Jennifer Estep - The Spider

I had to know better, or I’d get dead for real one day.

Fletcher stared at me another moment before nodding again, satisfied that I’d learned my lesson, at least for today. “All right. I think that’s enough for tonight.”

“Finally,” Finn muttered, leaning down to grab his rifle from where it had landed. “We’ve been out here for three hours already. I thought the day was never going to end.”

“Aw, you wouldn’t be saying that if you had managed to kill me a single time,” I drawled. “Just because I’ve killed you five times since we’ve been here is no reason to pout.”

Finn narrowed his eyes at my crowing. Before we’d played sniper-versus-assassin, we’d done a few rounds of hand-to-hand combat, all of which I’d easily won. All of which I’d loved, since that was one arena where quick, decisive action always came in handy, instead of the wait-and-see approach that Fletcher preferred.

“Whatever,” Finn muttered again. “I’ve gotta go. I’ve got work to do.”

“More boring reports to read for your summer job?”

He sniffed. “The reports are not boring, and it’s not some lame summer job. It’s an internship with one of the most prestigious banks in Ashland. If I play my cards right, this could lead to a full-time position.”

I rolled my eyes at his snotty, superior tone. Finn had recently turned twenty-three and was finishing up his MBA with his internship and some sort of accounting program that he was taking online through a university in Bigtime, New York. With his new job and fancy suits, Finn thought that he was it on a stick—and then some.

“Whatever. I’d rather be cooking in the Pork Pit than sitting in some stuffy old bank day after day.”

Finn sniffed again, but he didn’t respond to my taunt this time.

Fletcher didn’t comment on our sniping. He’d long ago given up trying to referee the two of us.

“Come on,” the old man said. “I want to go home and get some supper.”

The three of us climbed down the ridge using some rope that Fletcher had brought along, piled into his beat-up white van, and headed back to the city. Thirty minutes later, Fletcher dropped Finn off at his apartment building downtown.

“You coming by the restaurant for lunch tomorrow?” Fletcher asked through his open window.

Finn hesitated. “I’ll try, but it depends on work. I’ll call and let you know, okay?”

Fletcher nodded and smiled, but not before I saw the flicker of hurt that pinched his face. Finn hadn’t been around much this summer, spending more time at that stupid bank than he had with his dad. Anger sizzled in my chest that he could be so thoughtless toward Fletcher. Finn should be grateful that he still had a dad, especially one like Fletcher. But I kept my mouth shut. There was no use arguing with Finn. He was even more stubborn than I was.

Finn waved at his dad, then headed into his building. He didn’t wave at me or tell me good-bye, though. He was still pissed that I’d beaten him so many times tonight. I grinned. Too bad.

Fletcher threw the van into gear, pulled away from the curb, and drove through downtown, going by the Pork Pit. Since it was after nine now, the restaurant was closed, although the neon pig sign over the front door burned with bright, multicolored lights. The sight never failed to cheer me up.

“You know, I noticed that there are a couple of apartments for rent in that building across from the Pit,” I said, trying to make my voice light and casual as I pointed out the window. “See the sign right there? I thought I might call about one and see how much the rent is.”

Fletcher harrumph ed in the back of his throat, but that was his only reaction. Finn had his own apartment, and I was itching to move out of Fletcher’s house too. I loved the old man, really, I did, but I was an assassin. I was the Spider. Fletcher had been sending me on solo jobs for a while now, and I felt like I should have my own place, my own space, and not what I’d carved out for myself in his cluttered house.

“So?” I asked, impatience creeping into my voice. “What do you think? About the apartment?”

Fletcher stared out the windshield, instead of looking at me. “We’ll see.”

I wanted to pester him about it and get him to say yes right then, but I forced myself to wait, even though I ended up grinding my teeth the whole time.

But that was all he said.

If Finn and I were stubborn, then Fletcher was doubly so, and I knew that nothing short of being quartered by wild horses would make him say another word before he was ready to.

It was difficult, but I made myself unclench my jaw, although I couldn’t keep from tapping my fingers against the open window frame in frustration. As I watched the passing scenery, I wondered how much longer it would be before the old man realized that I was all grown up.

Twenty minutes later, Fletcher stopped the van in front of his house, which perched on top of one of the many ridges that ran through and around Ashland as part of the Appalachian Mountains.

I hopped out of the vehicle and headed toward the front porch, ready to wash away all of the grime, dust, and sweat from our war games. But Fletcher stayed by the van, as was his usual routine, scanning the dark woods that lay to one side of the house before his gaze moved across the yard and over to the rocky cliff that marked the edge of the property.

I didn’t know why he bothered. Fletcher was extremely careful as the Tin Man, using all sorts of cutouts, aliases, and back doors to book jobs and then being even more careful to leave no evidence behind at the scenes of his crimes, much less any clues to who he really was. There was no way that anyone could trace what he did—what we did now—back to us, but every time we came home, he still stopped, looked, and listened like he expected an attack at any second.

I sighed and waited by the front door, my arms crossed over my chest and my right foot tapping a staccato pattern against the weathered wooden porch. I was all for being cautious, but this bordered on the ridiculously paranoid.

After about three minutes, Fletcher was finally satisfied that no one was lying in wait to try to kill us, and he left the van and headed toward the house. He inserted his key in the lock, turning the knob to open the door, but the wood wouldn’t budge.

“Stupid door,” he muttered. “The wood always sticks in this humidity. I should go ahead and get that black granite one installed like I’ve been thinking about.”

I rolled my eyes. The house was already a hulking monstrosity. Several folks had owned it over the years, and each of them had added on a room or two. All in different styles, colors, and materials, including white clapboard, brown brick, and gray stone. And Fletcher had only added to the oddness by installing a bright, shiny tin roof and coal-black shutters a few months ago. I always wondered why he didn’t remodel the entire structure and give it some sort of cohesive style, but he seemed to like the strange angles and mismatched pieces of wood and stone. I supposed that a black granite door would fit right in with the eclectic feel of the rest of the house.

Fletcher put his shoulder into the wood, and the door finally wrenched open with a violent screech .

We stepped inside the house, which had as many odd corners and incongruous styles as the outside did, and went our separate ways. I headed upstairs, took a shower, and threw on a thin blue cotton robe over a white T-shirt and some short pink pajama bottoms patterned with garish green limes. Then I went back downstairs to the kitchen to get something to eat.