“Paige.” The name burbled from my throat and I scrambled up from Karl’s lap. “Oh, God. You don’t know. They don’t know.” I looked up into his face. “She’s dead, Karl. Jaz had me lure her in and I thought she’d bring backup, but she didn’t and he—”

“Hope?”

A soft contralto voice echoed through the parking garage. I turned and my knees gave way. Karl caught me.

“It’s okay,” he whispered. “She’s okay.”

I watched Paige walk toward me, her face tight with worry and guilt, and I knew then that I was dreaming. Still drugged and lying in the back of that car, lost in my thoughts. In my dreams.

“I’m so sorry, Hope,” she said. “I’m so, so sorry.”

“It wasn’t her idea.”

Another voice. I looked over Paige’s shoulder to see Lucas.

“It was Benicio’s plan,” Karl said, a growl underscoring his words. “If I’d known—”

“But he didn’t. Yes, it was my father’s idea, but I agreed with it and I talked Paige into it.” Lucas stopped beside me. “We couldn’t see any other way, Hope. It was a cruel ruse and I sincerely apologize.”

“We had to stop them,” Paige said.

I shook my head. “No. I saw you. The hole—That was real. You were dead.”

“A glamour spell,” Lucas said. “Cast on a Cabal prisoner awaiting execution for murdering her parents. My father—” He inhaled. “We offered her a deal. If she went along with it, and it succeeded, she’d be granted a pardon. If it didn’t…” He let the breath out and, in that second, seemed to age a decade. “Then the writ of execution was carried out.”

I looked from him to Paige. To sacrifice a life—even to stop a killer—would have taken a lot of soul searching and, from their expressions, the decision still didn’t rest easy. For most people, the choice would be simple—the woman had been condemned to die so her death might as well serve some higher purpose. But Paige and Lucas weren’t most people.

“You’re right,” I said. “It was the best way to get to them. The only way probably. It was fair. She’d earned her death and you gave her a chance to beat it.”

Neither spoke and I could tell, as sincere as my words were, that they didn’t really help.

“Speaking of executions,” Karl said. “I trust Jasper Haig is going to be taking that woman’s cell, and her slot on the schedule.”

Lucas pushed his glasses up and pinched the bridge of his nose.

“You know Benicio’s plans, Karl,” Paige said. “Lucas argued strenuously against them, and he’ll continue to argue—”

“You can’t let him live. The man can impersonate his jailer. His lawyer. His doctor, for God’s sake. If he comes into contact with any person—”