Deceitful (Rules of Deception 1)

Tanner clapped Alec’s shoulder. “She’s right. You’ve got to chill.” He sat down on the bench beside Holly and me and leaned back against the wall. “Have you guys heard the news?”

“What news?” Holly asked.

“Kate and Major left headquarters before sunrise. They’re on their way to Livingston, some hick town out in Oregon.”

So that was why I hadn’t seen Kate all day. Usually she never left Alec’s side. She was his constant shadow. “Isn’t that the place where that awful murder happened?” I asked.

Tanner nodded. “Yep. And I heard there was another incident.”

Water trickled over my face but I didn’t bother wiping it off. “Why are they even interested, though? It’s just a small town. And it’s not like every killer is FEA business.”

The FEA was officially a section of the FBI, and the majority of our cases came assigned by them—though we were also involved in larger counterterrorism and espionage efforts. But apart from having the FBI motto fidelity, bravery and integrity engraved above the entrance to FEA headquarters, our organization was pretty much autonomous. Whenever a crime reeked of Variant involvement, FEA agents were sent to investigate. Otherwise the FBI left us to our own devices as long as we didn’t draw any attention to our existence. Major wouldn’t have had it any other way.

Tanner shrugged. “Who knows what’s going on in Major’s head. Maybe there’s more to the case that we’re not aware of.”

“Maybe the FBI suspects a Variant,” Holly added.

“If the FEA does get involved, I wonder who they’ll pick for the mission,” I said. We would find out soon enough.

xxx

The intercom hissed.

Holly groaned, bleach-blonde hair falling over her face as she sat up. “Fuck. What do they want now?”

I didn’t move. I was beat from my morning in the pool, followed closely by our afternoon run, and wanted to catch a few blissful minutes of rest before Holly and I had ballistics training.

“Tessa. Meeting in my office ASAP,” Major Sanchez bellowed, his voice warped by the old speakers. I rolled my eyes. One would think the FEA could afford up-to-date hardware.

In Major’s world, ASAP meant “right this second or you’ll run three laps.” With my legs still burning from my daily run, I wasn’t keen on being late.

Holly grinned. “Good luck.”

I jumped out of bed and hurried out of the room. When had Kate and Major returned from Livingston, anyway?

Major Sanchez’s closed door greeted me, the do not interrupt sign taunting me with its fat black letters. I knocked and without waiting for an invitation—which would never come—I gingerly opened the door. Major stood behind his desk, his thick arms crossed. His black hair was slicked back with enough pomade to grease the hinges in the entire complex. His dark eyes glared at me, but I’d been on the receiving end of that look so often that I barely flinched.

“Get your butt into the chair, Tessa.”

I stumbled toward the free chair and sank down onto it. They were the kind of chairs that made you want to get the hell out of them as soon as possible: high-gloss, black hardwood—unyielding and impeccable, like the man who’d chosen them. Not that such chairs were even necessary, as a few minutes in Major’s company had the same effect on most people.

Alec and Kate were already seated, holding hands. Or rather: Kate was clutching Alec’s hand like she was afraid he’d run away. He wore one of the white button-down shirts Kate had bought for him, his hair still wet from his post-run shower. Kate’s narrowed eyes came into my focus: amber with a weird coppery hint—if my turquoise eyes were uncommon, hers were outright unsettling.

I whipped my head around and turned my attention back to Major. If Kate got a direct look into my eyes, she’d use her Variation to read exactly what was on my mind, and that could get awkward because usually it involved fantasies of Alec in some degree of undress.

Major didn’t sit down; instead he stood behind his desk chair, hands gripping the backrest so tightly his knuckles were turning white. Not an easy feat with skin as tanned as his.

I shifted in the chair. My eyes were drawn to the pinboard behind Major’s desk. It had been a while since I was in his office and the board had changed since then. Back then, the disturbing photos hadn’t been there.

The first showed a woman splayed on her stomach, a wire coiled tightly around her throat. My own breath hitched at the thought of being strangled, of looking into the eyes of my murderer as I struggled for breath, of dying with a killer’s cruel face as my last glimpse of the world. My eyes drifted over to the second photo, of another female—it was hard to tell her age, as her body had grown bloated and taken on a greenish hue. Floaters were the most horrid corpses of all. I’d never seen one in real life—or any other dead body, for that matter. But I’d seen plenty of pictures during Basic Forensic Pathology, and that was disturbing enough.