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The dragon turned to me. “Do you have my treasure?”
Shit. I hated disappointing Desmon. I wasn’t worried he’d fry me to crisp or anything, but I took my job seriously. “No, I do not. I didn’t expect company of that caliber. So we ran for it.”
Seth made a sound, and I expected him to shove my failure in my face, but he just murmured, “None of us did.”
It was only then that I noticed there was a giant bruise developing on the side of his face.
“What the hell happened to you?” I asked.
“When I said I got booted out, I meant I got booted out.”
Carly was the one who clarified. “With enough force to send him flying clear across the room.”
“Oh, shit,” Eva said.
“Oh, shit is right. We’re dealing with someone seriously powerful here,” Seth agreed. “Too bad I couldn’t get a look at the guy. I might recognize him from my days with the Council.”
Eva’s eyes grew round. “You mean the WEC? I thought they were all stuffy old men.”
“They are now that I’m gone,” Seth muttered.
“I might be able to pick him out of a lineup,” I said.
“For sure,” Eva said. “We might be able to identify him. There aren’t that many creepy-ass wizards around, are there?”
Seth scoffed. “You’ll be surprised.”
I sat down heavily in one of the chairs. “We’ve been treating it like a petty theft because a petty thief took it when we should’ve been prepared for something more. Things could have gone really bad really fast just now.”
There was a general air of gloomy defeat in the library. I couldn’t help but think that was all on me. I should’ve done better research. I should’ve made a backup plan in case things went south. I should’ve—
Eva took a step forward, her voice a beacon of hope. “Well, they didn’t. We’re both still alive, and”…she dug into her neckline and under her shirt and brought out the locket...“we have this.“
She took a deep breath and approached Desmon, holding it out to him. My respect for her grew. It took serious cajones to face a dragon who’d just found out we’d failed at retrieving his treasure.
It was different for me; I’d known Desmon for most of my adult life. He’d seen my potential to be more than just some street thug, breaking things for the sheer hell of it because I could and working for the wrong people. He’d paid me while I learned to control the giant body I’d been given, not to mention learned not to let my anger control me, and I’d done many jobs for him since.
Eventually, I ended up guarding his home and lived there for a few years. When I left to take the job with the EA, he understood that I needed to make my way in the world. Of course, that stint at the EA hadn’t lasted very long. I quit before they could fire me for never following protocol and took the job at the museum instead.
Long story short, Desmon was no stranger to me, but to Eva he was the Darlington Dragon.
Desmon took the locket, held it up, and examined it for a long time. “This is not my locket. It is the other half of it, however, and extremely valuable. How did you get your hands on it?” He made as if to hand it back to her, but Eva didn’t take it.
“It was my mother’s. I was always told they accidentally buried it with her. I just found out ten minutes ago that in fact my brother stole it.”
Desmon opened the locket, and a faint smile played at the corner of his lips, so faint that no one would have noticed it unless you knew him well. “This is your family?”
“Yeah,” Eva said, rubbing the back of her neck. “That’s us.”
“Your brother’s image has been…crossed out with a marker.”
Eva blew out a breath and laughed nervously. “It has indeed. Mom did that after they disowned him. He was too much trouble, and they’d had enough.”
Desmon held the locket out to her again. “This half-locket is rightfully yours, Witch. Take it and keep it safe.”
Eva frowned. “My brother stole yours; you should take this one as a replacement. I thought it was gone all these years anyway, so what difference will it make? I’ll just keep pretending it’s with Mom. I don’t mind. Really.”
She was lying. She did mind. I could tell by the way her hands tightened on the chain that she didn’t want to let it go.
