15. I can’t win this one, can I? #5
“That plus angelic verification, which I did after your apartment was bombed and the 120 Wall Street incident.”
“Wait. You angelically verified that? But why?”
“I am an overbearing police chief who had a crush on you, and I am considered ruthless enough to napalm my future wife’s apartment in a shameless ploy to make her move in with me.”
My mouth dropped open. “You wouldn’t!”
He laughed. “I know that, Commissioner Dowry knows that, everyone who knows me knows that, but any time a chief is determined to have personal involvement with a crime, we have to verify our lack of involvement. Morrison dodged that because he’s a clever asshole—but his game was up the instant he had Janet kidnapped.
He forgot when something happens to one of our cops, if any law enforcement officer questions the situation, the chief will be required to undergo angelic verification. ”
“You don’t think he would make it through verification.”
“I know he wouldn’t. But the accusation involving you overrode his connection to Janet’s kidnapping.
Assuming he’s caught, that’ll be carefully scrutinized, but nobody had made the base accusation of his direct involvement.
It was on the minds of a lot of people, but he hadn’t been formally accused, and innocent until proven guilty still applies. ”
“Right. But we’re piling up a lot of evidence, though it’s circumstantial right now, isn’t it?”
“The instant an angel verifies the truth from a victim, that’s that. Angels cannot lie or they fall, and it’s pretty damned obvious when an angel falls. As such, Morrison is already guilty of a felony and will lose his rank. How much more guilt is on his shoulders remains to be seen.”
“All right. So, what do we do at this place we’re going to today?”
“We check for evidence, and if it’s there, we contact the CDC.
If there’s no evidence, we leave and head for Long Lake at your father’s recommendation.
I don’t want to see what Ra will do to protect you, and the last thing we need is a divine breaking one of the universal laws because his daughter can’t stay out of trouble.
I expect there will be trouble, but at least it’s sanctioned trouble, and your father can handle that.
Surprise trouble that threatens you or your mother?
Let’s just say while Egyptian, the consequences of him breaking certain rules would probably help the End of Days come along in a hurry.
Divine doesn’t mean infallible, and he’s pretty damned aware he’s missed out on the entirety of your life so far.
Anything that might cut your life short?
He won’t handle it well.” My husband sighed. “Neither would I.”
“It would be weird if you did. In other news, I don’t handle threats to you very well, either.”
“Oh, you handle them just fine. Except you tend to get yourself hurt in the process. And even when you don’t get hurt, you find some way to scare the liver out of me.”
I frowned. “Where do you think that asshole cadet got that ambrosia from anyway?”
“That is a very good question, and truth be told? I’m not sure it’s one I want the answer to.
The last thing I need is to have to face off against some idiot divine with a dire lack of common sense and ethics.
The last I checked, the CDC was investigating to see if they were missing any ambrosia.
Morrison has access to one of the CDC vaults, so chances are, he just stole it from there.
That is also a felony, and that would become a critical part of the flame game should it be proven to be the case. ”
“Why? Because people don’t tend to like when mere men attempt to become gods, or that there is a high chance of the ambrosia taking him out along with an entire city block out when he goes?”
“Mostly the general acceptance he would be taken out along with an entire city block. People don’t like when assholes are willing to kill them for the sake of power.”
“I agree with that. Can we make a plan other than don’t destroy evidence, call people at the appropriate times, make sure our furry prince and princesses are content, and eliminate all threats to our children?”
“A plan for accomplishing those things would be nice.”
“Quinn, look at who you’re talking to here. Have I ever made a plan that actually survived to its conclusion?”
“You did pretty well with those phoenixes, although I would appreciate if you did not do that again. Phoenixes are really bad for my blood pressure. Your plan to run away from home went off pretty well, too. You made it to your destination and acquired what you set out to acquire.”
“A full night of sleep is vastly underrated, Quinn. However, I would be content enough with maybe only two or three nights of those a week. It turns out I don’t sleep all that well when you’re not around, and that sucked.”
“I will do my best to make sure your sleeping needs are met.”
As I could interpret that in one of two ways, I eyed him.
He smirked.
Evil, evil, delicious gorgon-incubus doohickey. “You’re a bad, bad man, Sam.”
“I try.”