Page 17 of How to Seduce a Slender

She rushed around him toward the hallway, the fabric of her crimson gown fluttering behind her. Smith stopped as Sebastian rose to his feet with a chuckle. “Smith, you know pinkie promises aren’t legally binding.”

“Yes,I am aware!” He hissed, embarrassment burning him alive as he ripped away from his snickering employers. Smith stormed after his fleeing werewolf.He knew all the laws. It was his job to know all of them, magical, necromantic, and benign.He knew all the bylaws and legal origins of everything! Smith spent too many years studying not to be a well of knowledge.

But like Melody said, this wasn’t something she’d take to court…Was it silly? Sure…but the thought of a secret code of rules and laws they made up on such a childish premise made the fluttering in his chest incessant.Because she made them with him.

Smith rounded the corner of his office, finding Melody staring at the massive chalkboard he’d wheeled in. She marveled at it with a cute ‘o’ shape of her mouth. He slithered up beside her, watching her as she inspected all the clues he’d gathered.

“What do you think?”

“It’s fantastic! It feels like a real detective case! We’re just missing pipes and monocles.” She flashed him a toothy grin. “What’s up first, Detective Smith?”

He chuckled, taking her gingerly by the elbow and leading her back to the fainting couch. She plopped down into it without question. Even took the massive goblet of water from the hand extending out of the wall.Good girl.He wheeled the board between his desk and her.

“So, Aravis took what I told him—from what you told me—and built a timetable, but unfortunately, most of it goes cold. It seems whoever our perpetrator is covered your trail with an erasing curse, so not even the shield predicted where you were, and if there would have been witnesses, they didn’t see anything. Which may also be why your memory is…” He trailed off.

“Shit.” She added with a soft nod.

Smith snorted, “Precisely. Now,” he returned his attention to the board without blocking her view of it, “you said you woke up around noon, as per usual. Prepared for work. Leaving your apartment around one, which your neighbor confirmed for us, as per usual. You arrived at the diner at one-thirty after a walk through the city. Your line cook and the owner of the diner confirmed for Aravis that you sat down to eat a b.l.t. sandwich with fries at the bar and were clocked in by two on the dot. Very punctual, as always, Ms. Deathless. But from there, all we have are credit card receipts that all line up with who was seen at the diner. For anyone who used gold, however…”

He tapped his chin.

Melody hummed, nodding softly. “Yeah, if they use coin, then we can’t track nothing other than what they ate. Did Mr. Bourgias give you the list of orders I took for that day? We could like, I don’t know, narrow down who used card versus coin, and start there? You think it was a customer of mine who attacked me?”

Smith whirled to face her. “Mr. Bourgias, the owner?”

“Yeah, sounds like burgers, but with a fancy ‘oooour’.” Melody wiggled her shoulders playfully. Smith warmed as she instinctively raised the glass to her lips before continuing. “The computer tracks all the orders that come through, but I’m not sure how accurate it is for where they were cause when it spits it out it just says order number and not where it goes. OH! My notebook! Have him send over my notebook. It’s hangin’ in my apron in my locker! If he sends you a list of all the orders for that day, I could tell you who paid with coin, and if they said somethin’ funny. I always take notes on customers if they’re needy, extra cold, all that good stuff, plus where they’re sittin’”

Smith clapped his hands together before rushing around his desk. “Genuis, Melody.”

“Oh really?” She giggled, flipping her hair off her shoulder with a dramatic flick of her hand.

“Really,” Smith breathed as he scribbled down his request for her apron and all other belongings from her locker to be sent to Rosemont Manor. He sealed the envelope and popped it into one of the open copper chutes along the eastern wall of his office. It was sucked up into the pipes and shipped out to the city. “We should either see a response or your belongings within an hour. In the meantime, let’s continue.”

He pointed to blocks of time where the information was little or blank. In the twenty-four hour window, they could only account for her whereabouts for ten of them, from before getting to the diner till she was there for an entire shift. Then the missing hour and a half, give or take, until she passed Smith in the woods. Which meant she was missing for nearly two hours, likely being chased through the city.

As he finished, she raised a hand “Don’t forget, you sat in my section at your regular time.”

“Mmm, but would you have told me if something strange happened that day? Your line cook didn’t say you looked upset when you left work, so would it have even shown?” Smith faced her, arms folded into the small of his back.

“I’m not sure,” she sighed, taking another sip before sitting the goblet aside. She climbed to her feet, took up a hunk of chalk from the bar at the base of the board, and scribbled a quick tick in her timeline.Smith was here.

She flashed a smile over her shoulder at him. “I’m not even sure anyone is going to be memorable unless they tip as good as you or were downright nasty.”

He took the chalk from her tenderly, placing it back in the bar. His lips curled with a teasing tone as he pushed the board back where it was, “Is that all I’m memorable for, Ms. Deathless?”

“No, I always remember a pretty face.”

They shared a look.Well, she looked at him with a ‘oh please’ expression…He doubted she could see the wicked expression plastered to his.Melody slowly looked around his office, a dreamy sigh coming off her lips. “But I’ll always remember this place. Curse or no curse.”

Words beat against his tongue, ready to spill into the air.You could stay!He swallowed them, screams and all, as he stepped up beside her once more. He would offer for her to stay. He’d already constructed an agreement for Sebastian to see when the time came. However, he wanted her to stay of her own free will. Not because of a perceived threat. He was making her stay for her safety but…maybe…if she liked it enough, she’d stay after that threat was gone?

As if right on cue, Moonpie barged through the door and Melody gasped. She rapidly got ahold of her journal and her pencils as Dahlia’s cat crawled up onto Smith’s desk, as the creature always did, and began to study Melody from afar.

She plopped onto the couch and immediately began to sketch the flowery, zombie cat. “Good! I only caught a glimpse of you the other day! This is perfect!”

Smith chuckled, passing the cat. As per usual, she swatted at him. He swatted back. He rounded his desk and returned to the endless sea of paperwork he was rifling through to ensure the house was ready for tax season the moment the snow cleared. Winter was steadily gaining on them, and soon it would coat the realm in a blanket of blinding white.

“Smith?”

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