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His eyes lingered on her a bit longer. “When you leave here, the world will be a bigger place.”
“No,” she said. “Not bigger. Just revealed.”
“Very true.” He pointed to a door over which hung a logo that seemed vaguely familiar, though she couldn’t place it at the moment. A triangle inside an ornate circle, the three spaces filled with each of the letters P, E, and C. And in the center of the triangle, the familiar sword and scales of the goddess Justicia.
“PEC?”
“Preternatural Enforcement Commission,” Porter said. “It’s an ancient organization. Homeland Security is the cover story for Division 6, the arm that covers this portion of the US.”
She nodded, processing that. “The evidence was right in front of me,” she said as they passed through the door and into a hallway lined with a long counter topped with a number of odd-looking devices. “I never saw it. What kind of prosecutor does that make me?”
“The evidence? Sara, you couldn’t possibly have known. Very few do.”
She thought of her father’s neck wound. “I should have,” she said as Porter gestured for her to take a seat at one of the desks.
A harried looking worker behind the counter signaled that she’d be right there, and Sara used the wait to look around more. She twisted in her seat, wanting to take everything in, and noticed two men—or they looked like men—heading down the hall with lanyards boasting what looked like a QR code and a bold letter V.
“—same thing last week,” one was saying. “It’s going to get worse.”
“Therian pricks,” the other said as they continued past Sara and Porter. “Speaking of, I heard Caris dropped into town. Traitorous bitch.”
“Therians?” Sara repeated, her voice a whisper. “That’s shape-shifters, right?”
Porter’s brow rose. “I see why you caught Leviathan’s eye.”
“Okay, let’s get you checked in,” said the worker, the words going straight into Sara’s mind without being voiced.
“Thumbprint,” said the voice in her head, and she put her thumb on the electronic pad. “Now look here,” she said, and when Sara complied, her face was suddenly dotted with light. “Face mapping,” the worker said in explanation.
She peered at a monitor. “Sara Constantine. Designation? H?”
“Uh?”
“Yes,” Porter said from behind her. “Human.”
The worker rolled her chair back, retrieved something that was emerging from a machine, attached it to a lanyard, and passed it to Sara. A QR code and the letter H.
“Keep that on at all times. Corridor A. Blair will meet you.”
Sara slipped on the lanyard as she stood, then looked around, not having the slightest clue where to find Corridor A.
“This way,” Porter said.
She fell in step beside him. “Who else knows about this?”
“In Los Angeles? The only non-Division 6 employees are me, the federal prosecutor, and you.”
She paused to stare at him. “Seriously?”
He lifted a shoulder. “So I’m told.”
“Why me? Why now?”
“The truth?” He shook his head. “I haven’t a clue.”
They continued in silence down the hall, the counter soon replaced by offices, many with open doors. In one, Sara saw a guy in a suit leaning back, his boots on his desk the way Manny often did when he settled in to read. The familiarity of it made her smile, though it quickly disappeared when they passed the next office. There, a red-faced creature pounded on a desk as he yelled into a phone, sharp protrusions extending from his face.
She looked away. “So, um, this is a judicial system?”
