“Don’t worry, son. As long as you cooperate you won’t be in any trouble at all.” Roman clipped the handcuffs over Roberts’s wrists.

Dorothy smothered a smile. It amused her to hear Roman call a man older than him “son.”

“What the hell?” murmured a voice behind them.

Security guard number two, Dorothy thought. It was happening just like she’d read it would, just like she’d planned. It felt a bit like playing God.

She wanted to smile, but she bit the inside of her cheek, stopping herself. Moving her lip seemed to dislodge the mustache, and she couldn’t risk blowing her cover, not when they were this close.

Nothing she’d read had mentioned the second security guard’s name or anything about him, so she hadn’t known what to expect until this moment. She turned—

And breathed a sigh of relief. He was barely older than they were, with long, gangly limbs and a spattering of acne on his forehead. Not a threat.

He looked at Roberts. “Aaron—?”

“There’s been some kinda disturbance,” Roberts muttered. Then, frowning, he added, “You didn’t frisk me. Aren’t you supposed to—”

“Sir, I’m going to need you to come here and stand next to your partner,” Roman said, cutting off Roberts. “We’ll have to call your names in before we move on.”

Guard Number Two was staring at Dorothy, eyes narrowed.

“Sir?” Roman said again, approaching him.

The guard pointed. “His mustache is falling off.”

Blast.

It seemed to Dorothy that Roman stiffened as her own fingers flew to her face. Sure enough, the damn mustache was askew. Her first impulse was to fix it, but it was too late. The second guard was already shaking his head, backing away. His eyes flicked to the security desk. The alarm.

She felt Roman’s eyes on her, questioning, and she could hear what he was thinking as clearly as if he’d actually spoken the words out loud. It’s not supposed to happen like this.

History was supposed to be on their side. Dorothy had spent so long preparing. Night after night falling asleep with a musty old book as a pillow. Hours spent staring at a computer screen, until the words all blurred and a dull headache beat at her skull. They weren’t going to be caught. They couldn’t be.

Dorothy moved between the guard and the alarm, reflexively. He was larger than she was, and she saw his eyes narrow as they moved over her body, sizing her up. He could push through her, he was thinking.

Well, he could try to.

Dorothy had learned many things during the last year she’d spent with the Black Cirkus, but perhaps the most useful was the location of the esophagus. There was a spot on the human body where the esophagus peeked out from behind the collarbone, all frail and weak, and if she happened to, say, jam her fingers into that spot, she could make a man twice her size cry for his mother.

This man was not twice Dorothy’s size, but he still lurched at her, and so she calmly stuck two fingers into that tender spot just below his neck and hooked them in and down.