Page 50 of Hopelessly Teavoted

Azrael couldn’t shake her, both the scent of her strawberry perfume that wafted off her and the salty-sweet slick of her that lingered somewhere on his person, even though he had washed his hands and changed into new gloves.

Fuck. Blood rushed away from his head. It was October now, and they only had a month to sort things out. They needed to talk about the case.

He pictured baseball, but that never worked.

Hot guys in tight pants did it for him too.

Gritting his teeth, Azrael thought about the moment when Vickie had rejected him, or when he thought she had.

At the party, long ago, when Vickie went upstairs with Anya.

When Vickie left for school, taking his whole heart with her.

When he realized he couldn’t touch her, moments before he would have finally fucked her again and the ghosts of his parents had showed up in the back seat of the Packard.

There. That was better. Now he could focus on solving the mystery.

“So, Priscilla and I put a tracking spell on the metal detector at the front entrance of the school, tracing for someone stepping through it who had close contact with a greater devil,” Azrael said.

“It was a tricky piece of spell work, but we ran it by the Council. It should have worked. Whoever the big bad guy is, they’re not at the school. ”

“Or they’re not using that entrance. Have you talked to Chet at all?” Vickie’s grip tightened on his arm.

He shook his head. “He’s hard to pin down these days. I’ve been trying to keep an ear out for anyone who might work as a volunteer youth pastor, but honestly, most of us are too underwater on grading and planning to take on anything else for free.”

“Az, I’m sorry. That can’t be easy, starting a new job.”

“We knew the students were innocent. The Council detected traces of greater devil work near the building, so Evelyn helped to enchant and run the tracking program to prove that no children were involved on the metal detectors. It would catch anyone who came through that way, just in case there was some sort of accidental summoning by a minor they were picking up with those traces. She’s got a program running everywhere there’s a scanner in town now, so, at the courtroom and the police station, a few of the clothing stores with compatible sensors. So far, nothing.”

“That’s super smart,” said Vickie. “She must really love your sister.”

“I think she does, yes.”

“But?”

“Never mind.” It wasn’t for him to share, but he had overheard Priscilla and Evelyn arguing a lot lately. Evelyn wanted to settle down.

Priscilla liked kids, but was happy to like them from afar.

He was pretty sure—though it wasn’t his business to know for certain—that she didn’t want to have her own, and that Evelyn maybe did.

But tonight, they all had a common goal, and Prissy wouldn’t want to mourn a good relationship before it was over.

Sometimes things kept people apart, even when there was also love to hold them together.

Vickie squeezed his arm, pausing for a moment at the end of the long hall and looking down at the polished wooden floors.

“It’s still a shame you have to suspect your coworkers. Does anyone besides Chet seem competent enough to pull something like this off?”

“I don’t know. I mean, we have a few real assholes on staff, but I’m not sure being an asshole means you are also a murderer. It seems unfair to make that leap, even if there are too many coincidences to ignore completely.”

Vickie remained quiet, tilting her chin down.

“I know that look. Whatever it is you have to say, say it.”

“Fine. I want you to know this is true whether Chet is suspicious or not. Sometimes men let other men off for being ‘just assholes’ or ‘just creepy’ too easily. Like, sometimes those are the folks we should be looking into, who might be up to so much worse.”

Azrael opened his mouth to protest, then closed it.

“I hadn’t thought of it like that,” he said. The guilt over his gut reaction tripped him up, and he stumbled a little, lost in the thought that he had been about to justify other men’s bad behavior. And for what? Unwarranted loyalty to people he didn’t even know very well?

Vickie steadied him with a gloved hand, turning to face him.

“I’ve got you,” she said. “But you’re better than that, you know? Be better.”

He nodded.

“We think we’ve narrowed down a more specific tracking spell. One that might work to help us pinpoint who our person is. And if that doesn’t work, you and I can go through a staff directory and start investigating one by one.”

It wouldn’t be fun, sleuthing on his new coworkers. But he’d do it for Victoria.

He’d do just about anything for her.