Steelhands - Jaida Jones [93]
“I happen to know this room was let to Gaeth, a young man with blond hair, who I’ll point out is neither of you two,” the man said, glancing between the two of us suspiciously.
“Oh yeah, Gaeth,” Laure said, finding her voice before I did. “He’s our friend, and we … We haven’t seen him for weeks now. Neither has anyone else. We knew he took ill with the fever, so we were just—”
“I don’t see how that’s any concern of mine,” the man said, crossing his arms. Then he did a double take toward Laure—as men so often did—and I felt the smallest sliver of hope wedge its way into my chest. Perhaps we might be able to use her assets, hideous as it made me feel to exploit her.
Behind her back, she thrust the letter into my hand, and I took it, folding it up and sticking it into my pocket.
We could use it—somehow—if only to send home to Gaeth’s poor parents as evidence of his final, lunatic ramblings. It might bring some comfort to them.
“I know it was wrong to break in like this,” Laure added, taking a step forward with some hesitance, as though she was nervous. She was a born actress, though she used her skills sparingly, and she’d never even had a single lesson. “We would never have done it except as a very last resort, and then only because we were so worried about our friend.”
“It’s quite illegal,” the man said with a sniff. If he was one of the room advisors, I’d never seen him. Where had he been hiding himself all this time? I doubted he even lived on the premises. “You should have come to me first with your questions.”
“I know that now,” Laure said, reaching up to twine a piece of her hair around her fingers. “And I feel just … silly about it, believe me. When there was someone right here all along who could help me. I don’t know why we were so foolish.”
Ever so slowly—not wishing to draw attention away from my leading lady—I began to inch my way to the door. Gaeth’s disturbing letter was secured within my pocket, my hand covering it as an extra precaution. Though I had no idea yet of what we might use it for, it was the best piece of evidence we’d managed to uncover. I just hoped madness wasn’t catching.
I didn’t like what Laure had been trying to say before we’d been so rudely interrupted, but we’d try to sort that out later.
“Now, normally, I’d have to write the pair of you up for safety violations,” the man said, some indecision in his voice. The closer we came, the younger he seemed—and not quite as terrifying as the real authorities might have been. I’d been certain he’d been one of the Provost’s wolves come to arrest us, and now I saw he was merely a shabby little man. “But if—and that’s if—you leave here right now, I might be able to let you go with no more than a warning, and a promise not to do it again next time.”
“Could you really do all that?” Laure asked, her voice pitched to a frequency I’d never heard before. It was ghastly, and my sides were starting to hurt from holding in my laughter. “How perfectly dear of you. We’d be ever so grateful. All we really wanted to see was if he was all right. I know someone like you would understand. You’d do the same for a friend, I’m sure.”
The man shifted his weight, looking uncomfortable. He was starting to turn pink—just a natural side effect of being so close to Laure while she turned on the full effects of her charm. Sometimes she didn’t even have to turn it on—it just worked naturally—but this was a special case, and I was in awe of her abilities. The older she got, the better the ruse worked. If only I had been born with such a lucky gift.
“Look,” the dorm manager said finally, “I have it on good authority that Gaeth went home. I wouldn’t look for him anymore if I were you; it’ll only lead to disappointment.”
“You’ve put our minds at ease,” Laure said, moving closer to him, as though she were about to thank him in some other way. I saw the pink in his cheeks turn to red, but Laure only moved past him suddenly, out into the hallway. I managed