Axle began to move, and then he paused, wondering why Bingwen wanted it that way. Then it dawned on him. Axle wasn’t going to be able to do what needed to be done. If he had to make a choice between keeping Kanai from getting the bracelet, and keeping Natalie alive, he would let the bracelet fall into Kanai’s hands. Bingwen, on the other hand, wouldn’t hesitate to do anything. Even if it meant he had to kill Natalie, he would do what he had to do.
“Just be smart, and make sure she’s alive,” Axle growled, looking up at the building. It was hard to tell where they should start, or where they would be keeping something like that. The basement was a good place to start, so Axle walked right up to the building, looked around to make sure no one was watching, and slipped in through a side door and began searching for stairs.
As he walked around, he took a breath, and he could smell the odor of burns and sulfur. A sign that they were not alone. Kanai was in the building, and he had just summoned other demons to come help him find what he wanted.
Chapter 12 - Natalie
Natalie got out of the taxi and rushed up the stairs of the building. She noticed others looking at her, as she wore a large polo t-shirt that Axle had given to her after he had ripped the clothes off her body. As she headed up the stairs, her mind drifted to the sex.
It was the best she had ever had, by several miles. Axle was inhuman, no lie, but it had also felt like an out of this world experience. There weren’t enough words to explain it and Natalie caught herself smiling as she walked into the office building. It had to be a one-time thing, because as much as she enjoyed herself, she couldn’t imagine a life with Axle.
He was a monster, who probably spent most of his time saving the world from threats like the demons, and Natalie wanted that to be over. She had no idea how to protect herself from any of them, and all she could do was make sure she was safe and find the best spot to hide whenever the chaos began again. She wanted her normal life back, her boring life as an archeologist, when her only fears had been wrong dig sites, and crumbly artifacts.
“Well well well,” Eric began, taking a seat on her desk and crossing his legs, “that doesn’t look like yours.”
“Not now, Eric,” Natalie replied, running her hands over her desk as she searched for the box. She recalled borrowing it from storage to analyze, but she had never returned it. She checked her drawers for it, but it wasn’t there.
“Brave of you to wear it to work though,” Eric continued. “I mean, it’s like you want us to know someone did the horizontal mambo with you.”
“What?” Natalie asked, turning to him in shock. She hadn’t said anything about Axle, or that they’d had sex. So how did he know?
“Come on, you always have perfect hair, dress impeccably, and look like you wake up with perfect makeup pre-applied by angels. But now this? Come on, who do you think you’re fooling? You hooked up with someone last night, and everyone who has seen you before this very moment knows it.”
Natalie held back a chuckle, realizing he was right. “Eric, you’re really sweet, but out of my way. I don’t have the time right now, okay?”
“Okay, babe, I hear ya,” Eric replied, watching her with anxious eyes.
Then it clicked, Eric could have it. He was the one who had found the box in the first place, and he had taken it out. She looked at his wrists, and saw that he wasn’t wearing the bracelet, so she could tell that it must still be safely in the box. She turned to his desk on the other side of the cubicle and walked over to it.
“Need help with something, love?” he asked.
“The box, do you have it?”
“Well yes, after all. You decided to just leave it out without returning it, so I took it back, and I’m working on it right now,” Eric finished. “Why do you ask?”
“I need to borrow it,” Natalie replied.
Eric raised an eyebrow at her, shaking his head. She let out a breath, knowing that Eric could be hard to deal with. She didn’t have the time. She had to get the box and head back to Axle. From what he had said, the monsters wouldn’t attack where they could be seen, so she was safe here. But if somehow that changed, maybe once she was alone, that would cause issues for her.
Which was why she had to get the box and get back before nighttime. It was still early in the day, the best time for her to act. But if Eric was choosing to be difficult, there wasn’t going to be much she could do in response. She watched as Eric bit his lip, shaking his head as a mother would to her son who had just asked for something unthinkable.
“Now, when I first let you borrow it, you left it out and went down to the caves without returning it—why?” Eric asked.
Natalie considered telling him, and seeing as he was being headstrong, she buckled. “I had a feeling there was a second one.”
“And?” he asked.
“There wasn’t. Look. I fucked up, I get it. But I really have some research I have to carry out, and I need it. So please, if you can just let me have it for today, I’ll return it by tomorrow, I promise you.”
Eric stared at her. “Wait, you mean you want to take it out of the building? To where?”
“Back to the caves. I…have a hunch.”
“I’m coming with you then,” Eric replied.
“No, I have to do this on my own,” Natalie objected. “It’s not safe.
Eric burst out laughing, shaking his finger in her face. “Look, darling, I know what this is. Alright? This is the Max Planck to Einstein thing. You just don’t want to accept that I made the discovery first, and you need to use what I have to build up your own rep somehow, so you can look important. But, sweetie, I can’t allow that, I really can’t. I made this discovery, and I’ll be keeping it here until I’m done, you understand?”