Page 54 of The Paranormal Investigation Bureau
I had my tribe, just like she did, but we all had opinions and none of us hesitated to tell the other if we were doing something stupid. Bevan wasn’t interested in playing the same games Nicolai and I did, but we both listened when he told us we were taking something too far.
We all had dumb ideas no one would follow. Bevan and Nicolai weren’t about to do the same if I fell out of a turn, so I didn’t look bad. I didn’t want them to. If our teacher noticed and gave us the choice was pushups or leaving class… there would be no choice. None of us would look to the other for how we were supposed to react.
Bellatrix let out a shriek.
“I’m reporting this to Marsden!” she yelled, flouncing out of the room.
Ivory flung her ponytail over her shoulder and looked at us all like we were cockroaches as she obediently followed behind her. Who had hurt this child so bad that she thought she needed to do everything Bellatrix did?
Madame Lucinda seemed like she was in amuchbetter mood after kicking what was now the Terrible Duo out of her class. The combinations she gave us after that were actually fun, and she went back to handing out compliments.
I don’t think a single one of us was angry she took out her frustrations with Marsden on Bellatrix and Ivory. She probably wouldn’t have said a damn thing about it normally, because sometimes you fell out of a turn no matter how talented you were. Ivory had just quit like that, despite the fact she was perfectly capable of continuing.
We’d normally break for lunch, then go straight into rehearsals. I knew we had dinner planned, but that was before Marsden had Julian arrested right in front of Bellatrix. We needed a plan because she was already after Bevan with Julian in the picture.
We all knew Julian was arrested because Bevan outed him as a coke dealer. All of us were proud of him for finally getting his revenge, but Bellatrix wouldn’t let that slide.
Marsden clearly wouldn’t do anything about his girlfriend. So it was time we did something about her.
Chapter6
Beyla
Iwas furious with Marsden. Was this all a game to him?! Santiago Suarezhadto be pulling some strings. I almost felt bad for Bellatrix, because it seemed like Marsden was manipulating her into a rivalry with me that I didn’t even want. Either that, or he was the dumbest Unseelie on the planet. Although I highly doubted that, because this company had flourished under him.
There was absolutely no reason to teach Nicolai and me choreography without her, especially where she would walk in and see it. Having Julian arrested in the studio while she was there was just playing mind games. I’d never personally arrested anyone yet, but I knew the bureau would wait and avoid making a public spectacle if asked and when needed. They certainly wouldn’t have arrested him without evidence. I guessed they busted into his apartment as soon as he left, and had people waiting when he arrived, and they found what they needed. That reeked of cooperation with Marsden.
He was at the studio to do more than teaching us choreography. He knew this was going to happen, and he had something to say to Bellatrix when he pulled her aside. Marsden sure split quickly after that, leaving us all to deal with the fallout.
I wasn’t looking forward to rehearsal. I didn’t particularly appreciate watching her try to hurt Bevan, and it was going to be even worse now. She’d mostly ignored me in rehearsals because she was trying to get Julian in Bevan’s role. She was playing stupid games with me in class, but not rehearsal. Marsden decided to change that, and I wanted to punch him in his stupid Unseelie face.
I had an entire group of people waiting for me after class, but there was only one person I needed to talk to. I doubted she could tell me much, but I had to try. So, I asked everyone else to meet me at the café and stayed behind to talk to Madame Lucinda in private.
“That was a lot of drama in class today.”
“When I told Marsden you were dedicated, and liked to come early, I also mentioned how well you danced with Nicolai, who is always there before class. I told him that because I think you deserve a place here when this is all over, and frankly, you should be dancing Damita. I didnotinvite him to crash my private lesson to demand a rehearsal that he isn’t even paying you for! After that nonsense with Julian, I know exactly why he was here.”
“Marsden is messing with Bellatrix. He wanted her to see me dancing her role at a rehearsal she wasn’t invited to, and he wanted her to see Julian get arrested. He’s trying to cook up the same rivalry there was between Selena and Tabitha, and I don’t want to play. I’m fairly certain Santiago Suarez is close toThe P,no doubttrying to get his curse broken, and Marsden is manipulating us because of it.”
“You aren’t wrong, Beyla, but aside from his name, there’s not much I can say about that man.”
“Do you have any old photos lying around? I don’t even know what he looks like.”
“It was different back then. No cell phones or social media, and the paparazzi was a little more respectful. They all knew he was on the run from the Unseelie and did their part to protect him. They often photographed Selena, but he was never in their shots. I say that because it was a bigger scandal than you realize when he was photographed with Tabitha. The newspaper got a lot of backlash because no one wanted the Unseelie descending on the city, trying to bring him back.”
“Do you have any photo albums with him in it?”
“I don’t. Cameras were a luxury back then. I was only an apprentice and couldn’t remotely afford one. Anything in our archives has been removed. I couldn’t tell you what he looks like because of the geas.”
“That newspaper might have that photo archived on microfiche.”
“That was a nasty newspaper. They’d publish anything if it sold papers. They ran a story full of lies about a particularly nasty family of skinwalkers. The building burned to ash, and they were too scared to reopen. I’m afraid that, if a photo of him does still exist, I don’t know where to find it.”
I didn’t either, but maybe someone took one when they were interviewing him at the bureau, and it just wasn’t in the file sent to me. I needed to call Kaine, and I was staying after rehearsal and talking to Marsden again. He was an Unseelie, and always twisted our conversations.
I’d think he was alleviating the problem, but he always put his own Fae stamp on it, and we got the shitty end of the deal. Why couldn’t he have just had Julian arrested at home?
Marsden was getting me an audience with Santiago Suarez. If Ravyn was right, I couldn’t kill him. The only way this was going to end was getting his ballet in front of an audience. I needed to know more about this curse, and he was the only one who could tell me.
