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

“Don’t you think I thought of that! I detected no spells or wards on her! If you don’t believe me, that's fine, but you will see for yourself when we go to her office tomorrow.”

When he finishes speaking, he digs around in his pocket for something before chucking his phone at me, which I easily catch. I look down at it in confusion before looking back at him with a raised eyebrow, causing him to tut.

“The last number she called was her friend. I need you to call her and ask for the address of her office. I’m sure by now she will have called her friend and filled her in on our deal, so hopefully, she won’t mind giving you the address.”

I can’t help the groan that escapes me when he tells me this. Zaph never really liked technology, which makes trying to explain how it works to him like explaining it to a pensioner. He would never understand how easy it would be for someone to find out every detail about his life, just by gaining access to his phone.

“You do realize that if your little songbird's friend is a wiz with technology, then she could track us right now. Why do you never listen when I tell you not to give anyone your phone?”

“What does that matter? It's not like I use the thing for anything important. If it will put your mind at rest, you can dispose of it once you make the call. It’s not like you don’t have a collection at my place for this exact reason.”

I let out a huff at his blase reply before doing as he asked. Pulling up the last dialed number, I press call and wait patiently for someone to answer. The phone continues to ring and ring and just as I become impatient, someone finally answers.

“Well, if it isn’t Mister Mysterious. My friend filled me in all about you, but that leads me to question why the fuck you’re calling me?”

“Well, that was quite rude coming from the friend of a thief. I’m calling on behalf of the Mister Mysterious as you called him. Since your friend has filled you in, that means you know that she’s agreed to help us. So if you would be a doll and give us the address to her office, that would be great.”

“Fine, I suppose I could do that. You’ll get a text with the location in a few minutes. You should know though that if your Prince lays a single finger on her to harm her, then I will do everything in my power to kick his ass. Mel is only human, she may know about our world, but she’s powerless to defend herself.”

Nothing could stop the laugh that bursts from me at her words. How anyone thinks they could hurt Zaph is beyond me, but the woman has balls, that’s for sure.

“I’ll be sure to pass on the message, although I wouldn’t hold your breath. I’m sure your little friend will be perfectly fine since my Prince seems to be quite taken with her. Ciao!”

I hang up the call, chuckling to myself, and turn to Zaph to find him suppressing his laughter as the phone buzzes in my hand with the incoming text. I open the text to find an address in one of the rougher parts of the city and a sassy remark about knowing who I am too.

“Well, it seems I was right again. Her friend is savvy enough with technology to have hacked into Cailean’s security and find out who we are. There’s not much point in getting rid of the phone, I’m pretty sure she would just hack something else anyway.”

“You never know, it’s always good to have a number for people who could help us in the future. Everyone has their price and I’m sure she wouldn’t turn down the chance at money, not many people do.”

Sometimes I hate how uninterested Zaph can be when it comes to his safety, but if I know anything about him, then I know there’s no point trying to lecture him. Deciding to do a little investigation of my own, I type the address into my phone, pulling up the website that it’s linked to.

I’m greeted with a site to a small private investigation firm. Scrolling through the information on the site, I come across a picture of who I assume is our little helper and my breath catches in my throat. She’s certainly a stunning woman, and I can see why she caught Zaph’s eye. Continuing through the site, I find a section for reviews and my eyebrows raise when I see that most clients have hired her for small-time gigs.

Surely someone that is best known for finding lost pets or proof of cheating spouses wouldn’t be the top pick to hire when you need something stolen from the Seelie Prince. Which leaves me to wonder what her client hired her for, and why? The only reason I can think of is that the client didn’t want word of what he was looking for getting out to everyone. Plus, he must have known it could be dangerous for her, meaning that it was less likely for people to care about a small-time PI.

That thought causes me to bristle for reasons unknown to me. All I do know is something about Miss Melissa Greene intrigues me.

The Next Day

We pull up in front of Crimson Investigations in our Aston Martin Vanquish and for some reason, I’m more nervous than I’ve ever been to meet someone. There’s already a car out front that is as out of place as you could get. I’m not being a snob or trying to judge the neighborhood, but with the street being lined with Toyotas and Fords, a Mercedes