A Glimmer of Hope (The Avalon Chronicles #1)(49)
18
It didn’t take Layla long to get home, although by the time she’d gotten there, she’d realized she didn’t have her keys. She sighed.
“Move metal, remember?” Rosa said from beside her.
Layla felt incredibly stupid for a few seconds. “I didn’t think of that.”
“It’s been a long few days. I wouldn’t worry about it.”
Layla reached the rear door of her building and found it to be unlocked. She pushed it open and almost crept through the hallway to her apartment. She didn’t really want to melt the lock, mostly because she didn’t want to have to pay to get it fixed. But she guessed when this was all over she’d have to move. Again. The landlord could get the lock fixed out of her deposit.
She placed her finger against the dead bolt and pushed slightly, feeling the hard metal give way as it turned to liquid and spilled out down the doorframe. She took hold of the door handle and it too turned to liquid. She gave the door a small push and it swung open.
“Any chance you can check ahead to make sure no one is in there?” Layla asked Rosa.
“We’re spirits—we only see what you see. We can’t go exploring for you.”
“Well, balls,” Layla said, and stepped into the dark apartment. She walked the length of the hallway inside, moving slowly and checking each room to ensure she was alone.
When she’d completed the task, she decided not to bother switching on the lights, just in case someone was watching from outside. Instead, she went to her bedroom and fished out a torch from a bedside-table drawer.
Layla went back into the living room and pulled the red and white rug off the floor, exposing a safe. She tapped the six-digit code into the keypad and pulled open the door. She placed the torch on the sofa behind her, ensuring that the light remained on her at all times, and removed the shoebox from the safe. She placed it to one side and closed the door.
“I want to use the computer first. I’m not sure I’ll be in the right frame of mind to think much once I’ve opened this up.” Layla spoke mostly to herself, and wondered if Rosa would think she was crazy for doing such a thing. But something inside told her that, no, Rosa wouldn’t think that. She had an unpleasant past all of her own.
Layla switched on the desktop and waited for Windows to load, which, despite the feeble power of the machine, only took a few seconds. A heartbeat later and she’d opened the Internet and typed in “Enhanced Security,” the name of Tommy’s company.
It brought up a website with lots of nice pictures of the main headquarters and several quotes from happy customers. Everything about it appeared to be legit. There were no pictures of staff members, and the names of everyone bar Tommy were missing, but Layla imagined that was a security precaution.
She left the page and began going through Google to check for any reports on them, but found little apart from the occasional website forum where someone recommended them to someone else. There was nothing to suggest that it was anything more than a normal, human organization.
She added “Avalon” to the search, and after digging further and further into the results, she began to see the sort of things she was looking for. The first page was another forum, by the name of “Fangs and Claws.” After reading the first dozen posts, which extolled the virtues of Tommy and his team, there were several which badmouthed Avalon. Three separate posts called it a police state, with one suggesting that trusting them was the same as nominating yourself for execution.
She stayed in the forum and searched for “Law of Avalon”, and got dozens of hits. Several of them said how everyone posting here would be caught and arrested if they were anti-Avalon, and a few sounded like conspiracy theorists. She’d seen some of them after her father’s arrest suggesting the reason he was out of the public eye was because he was a CIA wet-work assassin.
Layla rolled her eyes at several of the posts, and found a members-only section that she couldn’t access. She tried to create an account, but it kept saying that she was not old enough to view these details.
“People don’t trust Avalon,” Rosa said. “That’s why they’ve put a block on it. Change your birth year to 476.”
Layla did as requested, and it allowed her to create an account. “What happened in 476?”
“The Roman Empire died. A lot of people who distrust Avalon use that date as the day Avalon failed to stop something they desperately didn’t want to happen. It’s the proof that Avalon isn’t all powerful.”
“Is this all stuff I’ll eventually learn as your memories and mine blend?”
“Probably, but do you really want to wait that long?”
Layla shook her head and opened the first members-only forum post, and her eyes widened in shock. “This says that a decade ago Tommy and a Nate Garrett saved a bunch of werewolves from being murdered. They helped people, saved lives, and ensured that those responsible were brought to justice.” Layla turned to Rosa. “Werewolves too?”
“Of course. There are many, many things in this world that aren’t human. Werewolves aren’t that hard to believe, are they? And that’s your proof that Tommy is one of the good guys.”
“Because he saved werewolves?”
“No. Nate Garrett, although I knew him as Nathaniel. If he’s friends with Tommy, if he worked with him, then Tommy can be trusted. Nathaniel is a good man.”