For their entire friendship, she’d let Megan believe she shifted into a fox like the rest of her family. Mom’s incessant nagging and warnings had prevented her from sharing the truth regarding her mixed heritage with Megan when they were younger, but now, as adults, she’d maintained the lie. Guilt plagued and weighed down her soul.
Maybe she should just tell her. The longer she perpetuated the lie, the harder it would be to come clean. A memory surfaced and Raven slammed the lid on that possibility. About a month ago, she’d found pamphlets supporting Regulators in Megan’s house and her friend parroted some of the common arguments against the Others. If her best, and only, friend discovered Raven was one of them, the evil dark fae she needed to protect her kids from, would she still want Raven as a friend? Could Raven recuperate emotionally if Megan’s hatred for Others proved stronger than her love for Raven? Could Megan forgive Raven for the years of deceit?
Raven didn’t have any answers and she was too chickenshit to find out.
Chapter Twelve
“You can get the monkey off your back, but the circus never leaves town.”
~ Anne Lamott
Raven braced as the door to her ex’s sin bin swung open to reveal an impatient fiancée on the other side.
“I don’t know why you insisted on searching our place,” Sarah said. “I’ve already looked everywhere.” She’d plaited her chestnut hair today and wore ripped jeans and a plaid shirt. She’d left one too many buttons undone to show off her ample cleavage.
Raven took a deep breath and pulled her shoulders back. “It always helps to have a neutral third party take a look.” And you know, a professional. But the last thing Raven needed right now was a pissing match with her client.
“Except, you’re not exactly neutral, are you?” Sarah stepped back and waved Raven in with her manicured claws. Seriously, how did anyone function with fake nails that long?
“If you had a problem with that, you shouldn’t have hired me.” Raven stepped into the house and took in a deep breath of fresh linen scented air. “To be honest, I thought my past with Robert was an endorsing factor.”
A wicked grin spread across Sarah’s face, flashing obnoxiously perfect teeth.
Yeah, Raven wouldn’t cross this woman anytime soon. Robert had messed with the wrong person. Finally.
“Where do you want to start?” Sarah asked.
“His office.” Robert was a creature of habit. He treated his office as a man cave and when they were together, Raven found evidence of his infidelity amongst his research papers for university.
Sarah nodded and closed the door behind Raven. “This way.”
Sarah walked down the hall and opened the first door on the left. Raven walked past her and straight into a sterile room with a small window overlooking the courtyard outside.
Einstein once asked, “If a cluttered desk is a sign of a cluttered mind, what is a clear desk a sign of?” Or something along those lines. If Robert was any indication for the answer to that particular question—a narcissistic douchebag.
Raven paused.
No. That label was too kind, but Raven needed to clear her mind and push her biases to the side. She had a job to do.
Raven needed to find something incriminating or any hint of what Robert was up to on the days in question. She turned to Sarah. “Where were you on August fourteenth and September eleventh?”
Sarah recoiled as if Raven had physically slapped her. If only. “Excuse me? This isn’t about me. I’m not on trial.”
“No. But we want to establish whether Robert’s absences have a pattern or rule out the possibility of a pattern. Can you check?”
Sarah rolled her eyes and dug out the phone in her bra. Her long nails clicked against the screen as she tapped the pad of her forefinger on the screen. “August fourteenth and September what?”
“Eleventh.”
Sarah scrunched her lips together and flicked through her calendar. “I was out of town August twelfth to September thirteenth. When I came back, Robert took me to that shitty diner you work at.”
Raven bit her tongue and ignored the bird energy coiled inside her. Sarah wasn’t wrong. The diner sucked. Saying so to Raven’s face, however, was rude and most likely meant to hurt her feelings. Raven pushed the comment to the side to sit on the bench with her biases and focused on the important stuff. What did Mike say Sarah did for work again? Corporate programmer? “That’s a long trip.”
Sarah shrugged. “We set up a new call center overseas and I oversaw the operation.”
Fair enough. Raven turned to Robert’s desk. She flipped open her ex’s laptop and started it. “Any chance you know the password?”
Sarah snorted somewhere behind her. Of course, she did.
Raven stepped to the side and let the other woman log on. Once again, a slightly furry scent prickled her nose. Definitely a shifter, but not a fox. Too bad Dad hadn’t placed it with his nose or turned up the information on his background check. Why would Sarah hide it? Only a few shifter types hid their nature from other shifters.
“Here you go.” Sarah stood back and stared at the computer as if it housed her worst enemy. In a way, if it held information about Robert’s cheating, it kind of did.
“Thanks.” Raven pulled her phone out and called Mike.
“Sup?” Mike’s muffled voice answered on the third ring.
“I’m on his computer,” she said.
“Okay, hold on,” Mike mumbled.
“Are you eating? Again?” Of course, he was eating. By the end of the day, Mom resorted to chucking whatever food was left in the pantry at him. They went through a lot of bread and cereal, so much so, Raven wouldn’t be surprised if he started sprouting wheat for hair. Her nineteen-year-old brother was a bottomless pit surpassed only by Juni, constantly filled with simple carbohydrates and processed food without any negative impact to his hips, thighs or ass.
Life wasn’t fair.
She only asked the question because she specifically told him her plans and he was supposed to be ready.
“Of course, I’m eating,” he said. A door creaked on his side of the line. He must’ve entered his room, aka the battle station. “It’s just a snack.”
Raven rolled her eyes and navigated the computer’s system to find the information she needed.
“Okay, I’m ready,” Mike said.
Raven prattled off the IP address and watched the mouse icon move on its own after Mike remotely hacked into her ex’s computer.
“Got it. I’ll clone it now and go through the files later.” He hung up without a goodbye.
“Sounds good,” Raven spoke to her phone screen. She stuffed the device back in her pocket and straightened.
Sarah leaned against the door frame with folded arms and a curled lip. Her jeans hugged every curve like a second skin. Apparently, the fiancée wanted to supervise.
Whatever. Raven spent the next forty minutes searching the office and the rest of the apartment.
“See?” Sarah said as she shuffled behind her, the soft carpet absorbing the impact and sound of her sock-covered feet. “I told you there was nothing.”
Raven bit her tongue and pulled the rubber gloves from her back pocket. She always saved this part for last. The plastic squeaked as she stretched the gloves over her hand.
Sarah’s eyebrows shot up.
“Garbage,” Raven explained. She pivoted and headed back to the office. No self-respecting PI neglected the garbage when conducting a search. One man’s trash was a PI’s much needed lead.
Unfortunately, it appeared Raven would end up with nothing but Sarah’s attitude.
Her phone buzzed while she flipped through receipts. She snapped one glove off and pulled her phone from her pocket to read the message. Mike had texted, “Done.”
Raven turned to Sarah while stuffing the phone in her jeans again. “You can log out of the computer now and turn it off.”
Normally, it didn’t take forty minutes to clone a laptop. At lea
st not for Mike. Having that stinky cast hadn’t slowed him down much, either. If he took a break to refuel, she’d kill him. Or at least have a stern conversation with her baby brother about responsibility, accountability and professionalism.
“This has been a complete waste of time.” Sarah sauntered over to the laptop and shut it down.
Raven scrunched up her face and resisted the urge to point out how Sarah didn’t have to accompany her to every room. Instead, she glanced at the last of the receipts still clutched in her one hand. She wiggled her hand back in the glove and unfolded the receipts to scan their information.
Hang on.
October ninth. The date Robert went missing. He must’ve emptied his pockets in the office trash. Idiot.
Luckily, the dumbasses of society kept Crawford Investigations in business.
She rifled through the last of the garbage and found one more receipt for the same date range. She recognized the popular downtown café. He’d ordered a latté and a pumpkin spice scone. She stuffed the rest of the contents back in the garbage bin and pushed it back in place.
Maybe not so emptyhanded after all. She folded the receipts and slipped them into her back pocket. She pulled off one glove, held it in her palm and peeled off the other glove so it folded over the first one. She shoved the wad of latex into her other back pocket. Robert’s trash was all paper, so she wasn’t worried about germs. She was, on the other hand, concerned with his complete disregard for their already failing environment. Had he never heard of recycling?
“I’m done here,” Raven said and straightened from her squatting position. Her muscles complained.
“What did you find?”
“Hopefully, a lead. I’ll let you know when I have something solid.”
“I want to know now.” Sarah flashed her teeth.
“No.”
“No?” Sarah’s whole body stiffened as if she never heard the word before.
“No.” Raven was getting some solid practice at using that word lately. Grandma Lu would be so proud.
“Why not?” Sarah’s hands clamped onto her hips.
“Because I can’t have my vigilante client storming off to investigate my leads and potentially destroying or tampering with evidence, or unnecessarily tipping off the target.” The receipts burned in her pocket.
“You’re my employee and I’m not planning to take Robert to court. Maintaining the integrity of evidence isn’t a requirement of your job.”
The shifting dark energy in Raven’s core pulsed. As if it had a mind of its own and took offence to Sarah’s tone, the power pushed at her skin from the inside. The force of motion so strong, it threatened to break Raven at the seams. Her hands itched to reach for the power and grab…something. What did the corvid energy call for? What did it want?
Raven grit her teeth and forced her breathing to remain steady, though her heart raced like a horse at a derby. “Yes, and you signed a contract. Let me do my job and I’ll get you the information. You need to trust me, take a step back from all of this and not interfere.”
Sarah’s face contorted as if Raven fed her a lemon instead of the truth. “Do you need anything else?” she finally bit out.
“Yes.”
Her client scowled.
The pulse of dark energy eased away. “Do you share the same account for your phone’s app store and music?”
Sarah pursed her lips. “How did you know?”
Robert was a creature of habit. Raven would bet her last pair of non-discount bin pants Sarah had her name and credit card information on the account, too. “Your fiancé likes to pinch his pennies.”
Sarah snorted. “That’s not what’s going to get pinched when I bust him.”
They shared a smile and warmth spread through Raven’s chest. Oh, she sincerely hoped Sarah spoke the truth. “I need your phone.”
Sarah pulled the device out from somewhere in her bra and handed over one of the newest models on the market in a glittery, bedazzled case. It was still warm. Ew.
Raven quickly navigated through the app store and found the program to download. Originally intended to retrieve a lost device on the same account, not stalking a loved one, the app had come in handy in previous cases. Conveniently, it didn’t require consent or acknowledgement from the other device user, unlike the popular friend finding app. She handed the phone back to its owner.
“What is this?” Sarah stared at the phone screen and the downloading app.
“If we don’t figure out what happened by the time he goes missing again, you’re going to call me and we’re going to use this app to track him.”
Sarah stared at her phone screen and the creepy evil smile spread across her face.
All right, then.
Raven should feel sorry for Robert and the eventual misery this woman planned to put him through, except, well, she didn’t. She wasn’t a big enough person for that kind of compassion and forgiveness. Robert deserved every piece of revenge coming his way.
Chapter Thirteen
“There’s only one basic principle of self-defence—you must apply the most effective weapon, as soon as possible, to the most vulnerable target.”
~ Bruce Lee
Raven stepped from Sarah and Robert’s house and inhaled autumn air, fresher in this neighbourhood than the one she lived in and filled with dry leaves and sweet pine needles. Her phone vibrated in her pocket again. She yanked it from her jeans and accepted the call from Dad.
“Hey!” she said.
“Hey, Rayray. I finished running through Robert’s background check.” He sounded tired.
“Anything?” She looked both ways and crossed the street. Her sneakers slapped the dry pavement and crunched random dirt littering the road. She’d parked a few blocks away because Jean Claude wasn’t exactly inconspicuous, and she couldn’t assume Robert didn’t have loyal friends. She might be a random girlfriend visiting his fiancée while he worked, but if a nosy neighbour was also able to describe her car, the gig was up.
“Nothing overtly suspicious. He refinanced the mortgage on the house six months ago, but a lot of people do that.”
“Any access to his finances?” She referred to the private, personal records.
A long pause. “You know that’s against the rules.”
Raven sighed. Yes, she knew that, just as she knew Dad would never cross that line. Why had she even asked? Dad represented everything good in the world. He wouldn’t break the law unless it was to protect his family.
But she knew who would. Mental note: call Bear.
“Have you run Sarah a second time, yet?” she asked.
“No, it wasn’t a priority. I was focusing on our other case. Why?”
“Just a vibe I get from her.” She stepped through a pile of dry leaves. Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
Dad chuckled, low and rumbly. “Well, she’s a shifter and engaged to Robert.”
“Yeah, I picked up a little fuzz in her scent.” She took the high road and didn’t comment on Robert. “But there’s something off about her. Something sinister.”
“What are you thinking?”
Raven turned another corner. A cool breeze washed over her. “Not sure yet. She’s hiding her nature and she wears socks in the house, so she doesn’t shift a lot. Maybe jackal or raccoon.” Just the two biggest shifter-run gangs in the Lower Mainland known for less than legal business dealings with the Other Realms. No big deal.
“Normally, I’d pick up either of those scents. She must wear a scent-cloaking spell of some kind.” Dad grunted. “I’ll look into it.”
“Okay, I’ll—”
A large hand grabbed her arm and hauled her into the alley. Another hand clamped over her mouth and muffled her cry. The man’s skin smelled like smoke and oil. She flailed, her arm flung out and sent her phone flying.
“Raven?” Dad’s voice barked on the other side of the line as the phone flew through the air. “RAVE—”
The phone smashed against the pavement near the entra
nce of the alley with a loud crack.
Raven flinched.
The man pulled her back, his beefy arm holding her across her body, pinning one arm against her side while he gripped the other with his hand.
His Other energy vibrated along her skin, soaked into her essence and dampened her own power, like a soggy towel. A shiver crept along her spine and her hair coiled into tight curls around her face.
His other hand still covered her mouth.
“If you scream, I will hurt you. Do you understand?” A deep voice fanned her ear. Not Cole’s. Not Bane’s. Great. Like she needed another dangerous man in her life.
Raven gulped and nodded. The hand slipped from her mouth. Was that even smart? Maybe she should’ve let him keep it there so she could bite him, draw blood and summon Cole.
“She’s going to get hurt anyway.” Another voice drew Raven’s attention.
A tall, lean man with dark hair, gray skin and the all-black eyes of the Other Realms turned the corner and walked into the alley toward them. His boots clicked on the pavement. His face had all the right components to make him handsome, but something about their sharpness and the calculation of his gaze gave him too harsh an appearance for that word.
“I don’t have any money.” She didn’t even need to lie about that.
The man’s thin lips widened to show jagged teeth. Like a shark. “I’m not here to rob you, Bhanrigh.”
Raven narrowed her eyes. She reached for her raven energy, but the other man still held her wrist and his power muted hers. Odin’s nutsack, she was getting sick of this. For some reason, dark fae energy short-circuited her own and she didn’t know why. What she did know was she always struggled to access her abilities when someone from the Other Realms physically touched her.
Except Cole.
Warmth bloomed in her chest at the thought of the Lord of Shadows, despite the serious situation. When Cole touched her, the dark powers she harboured inside came to life.
Well, Cole wasn’t here to help her. And neither were her powers, apparently. Even the shifting energy faded from her awareness. Time to flex that good ol’ noggin.
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