Marked By Lies: A Reverse Harem Series (The Marked Series Book 1) by Paige Orr (the red fox clan TXT) 📗

can find this fucker and make him pay? Because if not, I can see us all chasing our fucking tails trying to catch the bastard while he watches on with a smile on his face, and that means I’m willing to work with whoever it takes to get the job done.”

Cailean and Zaphyr get to their feet and I hold my breath, waiting for what they are going to do. When a smile covers both of their faces and they reach their hands out to shake, the breath rushes out of me in relief. Whoever this fucker is, he’s going to wish that he never fucked with the Fae because together we make one lethal team.

Chapter Seven

Melissa

I close my apartment door behind me, leaning against it and trying to catch my breath. I can’t believe how fucking close I was to being caught tonight, if it wasn’t for my dark stranger I would have been well and truly fucked. That doesn’t mean that I’m exactly excited about working for him, but I just have to hope that this job will lead to bigger and better ones in the future.

I make my way through to the bedroom, stopping at the painting hanging on my wall that conceals my safe. I trust Nika’s magic, but I still want to double-check that the necklace is in there and in one piece before I contact my client. Swinging the painting to the side, scanning my wrist in front of the safe before I enter the safe’s pin and wait for the telltale click to say that it’s safe to open.

When I first had the safe installed, I thought I would make it to the big leagues and be getting the best of cases. So I had Nika ward the safe so that only I could open it. That doesn’t mean that I don’t have to take certain precautions before opening it though, because if I mess the sequence up, even the slightest little bit, then I end up being shocked with seven and a half million volts of electricity. A nasty little precaution, but one that I thought was necessary if I was going to be handling rare or expensive shit.

I press the hidden button on the handle of the safe and watch as it swings open, revealing an almost empty safe, apart from a velvet bag sitting at the very bottom. Pulling the bag out, I untie the drawstrings, opening it and pouring the contents into my hand. I can’t help but let out a sigh of relief when I look at the necklace, which made it without a scratch before sliding it back into the bag and replacing it in the safe.

I lock everything back up, moving the picture back over the safe, and throw myself down onto my bed. I run over everything that happened tonight in my head, trying to figure out how it could have gone so wrong so quickly. I was so sure that no one had seen me slip away from the party, and everything was going so well.

These thoughts bring me back to the picture of the handsome stranger leaning against the wall, watching my every move. The confusing thing about it all is him not seeming to care about the fact that I was stealing from a Prince. The only reason I can think of why he was so unperturbed over finding me there is that he wasn't a Seelie Fae. That just raises more questions though, about why an Unseelie was wandering around freely inside the Seelie Prince’s home.

It was obvious that the man knew the Prince on a personal level, but whatever happened between them couldn't have been good with the disdain that filled the man's face when he spoke of him. I release a frustrated breath knowing that there’s no point trying to figure all of this out. Either I’ll get some answers when he comes to tell me what he needs me to do or I won’t. Either way, I’m not going to spend any more time thinking about him.

I reach for my clutch, which I threw onto the bed when I came into the room, and grab my phone. Usually, the first person I would call after finishing a job would be my client, but I know if I don’t call Nika first, she’ll never help me again. So pulling up her name on my phone, I press call and hold my breath waiting for her to answer. When she does pick up, I have to pull the phone away from my ear with the way she screams at me.

“Bitch, if you made it out of that shit alive then I’m going to kill you myself. How did you get yourself caught after we went over how not to get caught?”

“If you’re quite finished threatening my life, I’ll do my best to fill you in. but to be perfectly honest, I don’t understand what happened myself.”

“Alright, I’m sorry. I’ve been sitting here going crazy, worried about what whoever caught you was going to do with you. I mean, why the fuck didn’t he hand you over to the Prince. Not that I’m unhappy that you’re home safe.”

I take a deep breath trying to decide how much to tell her, but if I know Nika like I think I do, then she’ll be able to see through any bullshit I fob her off with so I’m better off just telling her everything. Well, everything apart from my non-corporeal stalkers help.

“Well, everything was going exactly how we planned earlier. I got into the party with no fuss and slipped away without being seen, or so I thought. But while I was slipping the necklace into my pocket, I noticed a shadow out of the side of my eye, who just so happened to be our mystery savior.”

“What do you mean savior,