Page 40 of Sebastian

“I don’t know. Once I found a connection between two of the adoption agencies, I turned the information over to the FPA.”

I started to argue, but Damien was already raising his hand to silence me.

“Don’t even start. I know you want to handle this case, but the FPA has a lot more resources than us. They can get answers faster, and in the end that’s all that matters. Right? The point is to protect the children, not stroke our own egos, and the best way to protect the children is to stop the bad guys as soon as possible.”

I still wanted to argue but could think of nothing else to say. All I could do was wave an accusatory finger in his face. “I hate when you use logic against me. It’s not fair.”

Finally, for the first time since Damien stepped into the room, he smiled. “No, it’s entirely fair. That’s why you’re so mad. Now, come on. We’re meeting with Mason’s guys soon, and it’s going to take us all day just to get you down the stairs.” He fetched my crutches from the other side of the room.

My hand wrapped around the familiar handle, and I hoisted myself onto my feet. I already dreaded the short but difficult journey ahead of me.

When Damien said he had a meeting with members of the FPA “soon”, it apparently meant “right now”.

We made our way down to our office on the lower floor, taking several minutes to navigate my crutches on the stairs, only to find a pair of agents already waiting for us.

One of them I recognized.

Gabe Long.

The man was a FBI agent on loan to the FPA but he still worked out of his old FBI office on cases too. I still didn’t truly trust anyone from the FBI after the debacle with our WitSec marshal and the resulting attempts on our lives over the years, but because we’d met him though Mason first, I was more tolerant of his FBI associations.

Gabe had worked on a few FPA cases with Damien and I in the past but I hadn’t directly interacted with him much since I usually let Damien play nice with the Feds. From what little I’d seen of him he seemed like a competent investigator. Though not exactly the warmest personality.

He reminded me of a strict schoolteacher I had as a kid. Frosty and sharp, like he could cut you just by looking at you while simultaneously critiquing every mistake you’d ever made. Except, unlike the teacher of my past, Agent Long obviously hit the gym a lot more. His chestnut brown hair was slicked back, and a pair of sharp glasses sat on his nose with such symmetrical balance I wondered if he glued them there.

The man sat at the chair near my desk, fingers steepled in front of him like he was waiting for me to turn in a late homework assignment.

“Damien, I wasn’t expecting your brother to join us.”

Damien guided me over to my desk, making sure my crutch didn’t knock against any stray chair legs, before claiming his own seat behind his desk.

“This involves him as well as me. More so, since he was the one attacked. He should hear whatever you have to report.”

Agent Long frowned, but before he could say anything, he was interrupted by the second agent sitting in the last chair positioned in front of Damien’s desk.

“Makes sense to me. We need all the mind power we can get on this case, and I’ve seen some of the cases you and your brother have helped us with before. I’m sure you’ll be an invaluable asset.”

I shifted in my seat, hiding my grimace as I struggled to find a comfortable position for my leg.

The man was a stranger to me, and even Damien didn’t seem to recognize him since he didn’t address the man by name.

Such quick praise from someone unfamiliar made me uncomfortable, but I bit my tongue before I said something regrettable. I’d always been a suspicious person. It was how Damien and I stayed alive so long. However, there was a difference between healthy caution and inventing enemies out of thin air.

Rather than confront the stranger, I kept my tone as neutral as possible.

“Sorry, I don’t think we’ve met. What’s your name?”

Luckily the man didn’t seem insulted by my question. He merely laughed in a way that was clearly directed at himself.

“Right. Sorry. We haven’t actually met. You and your brother have been mentioned so many times around the office, I feel like I already know you. I’m Blake Adder. I’m in charge of the CAP case.”

Only a few inches of space divided Damien’s desk from my own, so I didn’t have to lean far in order to speak directly to him. “CAP case?”

“Remember that case I told you about before, where someone’s been going around castrating pedophiles? The FBI has determined that it’s definitely the work of an organized group and have started calling them the Castration Anti-Pedophiles group. CAP.”

Agent Adder’s laughter rang out again. “Yeah, I definitely drew the short straw when it came to assignments. Most people in the agency don’t want me to succeed, not even me. I mean, who would want to stop people that are punishing pedophiles? Anyway, my whole assignment is basically just for show, so that we can legally say we’re doing our job.”

The sound of a throat clearing cut off Agent Adder’s raucous laughter.

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