Let’s Talk One True Mate (One True Mate Companion, Vol. 1)

∞∞ Abigail White Investigation

“That’s right, that’s right. While Wade and the others were in California, we were here helping Sebastian with the new Abigail White investigation, because the month before, when Crew talked to Paisley in the hospital—Wade, Crew, and the rest of them left to find Crew’s echo , leaving a patrol officer with Paisley White and her family—and when the officer went to the bathroom, the entire family snuck Paisley out and disappeared into the night. This time they didn't even sign out AMA, they just left. As soon as patrol realized, they sent a unit out to the house where the child had been taken from. The place was empty, and no one who lived on the block has returned since that day.”

Burton quirked an eyebrow. “Suspicious behavior.”

“We still weren’t thinking foxen —which we should have been—but Conri, Bruin’s brother, says Abigail White creates some sort of magical hoodoo smoke screen that keeps us from recognizing her and her family as foxen .”

“Messed up,” Burton said, his expression hard.

Canyon crossed his arms and nodded. Very messed up.

“How many foxen do you think live in Serenity?” Timber asked Burton.

“I don’t know, 20? 30?”

Timber nodded. That’s what he used to think, too.

“Am I wrong?”

“Maybe. We'll have a better idea once we get up the bluff. Seems like at least 40 foxen live just in this one little village, but we've got to get in there to be sure.”

“That’s not too many.”

“This is only one family—the Van Crimsons.” Timber stopped to measure Burton’s response to the name, but kept talking when there wasn’t one. “We’ve tried to talk to a few of them but none of them will say a word to us. It’s clear they’ve been schooled by someone on how to avoid us. There’s a few Vin Boesons in Chicago who will talk to us, and that’s how we’ve learned what little we know.”

“Vin Boesons—related to Boe?”

Canyon and Timber exchanged a look. There was a lot to this investigation and everyone, including Burton, was on a need-to-know basis, as far as they were concerned. Canyon gave him an ‘it’s up to you, bro,’ nod, clearly rolling with whatever Timber decided to do.

“Yeah, seems like it,” Timber said. “We’ve heard some crazy stuff, and we don’t know what’s true and what’s not, but we’ve got an informant who swears he can trace his family line back to Boe himself in 1720.”

“Making Boe over 300 years old.”

“Right. This informant says Serenity was full of Vin Boesons in the 1800s, but they all moved away sometime around 1870, which was when their tether to Khain was broken. Most of them went to Chicago.”

Burton frowned. “Tether to Khain…” he said quietly, his brow set in lines of deep concentration.

“You’ve heard of it, Chief?”

Burton nodded at first but then shook his head.

Timber didn’t press him, but watched him carefully while he spoke. “This guy says certain foxen are born tethered to Khain and they have to live in the Ula close to where Khain lives in the Pravus. He says the Van Crimsons are tethered and the Whites are too. If they leave Serenity for too long they get headaches and confusion, and can even become incapacitated. He loves to gossip about Abigail White. He says she’s the crazy-ass matriarch—”

You said ass-matriarch.

“—of a large foxen family here in Serenity. Many of them are supposed to live up Morning Bluff—you ever heard of The Morning Wood Inn Chief?”

“Yeah, the place burned down in the 70s.”

“Wade thought it was closed for tax fraud in 1976. Harlan heard it was sold to the federal government and bulldozed. That's part of the smoke and mirrors.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning the Morning Wood Inn is an active business that everyone but us can find.”

“Bullshit,” Burton said, his expression grumpy.

Canyon crossed his arms, his expression identical to Burton’s. So fucked up.

“Sebastian's explored the forest several times and found nothing but trees and shit. We've sent up drones, Graeme, and a helicopter. If it's up there, it's not visible from the air.”

“It's not up there,” Burton said.

Timber fished a brochure out of a file on his desk and handed it to Burton, saying, “A patrol officer took that off a tourist.” The paper showed a log cabins nestled deep in a thick forest. Timber read over Burton’s shoulder. “The Morning Wood Inn—Stay at Illinois' Premier Forest Themed Hotel, Home of the State's Best Sunrises, also known as, ‘The Birthplace of Bigfoot’, located at 1 Morning Forest Drive.”

Canyon was already pulling 1 Morning Forest Drive up on Google maps, and also on the official Serenity road map—both showing there was no such address. Morning Forest Drive had mile markers only, no houses or buildings.

“Conri says maybe a human would get a different result from Google.”

“That’s not possible,” Burton said.

“Shouldn’t be, Chief.”

Canyon shook his head. No, he’s right that it’s not possible.

Timber shrugged. He and Canyon had been round and round about this. “If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck—”

Canyon whipped something small at him. Timber dodged it with ease.

Burton’s expression turned murderous. “She’s hiding a whole freaking hotel right under our noses?”

“She might be,” Timber said, snatching the brochure from Burton’s hand and replacing it with a pack of beef jerky. Burton frowned briefly, then tore open the pack, making Timber grin. “We’re planning to check it out ourselves, maybe as soon as tomorrow.”

He put his hand up for the football.