I'd love to say I immediately launched into a professional grade interrogation right then and there. Really came out the gate with some hard-hitting questions, you know? Instead, as I stared at the stump of a man, comically seated in a plush chair at a massive table, I failed to find my tongue.

Mostly because I suddenly realized that I didn't know how to start.

"Ummm… okay." I turned to Amelia. "Help me out here. What should we be asking him? I'll be honest, I have no clue what your father's name is, if I ever even heard it. So I can't even ask him about working for the asshole."

I flushed a little at the amused smirk she sent me. Listen, it was just easier, okay? Her father was tied up in my head as this looming figure of horror. Hard not to have that impression when someone lops yours arms off. Whatever name I used to refer to him in my head was always a stand-in. It was a way to make him more… relatable? Mortal? Normal?

'Amelia's father' sure as fuck sounded less terrifying than 'doctor of doom with a ton of corpo contacts.' One was a guy you could maybe shank in an alley or something. The other was a giant of influence and tech I had no hope of approaching.

So, yeah. Coping skills for the win!

"What in the world makes you think Patch Six would recognize him, even if you could drop his name right now?" she asked.

"Because your father hired them a lot?"

"Yes, he hired. For extremely shady stuff, silly." Amelia giggled, still giving me that same amused look. "He wasn't going to let them know exactly who they were working with. He was extremely careful. Picked out the newest human traffickers around, set himself up as their major client right away, protected his anonymity while blocking them off from making contacts who could out him…"

I just stared as Amelia kept ticking things off on her fingers, reluctantly impressed. For a man who gave off the vibes of an outright psychopath with megalomania issues, her father sure did sound prepared to cover up his misdeeds.

"Then, what do we ask this guy?" I motioned towards Patch, who looked in danger of starting to drool a little.

Amelia's abilities truly were terrifying. Then again, of the two of us, she wasn't the one who went around turning people into potentially world-ending Shadow eldritch nightmares.

"We use the pseudonym he gave them." Amelia turned to Patch Six. "What's the last deal you made with The Professor? When was it, and what was it for?"

I wanted to giggle at the pretentiousness of the name, but then the asshole opened his mouth.

"The last time we were directly hired was to abduct forty people for him, ten children and thirty adults. This was about a week before the lockdown incident. Briefly before the lockdown, we were also contacted to provide transport for one of his agents. He had two 'packages' with him. We didn't pry or see the packages directly. This was a couple of days before the lockdown happened, at most."

I tensed, narrowing my eyes at the man. Was he saying what I thought he was saying?

"Who was the agent? Was it the man you came in with when we ambushed you? How do you know him?" I hurriedly dug through my memories, going back to what Mela had told me. "Mak? His name is Mak, right, or something like that?"

"No. The man's name was Griffith. He is an agent of The Professor we often worked with, because he was one of The Professor's designated hunters. He'd get us some of the more troublesome merchandise the Professor asked for. The kind that could fight back. He never liked us."

"If he never liked you, why was he with you? What happened to the other person he had stolen from the slums?" Amelia snapped.

I'd filled her in on who Mak was, or at least who I thought he was, and she was Not Amused with my story. From all our chats, she knew how much Mela had helped me out back then. The thought that the woman's own brother had been involved in her death seemed to press all sorts of buttons for Amelia.

Messed up family situations just did that to her. Wonder why.

"He was looking to arrange passage for two people out of the city. This is why I assume he kept the other package. He approached us about this a while ago, when he also got us to arrange a place for him and the package to stay in this district on their way out. But then the lockdown happened and ruined the deal. I was trying to convince him to stay and sign on with us."

"Even though he doesn't like you?" I asked, just to buy myself time to think. I was starting to feel a little dizzy from all the ideas rushing through my head, some of which I was trying not to cling to.

"He's good. Better than any of my men. Better than me. He could have become a threat if he joined us full-time, but he would have been too useful not to try and recruit. And I was planning how to neutralize him as a threat."

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

Amelia's brow furrowed. "Wait. Neutralize him as a threat? What do you mean? Like, kill him? That would be counterproductive."

"No. Drugs. Women. Men. Whatever he wanted. If I controlled his supply and his pleasure, I could have controlled him. It worked before, just like with my runner."

Well, that was some creative problem-solving. Nothing evolutionary, of course. Nowhere near what Amelia could do. But, it was still the kind of low cunning that let scum like good old Patch Six thrive in the shadier areas of civilized society. I should know, coming from the slums.

It was just kind of ironic that the same methods used to control reluctant joytoys were being used in a mercenary company. Then again, it wasn't like they were proper mercs, were they?

My disgust aside…

"Did you find out anything about the second person he brought in? Anything at all?" I pushed, still refusing to believe anything that could end up disappointing me and breaking my heart all over again.

"No. I just know it's likely that he cares about them. I couldn't even confirm their gender. He did insist we find a place with separate rooms for them, though."

For a moment, I wanted to hurt the asshole. There I was, shivering in my seat as Amelia pressed against me and pulled me into a hug, and he was giving me nothing but useless info!

"How many people have you smuggled to my father?" Amelia asked instead, diverting the topic to safer grounds.

As the idiot continued to drone on, citing numbers that made my blood chill, I couldn't properly focus on his voice. Not when my mind was screaming at me that the person who had 'accompanied' Mak, or Griffith or whatever the fuck his name was, could potentially be Mela.

It made sense, didn't it? Griffith could easily be a fake name he used for shady deals. And if he really was her brother, then he was unlikely to have just killed her and kidnapped some other random victim to take along.

Mela had never once mentioned her brother had a significant other. Knowing her, she would have brought that kind of thing up. More realistically, she would have been hounding them for information on her brother, then complaining to me about them while he was suspiciously 'missing.'

Or, rather, while he was turning the slums upside down on the orders of his corpo overlord.

I cut into their conversation once more. "The place you got for Griffith. Where is it? You said it was in this district, right?"

Patch froze for a short moment, two warring requests for information making it hard for him to decide whose request to fulfill first. Then Amelia demanded that he answer me, and he sagged in relief as he started to speak.

"It is not far from here. A few blocks over. Megabuilding 17, apartment 532."

I immediately turned towards Amelia. "Are there any other questions we need to ask him right now? I'm sorry, I just — I have to talk to that fucker."

I didn't need to clarify, and Amelia didn't feel the need to drag her feet, either.

"No, I'm good. Some of the stuff he knows might be useful, but… I mean, I know where most of those people ended up."

She looked ill when she said that. Once more, I promised myself never to push her on the subject of her father.

Honestly, I was more than a little impressed that she still wanted to go after him. With all he had done to her, she should have been running away, screaming. Not risking her own freedom to put a stop to him and his many atrocities.

"Okay. Thanks," I mumbled. "I just…"

I didn't get to continue justifying myself, because she pressed her lips against mine. The kiss was brief and light, but it made me feel like everything might just be alright, even with the storm brewing inside my head.

"Let's go. I understand. Really, I do." She dragged me out the door of the meeting room, taking us upstairs towards the mercs' bedrooms.

My chest swelled with gratitude, making me wonder how I'd gotten so lucky.

And mark my word, I'd gotten very lucky indeed. Not only had she set me free and helped me escape her father, not only had she extended a helping hand and taken me in once we were free, but our relationship was turning out better than I'd ever dared hope. For something that had started based on mutual trauma and pure hormonal instinct, we were settling into our very own twisted version of domestic bliss remarkably well.

Then again, it was kind of hard not to adore Amelia Harkness.

I distracted myself daydreaming about all of her amazing qualities. She was witty, beautiful, smart, extremely kind, an absolutely amazing kisser…

But when we finally stopped in front of a set of doors with four drones guarding them, I had no other choice but to focus up.

We waited for just a moment as the door read our credentials, confirming we had the clearance. Then we stepped through, encountering two more merc drones standing on either side of a bed.

Now, you might think this hilarious, considering the bed's occupant was missing all his limbs. But I was taking no chances. Not with giving him a chance to escape, and not with leaving him alone to do something stupid like commit suicide.

I shouldn't have worried about that, though. The sardonic, mocking grin he shot us the second we passed through the door suggested he was more than comfortable and willing to endure his new accommodations.

"Well, what a fucking honor, eh? The big bad leaders of the newly subverted merc company! I have no clue what ya did to them, but I gotta say, good job, yeah? These two idiots haven't reacted to a single thing I've said to them so far! They gotta be terrified of you."

"They're not terrified. Just loyal," I said through gritted teeth, fighting back a wince at how familiar his face looked. "But yes, we're here now. And I've got some questions."

"Do ya, now? And what would those questions be, hm?"

"Well… let's start with this one. What the fuck did you do with Mela, Mak? Where's your sister? Is she even alive at all?"

The change was immediate and startingly profound. The man seemed to forget his missing appendages and tried to shove himself towards me, exposed ports actually sparking in his attempt to call on phantom limbs.

"How the fuck do ya know that name, ya fuckin asshole?! Did you hurt her?! Do you have her here?! If you so much as —"

I stepped forward and decked him, feeling the slightest flash of shame as I did so. He was distinctly unable to fight back, after all.

"Me?! You fucking slaughtered the Kittens, you fucking — You dare ask me that, when the last time I saw her she was dying?!"

I saw it, then. The flash of realization. The recognition. Connections finally sparking in that empty skull of his.

"Oh. Oh, this is fucking rich. Ya that scrawny little shit the doc wanted?!"

The man laughed, a maniacal glint in his eyes as his emotions ping-ponged all over the place.

I had no idea what to say or do as he grinned at me. I just stared at his teeth, stained by the blood dripping out of the broken nose I'd given him.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.