Hector
He and Rachel whirled to face Andrew at the same time.
“You’re not?” they asked together.
“No,” he replied, and there was ice in his words. “I have a report about the incident and punishment taken, but I haven’t filed it yet.” He looked at Rachel. “I was holding on to it to see how Hector does, and if he keeps his word to help repair all the damage that was caused. I have yet to file it to anyone.”
“Well, I can tell you that he’s dedicated to doing so,” Rachel said fiercely. “It’s almost all he ever talks about, besides how much he likes me.”
Andrew smiled. “That’s good to know, though I had few doubts. That’s why all the punishment was being handled here, at a local level, instead of reporting it back up the chain to my superiors and the whole bureaucracy. I didn’t think that would be necessary.”
Hector considered those words, somewhat surprised by the unspoken endorsement contained within them. He hadn’t known Andrew believed so strongly in him. A bit of chagrin filled him as he realized that he’d doubted the gryphon shifter when he shouldn’t have.
“Thank you for believing in me,” he said quietly.
Andrew simply inclined his head. “You’ve given me no reason to doubt you, Hector. If the fire hadn’t happened, we likely would never have been put in this predicament. It was simply something too noticeable for me to ignore. It was never personal.”
Hector nodded. “So how did this happen then?”
“My guess is that it worked up the chain,” Andrew replied. “Shifters go back, and we get a fresh batch. Eventually someone back there finds out and issues the recall order for you.”
Rachel spoke next. “Could it be that the family of the shifter who passed away is filing charges? Could that be the case? I feel like word of mouth from low-level shifters—no offense to any of them—wouldn’t really carry much in the way of weight. Wouldn’t they contact you first, before going ahead and doing this?”
Andrew considered the words. “I would think so, yes. This is…more formal, than I might have expected. It’s almost as if they possess a copy of my report. But Corvin had no family back home.” He looked unhappy. “I know, I had to look into it to see what anyone wanted to do, but there was no one.”
“Even if they did,” his boss continued, “it likely wouldn’t fly.”
“What do you mean?” Rachel asked.
Hector jumped in. “In our world, death is not treated quite the same as with you humans. We understand that it’s the natural way of things. That we are born, we live, and then one day, we will die. It might be while we are young, or maybe we’ll be lucky enough to grow old. But our wild blood, our animal DNA, is much more in tune with the fact that death awaits us. I hesitate to say that we’re not as scared of it as you are, because that makes it sound like we’re all high and mighty comparatively, but it’s a fairly apt description.”
“I still don’t get it,” his mate said, looking back and forth between the two of them.
“What Hector is trying to say, is that there would be nothing to stick against him. Hector didn’t start the fire, and there was a certain onus upon Corvin to get his ass out of the fire. If he wasn’t all that drunk—”
“He wasn’t,” Hector interjected. “He’d had a bit to drink, but he was on his feet and moving on his own. There’s no way he shouldn’t have been able to escape.”
“Exactly,” Andrew said. “So it’s not Hector’s responsibility to baby Corvin, in our eyes. Even though he left his post and should be punished for that because of what happened, he couldn’t be held legally responsible for Corvin’s death.”
“Just morally,” Hector said softly, avoiding the looks of either of them.
Rachel’s hand reached out and found his, forcing her fingers between his when he didn’t respond right away, unwilling to let go of him.
“That’s been bugging me,” she said after a minute. “Ever since I heard about the fire.”
“What has?” he asked, looking at her.
Rachel hadn’t mentioned anything bugging her. Not to him at least.
“The fact that that shifter, Corvin, died. I mean, I know a little bit about you guys. Aren’t you pretty tough?”
Andrew shrugged. “Sure, but we’re still just as vulnerable as you humans. We have all the same weaknesses, they’re just smaller.”
“Yeah,” Rachel pressed. “But that’s what I’m saying. The fire started quickly, but going by Hector’s timeline, there were but a few minutes between when he saw Corvin and when he came back to see the embassy on fire. That shouldn’t have been long enough to kill someone. Especially a strong shifter, even if he was a little drunk. Shouldn’t he have been able to bulldoze his way through some walls, or the ceiling…or something?”
Hector shrugged. “Unless he started the fire, maybe? Perhaps he was drunker than I thought and passed out while making food or something, starting the fire. Then he wouldn’t have had a chance.”
“I guess,” Rachel said, but she didn’t sound convinced. “What did the autopsy have to say about cause of death?”
He blinked, then looked at Andrew.
“The what?” the two men said almost at the same time.
“The autopsy? You know, the examination done after someone dies, to determine the cause of their death?”
“We…don’t do those things,” Andrew said, speaking first. “You examine each dead person to see why they died? Isn’t it normally obvious?”
“Well, no,” Rachel said, looking back and forth between him and Andrew. “Are you guys serious?”
“Yes,” he replied. “The cause is usually well known. We…why would we examine their body?”
Rachel let go of his hand and pushed her fingers through her hair in frustration. “Oh, I don’t know. What if someone killed him and used the fire as a coverup?”
Hector’s jaw was hanging open. He knew it was, but there was nothing he could do about it. The suggestion she’d given was so…so...vulgar… that he couldn’t even contemplate it. “You’re saying someone might have murdered Corvin, but then tried to make it look like he died naturally?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” Rachel said, shooting glances at both of them. “Why do you both look so stunned at that?”
“It’s…that’s just despicable.”
“An abomination.”
“Dishonorable.”
“Vile.”
“Abhorrent.”
“Wouldn’t happen.”
“Ever.”
“Okay. Okay,” she said, waving her hands to get them to stop.
Hector fell silent.
“You’re telling me shifters don’t operate like that?”
He shook his head while Andrew vocalized his thoughts in the negative.
“Bullshit.”
“It’s not how we operate, Rachel. We confront our problems head-on. We’re not sneaks. We have issues, but something like that is just repulsive to even contemplate.” He shook his head yet again. “Not possible.”
“All right, all right,” she said, throwing up her hands in surrender. “Got it. So what do we do now?”
Hector looked at his boss. “Did we ever hear from the fire department what caused the fire?” He carefully didn’t mention his thoughts about it being deliberately set, and was glad when Rachel didn’t bring it up either. A line had already been crossed by suggesting that Corvin’s death was actually a coverup. No need to do it twice in one day. Not that he believed a shifter could do that to begin with. The whole situation was weird, and he didn’t like it.
“No, not yet,” Andrew replied. “I didn’t think it urgent, but they said they had a report ready. I was going to pick it up in the morning.”
“I’ll do it,” he volunteered.
“Thanks,” Andrew said.
The trio of them looked around at each other, but nothing was said. They’d all spoken their pieces already, so he and Rachel started toward the exit. Before he left, Hector turned back to look at Andrew. “How long?” he asked quietly.
His boss looked up at him. “I’ll try to delay, but not long. Twenty-four, maybe forty-eight hours, tops.”
Andrew pursed his lips in thought. Then he nodded once and left the office, trailing after Rachel, who was headed for the exit.