The Tracker's Mate: Sunderverse (Mate Tracker Book 1), Ingrid Seymour [red white royal blue TXT] 📗

he would have fat, juicy cockroaches coming out of his asshole and going back into his mouth.”

I burst out laughing. “Maybe there’s a reason you’re not a witch.”

“Who says I’m not a witch? Check out my wand.” She waved her piece of bacon in front of my face.

Slowly, and in her company, my headache dissipated. She could always distract me, even from attempted kidnapping. I still hadn’t told her about what had happened in Elf-hame, but why worry her more?

An hour later, we got to the agency. She parked her car by the front door, a red Scion, or the “box with wheels” as I liked to call it. She had bought it about three months ago. It wasn’t new, but it was in great shape. Only twenty thousand miles on the odometer, not a scratch, no collision reports, and no stench of cigarettes inside. She fell in love with it immediately, even if it looked like a cube and had the aerodynamics of an armoire.

Today, Rosalina’s black hair tumbled in curls onto her shoulders. Her eye makeup sparkled flawlessly and matched the subtle blue of her blouse.

We walked toward the door. Yellow tape stretched across its width. I tore it off and crumpled it into a tight ball, a surge of last night’s panic filling my chest.

“This can’t be good for business,” I said, as my eyes drifted next door without my permission.

Rosalina placed a finger on my chin and redirected my attention to the door. “Eyes on the prize, remember?”

I nodded and took a deep breath. Before we left her place, I’d reminded her to remind me to forget about Jake.

“God, you didn’t say it was this bad.” Rosalina’s face fell as she peered through the glass-paneled door.

“I don’t think it—” I stopped when I pushed the door open and saw the mess: file cabinets open, trampled papers on the floor, Rosalina’s desk ransacked and her laptop gone. I walked in, rendered speechless by the disaster.

“It wasn’t this bad when I left with the police,” I heard myself say.

“Then what happened?”

“I don’t know.” I pressed a hand to my forehead, trying to wrap my head around what this could mean for the agency. Would this give us a bad name? Would we lose potential clients? At the thought, my head snapped toward my office.

“The potion!” I exclaimed.

I clutched my purse tightly since I’d stashed the revolver inside. With two attempts on my person, I felt safer carrying it around. I stepped gingerly around the files on the floor and went into my office. A similar disaster welcomed me there. They’d ransacked my desk and taken my laptop, too.

“Shit,” Rosalina mumbled as she walked in behind me.

Hand trembling, I opened the door to the alcove. Had they been able to break Mom’s protective spell?

Please don’t. Please don’t.

But they had. My heart sank. Everything inside was a wreck. The shelves and tiny drawers I kept clean and organized were empty, their contents strewn on the floor, all my ingredients ruined. Their distinctive scents wafted in the air, creating a messed-up potpourri that made me wince. A familiar scent rode the air, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.

Dammit, I would have to go back to Elf-hame and spend a boatload of money to replace everything.

And Celina’s potion? I didn’t want to glance up to find it broken and spilled over my worktable.

“At least, the potion’s okay,” Rosalina said before I could look.

I let out a pent-up breath of relief. With the potion intact, I could still work today and keep one of our clients happy. We would have to cancel a couple of appointments until we restocked, a luxury we couldn’t afford since we could only take so many customers a month. What a mess!

Rosalina placed a warm hand on my shoulder. “It’s fine, Toni. Don’t worry. The insurance will pay for the laptops and anything else that’s broken. I’ll get to work on submitting a claim, and I’ll call the police, try to find out what happened. The rest should be easy. I’ll pick up all the files and make sure everything is there.”

I nodded. “You’re a saint, Rosalina. Thank you.”

“No need to thank me. We’re a team.”

I glanced down toward the floor at the broken bottles and ruined ingredients. “Damn! All this is expensive.”

“We’ll claim it all as a loss,” Rosalina said with confidence. “Who could have done this? And why?”

“I have no idea. Maybe a competitor? A maniac? I don’t even want to go upstairs,” I said, picturing everything wrecked on the floor, my underwear, and maybe even poor Cupid, which I hadn’t fed. Again.

“I’ll check.” Rosalina ran upstairs. A short minute later, she returned. “It’s undisturbed,” she said with a frown.

“That’s odd. Not that I’m complaining. Is Cupid all right?”

“Yeah, he’s fine.”

It seemed unlikely that whoever had torn up the office looking for who knew what would leave without searching the loft.

“Maybe we’ll need to splurge and get that alarm system we’ve been talking about. Just another layer of protection besides the spells,” Rosalina said.

“Yep, well...” I rolled my shoulders, forcing myself to relax. “Let’s make a list, so we can divide and conquer.”

“On it. Let me find a notebook and pen.”

She went back to look at her desk. That was when my subconscious, which had been busy coping with the loss, came up with a name for the familiar scent I’d detected among my ruined ingredients.

Jake!

He had been the one in my potions alcove. But why? Was he trying to sabotage me? Ruin my tracking business so I would help him? God, I was going to kill him.

Fury lighting my fuse, I whirled and headed out.

Chapter 12

I burst into Jake’s place with my ass on fire, though this time from rage. He’d left the door unlocked again, though no one was here, at least not in the front room.

“Jake!” I hollered as the front door swung closed behind me. “Jacob Knight!” I called again.

He appeared through the back door,