Chapter 22

It takes one moment to kill, but a lifetime to heal.  It took one sentence to shatter my heart, but days and weeks to begin taping it back in place.

Did I want to use a glue to hold my heart back in place and risk gluing everything else together and spoiling everything, or just trust tape to slowly mend things back in place? Or maybe I wanted to stapler it back, and make the edges bleed where they pierce the soft, tender parts of my heart.

In this sick analogy, Jeremy acted as my bittersweet glue, the glue that could hold every part of my heart together, and Dorian was the stapler. I could have Dorian piece back my heart, but he would always be a fear of mine, that he would turn his back on me and betray me. He would always be a fear –that he would betray my trust in him. He has shown that his ambition could get in the way of my teaching, and though it showed that I meant a lot to him, it meant too that his fire could potentially get us both burnt.

“Francis. Are you listening?” Rainer’s voice pierced through my inner dramatic monologue, and I blinked to find myself sitting in the meeting room of the FBI building, waiting to start on my next case.

“I’m sorry, what?”

Rainer didn’t seem happy that I was zoning out, but forgave it off-handedly.

“Barrett said you’re to be the front-man for this case. This is going to be the case you need to break out from  your position. You get a score on this case; you’re going to have good prospects.”

It took a minute to sink in. Contrary to popular beliefs, not everyone loves a promotion. I definitely didn’t like to be commended about being good in catching cons like me. I didn’t like to betray the people of my profession, but the case that I’d worked so far were really the low-skilled cons.

Except for this. This was Dorian’s, Jerlyn and Mabel’s works. I didn’t know what they were planning, but they were planning something big. They’d started with the banks, and was now raising red alert on security companies.

“I… what?!” My sudden exclamation shocked some of my team members, but my little brother’s amused expression came to me from the corner of the room, where he’d taken to habit to hide in.

“If you handle this case right, you’re promoted. You’re in charge of this case.”

I would not be afraid of taking charge of a case at the moment, but if it meant that I had to hunt down Dorian, Jerlyn and Mabel……

“If I let them slip?”

“You don’t want to let that happen to your track record. We’ll be giving you high priority and most clearance. The people up there are scrutinizing your every move on this case, Francis, so you better keep yourself careful.”

It was bad time for something like this to happen. Of course, it did mean that I effectively now had control of the entire FBI case tracking on Dorian, but if what he said was true – which most probably was –then it meant that I couldn’t make a single wrong move. I couldn’t pretend to not find out about anything. I was not afraid about breaking my track record, but what I had to be cautious about was doing anything off the books. Not only Rainer would be watching me closely this time. I would be Barrett and every single tier of superior above him.

“Is there any possible way I might turn down this chance?” I asked in a small voice, already knowing my answer.

“No. Why would you?”

I couldn’t give him my obvious reasons, so I kept quiet and took the file that had been laid on the table before me, reading up the case and the clues that Rainer and the team had come up with thus far.

Still hiding in his corner, I watched as my brother smirked in victory. I wasn’t sure if he was the perpetrator behind me being the lead investigator of this case, but it sure worked to his favor. Obviously, neither Hayden nor Jeremy had loved the fact that I was now trying to make my superior-and-also-Hayden’s-handler Agent Rainer Clarke fall for me enough to forget about the case on Dorian, Jerlyn and Mabel. Jeremy didn’t want me to stop my con and effort to save my little brother especially for him, while Hayden just hated everything related to me getting close to Rainer.

“If I were to go by my hunches on this case, is it going to be approved?”

“If they are rational enough to be approved by Barrett.”

I met Hayden’s eyes. If we were going down on this road, if I was going to be forced to show my card by the FBI, then I might as well have a little fun doing it along the way. The amused smirk fell away quickly at the serious look in my eyes, and worry flooded his eyes. He knew this expression of mine.

“Then I need a search warrant on Dorian Renay’s apartment and office. There’s only one Dorian I know in my life who wants more than anything to call himself a Vincent.” I spoke to Rainer, but my eyes were on my little brother. If this news had something to do with Hayden’s doing to make me stop getting closer to Rainer and save Dorian at the same time, then Hayden was wrong. Once I’d set my mind, I wasn’t going to stop. Even if I was the lead investigator now, even if I had many top management staring down at every single thing I do. I was going to get close to Rainer, and he was going to cover every single thing for me.

I was going to make Rainer my fallout.

“Dorian… Renay? Your ex?” Yuri asked with a quiet voice, and but I didn’t turn eyes away from Hayden. War with FBI was officially now full blown.

It was Hayley or FBI now.

“Dorian Renay, my ex. And now, very possibly, a successful con who has not only done a large Massacre con, but many others. It’s clear that he’s starting out in the visual arts scene, but I now have reason to believe that he’s moving on to simple cold hard cash and banks. He’s getting help from someone –I know Dorian inside out, and he has the hidden potential to con. All he needed was for someone to bring that side out of him, and he obviously must have found that someone.”

That someone had been me, but I had not only been the one to bring out his con artist persona, but also trained him to calm his cold, ruthless murderer down. When I’d first met Dorian, he’d given me the impression that he could have succeeded in three different areas of life. Music, con, or murder. Dorian had to fingers of a musician and con, but that cold ruthlessness fit the bill of only a serial killer. The man had been willing to do many things to get what he wanted, and I’d been there to tame that crazed side of him down.

That was why I’d tried to keep him as close as possible. Once I’d locked the beast inside Dorian in, I couldn’t afford to unleash it to anyone else. It was a personal responsibility I held to Dorian, and that was the reason why I was still partly worried about Jerlyn and Mabel working with him. He was an adaptable man, but if someone tipped him over the edge, it was going to hurt really badly. I’d experienced it before, and I’d sworn to him that I would help him keep it down.

“Are… are you sure?” Ryan continued after Yuri’s shocked question, and I nodded, still keeping eyes on Hayden, whose expression was now one of disbelief.  Dorian was going to get a bad shock today, but I guess it was a well-needed test for him –to deal with emergencies such as this.

“Absolutely. How fast can I get that warrant?”

“We’re on very shaky grounds of your basis, and it’s going to take a lot to convince Barrett to approve of something as… “

“…Unconvincing as my argument? Trust me, I know. But if we’re going to close this case quick, I’m going to need a search warrant.” I completed Rainer’s sentence quickly

“On the basis of…?”

Now that was something I couldn’t say……

“If I dig up dirt on some of his past dirty deeds?”

“Then we might be able to work up something.”

I stood up, ignoring the subtle shake of head from Hayden. I was gambling on Dorian’s life now against FBI, and though most of the chips were on my hand right now, one wrong move, and I could potentially destroy Dorian and everyone around me. I could potentially destroy Jerlyn and Mabel, both of whom trusted me enough to go against Tyler Yule and help me out instead of destroying me and forcing me to stop helping my little brother.

“Then I have work to do. Update me if there are any advances on the case.”

“Francis!” Hayden jumped up from his corner, suddenly taking the attention of everyone.

“Yes?” I asked as Rainer began to frown. Being fake boy-girl friends hadn’t affected our ‘working relationship’ but Rainer didn’t like it whenever we spent time together during work. I wasn’t sure if Rainer doubted me, or if Rainer just didn’t want our professionalism to be affected, but all the same, he didn’t place me to watch Hayden nor partner me up with him at all.

“Be careful. He’s your ex… and you know how you left him.”

I try my best not to smirk. If Hayden was the one pushing me to this corner, to test out his sister and to see if she would ever give up what she now set to do, then he was going to know that I, Hayley Seyfried/Annabel Francis, was not going to give up.

At least until I was sure Jeremy was going to be alright.

Until someone takes my focus away. But no one has done that, well, at least no one in my life at the moment.

I’d been sidetracked once in my life, and I would never make that mistake again.

I would never be sidetracked by Neal again.