“The Ferryman,” I blurt out, remembering Ash’s reaction last night. “I saw your face when I said his name. You know who he is, don’t you?”

His expression shifts to being unreadable, which makes me wonder what he’s hiding. “I know of him.”

I fight the urge to blabber nervously and instead sit in anxious stillness, hoping he’ll tell me the Ferryman is less awful than the hardened killer I imagine.

“He’s…,” Ash starts, and stops. “He’s known by reputation more than anything else. I’ve never met him.”

“What kind of a reputation?” I say, fear seeping into my words.

“Efficient,” he says, and my rib cage tightens around me, but Ash doesn’t continue.

“Go on,” I say, and he turns to me.

“November—”

“No, Ash. Tell me. I know you know more. And if this guy is after my dad, I need to know who he is.”

Ash exhales. It’s not like him to avoid a direct question. “He’s not affiliated with one Family but works with all of them. He rarely takes on missions, but when he does, he completes them. Everyone wants to work with him. He’s…skilled.”

Ash’s reserved tone tells me everything I need to know. When Ash says “skilled,” what he really means is a brilliant assassin.

“What I don’t understand is, why did Angus warn me about him?” I say, looking at Ash to make sense of it for me. I was already tipsy when I was trying to reason it out last night and I didn’t get very far.

Ash glances at me. “It was part of your negotiation, was it not?” he says, and there is something akin to worry in his voice.

“Not exactly,” I say. “Before he decided to trade information with me, he told me someone had already been there asking about my dad. He wouldn’t have said it if he didn’t want me to know it, right?”

“No, he wouldn’t,” Ash says, and his eyebrows dip.

“Do you think Angus knew who I was before I told him?” I ask, my concerns from last night burgeoning into anxiety. “And if he already knew who I was, why would he bother trading with me?”

“I couldn’t say for certain,” Ash says, and his grip tightens ever so slightly on the steering wheel. “He told you about the bounty and about the Ferryman. Then he pointed you toward the blacksmith, correct? Is there anything I’m missing?”

I shake my head. “Is it possible my dad traded with Angus in order to tell me those things?”

“In order to point you to the blacksmith…yes, that could be the case,” Ash says. “Angus went so far as to bring you Logan’s address—a deliberate and heavy-handed action.” Something about the way Ash carefully chooses his words sets me on edge.