Chapter 48
Chapter Forty-Eight
Ilyas
Chet arrived first, a resigned look on his face, but when he stepped into his office and saw all the piles of paperwork were now filed, he grinned. A dragon grinning, even in his human form, was a terrifying thing.
“I was convinced I was going to get my ass handed to me by some fucking pen pusher, but this?” He waved to the filing cabinet like it was a magical artifact.
“You might still get your ass kicked. Deuce needs to go back to elementary school and work on his handwriting. I’ve seen creatures who lack opposable thumbs with neater penmanship,” Otis grumbled behind the desk.
He stood and stretched, flexing the kinks out of his back after a long night of pouring over paperwork and call outs.
Speaking of the devil, I could hear Deuce and Liam in the foyer. They were joking around with Louis and making Hailey laugh.
Chet noticed the cut on her face, and the temperature in the room rose ten degrees. “What happened to the human?”
Otis’s teeth audibly ground together. “She was attacked by a human in front of the center. Told her she’d have to bring a bomb into the building when the time was right, or he’d find her and murder us all. Gave her a fucking pager, of all things. Do they even work anymore?”
“Not a burner phone?” Chet asked, equally as surprised. “What happened then?”
Otis recounted it with a professional tone that belied his very unprofessional interest in Hailey. “Hailey said he was human, that he smelled like body odor and meth, but I’d still take it seriously. He was dropping names and the anti-human movement like he had some kind of authority.”
Chet nodded. “Desperate people do desperate things.” He looked at Hailey and then quickly back at us. “Do you think she’s still part of the preservers of humanity movement? A sleeper cell?”
I was growling low in my throat before I even consciously acknowledged his words.
He gave me an appraising look but turned back to Otis.
My boss cleared his throat. “No. I don’t think she has any ulterior motive being here.
She didn’t ask for the job, we pressed it upon her.
Honestly, I feel like we’ve maneuvered her into this corner without much choice on her part.
They just saw her as the weakest link and exploited it. ”
“What does Syke say?”
That he was stupidly in love with her but didn’t actually know what the feeling was. I didn’t think Syke had ever loved anyone before, not even himself, but his rage at her injuries was beyond friendly.
“That she’s an open book and she had nothing to do with this or the preservers of humanity movement. She’s a victim, Chet.”
The old dragon sighed, slumping down onto the table. “Some people are born to be victims of others, society, and themselves.”
I shook my head. “Not Hailey.”
The elevator door dinged, and Louis shouted, “The auditor is here.”
We left Chet’s office and moved into the open office area.
The woman who stepped out of the elevator was surprising—a hybrid, or janus, depending on whom you asked.
Essentially she was half human and half creature.
It was a tough world to grow up in when you were neither one nor the other.
I couldn’t tell what creature she was, but her human half was no nonsense in a gray business suit.
She held a large box of equipment. Liam launched forward, taking the box from the diminutive janus.
A brief look of panic crossed her face before she steeled herself.
“Hello, my name is Eleanor. I’ll be your auditor.” She looked past the group, back toward Chet. “You must be the center manager.”
The big dragon nodded and tilted his head at his office. “Come this way. I’ll show you where you can work while we get this farce underway.”
Eleanor’s face hardened. “I promise you, Mr. Drokan, that no part of my investigation will be a farce. I’m here to do a job, and I intend to do it with thoroughness and integrity.”
Chet opened his mouth to argue, and I could see smoke curling from his nostrils. Apparently, the little hybrid had never learned not to poke a dragon.
“What Chet means is that the only reason there is an audit is because one of the committee members is using it as a battering ram to push his own agenda. He’s using you as a cudgel to beat me into submission. No reflection on your integrity was meant.” At least, I didn’t think so.
Her eyes narrowed on me. “Which committee member?”
I wondered if I should watch what I say, in case it buried us deeper than we were already buried, but fuck it. “My flight’s key, Adrik Aloma. He’s trying to manipulate me to do what he wants by threatening the crisis center, which he already thinks is a profession below my standing.”
Eleanor’s face gave nothing away, but she sniffed. “I see. Well, I can assure you that despite whatever prompted this audit, my report will be fair and truthful. I won’t be… embellishing to further anyone else’s agenda.”
I inclined my head. I had to respect the hybrid’s gumption in the face of a wall of creatures. “Appreciated.”
She looked back at Chet, her expression returning to its neutral mask. “Lead the way, Mr. Drokan.”
“Chet,” he prompted, but she ignored him.
I looked at Otis, and his eyes followed them to the conference room that she would use as a workspace for the foreseeable future. When he slid his eyes back to me, he was wearing the same expression as I was—a look that said, “What the fuck?”
“Did that feel tense to anyone else?” Hailey asked softly.
Everyone gave a little grumble of agreement. It was time for us to go. “Where’s Allison?” I asked the members of team two.
“Otis didn’t tell you? Chet put her on leave for breaching the privacy policy when she ratted Syke out to the arches.”
I looked at Otis, whose face was professional and entirely unsurprised, and then to Hailey and Syke, and back to team two.
“Sorry about that.”
Liam shrugged. “We don’t blame you guys.
Chet said we can’t have someone on the team who doesn’t have our backs, and that she had to have two weeks off instead of one to decide if she wanted this job as a team member or an informant.
” He kept his voice low in case our new auditor had creature level hearing.
“I agreed. We’ll be short staffed for the week, but it’ll be fine. Keeps us from getting bored.”
Syke rocked back on his heels. “We’re on call if you need us.”
Deuce slapped him on the arm. “We know. Now get out of here and enjoy your week off. It was nice to officially meet you, Hailey. Let me know if you get tired of these grumpy bastards and want to come to team two.”
I let out a soft grumble, and that just made them laugh. We collected our crap and piled into the elevator.
It was tight with us all inside—minus Eric, of course, who had already gone into work. Hailey looked up at me. “You’re coming home with me too, aren’t you?” she asked, and I looked down at her, from her sparkling blue eyes to the moonstone nestled in her cleavage and back again.
“Of course. You’re my flight now. I have to go pack some things, but I’ll be right behind you.”
She wet her bottom lip. “Will you be okay? Do you need to take one of the guys?”
The idea was so funny that I actually laughed. The deep rumble bubbled up inside me before I could stop it, and everyone in the elevator car looked at me with wide eyes.
“Did you just laugh?” Louis asked, and I ignored him.
I wrapped a wing around Hailey, pulling her tightly to my side. “Little hailstorm, I’ll be fine, but perhaps one of the others could bring a car, because I can’t carry much on the back of my bike.”
As the elevator doors opened, Louis bumped his shoulder into mine. “I’ll bring my truck if Otis is okay taking Hailey home.”
My minotaur friend rumbled his immediate agreement, but his ears flicked slightly, a tell that he was… bashful? Embarrassed? Excited? Who even knew.
Louis kissed Hailey like he was going off to war and not to pick up my crap from an affluent area filled with brownstones and snobby gargoyles.
I watched as Otis held the door open for her, looking like he wanted to lean in and buckle her seatbelt too, then Syke slid in the back, throwing us a wink.
Louis chuckled beneath his breath. “Do you think Otis knows how bad he has it?”
I shook my head. “No, but he deserves the happiness that’ll come if he lets himself grasp it.”
Sliding into the driver’s seat, Louis hummed his agreement. “We all do. You included.”
We pulled out of the parking garage, and I was glad I wouldn’t have to see the place again for another five days.
The trip to my former home was quiet, and my thoughts whirled.
I was doing this. I was courting a human and an orc.
I would never be allowed back in my flight or possibly any others.
I expected to feel some kind of grief or loss, but I felt nothing except relief.
The weight of their expectations was gone, or maybe I’d done the worst thing I could in their eyes, and there was nowhere else I could go but further down.
I didn’t need to try to hold myself to their standards and stand idly by while they paraded me like some prize winning cockerel.
Louis pulled into guest parking, and we sat there for a moment in silence. “Do you need me to come up with you?” he asked, and I shook my head.
“No. I don’t have a lot of stuff. I’ll be back down in like, twenty minutes.”
Louis chewed his lip. “You sure you’ll be okay? If you aren’t down in thirty, I’m coming up to get you.”
Silly, brave Louis. He was strong and dominant, but he had nothing on a gargoyle, even if we weren’t really a fighting species anymore. We would much rather emotionally manipulate you into doing what we wanted than fight you for it.
I walked into the lobby of my building, and when I saw Adrik, I knew someone must have narced about my return. He smirked widely, obviously happy he’d made good on his threat.
“Home early? Did the auditor already find something egregious? I’m not surprised.” He shook his head like he was truly disappointed instead of ecstatic at the idea that he might actually defund a public service that helped thousands of creatures a year.
“End of my shift,” I mumbled, stepping around him toward the elevator.
He went to climb into the elevator car with me, but I stood in the way.
“Adrik, I’d like to formally inform the flight that I have begun a courtship and will bond with two potential mates—a human and an orc.
I will be moving from the flight as of today.
” I looked the key directly in the eye so he could see my dominance and strength.
“Fight me on this, and I will take this fucking flight from you with a dominance battle that you will not win. Like the gargoyles of old, we’ll battle, and the position of key will be mine.
You’re old and weak. Let me leave with your dignity intact, or I will delight in taking everything from you. ”
I stepped back and held his gaze as the doors closed. It was done, but I didn’t think it would be the end of it. It never was with men like Adrik.