Page 41 of Sebastian

Agent Long never actually looked at his companion. All of his focus remained fixed on adjusting his lambskin gloves, but his attention was clearly pointed in Agent Adder’s direction. “Enough. Get on with it. We don’t have all day to sit around.”

I shifted again, tipping my leg to a new angle. My tumble off the weight bench earlier was catching up with me, and a new ache had started in my knee. “Since you’re here, I’m guessing that the missing children I was looking for are somehow related to your CAP group?”

“Well, sort of.”

Agent Adder pulled out a thin laptop from his briefcase and placed it on Damien’s desk, though he angled it so I could see the screen as well. He looked at Agent Long and gestured at the laptop.

“Do you want to...”

Agent Long stared at him and said nothing.

“Right, I’ll just...” He turned on the screen to show pictures of a kitchen that looked like it hadn’t been remodeled since the sixties with an alarming amount of blood staining the floor.

“Agent Long has been looking into Smith Harper, the man who worked for two of the adoption agencies in question. It actually wasn’t that hard to track him down, however, when we sent agents to his address, we found him passed out on the floor. Castrated. He’s the CAP group’s latest victim. So far as we know the group hasn’t killed anyone, but apparently something went wrong and they came close this time. In the process of removing... certain parts of Mr. Harper’s anatomy, the attackers also cauterized the wound with some form of crude heat or something, so that wasn’t what put him at risk, really. Anyway, before authorities could arrive, Harper must have tried to get to his feet and dispose of evidence on his computer. We found the smashed computer pieces—ironically the fool missed the hard drive entirely so we found a bunch of incriminating evidence anyway, plus there was a zip drive filled with information on this guy’s activities just sitting there on a side table—but anyway, in the process of trying to get loose from where he’d been handcuffed to a table, Harper busted up one of the table legs and somehow managed to fall and impale himself on it. If our agents hadn’t arrived when they did, he probably would have bleed out and died.”

I sucked in air through my teeth as my leg gave a painful twinge. Both the agents and my brother looked at me, and I schooled my face into a thoughtful expression. “So, we were right. The missing kids were taken to supply some sort of pedophile ring.”

“Hold on,” Damien cut me off, though he gave me a soft look that said he wasn’t trying to argue. “How do we know for certain that this was the work of your CAP group? Just being castrated isn’t enough to make that assumption. There are certainly other instances of castration that aren’t related to them. A jealous lover. An act of revenge. Or even...” Damien’s eyes flickered to me. “Or even a mafia hit could all account for this kind of attack.”

I could tell just from Damien’s expression that the same memories played behind both our eyes. It was a familiar and well-traveled path of thought. Even after so many years, it was still hard to ignore the memories of our parents, but I pushed their image out of my mind to focus on the current dilemma.

“It would be an odd coincidence. A suspect in a case involving a pedophile ring, getting attacked in the same way as a vigilante group that targets pedophiles.”

“True,” Damien agreed. “But we’ve chased that rabbit down a tunnel of assumptions before, and it doesn’t lead anywhere good.”

“Well, in this case,” Agent Adder said as he opened a different file on his computer. “The CAP group always leaves behind some obvious evidence of their victim’s crimes. In this case, we’ve got a terabyte’s worth of child pornography that Smith Harper was distributing.”

“So if—” I leaned a little too far sideways and my leg bumped the desk. The grunt of pain that wanted to leave my lips stayed locked behind my teeth, but I couldn’t stop myself from visibly flinching.

Agent Long grumbled as he abruptly stood from his chair. “Oh, for the love of...”

Storming over to me, he grabbed my chair and forcibly spun me around. I was by no means a small person, so the sudden manhandling caught me off guard. I didn’t even protest as he repositioned me to sit parallel to my desk, then dragged his own chair over and used it to prop up my injured leg.

“You’re going to end up back in the hospital if you keep neglecting yourself like that.”

I stared up at him, speechless, with my eyes nearly popping out of my head.

He merely raised one perfectly manicured eyebrow. “What? I was a medic in the army. I know what a person looks like when they’re hiding pain. You seem like the kind of patient I would have hated to have back then. Ignoring advice. Pushing yourself too fast. Ridiculous. Now, sit still and behave so we can get on with the case.”

Since his chair was now being used, Agent Long chose to stand off to the side of the room with his arms crossed.

I couldn’t help the grin that spread over my face. Maybe this man wasn’t as boring as he seemed.

“I was right. You do remind me of my old schoolteacher.”

“You mean Mr. Shaw?” Damien asked, though he was already giving Agent Long a considering gaze. “I had that guy for eighth-grade algebra. At least half of the students broke down crying during his class that year. Now that you mention it, I do see the resemblance.”

Agent Long sniffed and adjusted his already straight glasses. “Ridiculousness runs in your family, I see. Don’t know why I bothered. Let this idiot lose his leg for all I care. Adder, hurry up and show them the video so we can get out of here.”

“Video?” I perked up in my chair but made sure to keep my leg stationary when Agent Long scowled at me again.

Agent Adder pulled up a video on his laptop that seemed to be a black and white recording from a security camera.

“Right before he was attacked, Smith Harper visited another hospital. We acquired the security footage from the hospital to see if he met with anyone or did anything suspicious. So far, we haven’t found anything. All he did was pick up a few brochures for volunteer opportunities and then leave. We were hoping you might notice something that we didn’t, since you have the most experience with this case.”

The video played, showing a view of the front doors of a hospital where dozens of people were constantly going in and out. The agents had to point out which man was Smith Harper. I’d never seen him before, and even Damien only knew the man by name, not by face. He was entirely unremarkable. The kind of man no one would like at twice if they passed him on the street. Even knowing who I was looking for, he was still hard to keep track of among the hospital rush. Each time the video switched to the view from a new camera, we had to stop a moment and find our target again.

It was like a real-life version of “Where’s Waldo” but much less interesting and with much higher stakes.

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