As incredible sounding as what he’d just said was, my gut told me it was true. As I took in his feral stance, his leanly muscled body on all fours, his eyes gleamed in the low light, nostrils still flaring as he used his heightened senses to scent around us.
It all made a horrible sort of sense now. Why Roe had limited staff currently working and had barred us from meeting his husband and other son when we arrived. Carlos – where was he? If someone had carted off Shane, had something also befallen the lad? Was Roe under duress not to reveal their absence? Sure, it looked as if he was neck deep in something illegal, but was any of it related to the murder and newly revealed kidnapping?
“I think Lord Roe has some explaining to do,” Pilar said, as he gracefully rose to his feet. He rummaged in that sack of his, pulling out a small, short knife and two of those clear bags he kept putting bits of found evidence in. Kneeling down once more, I watched as he took scrapings from the gangplank and placed them into one bag and sealed it, then took more from the post he’d discovered the earring stuck on, along with bits of blood-stained rope, and placed those into a second bag. He then took out a pen and wrote on the bags, labeling them before placing them inside his carry bag.
“You’re like Mary Poppins with that thing,” I joked, remembering a vid they’d showed us in school as a child.
“Who?” His nose wrinkled adorably as he looked at me, puzzled.
“A character in an old children’s story. She had a bag she pulled out a lot of things with, many of them impossible to have fit inside.”
“Ah, a pocket dimension carrier,” he murmured, making my eyebrows shoot up in surprise now.
“You have stories like that too?”
He looked at me with faint amusement. “Not stories,” he replied. “Just how much about my people have your leaders told the rest of you? Surely they mentioned why my people remain and what we’re capable of.”
I stared at him, dumbfounded. “Remain?” My mind spun.
“Yes,” he replied. “Remain.” He sighed. “Did they not tell you why your settlements were allowed to stay, but are confined to such a small defined area, as are ours? Though we have ours dotted around the world.”
“Because it’s your planet and not ours?” I ventured.
He snorted. “And because our home world, this very planet, is a preserve. We carefully preserved anything truly historic, moving it to our new capital, the planet Tenebris. We then worked to restore this one to as virginal a state as possible. Those of that remainder do so to continue that work and to ensure no one comes to try to exploit it.”
My head spun. They had spaceflight? A whole other set of planets? What else had been kept hidden from us by the Council, and why had they kept this a huge secret?
I shook my head. That was something to look into later. Right now, we had a more immediately pressing matter. We needed to locate the whereabouts of Lord Roe’s omega husband and his surviving son, hopefully before we had more dead bodies on our hands.
“I think there is a lot about our histories I’d like you to share with me, but first, we need to have a chat with Lord Roe.”
Pilar gave me a curt nod. “That we do.”
The walk back to the manor was quiet, my own mood pensive as it wondered just what other lies of omission we’d been living under. Did any of them have to do with my current case? Was my fundamental lack of knowledge about those hidden facts the reason why they called in for a Hunter, since obviously his people knew the things we didn’t.
It rankled, that they’d hide something so seemingly innocuous. What did it matter that we’d landed on a giant nature preserve? Why had my people opted to settle into enclaves and try to recreate patches of Earth instead of assisting in the preservation of this one? And since they had spaceflight, why hadn’t we been moved off elsewhere? I rubbed the spot between my eyes, the beginnings of a tension headache making itself known. This case had certainly kicked up a helluva lot of questions and far fewer answers. Hopefully our talk with Lord Roe would clear up some related to the case at hand, and a later talk with Pilar would help answer some I had about what he’d revealed.
That hope was soon dashed, however, as upon reaching sight of the house, we were greeted by the asshole head groomsman, before he loped off without giving us a chance to say anything back to him. My mount and one other stood by the front door, our meager belongings expertly strapped to them.
“What is the meaning of this?” I called out to the retreating figure. He didn’t answer, but the creak of the front door had me turning around. One of the housemaids peered out.
“Sorry sirs, but Lord Roe left shortly after you did and he had us bring your things down,” he whispered, glancing around furtively.
“Any idea where he went?” I asked, gentling my voice. The youngster was scared stiff, no doubt about it.
He shook his head. “Nope, but he took off in a real hurry.”
“Just him?” Pilar pressed, keeping his voice soft.
“Uh huh.”
We glanced at each other.
“Can you tell us if Carlos or Master Shane are in?” I asked carefully.
“They ain’t came out of their rooms since the day…” The kid’s voice trailed off.
“Since the day of the murder,” I finished for him. He nodded, his eyes cast down, one toe of his shoes moving back and forth across the step in agitation. “Nobody brought them any food though,” he finally said, glancing up to meet my eyes. “Kitchen made some, but I saw his Lordship carry it all into his room and later, take his trash can out to the pig pen. It looked like the food was in here, most of it anyways.”
“A ruse, then,” Pilar murmured. “To make people think they were both still here.”
We knew of course, now, that Shane was most likely not here. It also looked incredibly likely that Carlos wasn’t, either.
“Take us to their rooms,” I ordered.
The lad shied back, shaking his head furiously. “I can’t! Lord Roe said you were going!”
“Oh, we are,” Pilar agreed, grinning ferally, his top fangs on full display, “but not before we have a look at those rooms.”
The kid turned and fled, leaving the door ajar.
I pushed it open and gestured inside with a flourish. “After you,” I said gallantly.
Pilar snorted. “I don’t suppose you know which rooms are theirs?”
“We’ll just have to go to their wing and look at them all,” I replied breezily.
“Well, let it not be said that we did not thoroughly investigate all possible areas to uncover any clues that could exist.” He glided inside, moving quickly across the floor and up the stairs. I hastened after him, just as eager as he to get up there and have a look around before another member of staff appeared to try to oust us, or Lord Roe returned to try to get in our way again.
Reaching the family’s wing, Pilar pointed to the door that was the furthest along the corridor. “Shall we begin at the far end and work our way to this end?”
“Sure, why not?”
It seemed as good a place as any to try to start unlocking this family’s secrets.