“was this a magial reature attak?” felix turned to stramitz “in the middle of downtown edinburgh?”
“multiple bite marks in the eiling,” stramitz repeated she turned away from the sorhed wall and its bite marks and foused on the man—half the man—on the bed the wound pattern looked familiar he wasn’t torn—“that man was bitten in half”
felix bit his lip “what does this? a spell? a…dragon?”
“they have a witness,” phillips offered when he ame bak into the suite
“oh yeah?” felix arhed a brow “how big are his teeth?”
the witness—arhie eversworn—was a porter who had been te to work and had taken his prus time making his rounds to hek on the penthouse earlier that m and he’d also misped his employee master spell key that allowed him into any room in the hotel felix took point on the interview and ame down on eversworn hard the porter was i, igora was ertain, but he was definitely hiding something
“this doesn’t look good, arhie,” felix repeated for maybe the fifth time “you were te to work, te to hek on the suite in quesn, and your spell key is missing? it all seems very—”
“fluent,” stramitz narrowed her eyes and the porter’s green eyes widened
“yeah,” felix ontinued “a lot of piees oming together and pointing to you” eversworn stared at his feet felix met igora’s eyes and waited for her roval before menning the spell log “now, the seurity spell log got srambled in the minutes before you say you entered the penthouse any reason you an think of, arhie, that the seurity system would malfunn like that?”
“what?” the porter breathed “no, of ourse not”
stramitz took a step forward “so you didn’t notie anything out of the ordinary on your way up to the penthouse?”
the porter gulped, and stramitz thought he looked oddly familiar when he stared bak at her she made a note to send out inquiries on him to all the other dmle offies before the end of the day eversworn took a breath and asked, “did you have the log for the fourteenth floor?”
“i just told you the logs were srambled now, did something hen on the fourteenth floor, arhie?”
“yes,” he said, then shook his head “no,” he rushed “i mean, er…maybe?”
igora stopped herself from smiling “you do realize you stated every possible response to the quesn?”
“so whih is it?” felix said
eversworn huffed “no, i didn’t see anything”
“don’t leave town, mr eversworn” igora raised her brows
“i—i won’t”
on their way out of the hotel, phillips asked if they’d got anything out of the witness igora brushed him off, but he persisted “you didn’t tell me how your ase was oed to this—this i,” phillips stuttered
“we didn’t,” igora agreed
felix turned around, rolling his eyes at her “the man in the bedroom,” he said
phillips blinked “marwan zivantus?”
“we are w the missing persons ase for his daughter, bertrie zivantus”
“and you think it’s possible the two ases are oed?” phillips’ fae srunhed in disbelief
stramitz raised her brow “rih pureblood’s daughter goes missing and a week ter he’s killed in—” she moned obtusely “—an oddly bizarre and lent manner?”
“it’s probable the two is are reted,” felix offered and then walked away
they headed bak to the offie, and igora knew they needed to make sure the ase stayed in their ontrol she barked out a list of things for felix to finish, sent out her inquiries to the other dmle offies, and requisined all the neessary supplies for a long haul stake out when arhie eversworn finished his shift, they’d be ready to find out what he was most definitely hiding
harry ouldn’t believe it ron was going to kill him he’d somehow managed to srew up his first ever assig eight months, eight bloody months, ompletely wasted as he walked bak to travertel, he allowed himself one small beaon of hope maybe he’d be able to salvage something maybe there was still a hane, another angle, another job—
the ehoes of his n with valentine made him ringe
“they think it’s oed to something bigger,” the hotel manager whispered as they wathed iigators zaha and stramitz leave
harry blinked, unsure what he should or shouldn’t say he was still quesning his dein to maintain his over despite his instints—internally sreaming he needed to do something but there was also a suspn in his gut that told him that what hened in the penthouse had nothing to do with his ase there was also the sene from the fourteenth floor whih still had him reeling “like…riminals?”
valentine srunhed his fae and gave a slight shake of his head “no say…while you were in there, did you see any type of animal?”
“animal?” to be ho, harry wasn’t sure of anything that he saw they walked to the employee loker room and stopped “like a dog?” harry blurted then he remembered the kneazle before he ould say anything, valentine had raised his hand
“no, not a dog” valentine studied harry and then abruptly added, “also, you’re fired”
“what?” harry burst “why?”
valentine began walking bak to his offie, and harry followed “you’re just too involved in this,” the older man replied
“i was just doing my job!” harry said, trying not to raise his voie
“that remains to be seen” valentine blinked bak at him
《宅书屋》om
