They moved carefully, wearing white gloves, and gripping each box with both hands.
To my utter annoyance, Reo had sent his right-hand man, Ali, to oversee the process.
“There we go.” Ali directed the operation with one gloved hand and held a massive donut with the other. “Come on. Make it quick.”
I frowned and went over to my desk.
Ali was 5’9 and built like a wire hanger someone had draped a cheap, gray shirt over. His glasses always sat on the tip of his nose in a way that made him look like a librarian who had accidentally been assigned to the yakuza.
Powdered sugar covered his chin.
"Careful with the frame. Hold it from the bottom, not the sides." Ali pointed a gloved finger at one of the men while taking an enormous bite of his donut. Powdered sugar drifted down like snow onto his shirt.
He turned to the next pair of men carrying a long crate. "That one goes near the wall. Gently. Reo will have my head if any of this is damaged."
Still frowning, I watched him work and eat. This man consumed food at a rate that should have made him enormous, and instead he remained built like a chopstick.
I didn't like Ali, and understood that the dislike was not rational.
Ali was competent, loyal to Reo, and highly effective at his job. He'd also never disrespected me or overstepped his position.
But he was close to Reo.
Too close.
Ali occupied a space in Reo's daily life that the beastly part of me couldn't accept quietly. Ali cooked for Reo, read beside him, and knew the way Reo liked his tea in the morning.
They’d met in Dubai years ago. Ali had been working for the wrong people. Reo had almost killed him. Whatever stilled my Roar’s trigger finger that night had turned into a partnership that outlasted most marriages.
Granted. . .Ali looked very similar to Reo's estranged little brother. Perhaps, my Roar used Ali as a stand-in to fill the emptiness in his heart.
A crumb fell from Ali's donut and landed on the hardwood floor. White powder on dark wood. Ali froze mid-chew, looked down at it, and then up at me.
I raised an eyebrow.
He stuffed the rest of the donut into his mouth, making both cheeks swell. Next, he dropped to one knee, picked up the crumb with his gloved fingers, and deposited it into his pocket. "My apologies, Dragon."
The men continued setting down boxes and crates.
I moved among the boxes and opened one. It held aged and brittle scrolls. I untied one and unrolled it to find a family tree rendered in ink so old it had turned from black to amber. My mother's maiden name sat near the center, connected by thin lines to branches that stretched back centuries.
Ali got to my side. “This stuff should be in a museum. The pigment preservation alone looks to be hundreds of years old and the red is still saturated to show. . .”
I turned to him and scowled.
Ali cleared his throat and backed up. “Well. . .I’ll be leaving.”
I set the scroll down. "And what about the serial killer? Do we have more news?"
Ali turned around slowly. "Yes, sir. We do."
"Go ahead."
Ali blinked behind his glasses. "Oh. You wantmeto tell you?"
My scowl shifted to a glare.
"I-I usually give my reports to Reo."
