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I waited.
He remained silent. Expectant.
“That’s all?” I shouted. “You follow me for three weeks, and that’s all you have to say? Why? What was the reason for any of it?”
“You say that you don’t take on high-profile cases, and I’m sure you’re telling the truth. But what I see is a bored C-grade tracker who’s shitting her talent away working mundane cases of lost keys or whatever the fuck else. You say you don’t take high-profile cases, but I see you get more excited over a Tetris app than you do using your power. You hate your everyday life, Gray. Whether you want to admit it or not.”
This arrogant fuck.
I raged, “Who the hell do you think you are? You don’t know me! Unless you can poke around my brain with whatever secret power you have, you don’t have a right to tell me my shit, got it? Fuck, you’re irritating. Was this really your plan to get me to work with you? Was all of that stalking worth the effort? Because there is no way you can convince me to accept your filthy money.”
My chest rose and fell with deep, heaving breaths.
“The thing is,” he confided, “I’m very good at my job. I might not be able to splay your mind open and read the contents of your desires, but my observations are rarely wrong. People don’t need power to explain every talent, and you are not as good at hiding your thoughts as you think.”
Chapter Six
His chin dipped. A hand rose, fingers catching the edge of his sunglasses. Slowly, he slid them down.
I gasped. It couldn’t be helped. I’d just… I’d never seen eyes like his before. Staring, caught in their spell, I was certain magic had nothing to do with it.
A green so bright it was almost silver. Streaked with deep emerald and brilliant lines of gold. They were like gemstones. Something to lose yourself in.
“I like my life,” I stated, pushing against the lure of his gaze. “And you aren’t as good at guessing as you think.”
“Oh, but I am.” He straightened and slid the glasses onto his head, pulling his hair back in a makeshift headband. Without the dark glasses, he almost looked like a different person. Those weren’t the crazed eyes of a stalker.
He was just some beautiful, irreverent archangel. Not someone intent on harming me.
But looks aren’t everything, are they?
“So, the last three weeks, you’ve just been watching me to test me?”
He shrugged. “It’s all part of the hiring process. To see if this is the kind of job you can handle. We didn’t know much about you or your work history beyond rumors of your little gig business. Your records say you were orphaned. Taken in as one of three dozen wards by Archangel Senator Sage Eliel when you were ten years old.”
My adrenaline spiked yet again at the sound of my father’s name.
Archangel Senator Sage Eliel.
There was a reason I feared the archangels. Dad was always kind to me, but he never claimed to love his own people. He’s explained in great detail what they would do if they found out I was his real, half-demonic child.
Don’t react. Calm down. He read what’s on your record. It’s nothing you have to hide.
Swallowing hard against the panic, I snapped back into the stranger’s rant on my life history.
He continued, “You were placed in the Kaya family, who took you in like one of their own. Lived with Azra Kaya from years eighteen to twenty and then moved out into your own space. You’ve kept a quiet existence. Did well in school but nothing exceptional. Worked odd jobs but did nothing ambitious. And yet?”
“Yet?” I drawled, affecting boredom.
“You’re the only one who can take on this job. This mystery that so many others have failed at.”
Curiosity got the better of me. He was right about one thing. I did like challenges. Puzzles were fascinating. Controllable. Solvable.
I liked puzzles more than I liked people half the time.
The stranger waited, that infuriating smirk in place. He knew he had me.
Rolling my eyes, I grumbled, “I’ll bite. What’s this impressive mystery, then?” Not that I was going to accept.
