Page 32 of Fool Me Twice
Ash quirked a brow at him, sticking a strawberry-flavored lollipop into his mouth from an oversized pot of them on the desk. “Fix just told me about the twins.”
“It’s not his case either,” Hart said for what felt like the millionth time. “It doesn’t seem like it’s anyone’s case.”
“And yet…” Ash trailed off, and Hart allowed his shoulders to slump marginally. He sank deeper into the chair and sighed.
“I know there’s something going on,” Hart said, looking at Ash.
Having recently come out of his own career-defining case, Ash knew better than anyone where Hart’s head was at. Both professionally and personally. None of them knew how to do anything else but what they were trained to do, and failure at work meant failing at being who they were fundamentally. It was a tough pill to swallow. Especially for Hart, who thrived on being perfect.
“You know we believe you, right?” Ash said and Hart held his gaze as best as he could. He didn’t like being the one who needed encouragement.
“I know,” he said, voice thick.
“We’ll get to the bottom of this. Together, like we do everything else.”
“Thank you,” Hart said, running a tired hand over his face, desperate to talk about something else. He caught sight of a pile of papers on Ash’s desk. “Are you working on something?”
Ash lifted the journal from Morgan’s house into the air to show Hart.
“Still trying to make sense of the whole thing,” he said. “We filed the case with as much detail as we could and added in the professional opinions of the other bonding curse experts, but we’re still missing a lot, and I have no clue where to even begin.”
“The list of names?” Hart asked.
Ash shook his head. “Nothing so far. Black keeps chasing it at PUMA, but every last one of those names was a dead end. It’s like someone is working really hard to stop us from finding out.”
“You think so?” Hart frowned.
“You were there for the whole hacking ‘let it go’ creepo moment. Which was untraceable, by the way. No one has a clue how they got in or out of our system, or who the hell they are. And when the largest curse-related law enforcement agency hits walls repeatedly when looking into something, you can’t help but wonder…”
“Maybe the legal way isn’t gonna yield any results this time,” Hart said before he could stop himself, and Ash gasped so loudly the room echoed with it, making Hart squeeze his eyes shut.
“Excuse me?” Ash almost squealed, his voice reminding Hart uncomfortably of Black when he got excited about something. “I don’t think I heard you properly there. Can you repeat that?”
“But better die than live mechanically a life that is a repetition of repetitions,” Hart said.
“Oh no.” Ash shook his head. “No, no, no, no, no, you are not proverbing your way out of this conversation. You, Saint Hart, just suggested illegal avenues of obtaining information.”
Hart shook his head. “I did no such thing.”
“Yes, you did,” Ash sang obnoxiously. “You totally did. I heard it. And I’m pretty sure Taylor heard it somehow. Pretty sure she has the place bugged.”
“No, I don’t,” a voice said from nowhere, and both Ash and Hart jumped in their seats, looking around but finding nothing.
“Creepy,” Hart said.
“Not creepy enough to change the subject,” Ash said. “Cane has rubbed off on you, I see.”
Hart blanched at the words, trying desperately to stop them from flooding his brain.
“Nobody has been rubbing off on me,” Hart said.
“I think that might be the problem,” Taylor suggested from wherever she was, and Ash actually nodded in agreement.
“She has a point.”
“She doesn’t.”
“You know I do,” Taylor said.