“Follow me.” He turned, heading towards whatever hid in the darkness through those double doors.
The next room wasn’t quite as terrifying as the last. It was a glorified office. Although large, it wasn’t anything particularly special but more what you’d expect of a high flying city lawyer or someone who worked in government. A wide oak desk sat in front of a trio of floor to ceiling windows, the only natural light source in the room. The walls were not adorned with the artwork and carvings that patterned the rest of the building, which made me think that we’d moved into an extension of the original building or perhaps just a renovated portion. Painted in an off white, it was instead decorated subtly, with just a couple of potted plants and photographs of Edinburgh’s tourist sights. Bland—to say the least. As though Gabriel were renting the office space for the purposes of today’s meeting. It gave me no insight into his personality, job description or otherwise. Which was frustrating. In fact, I couldn’t get a read on the guy at all—apart from his apparent distaste for me. That was clear in how he continued to scowl and grimace at me at any given opportunity.
“Quinn confirmed our suspicions that Lilith is in London,” Miranda said, refusing to beat around the bush.
“And how did she come to that confirmation?” Gabriel asked, leaning his elbows on his desk and setting his pointed chin on his knuckles—which, funnily enough, I noticed were ever so slightly marked with bruises. They were old bruises, almost faded, but still noticeable. He caught me looking and moved.
“I visited one of your gatekeepers, Seamus,” I began, feeling like I had perhaps managed to get just a teeny tiny one up on this arrogant son of a bitch. I’d at least rattled his cage and that was enough to satisfy me, for now.
Gabriel rolled his eyes. “Seamus is hardly maintaining his gates as it is. He’s hardly reliable.”
“Is that so?” I asked, feigning surprise. “And who is it exactly who’s in charge of the gatekeepers?”
His mouth formed a tight line, and I knew I’d once again forced him into some form of submission, so I continued.
“We went through years’ worth of his records and found that the only demon who had been recorded as coming in and not leaving had been Lilith. That’s the short version.”
Gabriel’s eyes narrowed, flashing between me and Miranda. “We?”
A lump formed in my throat and Miranda shifted uncomfortably in her seat.
“Quinn has found herself working with King Sallow,” Miranda stated, only for Gabriel to immediately force himself up out of his chair, throwing the flimsy wood backwards as he launched his closed fists into the desk in front of him.
In a blur of movement, a ripple of thunder shook the ground beneath my feet as my eyes tried to make sense of what they were seeing. First, it was the shock of Gabriel’s dark eyes staring into me, shining a pearly white so bright they blinded me just long enough that I almost thought I was imagining the wings.
My chair fell backwards, and my back hit the floor with a thud, knocking my head hard enough that I could see stars and my previous nausea worsened.
“How dare you!” Gabriel bellowed, his voice triumphant and echoing around the room, that felt claustrophobic now that it was filled with his huge, white wings.
“Gabriel! You’ve already scared the girl half to death! This is enough!” Miranda yelled from her now standing position in front of me, and I peered around from behind her to get another look at Gabriel. He was beautiful, majestic, and terrifying. I’d seen nothing quite like it—even in these few weeks amongst the vampires and the monsters, nothing compared to this. He was otherworldly.
Gabriel’s wings receded, disappearing as though they never existed as his eyes returned to their original dark brown before he spoke. “Her mother was tempted by darkness just as she is, and look where that got us all. Broken gates, dimensions left wide open and thrones free for the taking. Miranda, there is a war brewing, and this is our key? This child?”
Gabriel was furious, his face beetroot red and his tone still just set above a lion’s roar. I dared to get up from my place on the floor. “I’m not a child.”
Had I said that? Did I have a fucking death wish?
“Quinn,” Miranda whispered, trying to silence me. At least she still had some common sense because mine had left the building as soon as Gabriel’s wings made their appearance. “You’re right, I don’t know what I’m doing,” I added, struggling to stand up but brushing myself off as best I could when I got to my feet, although I was still dizzy from the knock I’d taken to the head. Still, though, I locked eyes with Gabriel.
“But there are girls going missing, ending up dead.” I pulled Jocelyn’s picture out of my pocket. It was crumpled and torn at the edges, having been shoved in so many bags and pockets over the last few weeks, it was depressing. Nevertheless, I slammed it down on the desk. “You might be some otherworldly creature. Xavier might be some vampire, king, evil, whatever. I might be completely wrong, confused, clueless. I don’t know. But this is my world, it’s her world,” I said, pointing to Jocelyn’s picture. “And we want it back.”
Chapter Twenty
Gabriel didn’t have much interest in talking to me directly after my outburst and they sent me to sit out in the hallway like a disobedient school child while he and Miranda finished their conversation. It was degrading, but honestly, I didn’t care. I had too much on my mind and was far too confused to concentrate.
Where it had been the bang to the head, the passing through gates or just the information dump, who knew. I needed to get and check on Thatcher and I needed to visit Jocelyn’s sister, Lily, to make sure she was up to date on our investigation. As far as that side of things, though, I didn’t know what I was going to tell her. The truth? Not possible. I didn’t want to give the woman a psychotic break on top of everything else. I’d have to come up with a lie of some sort that may or may not cover the idea that we might be close to finding Jocelyn. But did I want to give her that hope? Did I really want her to think we might find Jocelyn?
Even if she was still alive, what had she seen? Would she ever be able to have a normal life?
Kidnapped by vampires, she had to have seen some unexplainable things. Then there were the love letters she’d received from Meri, who we were still no closer to finding out about. Where the hell did he or she fit into this weirdo scenario?
My head pounded, and I allowed my face to fall forward onto my lap. Seconds later, the office door opened and Miranda exited, with Gabriel following closely behind. I was about to stand to greet them but decided against it, especially when Gabriel’s eyes darkened at the sight of me.
“I need to get home. As much as I hate to ask, can we take a gate?” I asked, and Miranda nodded.
“Do you mind?” She looked back at Gabriel with an expressionless face, and he nodded solemnly. With a subtle wave of his hand, the air blurred in front of Miranda and she reached out to grab my hand. I didn’t bother to say goodbye to Gabriel, but at the last minute, he reached forward and wrapped his bear-like palm around my arm, tugging me away from the gate.
“You left this,” he stated, passing me the photo of Jocelyn. For the first time, his eyes locked with mine and they weren’t as hostile as they were previously.
“Do you want a thank you?” I quipped with a raised eyebrow, snatching the photo back and gripping it tightly.
Gabriel smirked. “I wasn’t expecting one after my behaviour.”
“That sounds almost too close to an apology.”
He let go of my arm and nodded towards the gate. Simultaneously, Miranda pulled me through, and I lost sight of Gabriel’s cold eyes and strangely sorry expression.
Confused or not, I knew where I had to go next—home. Not to my apartment, but back to the office to see Thatcher. I didn't have any signal the whole time at Miranda’s place or in Edinburgh, but as soon as my feet hit the London pavements, my phone started buzzing with messages from Barbara.
Barb:
Thatch fin
e, sleeping, drugs gd x
Barb:
Piece of wrk him, c u soon x
Barb:
Awake now, hav work c u 2moz x
I shook my head and pushed my phone back into my jacket pocket before I turned to Miranda with a sigh.
“I’m guessing someone is going to explain everything to me at some point?” I asked with exasperation.
Miranda smiled sympathetically. “Speak to Thatcher. He’ll fill you in. Just don’t give him too hard a time. He loves you like you’re his own.” She reached forward and stroked a soft thumb across my cheek briefly. The gate was still lingering open behind her and she waved before stepping into it and vanishing into the chilly night air as though she had never been here in the first place.
I walked a little further into town until I came across a free cab and flagged it down. Traffic wasn’t too bad and within around twenty minutes, we were pulling up outside the office and I was paying the ridiculous fare and making my way inside. The lights looked to be off from the outside, but as I unlocked the front door and made my way in, I noted the quiet sound of the TV through the back and warmth of the dim table light Thatch always had on by the sofa.
“Thatch?” I called as I shut the door.
“Quinn? That you?” He replied, sounding surprised. I heard a rustle of activity before he appeared in the entranceway to the backroom and grinned in a strangely out of character way.
“Firstly, what pain meds are you on and secondly, can I have some?” I chuckled, tossing my coat onto the desk.
He threw his hand forward, spinning his wheelchair around before heading back into the backroom and getting himself comfortable once again. I followed willingly, grabbing two beers out of the small fridge he kept in there and passing one to him before I collapsed down on the ancient brown sofa with a sigh.
“I’m fine. Knock to the head, nothing more. Plus, I’m just happy Barb’s out of here, can’t stand that bloody woman. Does my head in,” Thatch cursed, his eyes trained on an episode of Antiques Roadshow as if it were the most exciting thing he’d ever seen.
“Would’ve looked after you myself, but this case is turning into a circus,” I said quietly, fiddling with the label on my bottle.
Thatcher finally pulled his attention from the TV and looked at me. “Grown arms and legs, eh?”
“Could say that,” I muttered.
“If you don’t want to be involved, Quinn, you could close it. I could tell Lily it’s not for us. No shame in that,” he said, his voice softer than I’d heard it in a long time and I noticed he’d switched off the TV and turned his wheelchair so that he was facing me, his tattooed hands clasped so tightly around the beer bottle it looked like the glass might crack.
I shook my head. “You know I can’t do that.” My gaze met his and there was a sudden understanding. Sadness deepened the wrinkles embedded in his forehead and he looked off towards the wall in deep thought.
“I never wanted this for you,” Thatch murmured with regret. “I was there the day they found you. Had no desire for kids. No desire for a wife, nothing like that. Didn’t want that life.”
I dared speak for fear of scaring him out of talking. Thatcher was a man of few words and I desperately needed to hear what he had to say. For my own sanity and, by the looks of it, for his.
“It was Miranda that was going to take you, originally. She did, for a while,” he said. “While you were wee. We were just missionaries, after all. Guardians don't have the capabilities to love or care, they don’t have human emotions.”
“Why didn’t Miranda keep me?” I asked with a frown.
Thatcher took a swig of his beer and puffed out a breath. “Her husband got the cancer, she had to look after him. She just didn’t have the time. I said I’d take you until they had somewhere more permanent.”
“Then what happened?”
“I woke up one morning,” he began with a nostalgic smile. “You weren’t in your bed, and I thought for sure I’d fucked it. You were gone, someone had come and taken you or you’d gone and fallen down the stairs or something. You were about six at this point.”
I nodded, urging him to continue.
“Turns out you were down the stairs, you’d wanted to make breakfast and you’d managed the toast fine, but do you know what you were using to spread the butter?”
My brows raised as I watched Thatcher’s lips lift in a grin that foretold laughter. “What?”
“One of my hunting knives! You’d got a chair and climbed up to the key boy, got the key, opened the drawer where they were all kept and pulled out the biggest fuck-off knife I had and you were just buttering your toast with it like it was the most natural thing in the world. I knew then and there, if I was ever going to have a kid, it was you.”
We both fell into a fit of natural giggles, so much so that my stomach ached and tears leaked from the corners of my eyes. I watched as Thatcher wiped at his just as much as I did and only when our breathing calmed down and we fell back into a comfortable silence did he shake his head and started to talk again.
“That was it. You never left my side after that, apart from your teen years, but that was different.”
I cleared my throat, trying to find the best way to broach whatever question I was about to ask first.
“What did you know about my parents?”
Thatcher dropped his eyes and fumbled with his hands where they were clenched in his lap. “Your parents were an anomaly. I don’t know the full story, but they’d been on the Guardian’s radar for a while. The Guardian’s work to keep the balance between the Thrones. Your mother belonged to Caelum and your father to Gehann. This is itself, wasn’t an issue.”
“But I was,” I interrupted, knowing where he was going with this.
“In theory, yes,” he stated. “You yourself don’t cause an issue with the balance of the realms, but you could be used by someone else to upset the balance.”
“Used how?” I questioned, feeling just as confused as I had done when I came into this bizarre conversation.
“I don’t know, neither does Miranda. I don’t think anyone knows.”
“It could mean nothing,” I added with a huff.
Thatcher shrugged, draining the last of his beer. “Or it could mean everything.”
“Presumably, if my parents were from different realms or whatever, they weren’t…” I began, unable to get the rest of the words to leave my mouth, no matter how hard I tried.
“Human? No,” Thatcher said, shaking head.
Questions jammed in my throat; my mind unable to keep up with everything I wanted to know.
“Are they dead?” I asked, unsure why this seemed to be the most important answer I needed.
Thatch nodded solemnly.
“Does this have something to do with my scars?” My voice sounded so feeble, so childlike. I couldn’t bear to look at Thatcher. I knew how much he hated me mentioning my scars, our entire relationship we’d practically ignored their existence.
He took a few minutes, but eventually replied, “Yes. It was a fire, but I think you already knew that.”
“I figured,” I said, smiling to make him feel just a bit better about forcing him into having this conversation. “How have you kept all of this to yourself for all these years? I don’t understand,” I added with a frown.
“I wanted you to have as normal a life as possible. I didn’t want you to feel like you were being forced into this world, this life. It’s cruel. Hard, lonely.”
“It feels like this world is having me whether or not I want it.”
Thatcher agreed, and we stayed there in silence for a while, just sitting in each other’s company like we had done so many times. Except this time, it felt so different.
“Do you mind if I sleep here tonight?” I asked, already grabbing the worn blanket off the back of the sofa.
Thatcher shook his head and grabbed the empty beer bottles, setting them in his lap as he wheeled towards the tiny kitchenette. “Of course n
ot. Just get some rest. I can answer the rest tomorrow. I’ve got a couple things I can show you if you like. Your mother, she left you something. It seems like it might finally be time for me to give it to you.”
My interest piqued, but the exhaustion from the day hit me much harder. Whatever it was, it could wait until tomorrow.
“Thanks,” I called through to the kitchen, listening to him tossing the bottles before he wheeled himself towards his own small, single bedroom, turning off the dim table light on his way.
“Night, Quinny,” he said, placing a quick, almost unnoticeable kiss on the top of my head—something he hadn’t done since I was a child.
“Goodnight,” I paused, my breath hitching in my throat as darkness fell throughout the room. “Dad.”
Chapter Twenty One
Rain was the first thing I heard when I woke early the next morning. It was battering down against the windows of the office. It was still dark, and a quick look at the clock on the far wall told me it was just before seven in the morning. Despite usually despising early mornings, I flung the thin blanket from on top of me and reluctantly climbed off the sofa. I didn’t bother with coffee, just a quick bathroom break and a squirt of toothpaste. I swiftly ran my hands through the knots in my hair as I headed out the door, choosing not to disturb Thatch, since he needed the rest.
If I left now, I’d make it to the hospital in time to speak to Lily. Detective Jack Amanya had been kind enough to leave me out of the investigation so far, but I had no doubt that wouldn’t last long, so I had to make sure that Lily and I were on the same page.
Jack was a good guy, a decent detective, but there was a lot of history between us. Some of which I was certain we’d both rather forget. One of his major downfalls was that he struggled to let anything go. If experience was anything to go on, he wouldn’t be dropping Lily’s home invasion case any time soon and the last thing I wanted was him getting mixed up in this whole supernatural mess. Even if he annoyed the shit out of me most of the time.
Silver Vein: Beneath the City Sleeps Book 1 Page 17
