by Wren Weston
“That’s vague.” Tristan turned on a lamp, wincing. He fiddled with the controls, and the bright light in the room faded to a welcome dimness.
“I can’t find Oskar and the girls and figure out this too. Cut me a break.” She knelt on the floor, finally finding her underclothes and digging through the pile for her trousers.
“You have to live sometime, Lila.”
“Tell that to Oskar, and the kidnapped—”
“I know. I just meant—”
“I know what you meant.” She turned, annoyed to find Tristan’s hungry eyes following her every move. “Stop looking at me like I’m breakfast.”
“Then stop looking so delicious.”
Lila found her palm and scrolled through her messages. “Great. I’m to breakfast with my father. He gave me six weeks to look into the oracles, and he already wants an update.”
“That will be hours away, and you didn’t even have dinner. Let me make you something to eat,” he said, slipping out of bed. “Maria taught me how to make pancakes. Sort of.”
“Sort of?” Lila turned her eyes away, not wanting to stare after she’d just chastised him for doing the same thing.
“I asked her how to make them. Instead of teaching me, she cooked a bunch downstairs, tossed them in bags in my freezer, and told me how to heat them up. I think she’s scared of me.”
“It’s Maria. Maria is afraid of mice.”
“I would be too with those beady eyes and whiskers. Come on. Eat with me before you go.”
“I’ll eat later. I need to go home now.”
“You’re not eating much lately. I don’t like it.” Tristan helped her up and wrapped his arms around her. He smelled so good, felt so warm against her, both of them still mostly nude, both of them ready for another round.
Gods, what if she walked out now and it never happened again?
“Do you want to leave? Is that it?”
“No, I don’t want to go home. I just have a great deal to do.”
“You could work from the shop.”
“I work better from home. There are too many distractions here.”
“One of these days, I’m going to hop that wall and find you.”
“Don’t even joke about that,” she said, pulling away.
But Tristan didn’t let her go. He held her even more tightly. “Then come back tonight. I want to keep being with you. I miss you when you aren’t around. I know I need to stop telling you that. I know it bothers you, but I can’t help it.”
But it didn’t bother her. That was the problem.
“Go back to bed, Tristan. I’ll send you a message after I finish the list, and we’ll start working our way through it.”
He opened his mouth to say something more, then thought better of it. “At least promise me that you’ll eat something?”
“Sure.”
After one last kiss, Lila slipped downstairs in the darkness, her fingers tracing the newly painted walls as she made her way to the back door. She cringed at the thought of seeing anyone else in the shop, especially any of the night guards that Tristan had placed outside the building.
Turning the door handle, she held her breath and peeked outside. Samantha paced away from her, deeper into the alley. Tristan’s people always paced. It was sloppy, but it made it so much easier for her to get in and out undetected that she never said a thing.
Lila darted around to the mouth of the alley while Samantha’s back was turned, her Colt jutting from her hip and creating the familiar bulge that would keep everyone she met away. But the street was empty in the hours before dawn, too early for the workborn and too late for criminals and drunkards.
She crept into the parking garage, thankful her sedan had not been vandalized or stolen, and hopped inside. The ride home would give her enough time to wipe the silly grin off her face and think.
Tristan certainly wanted to be more than friends.
She did too. She wasn’t content with what had happened. She wanted more. Lots more.
She’d been worried about that. Getting too attached was a dangerous line to toe among highborn, a line Tristan had no experience navigating, a line Tristan wouldn’t respect.
Frowning, she pulled into the compound, ignoring Sergeant Nolan’s raised eyebrow, and parked in the garage. She slipped back upstairs, checking for bugs in her room. Then she turned on her desktop computer and pulled up the rest of Natalie’s accounts, prepared to complete her research before she met with her father.
She managed to find a great deal in a few hours now that she’d been laid good and proper, now that she didn’t have Tristan beside her, distracted by his grin, his smell, his little sighs, his lips, his cock.
Racing through every new contact she found, she tossed out anyone who turned out to be a highborn. Natalie wouldn’t bother partnering with a highborn crony. None would aid her, for the ensuing scandal of stealing and selling Oskar might cost the entire family its highborn status.
And the one who lost it for them?
Their body would never be found.
Lila rubbed her chin. What if a Randolph had helped Natalie?
Gods, she didn’t want to think about what would happen once the chairwoman found out. The punishment wouldn’t go through Lila and the security office, that was for damn sure, and Lila wouldn’t say a word against it.
No, a highborn wouldn’t risk her matron’s wrath—not anyone in the good graces of their family, anyway. The culprit might be a disgraced highborn, though, or perhaps another in the city who wouldn’t mind getting back at the Holguíns.
Someone like Tristan, if he’d gone into crime rather than crusading.
As she composed her list, she rated both types as equally likely to harbor Natalie, adding every property they owned, including those they’d bought or rented using fake accounts.
Once she finished her work, she had nearly a hundred properties from two dozen people.
Lila rubbed her eyes and ran through the list once more, shuffling it until she had a list of the ten likeliest properties. Picking up her palm, she typed out a message to Tristan. They’d check them out together after she had breakfast with her father.
It was too late for a workout, so she hopped into the shower, tossed some unmarked clothes into a satchel, and dressed in the same clothes she’d worn to have breakfast with her father two days before. She wondered if he’d even notice.
Probably not.
Lila arrived at Falcon Home ten minutes early, just in time to witness Marie Masson, the youngest sister of Chairwoman Masson, slip out of her father’s apartment, a last giggle still in her throat as he kissed him goodbye. She’d worn a thin burgundy dress and black boots, a color to honor her lover, rather than her family.
“Chief Randolph.” Ms. Masson laughed, giving Lila a hug and a kiss on the cheek. “How are you this morning?”
“Well, and you?”
“Well, but I fear you are fibbing. You look tired, child. You must get more sleep.” Ms. Masson stroked Lila’s cheek. “Henri, look at her? Such pale skin! See that she gets more rest. It does no good for the Randolph prime to burn herself out before she’s turned thirty.”
Lila gritted her teeth but did not correct her. Ms. Masson was a silly woman, but very sweet. You couldn’t help but love her, and her concern was genuine.
Because of that, Lila had always been secretly pleased at the match between Ms. Masson and her father. He needed someone light and joyful in his life, someone both silly and sweet. While her mother was her father’s best friend and soul mate, Ms. Masson was more of a playmate. Always had been. Always would.
“Yes, Marie,” her father said, patting her hand. “I’ll be sure to do that.”
Ms. Masson smiled and gave Lila and her father one last hug before trotting down the hall toward the stairs.
“Making the rou
nds, I see,” Lila said as she followed her father into his apartment.
“I have to catch up with my family, my lovers, and my children when I can. I suppose it’ll be easier when I retire. I can bounce back and forth between Unity and New Bristol and give everyone equal time.” He closed the door and escorted her into the dining room while a servant finished setting the table.
“Is that what we’re doing?” Lila asked when the servant bowed his way from the apartment. “Catching up?”
“As far as everyone knows. Everyone thinks that you’re my favorite child, and I do nothing to dissuade them from that theory.”
It wasn’t until that moment that Lila realized her father hadn’t asked a single personal question since he’d been in town. He’d nosed into who she was sleeping with, likely at her mother’s urging, but that had been another bit of highborn business. It had been a very long time since he’d merely sat with her, as Tristan’s father had tried to do, and spoken about her day.
They hadn’t caught up in ages.
They’d had briefings.
When had it all changed?
Lila sat down at the table, pushing aside the question. She could worry about it next time he came into town. She had far more urgent problems.
“I ordered waffles,” he said, pulling off the tops of the silver trays. “You can’t eat pancakes every day. You’re not five anymore.”
He winked as he sat across from her.
Lila poured maple syrup over her breakfast and updated him on her progress with the oracles, eyeing his plate to ensure he hadn’t added any sausage or bacon. She didn’t mention that she’d met the oracle twice in as many days. Instead, she kept her information light and sparse, saying only that she’d looked into records of the kidnapped and murdered girls but hadn’t drawn any conclusions yet. She’d only compiled lists and biographical data.
Lila sipped at her Sangre. “I disagree with your actions toward Rebecca. The oracles have had enough tragedy without you adding to it.”
“I’m not convinced that the parents weren’t involved,” he retorted, and bit into his waffle. “I’ll not give her back just to let it happen again. These girls need to be protected.”
“By strangers?”
“My gut says I shouldn’t give her back.”
“Is your gut prepared for the shitstorm that will erupt if you don’t? The oracles will not suffer the government stealing one of their own.”
“Are the oracles threatening to act?”
“Not that I’ve heard, but they’ve lost enough daughters without having a target. You’re giving them a big one. What do you think they’ll do once word leaks to the press, assuming they don’t leak it themselves? Do you honestly think they won’t use it to their advantage? Do you want to give your rivals the ammunition?”
“I won reelection with three-quarters of the vote last season. I’ve never backed off from anything because of an election.”
“Yes, that’s one thing the senate and the matrons respect about you, but the matrons will withdraw their support the moment your decisions impact their bottom line. Pissing off the faithful so that they demonstrate rather than shop will certainly do that.”
“I don’t care about the matrons’ attention on this one. My gut—”
“You can’t arbitrarily take a child from her parents based on your gut,” she snapped. “Your gut is not proof. Your gut isn’t infallible.”
“If something happens to that child—”
“Then it will be her parents’ fault. My gut is telling me that you’re wrong about this. My gut says that you’re slipping away from the confines of your position.”
He leaned back in his chair and snatched his wine, frowning. “You’re probably the only person in the entire country who will tell me I’m being an idiot to my face without having some agenda lurking in the background. I value your opinion. Always have, from the day you earned the rank of captain. Perhaps even before that.”
“But?”
“I don’t know who’s right about this one.”
“Fine, you have a desperate urge to save a girl? Surrender this battle and charge into another that saves more. Like the hospital.”
“That’s a segue worthy of your mother.” He swirled his wine. A thin purple sheen clung to the glass.
“I’m not lobbying. You know me better than that. All I’m saying is put your energies elsewhere while I look into things. Focus on the hospital. Pick a lowborn family for all I care, but find something else to do instead of obsessing about the oracles. It’s going to end your career.”
“Lots of things could end my career.”
“Yes, like promising a deal to the Randolphs in exchange for Oskar Kruger? What were you thinking, Father? You don’t think the matrons wouldn’t figure that one out in two seconds? You don’t have the political capital for these deals you’re trying to pull. No one does. I suggest you not waste what you do have by chasing children.”
“I just want a legacy, Lila. Is that so wrong?”
“You’re fifty. There’s time to worry about legacies later.”
“Is there? I can’t even eat bacon without a whole host of people muttering curses at me. If I don’t make councilman in the next few years, then I’ll be cast out of my position to make way for a younger prime minister. What do I have to show for it?”
“Fifteen well-placed children and the promise of grandchildren?”
“I mean professionally.”
“Gods, this is a midlife crisis, isn’t it?” Lila sighed. “Father, sometimes the best leaders can be defined by what they didn’t do, rather than what they did do. The war has not resumed. You could have urged Head Councilman Abbot to declare war after Peter Kruger tried to murder me.”
“I never wanted to be a quiet leader.”
“So you’d rather be a stupid one?”
He snorted and returned to his breakfast. “You’ll make a good matron one day.”
“No, I’ll continue to make a good chief. You can’t save everyone, and it’s not your responsibility to. You save who you can.”
“Where’d you learn that?”
“From Holly? From Commander Sutton? The Randolphs aren’t above domestic violence, you know. If I tried to take children away from their homes permanently instead of putting their parents through anger and relationship classes, we wouldn’t have had the success we’ve had in treating the problem. Sometimes you have to trust people if you want them to surprise you.”
“This isn’t domestic violence, Lila. Too many children have gone missing lately. Not only the oracles, but Oskar and his sister Maria. Someone even snatched Phillip Wilson a few hours after the auction on Saturday night. He never made it to the Hardwicke factory outside of town. There are too many children missing on my watch. I can’t suffer another one.”
“You can’t hold on to them so tightly that you break them, either. Trust me to look into the oracles and let Rebecca go back home to her parents.”
Lemaire rubbed his chin and returned to his wine, not giving her an answer.
Chapter 16
Lila parked her Cruz sedan in the same garage she’d used the night before. Rummaging in the back seat, she retrieved her satchel and trotted to Tristan’s shop. She didn’t slip on her hood until she’d darted into the alley behind the shop, waiting until the guard turned his back to slip through the door. The hallway smelled of sausage and biscuits and wine.
Creeping through the dim corridor, she slid into the garage, dodging the tangle of trucks and cars and motorcycles. Tristan and Fry called out to one another as they backed two trucks through the open dock doors.
“Hey, Hood,” Shirley said, looking up from her perch. She settled a small motor on a table and waved her closer. “I heard you’re taking the boys out hunting.”
Lila nodded.
“Good. They’ve
been driving me batshit insane the last few days. My team can finally get some work done without them hovering. I have four customers coming in at five o’clock, and we’ve barely started their repairs.”
“Does it matter? This is just a cover, isn’t it?”
“It’s still a business. Keep them out all day, will you? I’d consider it a personal favor.”
Lila laughed, drawing Tristan’s attention. He peeked through the dock door and grinned, strolling across the shop. “How’d you slip in?”
“By being sneaky.” She followed him to one of the trucks parked outside. She climbed into the passenger seat while he started the engine and pulled to the end of the street. Dixon and Frank stopped behind him. Fry and Dice backed a third truck from the shop’s dock door, bringing up the rear.
“Are we splitting up the list?”
Tristan’s eyes slid to the rearview mirror as they pulled into traffic. “No, I called them for backup. They’ll stay close in case we run into Natalie and Oskar. I have another few teams on standby.”
“You’re worried about Dixon,” she guessed, removing her hood as the other trucks made their own way to the first address.
“He’s not at one hundred percent. Last night exhausted him. I shouldn’t have let him come along.”
“He’s a grown man.”
“He’s my family, and he’s unwell.”
“And you don’t want to let him out of your sight? Dixon can take care of himself. He’s used to leading teams, not being watched like he’s some invalid child.”
Tristan’s gaze flitted to his vibrating palm. “If he could manage to stay awake for more than five minutes, I might feel better about the situation. Apparently, he’s already sawing logs in the front seat. Send them a message not to wake him, will you? I’m driving.”
Lila tapped out the message. “A nap will do him some good. It’ll take us twenty minutes to get to the first address.”
A nap would have done her some good as well. She’d just begun to stretch her toes when Tristan intertwined his fingers with hers. He didn’t seem to care that he had only one hand to steer.