Page 149 of Nobody Told Me Thrift Shops Sell Stolen Dragon Heirlooms

Rafe reached us a moment later, his presence immediately making the backstage area feel smaller.

“Ms. Bradley,” he said.

“Mr. Virelli.”

His gaze moved over the jacket, the badge, the gavel, then my face. “We will discuss this.”

“So I assumed.”

The auctioneer cleared his throat. “Sir, if you’ll come with me to buyer services, we can confirm the hammer price, premium, and paperwork.”

When Rafe’s gaze moved to him, the man paled further.

I touched Rafe’s sleeve lightly. “Paperwork first. Moral reckoning later.”

His attention dropped to my shaking hand, and his jaw clenched.

Buyer services occupied a small office off the main hall. A woman in pearls and reading glasses processed the sale calmly, clearly long past being surprised by how badly rich people could behave over unattractive objects. The buyer’s agreement confirmed the hammer price, buyer’s premium, tax status, title terms, and collection arrangements. Rafe signed where required, provided authorization for wire payment, and requested immediate secured transfer to a bonded courier after payment cleared.

The woman glanced at the lot description. “All this for a battered shrine mirror?”

I braced myself.

Rafe looked at the page, then at her. “Yes,” he said.

Just yes.

For some reason, that made my throat constrict.

When the paperwork was complete, the auction house wanted to return to pretending the last fifteen minutes had been orderly. I returned the jacket to the coatroom and left the blank badge on a shelf. The auctioneer didn’t look at me again, which I considered healthy for both of us.

We made it as far as the front doors before Dimitris Burelian appeared beside a marble column, one gloved hand resting lightly on his cane.

“Rafe Virelli,” he said.

Rafe stopped, and when he did, the air changed.

The air changed.

Olden Folk power was usually something I felt through context more than sensation. Rafe’s power was heat and presence. It gave off the sense that the world had become more attentive. Dimitris’s was different. Dry. Bright. Like sunlight on bone.

He smiled at me first. “And the resourceful Ms. Bradley.”

I didn’t like that he knew my name.

Rafe stepped slightly forward. Not in front of me, but enough that the line of sight between Dimitris and me changed.

“Dimitris.”

“I had wondered when your family would begin collecting its ghosts in earnest.”

“They aren’t ghosts.”

“No? That mirror has passed through five collections and three estates. It has acquired lives since leaving yours.”

“It was taken from people who didn’t survive well enough to object.”

Dimitris’s smile didn’t move. “History is rarely tidy.”