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“Did we what?”
“There’s no delicate way to ask this, so…are you involved?”
“We are definitely not involved.” Not anymore. “He just didn’t like finding out that his parents have lied to him for over thirty years.” The escorts unlocked a steel door and held it open for them. “I shouldn’t have said anything,” Eva said as they entered the underground level of Aegis headquarters. “I should have let him believe that his parents had some sort of fairy-tale romance. Poor guy. He actually thinks we tried to kill him.”
Maja’s silence sent an inexplicable stab of doubt into Eva’s gut. She kept hoping the Elder would offer some sort of explanation, but the thunderous silence continued until they stopped at an elevator, and she punched theupbutton.
“I have a meeting right now,” Maja said, “but let’s meet in an hour, and you can brief me on everything that went on while you were with DART and Logan. Your parents will be there, and I’m sure they’re looking forward to seeing you.”
“Sure,” Eva said as they stepped inside the lift. “Where are Sig and Carlos?”
“They’re here.” Maja smashed the third-floor button, and the doors closed, leaving their escort to take the next elevator. “You’ll all stay in the DC Guardian quarters until the threat is neutralized.”
“Shouldn’t we be someplace secret? The entire world knows about this place.”
Maja shook her head. “If you three are in a secret location, it won’t stay that way. Besides, this is the most defensible location we have. Welcome back.”
Yeah. Sure.
“Thanks.” Eva should probably track down Jennifer, but for the first time in her life, her career wasn’t in the forefront of her mind.
Logan had taken up that space, and Maja’s reaction to the story about his parents niggled at her. It might be nothing. It might have something to do with Maja’s past relationship with Logan.
But it could also be something else. And after years of following her instincts as an investigative journalist, she knew she should look into it.
She glanced at the time on the elevator’s control panel. If she hurried, she could get in forty-five minutes of research before she met with Maja again. She could catch up with Jenn later.
Maja got off on the third floor, and Eva took the lift down to the underground level where the library and artifact center sat deep inside the complex, protected from physical and magical attacks by layers of security from locked doors and guards to wards. It was like a gauntlet, and it always gave Eva a thrill. She loved research, and when the research material was cloaked in mystery and protocol, it added more fun.
At the very end of the gauntlet, a gray-haired Guardian named Tobey sat behind a desk, his fingers flying over the three screens in front of him.
“Hey, Tobe,” she said.
He looked up with a smile. “Hey, Eva. Haven’t seen you in almost a month. Heard you were on the DART exchange team.” He shook his head. “Terrible what happened. I hope those freaks are shut down. The Aegis can do everything DART does.”
That…wasn’t entirely true. People argued that The Aegis could replace DART, but right now, The Aegis wasn’t set up to capture demonic spirits or handle forensic investigations the way the Demonic Activity Response Team could. They were usually called in when a demon was suspected of a crime, where The Aegis handled larger attacks and clear demonic incursions. Plus, like it or not, DART did employ demons, which often gave them unique and more effective methods when it came to dealing with demonic activity.
But it wasn’t worth her time to argue with someone on Team Destroy DART.
“Well,” she said politely, “hopefully it will be resolved quickly. There’s been too much tragedy on both sides.”
“Both sides.” He laughed. “That’s cute. But they need to pay for what they’ve done. Haven’t you seen the video?” Tobey pinched his fingers on the screen, made a throwing motion, and a life-sized, 3-D holovid popped up in front of her. Suddenly, she was standing in the DART cafeteria again, surrounded by DART and Aegis people.
“I’ve seen this, Tobey…” She trailed off as Shanea and Noah shifted into their demon forms, just as she’d seen them do in the video Kynan had shown her. But then everything went off the rails. Shanea and Noah attacked Carlos and Mason, completely unprovoked. Sig rushed in to separate them. Then, when Shanea raised her clawed hand for what looked like a potentially fatal blow, Sig shot her, totally justified in his actions.
But…that wasn’t what happened. This wasn’t right. Or was the DART video the one that wasn’t right?
“Tobey, where did you get this?”
“It popped into my newsfeed. Like, five minutes ago.”
After the prisoner exchange. After Ares and Logan left the ball field. Quite the coincidence.
“Didwerelease it? Surely, DART didn’t.”
Tobey reached for his coffee. “It’s not an official release. It’s from a whistleblower blog. They claim someone from DART leaked it.”
Ah, whistleblower media. She’d loved it when she reported stories for thepro-humannews outlets she’d worked for. There were always good conspiracy theories or so-and-so-is-really-a-demon stories to dig into.
