had no idea, but he obviously thought he was running for his life. He murdered a bunch of his friends, then a supernatural pharmaceutical company took an interest in him? He escaped five years ago? He wasn’t running from human law since humans had no idea where he had been for the last ten years.
The good people at Mygi had him for five of those years. Holy shit, Paden, you had good instincts on this one. This guy is probably a gold mine of information and blackmail you can make millions off of.
I took more pictures, knowing I was in for some interesting reading once I was out of there. Then my phone buzzed in my hand, and I saw Carter’s name.
Carter: They just left, probably headed home. I know I am since dawn is only a few short hours away. Whatever you’re doing, don’t get killed, please.
I quickly took pictures of the last stack, thanking my lucky stars Carter knew I was going to need the heads up. Shoving my phone in my pocket, I made my way back to the attic and closed it up. Once I was shifted into my snake form, I took the same route out, carefully climbing down the building. I had to move fast. I forgot to check the time before shifting, but if dawn was coming, people were going to be waking up. My car wasn’t in a good spot, and I couldn’t get caught shifting back into my human form where people could see me.
I found a quiet place between two houses and shifted, then jogged to my car. Sinclair and his friends didn’t have a long drive to get home, and I needed to get out of the neighborhood before they had a chance to see me. One of them being fae was inconvenient. He would be immune to the Look Away charm.
I was able to make it out of the neighborhood without seeing any of them and breathed a sigh of relief as I jumped onto the 101 and headed toward home.
“If I play my cards right, I can find Raphael before they’re active tonight. Sinclair’s little minions won’t move on the human until he’s ready, and he can’t do anything until after the sun goes down.”
My phone started to ring, and I picked it up, not paying attention to the caller ID.
“You never came back last night after you ran into Sinclair. Am I going to assume you aren’t going to drop this?” Paden sounded tired and annoyed. “I know I gave it to you, but I don’t want you out there doing something stupid.”
“I actually just got a load of good intel you’re probably going to be interested in, Paden.” I grinned. “He was running from Mygi. They had him for five years after he killed all his buddies that night, and he escaped. Been running ever since.”
“Wait, so they made him not exist? They’re the reason he disappeared completely?” Paden seemed as intrigued as I thought he would be. “Well, that is interesting.”
“Oh yeah. I highly doubt this is a case of a human employee gone rogue. This feels more sinister, without a doubt.” I was amped up. This was the kind of thing I lived for. Not so much the saving the human thing, but the dirt. I loved sticking my nose in the business of the dirtiest, most underhanded pieces of shit in the supernatural world. It gave me a rush and kept me going, day in and day out.
“I might need to bring Cassius in or some other Investigator, but I’m going to wait until I have Raphael in hand. I have to find and get him today because, apparently, Sinclair has plans to grab him after he sleeps.”
“Well, your new information makes mine seem light and stupid,” Paden mumbled. “You’re moving a lot faster with this than I thought you would.”
“I’m moving a lot faster than I thought I would. Tell me what you got.”
“It’s nothing. Stupid personal shit.”
“Paden, that’s the best stuff. If you give me a way to make him emotionally vulnerable, I might get him to hand over information willingly.”
He chuckled in my ear. I felt bad for his wife—Paden’s chuckle was like something out of a porno, meant to get women worked up. His wife probably had to beat those women off with a stick. I had only met her a handful of times, but once she realized I didn’t see Paden like that, she was an easy