Chapter 5

The Don Shaw threw her a quiet send-off in the family ballroom.

Quiet, for the Shaws, meant fifty people and a string quartet. Black suits, cigars, the smell of old whiskey and gun oil clinging to the men's lapels even in their Sunday best. The big chandelier had been polished. The capos' wives wore their second-best pearls — first-best was for funerals — and watched the door like hawks.

By the time Rayna came down from the training wing, Mia was already in the center of the room, surrounded.

A handkerchief in her hand. Eyes very wet, very bright. The picture of a brave young woman about to walk into the lion's mouth for her family.

"I didn't think the draw would land on you, sweetheart." One of the older wives was patting her wrist. "Rayna's the Don's blood daughter — she should have been the first to step up. Instead she's running around the city forcing poor Ethan to marry her. Our Mia's the one paying for it."

"That's the truth of it," another woman sniffed. "And Mia is the one risking her life, and she can’t even come say goodbye?”"

Rayna watched Mia's eyes shine through the tears — and underneath the shine, the small, satisfied glint of a girl who had spent her entire childhood learning exactly how to be pitied.

Then Mia looked up, saw Rayna in the doorway, and froze.

She had not expected her to come.

Rayna smiled — a small, amused thing — and walked across the floor as if she had been invited.

The whispers changed pitch around her.

"What is she doing here —"

"Showing off. What else."

"Don't look at her like that. Mia's just better than she is. Spoiled little thing — won't even lift a finger while her own sister goes into Vossberg territory. God knows how the Don raised a daughter that cold."

Rayna did not break stride. She did not answer.

She took a glass of champagne off a passing tray, sipped it once, and set it down again, untouched.

After a while the chatter and the laughter began to bore her. She turned for the door.

"Rayna."

Mia's voice, behind her. Soft.

Rayna stopped. She did not turn until Mia had crossed the floor and slid an arm through hers, easy, intimate, the way sisters did in photographs.

"Dad told me," Mia murmured against her ear. Her perfume was something light and floral; up close it smelled cheap. "He told me you gave up the engagement on your own. But Ethan's always loved me, you know. So I can't really say I stole him from you, can I?"

Rayna let her arm be held.

"The draw came up my name," Mia went on, "but I gave you this once-in-a-lifetime chance to make your name in the family. Surely I'm allowed a few words with the soldiers before I go."

Rayna laughed.

It came out short, low, genuinely amused, and Mia's smile faltered for the first time.

"Make your name," Rayna repeated. She tilted her head, studied her stepsister like a curious specimen. "You think you could make a name on this chance ."

Mia blinked.

"Mia, sweetheart." Rayna's voice did not rise. It didn't need to. "You can't shoot. You can't take a punch. You have never run a mile in your life. You think Silas Price's bedroom is a tea party? You think a Vossberg house is somewhere a girl like you survives a week?"

"The only reason you’re even in this life is because my dad protects you."

Her smile thinned.

"I stepped in to clean up the mess that would have been you. I didn't realize you were stupid enough to mistake that for a favor."

Mia's face drained of color.

For one long second they stood there, arm in arm, smiling for the room, while underneath the smiles something cold passed between them.