Fuck them.
I went to corporate and apologized to Lewis when it was clear he was waiting for me. He waved it off and asked about the situation with the snakes and what was being done. He was clearly as frustrated as I was.
Yeah, we all were a bit over it and on so many fronts.
Lewis was beyond amazing though. He was my right hand in corporate. A gluttony demon who was basically my life and work partner in too many ways. He did everything from personal assistant work to running my department besides the tech part to organizing my undercover details to… He was amazing.
And unlike others who wanted promotions and bigger titles, he didn’t.
Then again, being the right hand of power was a really good spot to be in.
Asafe one, which was his main goal.
Plus, I paid him ridiculously well because I was always grateful and never forgot him. Ever.
I took the file that he had composed, knowing I would dig into it way more. Or have Mason do it.
Steven Scalf was found dead in his home two days ago. No forced entry. No cameras or anything that gave any indication of who did it. No listed possible murder weapon or conclusion of how it happened.
There were even a few notes that one of the detectives objected to it being ruled a murder and suspected some type of drug interaction given the state of the body. He wanted that on the record for the coroner and the autopsy that wasn’t even done yet.
Red flag number one.
“Tell me what I want to hear,” I muttered as I flipped through more.
“Undeclared area,” Lewis confirmed.
I let out a slow breath and read the rest, agreeing that this was probably our killer. The one I’d been hunting for almost two decades.
The slimy fucker who always slipped our net and drove me fucking insane.
Mostly because I was pretty sure it was one of us. I was—my gut told me it was a demon. The others didn’t agree, but something told me it was.
And I’d done a lot—surviveda lot by trusting my gut.
First of all, an undeclared area was smart. They were complicated, and that always worked to a predator’s advantage.
The world was mostly split into areas that accepted supes or didn’t. But then there were areas that either turned a blind eye, like pretending we didn’t exist, or just didn’t want to handle it one way or another. Like they didn’t want to be on the hook for it.
Specifically in the US, it was more complicated than that. It was typically an area that had voted to repeal the “human only” legislation or mandate but hadn’t really figured out how to incorporate us yet. Their leaders couldn’t come to an agreement or couldn’t get the new rules passed.
So it was in limbo. Some for years and years.
Basically, it was like Mexico with cannabis. It wasn’t illegal anymore, but it wasn’t legal either.
Which made it interesting that this killer in particular always picked those areas.
But it was only ever three victims. Once a year. Normally right after the New Year, and that was a ridiculously hard profile to keep up with.
Andthey hadn’t stuck to the US, but generally North America. So we thought.
Plus, we normally focused on the assholes who hurt women and killed strippers, sex workers, and the like. This killer was on the other side.
They went after those who visited such establishments. So the victim profile was ridiculous. Cops not even agreeing it was murder, and three dead before gone for a year. A new location. Murders or reports not reaching our ears until three in an undeclared area and we’d missed our chance.
“We’re sure this is the first?” I checked.
“Yes. Completely sure,” he confirmed. “It was even in the news report that it’s the first death they’ve had in months in the area that wasn’t just like old man someone and something died from a bad ticker. Cops were rambling about it on the quick report in the bigger city. Seattle news.”
