It was not courtesy at all that made me add, “You know Melwas killed him, don’t you?”

She didn’t answer.

“The same Melwas you helped kidnap Greer. How does that feel?”

She shot me a dangerous look then, her blue eyes the kinds of ocean depths that carnivorous fish live in. “I loved my grandfather. And if even for one second you are implying that I had anything to do with this or that I’m happy—”

“I’m not,” I said mildly. “Just pointing out how all your carefully laid plans for revenge are coming back to destroy you.”

I expected a retort, a vicious reminder that I—and by extension my sister and Ash and other people I loved—were still very much under her thumb, but it never came. She simply went back to staring out of the window and didn’t speak again until we were at the church.

The moment we stepped onto the sidewalk outside of the church, her demeanor changed. Her chin lifted and dropped at all the right moments, her smile was the right amounts of grieving and tremulous, her perfect ponytail swung prettily as she moved around the narthex shaking hands and greeting mourners. It was the perfect performance, and it still is during the actual service.

She even manages a few sniffles during the service, enough so that she is obliged to dab at her large, wet eyes. She clings to my arm, rests her head on my shoulder, laces her gloved fingers through mine, as if it’s only my strong and sturdy presence helping her get through this difficult time.

I let her. I don’t have a choice, really, and I can’t exactly shove her off me in the middle of a funeral service. Instead, I let it happen and pretend it’s Greer holding onto me, pretend it’s her I’m comforting. I imagine Morgan’s face, I watch the strong lines of Ash’s shoulders, I remind myself of all the people I’m protecting by acquiescing to Abilene’s demands.

Greer still won’t look at me.

The Mass finishes, and the family moves to the front of the church to prepare for the procession to the cemetery. And that’s when it happens. In the press of black-clad mourners, Secret Service agents are surrounding Ash and Greer to hustle them out a side door, and then there’s a stir, a collective shock.

And then a scream.

Abilene and I are just close enough to see the knife, the woman holding it, Greer staggering back as the Secret Service agents lunge forward. I’m there before I know it, jumping up and over a pew and into the crepe-and-wool tumult of panicking mourners. I reach Greer and Ash, Ash holding Greer tightly and Greer saying, “I’m fine, really, I’m fine.”

“What happened?” I ask Ash.

He shakes his head slowly. “I don’t know yet.” But his eyes flick meaningfully around the still-swarming room, the chaos of the agents wrestling the attacker out of the room, and I realize the answer is that he does know but here isn’t the place to talk about it.

Greer turns and looks at me for the first time today, her gray eyes soft and curious. I can see that not only is she unhurt, she’s barely ruffled by it, which is maybe understandable. A woman with a knife in a crowded church isn’t the same as being kidnapped and alone at the mercy of a man like Melwas. Even through this, her composure remains.

I am shocked to find, however, that my own composure is non-existent. My hands are shaking and my heart is in my throat and now that I know she’s safe, it’s like the reality of all that danger crashes down even harder. What if the agents had been just a little bit slower? What if that woman had been just a little bit faster? What if instead of standing in Ash’s arms, she were limp and bloody on a stretcher?

I wonder if she sees all this in my face, because her delicate eyebrows furrow and she shakes her head ever so slightly.

Because she doesn’t want me to worry? Because I no longer have the right to worry?

“We should go home,” Ash says to Greer. “We don’t know that the cemetery is safe.”

“I’m going to the burial,” she says firmly, tearing her gaze from mine. “It was a lone woman, a lone crazy woman. There’s no reason to suspect a grand conspiracy of murder is waiting at the cemetery.”

I step in. “Greer, you can’t. You’ve been consistently targeted since you’ve returned from Carpathia, and—”

Her eyes blaze, all softness gone. “You don’t get to tell me what to do. Either of you. I’m going to my grandfather’s burial, and it’s going to be fucking fine.”

And with that, she pulls free of Ash’s arms and strides away, her steps confident and strong. I see her stop at Gavin and Luc and tell them something; they both nod and escort her out of the sanctuary, Luc glancing back at Ash as they do. Ash nods after them and then our own Secret Service agents hustle us out of the church. I take a moment to make sure Abilene found a ride to the cemetery, then follow Ash into his car. We sit across from each other in the back seat.

“The woman hissed something to Greer when she lunged at her,” Ash says now that we’re alone. “Something in Ukrainian.”

It’s like my fear is a living thing, jumping from my throat to my stomach to my shaking hands. “Ukrainian.”

“It was ‘Strength in the Mountains, Strength until Death.’”

“The Carpathian motto.”

“Yes.”

The fear is acid in my mouth, my blood. “Ash.”

His voice is charred gravel when he speaks. “Don’t.”

We look at each other, and something shifts. I can’t explain it, can’t even really grab hold of it with my mind as it’s happening, but I feel it like a rope sliding through my hands, like a crack in the floor opening up between our feet.