Chapter 2
1076 Words
Jenna
The warm air that greeted her as she entered the greenhouse reminded Jenna of why she"d wanted to take this job in the first place. She often found herself longing for a warmer climate, she assumed because of the bird hiding inside her. But this was where her family lived, not to mention where she"d made friends and created a life for herself. She wouldn"t give that up for anything, not even the chance of sitting on a beach and sipping cocktails every evening.
She wanted to dally amongst the plants to admire the handiwork of the botanists who worked here, but she knew that there wasn"t the time for that right now. She needed to get to her meeting with Mr Bradshaw so she could do her job and sort out the thief who was terrorising the dryads here. Up until recently, there hadn"t been anyone doing the job she did, but that had all changed when the High Council finally started to get involved in inter-species issues, and now people like her were helping paranormals up and down the country to get the justice they deserved.
Luckily for her, the office was fairly easy to find, though the man inside didn"t seem to have heard her coming.
She cleared her throat, hoping to gain his attention without causing alarm. "Mr Bradshaw?" she asked.
He looked up sharply and set down his pen.
"Can I help you?" He sounded as if he"d had a rough week and was in desperate need of a weekend to himself with a paper and as much tea as he could manage.
"I believe we have a meeting. I"m Jenna Sunangel, the High Council has sent me," she said.
"Ah, yes. Thank you. Please take a seat." He waved at the chair opposite him.
She gave him a thin smile and did as he asked.
"You"ve arrived just in time." He sighed as if his words were an understatement.
"Have things progressed from the reports I"ve seen?" She resisted the urge to flick through her notes to check on the state of things. She"d prepared as much as she could in advance and had memorised the figures in preparation. She"d found it was easier to do her job if she wasn"t focusing on finding information while she should be observing the area around her.
"There were more thefts overnight," Bradshaw said.
She nodded. "Unfortunate. Do you have reports for today"s incidents?"
"No," he responded gruffly as he shuffled uncomfortably in his chair.
If she had to guess, she"d say that Bradshaw was the kind of man who would prefer it if he could hide everything deep in the flowerbeds and never have to think about it again. But that wasn"t going to keep his workers happy, especially when so many of them were dryads who had a deep connection with their tether-plants. She wasn"t going to pretend that she completely understood when she wasn"t a dryad herself, but she imagined that it was similar to how she felt about her inner bird. There was a connection she wouldn"t be able to explain to anyone who wasn"t a shifter themselves. If someone tried to take it from her, she"d be just as protective about it as the dryads were being about their plants.
Instead of saying as much, she gritted her teeth and faced the boss who she felt was failing his workers. "Can you at least tell me who to talk to about the thefts last night?" she asked.
"Baxter Heirloom. You"ll find him in sector two," Bradshaw responded.
"Do you have a map?" She had one already, but she wanted to know whether or not he was going to be helpful or not. She didn"t think it was purposeful, but that didn"t mean it wasn"t going to be frustrating.
"I don"t know. Maybe around here somewhere..." He searched through the papers, muttering to himself and trying to come up with the item.
She bit her tongue and tried to resist the urge to tell him she had one already, especially as she hoped he would have more information on it, including any of the other thefts that hadn"t been reported to the High Council. She didn"t need to spend any longer in this office to know that there would be more than either hadn"t been reported by Bradshaw or to him. Perhaps his staff had as little faith in him as she did.
"Ah, here you go." He brandished a crumpled up piece of paper barely big enough to hold a shopping list, never mind a map.
She forced a smile onto her face and took it from him. "Thank you."
"I"m glad you"re here." Relief coursed over his face.
It struck her that perhaps he wasn"t as incompetent as he seemed, and it was just that he was stressed out about the situation. She certainly would be in his situation.
"It"s best that I don"t waste more time," she said as she scraped back her chair. "I"ll get to the bottom of the matter as quickly as I can."
"Please do." There was almost a begging note in his voice, but she chose to ignore it.
Instead, she smiled and made her way out of the office and back into the main greenhouse. It was only then that she noticed how drab the office had been. How could Bradshaw work in a place as beautiful as this and not want at least one plant in his workspace? If she worked here, she"d be setting up her desk in the middle of all the living things.
The urge to shift came over her as she took in the sights and smells. She didn"t get many chances to fly around anywhere like this. A lot of humans could be unobservant, but the risk of them noticing a hummingbird flitting from one plant to another was still strong. But this place was different. Everyone amongst the staff, even down to the lowest position, was a paranormal of some kind. From the staff profiles she"d seen, the majority were dryads of one kind or another, along with a variety of small shifter types and a couple of witches.
Jenna glanced down at the map, finding the right sector so she could go and find Baxter Heirloom. Hopefully, he"d be able to give her a better introduction to the greenhouses than his boss had done. Though that wasn"t going to be hard.
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