Page 82 of The Succubi's Choice

Stepping back away from him, a safe distance away, she holds her hand up, and as easy as breathing her charm sparks up and into the air, useless. Not hitting anyone.

His brows furrow, and instead of being an opposing force, suddenly his shoulders unwind, and he’s investigative.

“Well,” he says, his eyes narrowing even further. “Then they lied to me about what they did.”

Gabriel and Miri exchange a quick, panicked glance at that statement.

“What did they say?” She asks, folding her arms back up again. “Because they were grilling me about charming the Archdemon.”

A look like he’s tasted something bad surfaces over his face. “That they had to make sure he didn’t put a rune over you to do his bidding,” he says. “That they had to do some blood tests to make sure you haven’t been poisoned.”

Not wanting to stand still, not wanting to give him any sort of leeway, she scuffs her bare feet against the edge of the kitchen tile and the carpet. “I think a blood test might have happened at one point,” she gives him, and feels a bit sour at the concession of just saying that. “But mostly it was a copper needle in my vein for...” She glances at Gabriel, still unsure of the timeline—“a few hours?”

Yeah now he’s pissed. “Well that explains your arm,” Lundy says, and his voice is deep, in an anger that she hasn’t heard since before the demigod got killed. “They told me it was a possibly infected blood draw.”

Again, the silence, and she doesn’t want to give him any sort of credit or any sort of way to stop feeling bad, but... “One of the women in charge was at the Archdemon event,” she says, quick, before she can convince herself to not do so, and even still, it feels like she’s betraying him. “He didn’t know she was in the Organization.”

Lundy has the look of a man slowly realizing he’s been tricked, and like his strings have been cut, he folds into one of their dining chairs. “This is above my pay level, isn’t it?” He says, weak.

“No,” Gabriel says, harsh. “It’s exactly your pay level cause it hurt her.” He points at Miri, and she really wishes he wouldn’t. “It’s like...your job description.”

“That’s not entirely fair,” Miri says, because defending people seems to be her job in this conversation. “I’m pretty sure his job is just making me obey rules.”

“Rules that hurt you,” he shoots back.

Jacqueline chooses that moment to come back in with coffee, and Lundy doesn’t even look up at her as she passes Miri the frapp. “That’s not good for you,” Lundy says, but with much less conviction.

“Coffee isn’t really good for anyone,” Jacqueline says, voice full of false innocence. “I don’t know why you always say that to her.”

Lundy squints at her, then at Miri in exasperation. “Oh, she knows, doesn’t she.”

“Wasn’t my fault, she’s smart,” Miri shoots back.

“For how long?”

“About three weeks, I think,” Jacqueline says, brisk. “Not that it’s any of your business what I know, as a private citizen. Knowing things isn’t illegal.” And she stares, dead-faced, at Lundy, and if the possibility of getting in trouble was taken off the table, Miri would be super amused.

“Also, you have enough of a leak that someone shared what happened to me to the Archdemon, before you even knew,” Miri says, uncrossing her arm cause it ached too much. “And you’re supposed to be linked to everything that goes through my file.”

“And that’s a huge civil rights problem,” Jacqueline chimes in, smiling sweetly. “Privacy violation, all that.”

Lundy stares at her, then back at Miri, for a long second, before he pulls out a notebook and places it on the table. “Let me see your phone,” he says, and she doesn’t move. “They’re obviously doing something harmful and I don’t like it, let me see your phone. I’ll disable the mirror.”

She raises an eyebrow at him. “I don’t believe you.”

“You just told me my bosses are actively undermining me, doing something that is harmful to you and possibly others,” he says, holding his hand out, insistent. “I’m gonna give you the opportunity to figure shit out without them able to read all your texts.”

She tosses him her phone, and Jacqueline wrinkles her nose at her.

“Now, you certainly did not just have sex with one person last night,” he says, fiddling with the settings of the phone, “And I don’t know what’s up with that, but I need you to appear that you have no clue while I figure this out.”

“You’re expecting me to just sit back and let you?” She asks, and he glances up at her in surprise before going back to her phone.

“Well I have much more access to the inner dealings,” he says, the dad voice coming out again. “And more weaponry.”

Miri and Gabriel exchange a look. In that look is over a decade worth of friendship, of dealing with this bullshit, and the identical realization that they are going to say they’re letting Lundy do his part and absolutely not sit on the sidelines.

“Sure,” Miri says, because Lundy is a responsible person and responds well to people acting in a logical manner. “Sounds good.”

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