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“Time’s up.” Darby’s voice came in just clear enough. “Manager is about to make her rounds. You need to be out in thirty seconds. Leave through the front.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Razai stood with me still attached to him, ignoring my squeals. He grinned wildly. “Get your robe on, Detective. Our undercover op is over.”
Should an archangel look this devilish?
I wriggled until he set me down, and then tied my robe on. Once we strode down the hallway and into the larger club room, we melted into the crowd and exited without a problem. The cold, fresh air shivered with clarity. Heels on the asphalt tapped like a metronome, counting the seconds separating me from that room.
And the gravity of what we’d done.
Shit, shit, shit. What is my deal?
Despite him being an archangel, despite my only just meeting him, I trusted Razai. I don’t just kiss random people. Azra never had any qualms about kissing or going out with people she didn’t know. She was the girl in the back of the club making out with a stranger, while I shied away from anyone trying to touch me. Even if I felt attracted to them.
The point? I didn’t fall into someone’s arms because it felt good or got swept away in the moment. It took time. Familiarity.
Trust.
I crossed my arms in the cold, hugging the robe tighter around me, and peeked over at Razai.
His content expression and lifted chin told me the cold felt nice. Refreshing. He welcomed the chill and the damp, foggy air.
Without asking or even looking, he moved closer and put an arm around me.
“I’m fine.” But I didn’t fight him. Who the hell was I right now?
Thankfully, he didn’t tease. Or mock me for kissing him. In fact, Razai seemed perfectly content to accept what had happened and move on. He commented on early classes tomorrow and the upcoming testing he had to prepare for. We made it to the car, and, once the heater warmed up, we began our journey back to the university; it was time to talk about what we’d learned.
“So.” My fingertips hovered over the heater vents, slowly thawing. “Benjamin was dealing. And it doesn’t seem like Clave was helping.”
“To be honest? I don’t know anymore,” Razai admitted. “I’ve been completely convinced that Clave and his tight asshole would never step out of line, but Benjamin was his close assistant. Maybe they were in on it together. I’ll be bitter to the end of my days if Clave managed to fool me on that one.”
He sighed and rubbed his jaw while the other hand lazily maneuvered the wheel. I swear, with the streetlights and his gorgeous bone structure, he looked like a broody model from a perfume ad. How did he do that so effortlessly?
“Let’s come up with two scenarios,” I suggested, eager to focus my mind on the mystery instead of my rising blood pressure and the champagne-flavored flashbacks already swarming me. “One where Clave is involved, and one where he’s not. What can we infer? If Clave helped Benjamin sell, then he’s been holding back a lot of information. He probably knows things about Benjamin and the other students. Maybe he even knows something about the attacks. That’s assuming he didn’t do it.”
“And if he had?”
“Then we can infer the attacks had something to do with the drugs. What kind of drugs does this company sell?”
“Performance enhancers mostly. Popular with college kids in high-pressure tracks.”
“So, why do the drugs matter? Were all the victims working with Benjamin? Or using? Was he killed over drugs? If he didn’t care about the money, then it’s unlikely someone attacked him over a debt. Godsdamn…”
“You have to talk to the students,” Razai said, stating the obvious.
“No shit,” I grumbled. “Just trying to devise a non-obvious course of action. I think I can get one of them, though.” Nathaniel’s shy face came to mind. He’d been watching me for a reason, and I thought it was about time I ask why.
Now I had way more to ask him about too. Maybe he was involved with Benjamin. Or, maybe the drugs were a complete red herring and had nothing to do with—
The moment I thought it, my intuition lashed back like it was scolding me.
I froze.
What the fuck did my magic just do?
Intuition hadn’t ever responded to my thoughts before. Only direction and physical places… had I just imagined that?
