Dobson’s cheeks burned tomato red with rage, but he whirled around and left the restaurant, yanking the front door open and stepping out onto the sidewalk. Ms. Wright and the other officers followed him.

Through the notices covering the windows, I could see Sophia standing beside one of the cop cars, her hands cuffed in front of her, waiting to be taken to the station. Catalina was talking to her, and Sophia kept nodding her head in response. Silvio lurked a few feet away from them, chatting up one of the officers about something. Probably what a crooked asshole Dobson was.

With her minion gone and his mission complete, Madeline finally deigned to sop up the last smear of barbecue sauce on her plate with a bit of bread, pop the whole thing into her mouth, and push her empty plate away. After taking one more slow, slurping sip of her iced tea, she slid out of her booth, got to her feet, and strolled over to me, her stilettos crack-crack-cracking against the floor. Emery left the booth as well, stepped outside, and stationed herself by the front door, staring over at Sophia, who glared right back at her.

Madeline set their white order ticket down on the counter, along with a hundred-dollar bill, which was more than enough to pay for the food she and Emery had eaten.

“I’m so sorry to hear that the restaurant’s been shut down, Gin. I didn’t think there was anything wrong with the food. Other than it being a bit too salty.” She shrugged. “But you know the system. You do one little thing wrong, and everything just seems to snowball from there.”

I stared right back at her, not showing any emotion, and not saying a word. This was her moment to crow, and I was going to let her have it.

Every condemned person deserved one last meal, and monologue.

Madeline leaned forward. “See? I told you that you wouldn’t make it to the library dedication. Next time, you really should listen to me. Now, I’m afraid that you’re going to have to spend the afternoon bailing your friend out of jail. Better try to get her out of there before tonight. I’d hate for something . . . unfortunate to happen to her while she was locked up.”

Maybe that had been Madeline’s plan for me. Maybe Dobson wouldn’t have shot me to death on the way to the station after all. Maybe he would have put me in lockup with the worst of the worst and let nature take its course. Even I could only battle so many enemies at a time, especially in a small, confined space like a jail cell.

Madeline kept staring at me, that smug, satisfied smile on her face stretching her crimson lips higher and wider than ever before. I dropped my gaze to her order ticket and money lying on the counter. Cold rage surged through me, and I reached down and picked them both up, one in either hand.

A sharp, painful, burning sensation scorched my fingers the second they touched the papers, as though my hands were about to burst into flames, even though my skin remained perfectly smooth. But it wasn’t any kind of elemental Fire power at work, and no runes flared to life on either the order ticket or the money. Since Madeline had touched them both, invisible waves of her acid magic had soaked into the papers, since she was one of those elementals who constantly leaked magic, even when she wasn’t actively using her power. Although I thought that in this case she had put a small bit of effort into coating the papers with her magic, knowing that I would reach for them, if only to put her money into the cash register. It would have been one more fun little way for her to fuck with me today.

Madeline’s smile widened a smidge more, as she fully expected me to start screaming as soon as I touched the papers and felt her power. But I didn’t scream. Didn’t yell. Didn’t holler, curse, and fling the papers away in surprise, pain, and anger. Instead, I ignored the horrid, searing sensation of her acid magic as best I could, and I didn’t reach for my own Ice magic to numb my hands to block the agonizing sensation.

I raised my gaze to hers, my gray eyes colder than the coldest winter night. Then I slowly crumpled her order ticket into a tight wad, until my knuckles whitened from the strain. I held on to it for several seconds longer than necessary, just to show her that I could, even though every nerve ending in my hand was screaming at me to let go. Finally, I threw the smushed wad into the trash can, just like I had Dobson’s business card. Another point for me.

I was still clenching the hundred-dollar bill in my other fist, and I deliberately held it up in the air, right in front of her smug face, and then tore it in two. The sound of the paper ripping was as loud as a gunshot in the hushed quiet of the restaurant.

But I didn’t stop there. I put the two halves of the bill together and then ripped them apart, until I had four pieces.

Rip-rip-rip-rip.

I did that over and over again, until I had reduced the hundred-dollar bill to tiny pieces. Then I dusted them all off my hands, watching the green and white bits float down to the counter like confetti.

By this point, my fingers felt like they were nothing more than brittle bones about to dissolve from the searing strength of Madeline’s acid magic, even though my skin remained unblistered and unblemished. But the scorching pain was nothing compared to the cold rage beating in perfect sync with my heart.

For the first time since I’d met her, a bit of uncertainty flickered in Madeline’s eyes. She’d deliberately coated the money and order ticket with her acid magic, another of her little traps, but I wasn’t reacting the way she had expected. She might play games, but so could I.

“You made a mistake,” I said in a calm tone. “Several, actually.”

Madeline arched a dark, delicate eyebrow. “Really? And what would those be?”

“You dragged my friends and family into this. Roslyn. Finn. Owen. Eva. You shouldn’t have done that.”

She shrugged, unconcerned by the ice in my voice. “It’s not my fault that your friends are having such . . . difficulties.”

“Of course not. You would never stoop to actually getting your hands dirty yourself unless you absolutely had to. That’s why it took you so long to come at me. You had to set all your little cogs and wheels into motion to screw with me and the people I care about. Like getting Dobson in your pocket, and having him browbeat that poor health inspector into going along with this sham here today.”

“You give me far too much credit, Gin. I might have made some new friends since I’ve been in town, but what you’re talking about sounds like a grand conspiracy. I’m just an employer who was concerned about a worker. That’s why I reported my maid missing this morning, nothing more. Emery was nice enough to contact Captain Dobson for me, since he was an old friend of her uncle Elliot’s. Dobson promised to look into things, and he drew his own conclusions from the information I gave him.”