“So that’s why you joined the task force?” Considine asked. “To prove slayers could protect?”
“Yes,” I answered, then mentally paused even as we strode down the hallway shoulder to shoulder.
Wait, should I have told him that? What’s safe to tell him? Or am I just overthinking things? He did help me with Gisila, but he’s an elder vampire…
“If you think much harder, you’re going to overheat your brain,” Considine said.
“I don’t understand your motivation,” I said.
“I already told you I’m here to protect you. Because I fancy you.” Considine bumped his shoulder against mine and flashed a flirtatious smile I’d seen on Ruin’s lips, but not Connor’s confusingly enough. “Do you want me to explain what I mean by fancy?”
“No,” I said, my tone too close to a wail.
Considine chuckled. “Don’t strain yourself, Jade. I’m being honest, but I don’t expect you or your squad to welcome me with open arms.”
I pondered that for a moment. “And you don’t care that we won’t?”
“Not really, no.” Considine looked up and down the hall, taking in the marked doors. “I’m here to keep you alive. Tricking you into returning my feelings can wait until I squish whatever plans that winged lizard is trying to hatch.”
Return his feelings? Return…feelings?
I stopped outside the door that would open up into the rooms used for bagging and processing evidence, and studied Considine.
He was a strange mixture of Connor and Ruin, with Connor’s casual manners and way with words, while retaining the deadly air that accompanied Ruin everywhere.
One step at a time. Forget…feelings. That’s not happening, given I have no idea what parts of him are true and what are lies. Today I just have to process that he’s mypartner. I can do this.
I took a breath and pushed the door open, walking into a room that looked like a weird cross between a college lab room and an office. “This is the room used to test and bag evidence. We mostly deal with magical evidence—artifacts, spells, potions, and occasional weapons. It’s processed here before it’s connected to a case file and sorted out to the appropriate room for storage.”
The Commissioner cobbled the room together based on observations of CSI shows. Previously it had horrendous green lighting due to the influence of a human TV show, but the techs had revolted and the lighting was swapped out.
Considine took in the room, his eyes carefully tracing over the standing desks, the stacks of empty boxes, and the plastic bags and labels used to bag and mark evidence, as well as a few sealed containers that glowed with fae spells designed to hold malevolent magic. “I see. How unique.”
“The humans do it better,” I confessed. “Most of the Department of Supernatural Law Enforcement is arranged around what some of the higher ups saw on human detective and police procedural TV shows and movies. But we’re learning.”
I watched Considine as he frowned at an X-ray film viewer I’m pretty sure we had only because several police shows also showed morgues and the Commissioner hadn’t noticed the difference between evidence rooms and morgues. “How did you do it?” I asked.
Considine raised his eyebrows at one of the sealed containers, then turned to me. “Do what?”
“Get Queen Leila to recommend you to the task force?”
He grinned and casually leaned against one of the standing desks. “Money applied at the right place is an excellent lever,”
“Youbribedher?”
“No.” Considine pushed off the desk and prowled toward me. “She wouldn’t take a bribe. I had to make a sizable donation to the Curia Cloisters. Apparently, there are some changes the Midwest Committee of Magic wants to make, and she wants to avoid the fae getting tapped for additional funds. She seems to have an irrational fear of the human IRS.”
Considine was almost upon me, so to avoid him I scuttled toward the door on the far side of the room. “I see.”
“What, you’re not going to lecture me?” Considine asked, his pace slow and casual as he followed me.
“Well. Donations are legal.” I set my hand on the doorknob, the uncertainty in my voice making me cringe. “And if you’d done something truly heinous, the wizards wouldn’t have stood for it.”
“Forget the wizards. Killian Drake is the real thorn in my side,” Considine grumbled.
“The vampire Eminence? Why?” I asked. “Isn’t he a Dracos—the offspring of one of your friends?”
“Yes,” Considine confirmed. “And he doesn’t want me here.” He gave another sigh—this one more dramatized. “He’s in a rebellious stage, it would seem. Trying to assert his independence and all of that rot.”
