Page 34 of Midnight Coven

He wanted to know where Jordan was.

Not like it would have done any good.

Jordan wouldn’t be able to talk to him either. In fact, Nick found himself thinking that’s likely why he wasn’t in here with Morley. Knowing Damon Jordan, he probably didn’t trust himself to not break character while he questioned him.

Shaking his head, Nick combed a hand through his straight black hair.

“Can I see the footage at least?” he asked finally.

“No.”

Nick frowned. “Why not? Don’t I have therightto fucking see it?”

“Not from me. That’s I.S.F. reg. Anyway, I don’t have access to the recording right now. Or authorization to share it with you, even if I did.”

Again, Nick heard the message behind his friends’ words.

If they could keep this in homicide, at least the NYPD would be the ones following the case. If they could keep it in Nick’s home precinct, Morley might be the one running the show. Nick knew what a shot in the dark that would be, though.

Just about anyone who knew Nick, or knew his relationship with Morley, would likely give the case to someone else. The NYPD wouldn’t want the appearance they were protecting him. If that hit the news, it would be mayhem.

But there might be a way to keep Morley and Jordan involved without putting them in charge. Nick strongly suspected that’s the way they would want to handle it.

Keep the vampire rights people happy.

Keep the racists happy, too.

If this whole thing went to I.S.F., or worse, to the Human Racial Authority (H.R.A.), then there was no way of knowing who would be assigned to the case. Worse, they might fall outside of Archangel’s sphere of influence too, if mitigating factors turned this into an international case, meaning one that went beyond national boundaries.

Nick didn’t like his chances with any of that.

He didn’t like his chances period, right now.

“When will jurisdiction be decided?” Nick asked.

Morley took a sip out of his blinking, brightly lit, ugly-as-shit NY Yankees coffee mug.

His facial expression remained impossible to read.

“They’ll tell me that when they tell me that, Midnight,” the human detective said next. “I know they’re bringing in interested parties on both sides right now to discuss it. Farlucci’s on his way,” he added, referring to Nick’s fight promoter in the vampire cage-fighting world. “And Acharya is in there with some of Archangel’s people now,” he added.

Nick nodded.

Jagan “Jag” Acharya was the Chief of Police for all of NYPD.

He was also a minor celebrity in his own right.

Technically, Acharya oversaw his contract with the human police, and negotiated any changes with the I.S.F. and Nick’s other employers, meaning Farlucci and St. Maarten. Nick wondered, not for the first time, just how many rounds of “deal with Nick the Problem Vampire Detective” it would take before Acharya cut him loose altogether.

Truthfully, Nick was surprised it hadn’t happened already.

“Can you tell me anything?” Nick exhaled as a mannerism, hiding his exasperation badly that time. “Does it really look that much like me on the footage?”

Morley met Nick’s gaze.

After a pause where he seemed to be weighing answers, he exhaled, too.

“It does,” he admitted. “But it’s not definitive.”

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