Show Them
ROGUE
This is why Society agents hate dealing with Sibbies or any other fucking agencies—they’re such dipshits.
I cut Archie off before he makes this worse by arching a brow at Raskin.
Staying quiet until he backs down, I keep my triumphant grin to myself.
“My partner and I know many things that you probably believe we should not. However, our clearance is much higher than anyone in this building, and if you force us to call in a rep from our employers, it will not go well for you.”
Barcec frowns, looking at me, then Reb, then back at Archie. “I don’t see how that’s relevant.”
Rebel snorts, his temper simmering in the air like a slow-burning blaze.
“Because Archer isn’t just our friend—his dads are on the Shifter Council.
We’ve invoked for him twice, which has been ignored, and when our superiors or his family find that out?
You’re all going to be busted back to fucking Wichita or some other Podunk town far away.
He’s too humble to flaunt his stature or his fame in your face, so I will.
Stop trying to make fetch happen before you end up on the wrong side of some powerful people. ”
“You never said ‘lawyer’; you just said he was done talking,” Raskin pleads weakly. His posture says he knows he fucked up now, and I grin broadly as his failure seeps into his bones. “We’re only trying to understand your missing teammate, Mr. Glaser. Seems to me you’d want to help.”
I hold up my hand before the lion responds.
“He does and he will. However, it will not be here or now. Unless you’re charging him, we’re walking out of here with our friend.
We can have his attorney contact the station, so he can come in and give a formal statement.
Your tactic might fly with people who aren’t savvy and don’t know how dangerous it is to answer questions without representation, but Archer is not one of them. ”
They look at one another, communicating silently for a moment before Raskin turns back to us. “He’s free to go. But if we don’t hear from you, Mr. Glaser, we will come looking.”
Archie lets out a breath of relief, then salutes the Fed. “Aye, aye, Agent Asshat!”
“We’re not pirates,” Barcec mutters grumpily.
I roll my eyes, offering Archie my hand, and he rises as he takes it.
“You should know that we will have to report our contact with you and the locals. Guardians are required to report every enforcement community interaction, even if it’s minimal.
That helps the Society monitor how our names are mentioned in your systems and prevent us from being exposed to anyone who should not know.
Keep that in mind when you file things, agents. ”
Raskin nods, but I know he’s pissed. He was ready to go off when he got back to his desk, whether it was in his report, to his co-workers, or even to his boss.
My warning has him reconsidering that, and that’s why I said it.
Guardians—with or without charges—must be kept under wraps until they have fulfilled their duties.
Even after their charges can go on sans monitoring, they are re-assigned to rapid response teams to assist in bigger problems. Revealing our identities is like burning a human spy’s cover, and the Society would come down on those assholes like a ton of bricks.
“Come on, guys,” I say to the twins, Reb, and Javi. “It’s time for Arch to get his stuff and for us to get out of here without the press seeing. We don’t need to be on the six o’clock news.”
Archie and Javi go first, then the demons, and before we exit, both Rebel and I give the Feds one last challenging look before we follow.
Putting the fear of our highest bosses into the growly Minotaur is a good thing—he’s the most likely to fuck us over for an easy solve.
As we walk down the hallway to the locker room, I whisper to Archie. “Do you really need anything here? I’d like to avoid more cops if possible. They’re looking to pin this on someone quickly and get it off their plates.”
“Nah. I can come back another time, or wait until the next practice,” he says as his gaze moves to the guard in front of the door. “Let’s make our way to the back and get out of here.”
“Ang, you and D go out the front and get the cars. Bring them around back as inconspicuously as you can, and I’ll get him in there,” Reb says as he tosses his keys to the elder demon. “I don’t know how you fuckers got here so fast, or what you had to leave to show up, but I appreciate it.”
Javi winks and then shrugs. “I got Dragonfly’s text. She must have been very surreptitious about it as you guys pulled up. It gave me enough time to call these two, who picked me up and… perhaps cheated a bit to get here in time.”
My eyes widen, and I smack Damon’s arm. “You’re not supposed to use that kind of magic where the humans can see it!”
He chuckles, then fist-bumps his brother. “Trust me, they didn’t see shit. That’s how fast we were going.”
Goddess save me from men and their reckless bullshit, I fucking swear.
The twins got the cars to the loading area fairly quickly, and before I knew it, we were sneaking around the police barriers with ease.
Archie pointed out the service entrances used by players avoiding the press—not what they’re there for, but that’s jocks for you—and we even got away from the arena without a tail.
I was worried for a few minutes when I saw an older sedan behind us for a few blocks; however, Reb and Ang revved up their engines to ditch it within minutes.
I’m not sure it was a cop or even a reporter, but there's no use courting disaster by ignoring something obvious.
“Archie, is Badger really the type to fuck off without notice if he’s mad?”
The lion nods, sighing heavily. “Dude is the least chill person I’ve ever met, including you, Reb.”
I snicker as my stepbrother mutters under his breath then turns back to my mate. “So he could have done that this time. Maybe he did, and someone planted evidence to frame the players. Badger himself could have done it, I suppose.”
“Uh, no. Badger is not the ‘think ahead and plot’ type, Wheels. He’s the ‘accidentally kill someone in a blind rage’ kind of guy. He definitely wouldn’t think that many steps ahead.”
Rebel licks his tongue as he races through the streets, obviously considering Archie’s info.
“Mmm. Well, if he’s not that bright and very hair-trigger, maybe he was kidnapped, but not for anything connected to the other shit.
Yeah, the idiot Feds reacted when we mentioned it, but that doesn’t mean this actually is connected. Chaos and butterfly wings, you know?”
“I don’t know if chaos theory or Occam’s Razor is going to help us on this one, Reb.” I bite my lower lip, spinning the pieces in my head as I try to make a full picture. “I guess we’re lucky Badger wasn’t lying in a pool of his own blood like our new friends’ rival was.”
At the mention of Morgana, Archie beams at me. “There’s a lot of ‘arctic’ big guys in hockey, obviously, because they’re suited to it. But that kid was scouted pretty intensely before State U picked him up. He could have had his pick of supe unis; I looked it up.”
I didn’t know that.
Giving him a curious look, I tilt my head. “When?”
“I’m not always on the ice when I’m here, Wheels. Sometimes the other strings are doing things, sometimes I’m in the box, sometimes I’m watching the plays… Coach likes to make sure we’re well-rounded.”
I arch a brow, my lips curved up in amusement. “How is playing on your phone making you ‘well-rounded’?”
“It’s not.” He chuckles and shrugs. “I was having trouble focusing today; it happens. To keep him from noticing, I was pretending to look at stuff on my phone, then at the ice. That’s how I made time to check on the surface half of our loose alliance.”
“What else did you find?” Reb asks as he heads onto the highway, accelerating quickly.
My cuddly lion shrugs. “The stuff about the Dean lady and her chopping off her ex’s head—but that’s old news by now. Gotta say I admire a chick who has the stones to face a dragon with a broadsword alone and come out on top.”
“Stones, ha,” I snicker as he grins proudly. “But you’re right—we’ve faced various dragons, and they’re not to be trifled with. Morgana comprises two very strong mythicals, but that was insanely risky and super impressive.”
“Agreed,” Rebel says as he passes a semi and then hits the gas again. “What about the others? The professor and the student?”
Archie shrugs. “I didn’t remember their names, honestly. The kid caught my attention because he could play against me someday, you know? And the dragon-slayer woman is hard to forget.”
Pressing my fingers to my eyes, I groan. “How on earth could you forget the fucking Prince and heir to the entire Fae court, babe?”
He blinks. “I dunno. I don’t much care what they’re doing over in Sparkle Land, Rogue. The only faeries I give a shit about are in this car giving me a hard time after a very rough day.”
“Don’t be a drama queen, Arch.” Reb looks over his shoulder, then back at the road.
“Royalty isn’t a big deal for some things, especially in this realm, but that guy is a big deal, even to non-Fae.
There are four courts, and someday he’ll be in charge of one.
That’s like being in charge of a quarter of this planet, man. ”
“He’s not my king, so I don’t give a fuck,” Archie says stubbornly. “Well, except that he seems to be on our side and since we saw assholes from his realm in the bad guy roll call… I guess that’s important.”
“It is,” I reply without thinking. “We will need lots of strong supes from all over if this becomes an out-and-out war. The more elite the bloodline, the higher powered the Fae will be. A prince of Daybreak is an enormous ally.”
Archie frowns. “But you guys are really powerful, especially you, Wheels.”
“I’m a hybrid nobody, and my power isn’t really normal.”
Rebel grunts, shifting as he changes lanes.
“I’ve got juice, man, but you haven’t seen shit until you see what royals can do.
Rogue is right about her shit, though. No one has a clue why she is the way she is.
Since Graciella and Odhran won’t spill on how they got us, we don’t know how to trace her line.
She might have some distant relatives who are distantly related to low-level royals or something. We just don’t know.”
“The hybrid thing is so weird,” the lion mutters, and I smack his arm hard.
“Ow! I don’t mean like that, babe. I mean…
the old rules said species and realms couldn’t crossbreed, which led to this huge amount of abandoned, possibly supernatural kids popping up all over.
They put together an entire government and infrastructure to deal with it, but all it did was highlight that the realms and species were doing whatever the fuck they wanted, law be damned.
It’s like… equal and opposite reactions, you know? ”
“I’m not sure Newton has anything to do with gods and shifters and Fae fucking, but okay.” Rebel snorts as he turns off the expressway to head toward our home. “Supes do not differ from humans in some ways, man. Tell them they can’t do something and they’ll do it harder.”
“Plus, people fuck up. They get drunk or high, and jump someone. The Fates meddle in shit. There’s so many ways that the stupid law could go wrong, and it did.
” I shrug, sighing as I lean back in my seat.
“Somewhere a Fae and a Cubi had a fling, and Reck and I were made. The gap between that and how my asshole adoptive folks got us is a black hole. No one’s been able to answer that question anymore than where they sent him before they got Rebel. ”
I frown, trying not to let thinking about my real twin cloud my day.
Even if I swear that someday, I will find out what happened to him and take my vengeance on everyone involved.