I still wouldn’t say I exactly trusted him, but if I didn’t tell him, he could just clock me again and have another conversation with Lugh. So I told him everything I knew, including the painful truth about Val.

Our plates were empty by the time I’d finished. Dominic cleared the table, then came back and refilled all our coffee cups. I wasn’t comfortable letting him wait on me like that, but I had just enough people skills to know arguing over it was pointless.

When he sat back down, Dominic was frowning. “So why would Andrew frame you for murder? It would be damn hard to burn you to death while you’re in jail.”

I hadn’t even thought of that.

Adam smiled grimly. “If Morgan mysteriously disappeared while she was out on bail, what would the police think had happened to her?”

“Oh,” Dominic said.

Lovely. Glad to see my enemies were so thorough and organized. If I had to have enemies, I’d much rather have disorganized and stupid ones.

“So far,” Adam continued, “we have Andrew, Valerie, and three unidentified masked men on our list of enemies. It begs the question, how many more of them are there? Just how big is this thing?”

I rolled that around my mind. “Lugh said this was about a war of succession. If that’s the case, I’d say it’s pretty damn big.”

Adam nodded. “Yeah. And just taking out a couple of foot soldiers won’t be enough. We have to find out who’s in charge.”

“Wouldn’t that be Andrew? Raphael?”

“Maybe, but I doubt it. If he was in charge, he wouldn’t have tried to hide that you were hosting Lugh. One of the privileges of being in charge, you know?”

The more I thought about this, the less I liked it. The fewer bad guys trying to kill me, the better, but here Adam was, telling me that there were likely more of them out there than we knew about. Not a comforting thought at all.

“Maybe you need to have a candid conversation with your friend Valerie,” Dominic suggested.

“Just what I was thinking,” Adam said.

My stomach twisted into knots again. I’d been doing my best to avoid thinking about Val’s betrayal. I knew I’d have to face my feelings about it someday, but it was going to be a bitch.

“Why don’t you give her a call,” Adam suggested. “Ask her to meet you here.”

I widened my eyes at him. “And just how would I explain that I was asking her to meet me at the home of the Director of Special Forces?”

“I’m sure you can come up with something.” He leaned forward, putting an elbow on the table and propping his chin on his fist. “You could tell her you’ve decided to throw your boyfriend over for me.”

Dominic laughed and shook his head. I resisted the urge to kick Adam under the table.

“Ha-ha, very funny. But all jokes aside, I think I’d rather meet Val in a public place.” It occurred to me to wonder why Adam wanted her to come to his house. I didn’t like any of the answers I came up with.

He sat up straight, his face gone neutral. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. We need to control the meeting place, make sure she doesn’t have backup.”

“She’s not going to burn me to death in the middle of a public place, no matter how much backup she has with her. Besides, she might have nothing to do with any of this. She might have been telling me the truth.” I didn’t really believe that, but I tried to allow myself to hope.

Adam didn’t challenge my delusion, though the look he gave me told me exactly what he thought about it. “If it’s just you and her meeting in a public place, why would you think she’d tell you anything? She’ll just claim innocence, and you might want to believe it enough to be convinced.”

My temper tried to make an appearance, but I tamped it down. He was right, but I still didn’t want to bring Val to Adam’s house. I had a sneaking suspicion I wouldn’t like his interrogation techniques.

“I’ll ask her to meet me for lunch at Reading Terminal,” I said. “If I can’t get her to tell me anything, then we’ll switch to Plan B.”

Adam looked exasperated. “And after you’ve had your cozy little lunch and she knows you’re on to her, what do you think the chances are that she’ll come meet you here for further questioning?”

I figured it was time to be blunt. “I’m not bringing her here so you can torture information out of her, and don’t tell me that’s not what you have in mind. I’ll either meet her for lunch, or we figure out another plan.”

“You’re a fool.”

“Well, you’re a — ”

“Morgan,” Dominic interrupted, reaching across the table and laying a hand on my arm.

I ground my teeth and glared at his hand until he moved it away. But he’d gotten his message across. I swallowed my opinion of Adam and crossed my hands over my chest in a classic I’m-not-open-to-your-suggestions pose.

Adam pushed away from the table with enough force to rattle the dishes.

“Fine! Do it your way. But when they catch you and burn you at the stake, don’t blame me.”

He stomped out of the room like a kid having a temper tantrum. I really wondered what Dominic saw in him. It seemed to take about five minutes of conversation for me to want to put a bullet through his hard-as-rock head.

“Well,” Dominic said with a little grin, “I’m glad to see you and Adam have patched things up.”

I couldn’t help laughing. “Yeah. We’re best friends now.”

“Do you want me to come with you when you go meet Valerie? If she might have backup with her, it wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to have it, too.”

His offer touched me, especially considering what I’d done to him. “That’s very nice of you, Dominic, but I think this is something I have to do on my own.” My throat tightened. “She’s been my best friend since high school. I need to find a way to deal with what she’s done, you know?”

He nodded. “Let me at least give you a Taser, just in case.”

That made me raise an eyebrow. “Why do you have a Taser?”

He laughed. “I don’t, but Adam does. I’m sure he won’t mind you borrowing it, as long as he doesn’t know.”

I was really starting to like Dominic. If I could just forget that he had some pretty sickening tastes, I might even say we could be friends.

“Thanks, Dominic. You’re definitely one of the good guys of this world.”

That seemed to both please and embarrass him. He muttered some self-deprecating remark that I didn’t quite catch, then slipped out of the kitchen to go steal a Taser.

CHAPTER 16

Val was only too happy to meet me for lunch. When I called her, she practically tripped over her own tongue with all her copious apologies and pleas for forgiveness. I tried to seem open to it, because if I didn’t, she might decide not to come.

Reading Terminal used to be a train station, until they converted it into an indoor version of a big open-air market. You can buy just about anything there. Cheesesteaks. Fresh flowers. Exotic spices. Produce. Baked goods. Meat, fresh from the flank of a living cow…Okay, just kidding on that one. The place is a total madhouse at lunchtime. The convention center is right next door, so the market fills with tourists as well as native Philadelphians.

I met Val at one of the Mennonite lunch counters, fighting my way through the throng to get there. Val was there before me, and had somehow managed to save me a seat at the counter despite the press of people. We greeted each other cautiously as I boosted myself up onto the stool. I ordered a turkey sandwich and coffee, having to shout to be heard over the echoing roar in the building. Then I turned my stool and faced Val.

She’d gone with her off-duty look today, her hair loose around her shoulders, contacts instead of glasses. A crisply ironed blue Oxford shirt tucked into a pair of tailored chinos. Her sneakers were sparkling white, fresh out of the box.