bread basket that Finn was rapidly emptying. Everything from the linens to the glasses to the butter knives was either patterned, etched, or stamped with a small fork, the restaurant’s rune and a symbol for all the good food it served.

  Our table was situated in the back corner, right next to the floor-to-ceiling windows that offered sweeping views of the Ashland skyline. Down below, the lights burned bright and steady in the surrounding shops and restaurants, inviting people to step inside and get out of the cold, snowy evening. The combined glow of the lights stretched across the Aneirin River, making the water shimmer like a silver ribbon as it curled through the downtown area. In the distance, I could just make out the white gleam of the Delta Queen riverboat casino, anchored at its usual dock.

  I admired the view for another moment before staring back out at the restaurant. It was just after six o’clock, and Underwood’s was filling up for the evening. Some diners were already cutting into their grilled steaks and charred chickens, but most folks were clustered around the bar, squeezing in one last business meeting over drinks before either heading home for the day or getting their party started for the night.

  Finn and I were here on business too, waiting for Stuart Mosley, Finn’s boss and the president of First Trust bank.

  I checked my watch. “What did you say Mosley was doing? It’s not like him to be even a few minutes late.”

  Finn finished chewing and swallowing his second roll. “He’s overseeing a few final details for the charity auction tomorrow night. You know, the one with all of Mab’s stuff.” He paused. “At least, the stuff that wasn’t destroyed during the Briartop robbery last summer.”

  I made a face. “Oh. That.”

  Mab Monroe had been the Fire elemental who’d run the Ashland underworld for years before I killed her for murdering my family. After her death, Mab’s massive art collection had gone to the Briartop museum to be displayed, but a group of giant robbers had crashed the exhibit’s opening-night gala, destroying much of the art. Of course, I’d stopped the robbers, but not before they’d killed and injured several innocent people during their attempted heist.

  What was left of the art had been put into storage, and various legal wranglings had gone on for the last several months, until the Briartop board of directors had finally decided to auction off everything for charity. The money raised would go to the robbery victims and their families, as well as helping to pay for repairs and new security measures at Briartop. Something that was desperately needed, since the museum kept getting knocked over like it was a common convenience store rather than a prestigious art institution.

  “Mosley’s on the museum board, right?” I asked.

  Finn reached for a third roll. “Yep. The charity auction was his idea, and he’s the one who’s overseeing everything, including cataloging and storing the art and arranging for the rest of Mab’s things to be safeguarded until the auction.”

  All the talk of the Fire elemental made my hands start itching and burning, and I stared down at the marks branded into my palms, each one a small circle surrounded by eight thin rays. Spider runes, the symbol for patience.

  Even now, all these years later, every time I looked at the s
cars, I still half expected the runes to be as red, raw, and blistered as the night Mab had burned them into my skin with her cruel magic. The marks might have faded to their current pale silver, but my memories were as hot and fresh as the rolls Finn kept gobbling down.

  My hands reflexively curled into fists, hiding the scars, but I forced them open again. A silverstone ring stamped with my spider rune glinted on my right index finger, and I twisted it around several times. Then I raised my hand, grabbed the spider rune pendant hanging around my neck, and ran it back and forth on its silverstone chain. Focusing on the solid, tangible feel of the other runes—my spider runes now—helped me to ignore the lingering phantom pain in my palms and all the horrible memories that came along with it.

  “I hope the boss man gets here soon,” Finn said. “I’m starving.”

  He reached for the fourth and final roll in the basket, but I smacked his hand away.

  “Leave one for Mosley. This dinner was his idea, after all. And as you so eloquently pointed out, you’re not the one paying for it. He is. The man should actually get some food for his money.”

  Finn’s green eyes narrowed, and he rubbed his thumb over the hilt of his butter knife like he was thinking about brandishing it at me.

  I grinned. “You really want to get into a knife fight with me? Go ahead, sugar. You just go right ahead.”

  His gaze dropped to the long sleeves of my black pantsuit jacket and the two knives that he knew I had tucked away there—silverstone blades that were a lot stronger and sharper than the pitiful little one he was holding.

  He sighed and put down his knife. “You’re no fun.”

  My grin widened. “So you keep telling me.”

  A waiter came over to our table. “Ms. Blanco?” he asked. “Ms. Gin Blanco?”

  I tensed. “Yeah, that’s me.”

  The waiter bowed and held out a bottle of champagne. “Compliments of the gentleman to your right.”

  I looked over at the table in question to find a man with dark brown hair, blue eyes, and tan skin staring at me. Liam Carter, one of Ashland’s many criminal bosses, respectfully raised his own glass of champagne to me, as did the two giants sitting with him. I tipped my head, politely acknowledging his presence and his gift, even though I was sighing on the inside.

  Even here, in a nice, quiet restaurant, on an evening when I just wanted to relax, I couldn’t escape being myself, Gin Blanco, the Spider, Ashland’s most feared assassin and the supposed queen of the underworld.

  The waiter expertly popped open the champagne, poured glasses for Finn and me, and left our table. I didn’t really want any champagne, but it would have been exceedingly rude to ignore the gift, so I lifted my glass to Carter in a silent toast of appreciation and respect and drank a generous portion of the cold, sparkling liquid. He returned the gesture, then started talking to his two associates again.

  I took another, much smaller sip of champagne, just to be polite, but the fizzy bubbles created an intense ticklish sensation in my head. I set my glass aside and raised my hand to my face, so that no one would notice me twitching my nose from side to side to alleviate the pressure. Owen Grayson, my significant other, teasingly called it my sour carrots face, like I was a rabbit who had bitten into something she didn’t like.

  Champagne almost always made me feel this way, and a couple of mouthfuls was all it took to trigger a violent sneezing fit, something I couldn’t afford in front of Carter or the other bosses dining here. They would think I was a lightweight who couldn’t hold her liquor, which would totally ruin my badass reputation.

  Finn sipped his own drink and sighed with appreciation. “What do you have going on with Liam Carter that would prompt him to send you champagne?”

  I shrugged. “I’m helping him negotiate a peace treaty with one of his rivals. He’s also been coming to the Pork Pit a lot lately. Supposedly, he just loves my cooking, but I think he’s really there to flirt with Silvio. But so far, Silvio has been resisting his advances. Apparently, Silvio’s coffee date over the holidays didn’t go so well, and he’s a little gun-shy now.”

  Silvio Sanchez was my personal assistant and even more reticent and cautious with his feelings than I was with mine.

  Finn eyed Liam Carter’s navy suit and gave an approving nod. “Well, he certainly has good taste in champagne and clothes. Those are two definite points in his favor. Silvio could do a lot worse.”

  I snorted. “Let me guess. You would judge a man’s dating potential by how expensive his tie is.”

  “If I were interested in guys? Absolutely. Clothes don’t make the man, but they certainly can help.” Finn reached up and infinitesimally adjusted his own silver tie, which was already perfectly straight, before smoothing down his gray suit jacket. “Then again, there are those of us who are just naturally beautiful.”

  He winked at me, then patted his coif of walnut-brown hair. Once he was sure it was still perfectly in place, he grabbed his butter knife again and started turning it back and forth, like it was a mirror that he was trying to line up with his face.

  “If you start admiring your reflection in that, I’m going to take that knife away and cut you with it,” I warned. “Knives are for eating. Or stabbing people. Nothing else.”

  Finn grinned and opened his mouth to respond, but his gaze flicked past me, and he waved at someone across the room. “Ix-nay on the ill-kay talk. Mosley’s here.”

  I looked in that direction. Stuart Mosley pointed us out to the hostess by the entrance and headed over to us, winding his way around the other tables and nodding at the folks he knew.

  Mosley was a dwarf, around five feet tall, with wavy silver hair, hazel eyes, and a hooked nose that made him look like he’d been punched in the face more than once. Like Finn and most of the other men in the restaurant, Mosley was wearing an expensive suit, although his was a dark, anonymous navy instead of my brother’s more stylish and flashy pewter-gray.

  He reached our table. “My apologies,” he rumbled. “I had to handle a few last-minute details for the charity auction tomorrow night.”

  I nodded back at him. “Finn told me as much. Please sit. We were just looking over the menu.”

  Mosley settled himself at the table, and the waiter came over and took our drink orders. Scotch for Finn and Mosley and a gin on the rocks with a twist of lime for me. Gin for Gin, as was my tradition. A few minutes later, the waiter returned with our drinks and took our dinner orders.

  Mosley downed his Scotch in one long gulp and signaled for another, which the waiter quickly deposited on the table. Then he sighed and shook his head. “I swear, this event is going to be the death of me. I just spent the last hour debating whether we should have white roses or orchids at the auction site tomorrow night. An hour! As if I care about the flowers.”

  I hid a smile. Stuart Mosley might be one of the most influential men in Ashland, but he’d never struck me as a society schmoozer. From the tidbits Finn had told me over the past few weeks, the other board members were driving the dwarf plumb crazy with their increasingly elaborate and expensive ideas for the auction.

  “This was supposed to be a low-key event, but they’ve turned it into a damn circus,” Mosley kept grumbling. “If it were up to me, I’d have the auction in the middle of a field somewhere. But no, we had to have food and flowers and music and a venue.” He spat out the last word like it was a curse.

  “And just when I think everything is finally settled, someone wants to change the flowers at the last minute. I thought that white orchids were perfectly fine, but no, apparently, I’m wrong, and white roses will be far more elegant.” He spat out that word as well, as though he had heard it so often that he wanted to permanently remove it from everyone’s vocabulary.

  “Well, look on the bright side—it will all be over with tomorrow night,” Finn said, trying to be cheerful.

  Mosley massaged his temples. “Trust me, I am well aware of that, and I am counting down the hours.”

  After a fe
w seconds, he sighed, dropped his hands, and steepled his fingers together. “But the two of you didn’t come here tonight to hear me complain. You came to talk about Fletcher.”

  Finn and I both sat up a little straighter. Fletcher Lane was Finn’s late father and my assassin mentor, so he’d meant the world to both of us. He’d also been friends with Mosley, who seemed to know all about Fletcher’s tendency to help people who couldn’t help themselves, especially as the assassin the Tin Man.

  “Anything you could tell us might be useful,” I said. “Anything at all, no matter how small or insignificant it seems. Especially when it comes to Fletcher and the Circle.”

  The Circle was a secret society that was responsible for much of the crime and corruption in Ashland. Mab Monroe had been heavily involved in the group, and so had my mother, Eira Snow. Something that had come as quite a shock to me, since I’d thought that Mab had killed my mother and my older sister, Annabella, because of a long-standing family feud between the Monroes and the Snows. But the truth was that the other members of the Circle had ordered Mab to murder my family—something they were going to pay for dearly.

  Ever since I’d found out about my mother’s involvement with the shadowy group a couple of months ago, I had been tracking down every single scrap of information on the Circle and its members that I could find. My search had eventually led me to several safety-deposit boxes that Fletcher had entrusted to Mosley to watch over at First Trust bank.