He’d been seen accompanied by a young man with red hair, dressed all in green.
It looked like I had a lead, after all.
CHAPTER 3
As much as I wanted to head straight to investigating my potential lead, I couldn’t. If I left right now, I was sure to be a suspect for the break-in. After committing a crime, the best way to avoid blame was to be at the center of the investigation to redirect as needed.
After an early morning stop at the cobblers, I headed toward the Syndicate safehouse, scuffing my new shoes so they appeared older, and found Brent halfway down the cobbled lane, also heading the same way. He lifted a hand in greeting, cheerful as ever.
“Morning, Gil,” he called. “You look unusually clean today. Did you finally take a bath?”
“My mam forced me, and I figured I’d try it to see if I liked it,” I answered. “But I don’t see what all the fuss is about.”
“Girls like it,” Brent told me with a grin.
I let out a noise of disgust. “I don’t care about girls. Everyone talks about how expensive they are, and I prefer to keep my coin for myself.”
He barked a laugh. “Well then, it’ll help if your targets can’t smell you coming from a mile away.”
We fell into step together, boots striking the cobblestones in easy rhythm. Brent looked at some of the reward posters the Nightsworn had tacked up all over town. A few matched the ones that the Syndicate had listed, but a few others were different, including several for notable bounty hunters.
“Didn’t you get a new mission?” Brent asked. “You just finished with Silas yesterday. Knowing you, I figured you’d be halfway across Berkway right now, tracking down a new target.”
My shoulders slumped. “I think I forgot to sign the bounty slip for Silas,” I said, frowning as though trying to recall. “I remember Ambrose saying he’d put the money in my account, but I can’t remember doing the paperwork. He was telling me about some Rodney Vale or something. You know how Ambrose is about paperwork.”
Brent groaned in sympathy. “Ambrose will have a fit if you didn’t sign.”
“I know. I hope I already did, but I’d rather check to be sure,” I said. “And I wanted to see if there are any new bounties up. The ones I saw yesterday weren’t good options.”
Brent gave a grunt. “If thereareany good ones, Ambrose probably gave them to Elvin already.”
As the Syndicate’s house came into view, I let my gaze travel upward, slow and casual. The window to the Employer’s study still sat just slightly ajar.
I slowed, reaching out to catch Brent’s sleeve. “Do you see that?”
He followed my gaze. His expression shifted from confusion to a frown. “Is that window open? On purpose?”
“Looks that way. Was it like that yesterday?” I asked.
“Ambrose never opens anything,” Brent said slowly. We exchanged a look and quickened our pace.
Inside, the safehouse hummed with its usual morning sluggishness. Elvin was nowhere in sight, and a few early morning bounty hunters lounged at the long table.
“Ambrose!” Brent called out the moment he was over the threshold. “Ambrose, we need to talk to you!”
Ambrose didn’t answer right away. When he did finally emerge from his office, he looked irritated and sleepy.
“What?”
“The window to the Employer’s study is open,” I told him. “Brent and I saw it when we were coming up just now.”
Several bounty hunters looked up, instantly curious, and Ambrose froze, suddenly much more awake than a few moments before.
“Maybe the Employer finally turned up,” one of the hunters said with a guffaw.
“You said you saw an open window?” Ambrose asked. “You saw it when you came in just now?”
“Yeah,” I said, injecting just the right amount of unease into my voice. “We saw it. Did you open it to air out the room or?—”
