Page 10 of Girl, Haunted

‘Maybe he’s sending us to catch Bigfoot.’

‘The only big foot you'll be seeing is mine up your ass if you don't hurry up.’

‘Hey,’ Luca said, catching her arm. ‘You ready for this? Us working together again?’

She hadn’t even worried about it for a second. There was no doubt in her mind.It had been too long since she’d been on thefrontlines, and doing it with Luca by her side was the icing on the cake.

‘Of course, honey, now let’s go.’

CHAPTER FOUR

The elevator doors parted and spat Ella and Luca out into the top floor of the FBI building in Northwest D.C.

Ella had wanted to take the stairs – for that brief period of reflection en route to the dragon’s lair – but there was a tour going on downstairs. Once a month, groups were invited to see the FBI headquarters in person, and it always made Ella feel like a museum exhibit.

‘I love those tours,’ Luca said as he peered over the balcony. ‘It’s nice that the public get to see inside here.’

‘Yeah. They’re doing them at Quantico now too.’

At the end of the hall, a big-dick oak door stood guard. The plaque readWILLIAM EDIS – DIRECTOR.Edis had returned in the interim after the previous, short-lived director had been assassinated on his doorstep, but Edis's masochism knew no bounds, so he'd signed on for another year. This was his final year because FBI directors could only serve ten years at the top. Then they replaced them with someone younger and better looking, or at least Ella hoped.

‘You know why they do tours at Quantico?’ Luca asked.

‘Same reason they do tours here. So people can see the inside of the building.’

‘No. It’s to stop the conspiracies.’

‘What conspiracies?’

‘All the conspiracies,’ Luca said. ‘Aliens in the basement. Hoover’s corpse on ice. Weapons that control the weather.’

‘You ever been in the basement?’

‘No. You?’

They reached the door. Ella raised a fist to knock. 'No, but Ripley did once. She saw things.'

‘What kind of things?’

‘Let’s just say...’

A voice boomed from the other side of the door before Ella could finish. ‘Enter.’

Luca cut a glance at her, then whispered, ‘We didn’t even knock. Man’s got sonic ears.’

‘Shh, he’ll hear you.’ Ella shouldered inside with Luca on her tail. Edis held court behind his aircraft carrier of a desk, built like a bulldog in his trademark power suit. Since returning to the job, he’d traded charcoal gray for blue. Appearances were everything, he always said, which made the ungroomed patches of hair on his head all the more confusing. His eyes fixed on them, managing to convey annoyance and exhaustion in a single glance.

‘Agents, sit.’ Edis gestured to the leather thrones in front of his desk. ‘Thank you for coming.’

He always thanked Ella whenever she arrived, as if she had a choice in the matter. She and Luca took their seats. It was still a strange feeling, not seeing Ripley sprawled out in that chair like usual. Maybe she’d never get used to it.

‘You’re welcome, sir. What can we do for you?’

‘First, Dark, I want to say well done for what you did down in NOLA. I’ve seen the clips.’

Luca turned to her. ‘Told you.’

‘Securing a death sentence for a high-profile guy like Creed puts us on good terms with all of the major players.’ Edis gestured to a bottle of whiskey on his window sill. It had a Scottish name Ella couldn’t pronounce. ‘Gift from the mayor this morning.’

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