*Sephie*
“So, princess, how do you control yours so quickly? You can get your eyes to change from normal to black and back again in a second now, without getting ridiculously angry. What do you think about to make that happen?” Ivan asked.
“Um, I don’t know that I’ve ever really thought about this before. I just kind of do it. But I learned very early in life to think of my anger like a living being, almost. Maybe what I think of as my anger is actually my demon? It’s much the same as when I’m sending stuff to you guys. I just concentrate on it and push it forward,” I said.
Ivan closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them this time, they were much darker than they were just a few moments ago. I couldn’t help but grin at him. “Clearly, that explanation worked,” I said. I turned to look at Adrik. “Have yours turned dark other than that one time when we were all in here?”
He nodded. “I was talking to Ivan the other day and they changed. Like him right now, I was barely angry when it happened.”
“You guys are learning much faster than I did. That’s impressive,” I said. Adrik closed his eyes for a moment, opening them to reveal his almost-black eyes. “Yours are getting darker much faster, too. How?”
“When you showed me how you control your anger, I started thinking about mine like a living thing too. Maybe we’re just giving acknowledgement to our little buddies in there?” He smiled, his eyes still dark.
“Are you asking me because you think I have the answer? Because that’s not a thing I have,” I said. “Has anybody else seen this yet?”
“Not that I know of,” Ivan said.
“I might’ve had it happen in one of my meetings. I noticed a look of surprise on someone’s face and blinked when I noticed my mind was wandering to Ricardo,” Adrik said. His eyes had returned to their normal blue as he laughed about scaring his business associate.
“All this time I’ve been worried it was me who was going to scare everyone off. Turns out it was you,” I said, laughing.
“Told you that you’re gonna need contacts too,” Ivan said.
--
Once the guys came back with Chen, Andrei caught my eye. He tapped his temple and raised one eyebrow at me. I took a peak in his head, looking through what he’d seen when he looked into the journalist’s head. When I looked into people’s minds, I could see what they saw, so I got a chance to see the journalist how Andrei saw him. I clearly saw his aura around him, but I also saw it was broken in a few places. Dark spots, like holes were visible. Andrei felt nothing bad from him as he talked to Chen. I couldn’t stop looking at the way Andrei saw him. It was fascinating.
It also gave me an idea on how to help Viktor. *“Squish, can you call the acupuncturist? Bubba just gave me an idea about Viktor. Also, I was able to see what he could see when I just went fishing in his head, so I’m gonna need to do that to you the next time you see a little demon riding shotgun on somebody’s shoulder.”* Ivan laughed loudly, which made me struggle not to laugh, because it looked like he wasn’t talking to anybody. *“My bad,”* I thought.
*“What did you do to Ivan, solnishko?”* Adrik thought. I caught his sexy smirk on his face as he pretended to listen to Viktor.
*“I have an idea on how to help Viktor. I also said I wanted to see what it looks like when a demon is riding shotgun on a person and now I know how,”* I answered.
Adrik was much more in control. I could hear him laughing internally. When I looked at him, he looked like he was still listening to Viktor, who was going through the information the journalist had given Chen on the mayor and the police commissioner.
As everyone started to pay attention to Viktor, the mood turned more serious. Our suspicions were confirmed by the journalist. It was Henry, not the mayor, that was dirty. However, it appeared that he hadn’t been on the take as long as we thought. From what the journalist could find, Sal had only recently gotten to Henry. We still weren’t sure what he was doing with the information on Ricardo, but we could still get that information to the mayor, along with this new information on Henry, and get them both taken care of. Along with a win in the next election for the mayor.
“So how do we get to the mayor without Henry finding out?” Misha asked.
“I might actually be able to help with that,” Chen said. He looked somewhat nervous to interject.
“How?” Adrik asked.
“Well, since you were gracious enough to take me on as a contractor on your latest building project, word has gotten around. I have a crew starting a job at the mayor’s house next week. I’m meeting with him Monday morning before we get started. I can get information to and from him and no one will ever know.”
“Fucking shit, Chen. You’ve been a criminal mastermind this entire time and you’re only just now telling us?” I said, trying not to laugh.
“I could say the same for you, my girl,” he said, laughing.
The guys started to discuss the logistics of getting information to and from the mayor through Chen. What that looked like, how it would work, and how he could get information to us. Once they agreed upon a plan, Chen said his goodbyes and left Adrik’s office, leaving the guys to discuss the latest information we’d received.
I was still frustrated with having to deal with yet another reversal of loyalty when it came to Henry. I was chewing on my bottom lip, staring off into space while I thought about how irritating it was to not be able to trust anyone. I suddenly noticed that everyone had stopped talking and they were all looking at me, with very amused expressions on their face.
“How many times do I have to tell you that spontaneous human combustion is a real thing, gazelle?” Misha asked.
“What? I’m not even that mad right now?” I said, somewhat confused.
“Your idea of ‘not that mad’ and mine are clearly different,” Stephen said.
“Your eyes say differently,” Viktor said.
“That’s not fair. You know these things have a mind of their own now, right? I’m just slightly irritated,” I said.
Adrik walked to me, smirking. He wrapped his arms around my waist as he stood behind me and rested his chin on top of my head. “She’s not lying. This is barely anything for her. You guys are just becoming really sensitive to being able to feel her now. You’ll soon get used to it. This is like a 1-2 on her scale. Once you feel her 10 a few more times, you’ll be able to differentiate,” he said. I could hear him smiling as he talked.
“I still don’t understand how you don’t kill everyone,” Stephen said quietly. “I’m beginning to wonder if Vlad learned his scorched Earth policy from you.”