Looking around the table after I’ve finished eating I notice that Talon’s gone. I don’t remember him sitting to eat but I do remember him coming in to get food.

“Where’s Talon?” I ask the table.

Hunter looks like he’s annoyed. Either that I asked the question or at Talon’s absence, but otherwise doesn’t answer.

“He’s probably in his office,” Parker says with a shrug.

Mercy meets my eyes from across the table and I can see the hurt in her gorgeous violet eyes before she looks down at her plate.

She may understand most people’s feelings for half-demons but that didn’t mean she was okay with it. In some ways she’s like a lot of those half-demons that others despise, the only difference being that she doesn’t want to be that way. The things that happened to her in her life is what caused her to become hard and unmerciful.

“I’ll go see what he’s up to,” I say after Talon’s cook takes my empty plate from in front of me.

I leave the dining room and make my way to Talon’s office. I knock on the open door and see Talon with his face in his computer while he types away, his food left untouched beside him.

“Hey man, everything good?” I ask.

He grunts. “Fine.”

“You wanna try that again?” I raise my brow, daring him to tell me I’m wrong.

Talon closes his eyes. He brings his thumb and forefinger up to pinch the bridge of his nose. “It’s fine. I’m just…” He trails off.

“Avoiding being around Mercy any more than necessary?” I question, though I already know that’s exactly what he’s doing.

His eyes open. “It’s not that,” he denies.

“No? So you no longer have a problem with what she is?” I challenge.

He looks everywhere but at me and I can’t help but scoff.

“That’s what I thought. It’s been a little over a week since she’s been with us, how long will it take for you to realize that Mercy isn’t like the others?”

Talon slouches back into his chair. “It’s not that I don’t realize that. After spending so much time with her it’s actually pretty easy to see how different she is from them.”

“So then what’s the problem?” I ask more than a little confused about his attitude about her.

He sighs. “It’s nothing. I’ll work on it, okay?”

I look at him for a heartbeat longer than necessary before nodding once. “Alright. Just, try to talk to her like she’s an actual person to you. She’s hiding it around you and all of us, but I don’t think she really likes the stereotypes that are thrown at her because of what she is. I’m pretty sure the way you’ve been treating her has been hurting her.”

He tilts his head, conceding that. “Alright. I can do that.”

“Good.” I lift my hand in a half-assed wave and leave his office without waiting for him to say anything else and make my way to the gym in the basement.

I chuckle when I see Parker and Kai on one side of the mat watching Hunter and Mercy spar. Stepping in between them I ask, “How long have they been going at it?”

“Shortly after you left the dining room Hunter asked Mercy if she wanted to spar. We obviously just wanted to watch and be lazy for a little while,” Parker says with a grin.

“You won’t be lazy for long, jackass,” Hunter calls out while he dodges a kick that Mercy sends his way. “You’re in here with me next, Parker.”

Kai and I laugh when Parker’s face falls a little. None of us have been able to beat Hunter yet. It’s honestly shocking that Mercy’s held her own for the most part since I’ve been in here.

I wince when Hunter does one of his fancy ass moves and knocks Mercy on her back.

Oops. Spoke too soon.

Mercy lays on her back for a minute, breathing heavily. She lifts her head up and stares at Hunter before grinning at him. “Teach me how to do that!”

Kai, Parker and I laugh. Hunter smirks and holds a hand out to her. “Maybe later.” He turns to face the three of us. “Parker. Get your ass over here.”

Parker groans. “Damn it.”

Mercy laughs. “At least I’m not going to be the only one landing on my ass today.”

* * *

With nearly everyone asleep later that morning- since we’re all still on a nocturnal schedule- I set out in search of Hunter, knowing that he sleeps the least out of all of us. I’m hoping that he has heard something in the investigation that the Head Orderly was doing.

Walking into a sitting room I find Hunter standing at the window, looking outside with his phone pressed to his ear, speaking to someone so low that I can’t hear him.

The only thing I know for sure is that whatever Hunter’s hearing on the other end is not making him happy because he’s tense and his knuckles are white from where he’s gripping his phone in his grasp.

After a few, very long minutes he hangs up the phone, his muscles still bound tight. He throws his phone on the chair beside him and lets out a sigh, loosening the muscles in his shoulder.

“Everything okay?” I ask when he’s less tense.

Glancing over his shoulder at me he shakes his head. “This is fucking ridiculous. It shouldn’t be so goddamn hard to find a fucking spy. Especially for that son of a bitch.”

My eyes widen. “There’s no news? At all?”

“Not a fucking thing.”

We’re both quiet for a minute before I break the silence. “Hunter? Have you thought about what Georgette said the first night we got here?”

“The warning she gave Mercy? About the ones she thought she could count on and needing to be weary of them?” Hunter asks, clarifying.

I nod. “Yeah. What if her uncle or her friend are the ones who told Jerome where she was?”

He thinks about that for a while. “I think it’s more likely that it was her uncle over her friend, seeing as her friend had been locked up for a while now.” He pauses. “Or, it could be whoever her uncle trusts that he told Mercy to trust with her safety.”

“So what do we do?” I ask.

He blows out a breath. “We’ll stay here for another day or two but then we need to move on before someone tells Jerome or Payne that we’re here and sends them after Mercy.”

I gape. “We’re running?”

He shakes his head. “Not running. I need to figure out a few things about why Payne wants Mercy so badly. To do that I need to talk to my father and see what he knows.”

“So when will you do that?”

“I’m leaving tonight after I get some sleep. I shouldn’t be gone long but we don’t need anymore nasty surprises like the one we got when we walked into the fucking bathroom to find Jerome with Mercy.”

“Or just finding out that Mercy knew Jerome,” I mutter, still more than a little shocked at the revelations that occurred the other night.

He doesn’t respond to my words, instead he continues looking out the window. “I’ll let the others know my plan tonight before I leave. If anything happens and I don’t answer any phone calls, you know where to go to get in touch with me.”

I nod. “Alright. I’ll see you tonight then.”

He makes a noise in his throat in response while I walk out of the room.