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“Fuck,” he murmurs, leaning back in the seat. “Secret thought you seemed decent.”
Clearly, he thinks I’m some kind of scumbag now. I should probably let him know why I’m here before he decides to knock me out or force that disgusting drink down my throat.
“I’m here because I need someone to take a case off my hands. It’s about the man who owns Anchor West. He killed my mother fifteen years ago, and he’s been trafficking Omegas for even longer than that.”
“He killed your mother?” Seth asks. “If that’s true, why the hell would you want to give up the case?”
“It’s a long story, but it starts with an L, ends with an E, and it’s related to your mate.”
He takes in a breath. “He’s threatened Leanne?”
“No, but he expects her to start working for him tomorrow at Anchor West. She took the job there before she took the job at my agency. I obviously can’t let her go into that building now.”
“Why not?” he growls.
“Would you let Secret be around a known trafficker?”
“No, but I don’t know you. Leanne, I know. If she’s supposed to go in there, she’ll go. I don’t know what you think you’re going to do to stop her.”
He might be right about that.
“Besides, she’s not an Omega,” Seth says. “She wouldn’t be at risk from an Omega trafficker.”
“Harlan West isn’t like the other traffickers. Everyone knows he doesn’t exclusively deal in Omegas.”
All of that everyone knows shit is based on rumors, but almost everything anyone knows about that man is based on rumors. Nothing ever gets traced back to an actual truth. That’s why no one has ever pinned him down.
“You think he’s interested in Leanne for his auctions?” Seth asks, starting to look concerned.
“I think he’s not going to miss a chance like that if it’s pushed under his nose. I’m going to make sure she doesn’t set foot inside that building. That’s all I care about right now. Making sure my mate is safe. That’s why I have to give up the case.”
“What are you actually giving up?” he asks.
I pass him the envelope. “Don’t lose any of that. I don’t have it stored anywhere else.”
“What evidence do you have that we can use against this guy?”
I give him a wry smile. “I saw his trophies once. In a jar, at his office. Back when I was too naïve to know what he was, and what they were. We went to college together. We used to be friends.”
“So, you saw what might have been evidence once and it’s located in his office?” he asks, raising an eyebrow. “Is that all? Because it would really help if we knew the locations of the auctions, or where he keeps a list of clients. You know, stuff that’s actually useful.”
“It was a year after my mother died, supposedly from committing suicide by jumping off the top of the Anchor West building. Conveniently, it happened a day before Harlan took over the building. He offered to let me onto the roof. He acted like a concerned friend. I went up there alone, and when I came back down to his office, I saw him sitting behind his desk, staring at the jar.”
“What was inside it, exactly?”
“It contained locks of hair and bits of jewelry, tied up with different colored strips of ribbon. I remember seeing black marks on one of the ribbons, so I think he has something written on each of them. A date, maybe.”
“So, you think that stuff relates to Omegas he took, and maybe some of it might be unique enough to be considered real evidence of a crime?”
“At least one item is unique enough,” I tell him. “The main thing I remember before he put the jar down and walked me out, was a baroque locket. It was an unusual design. I found a picture of my mother wearing that locket before she died. I never saw it in real life because it turns out, she got it from the man she loved before she met my father. The guy died, and she never got over it.”
“If she never wore it, how did it get in the jar?”
“I didn’t say she never wore it. She was always toying with her collar. I thought it was an anxious quirk when I was younger, but I can see now it was because she was wearing it under her clothes.”
“I don’t know about any of this,” Seth admits. “But it’s the only evidence I’ve heard about when it comes to that guy. He’s notoriously slippery. Everyone knows what he’s doing, but no one knows anything about how he does it.”
“There’s information about the cops he has in his pocket in that file. There’s dirt on them, too. It can be used to put them away if you’re making a move and you want to make sure all of them have their hands tied. He’ll get them released and any charges dropped pretty quickly, so only use it when you really need to.”
