Chapter 182: Detective Maddox’s Investigation

Chapter 182: Chapter 182: Detective Maddox’s Investigation

Chapter 182: Detective Maddox’s Investigation

"Want to guess what I’ve been doing lately?"

The Full Moon Lounge was quieter than usual tonight, with only a handful of customers scattered around the room.

Rhea Maddox sat across from Cyrus Calder in ordinary clothes rather than her police uniform. Under the dim lighting, her figure seemed wrapped in a faint layer of shadow, while her bright eyes remained fixed on him with enough intensity to make the attention impossible to miss.

Cyrus set her drink down.

"What have you been doing?"

Rhea raised her brows.

"You’re supposed to guess."

Cyrus did not answer immediately.

He lowered his eyes and actually considered it.

Ever since the incident at Rhea’s apartment, she had been noticeably less present at The Full Moon Lounge. Other than Halloween night, when she had unexpectedly appeared again, she had barely visited.

At first Cyrus assumed police work had simply become busy.

Now he wondered whether that was really the whole explanation.

Another possibility came to mind.

Maybe the things he had told her before had worked better than expected.

Cyrus had deliberately made Rhea believe that his younger Frostborn form was connected to memory loss. He had also told her that he did not know his own species and wanted to recover the memories he had lost.

The lie had been useful for one important reason.

If Rhea thought forcing him into that form could erase more memories, she might hesitate before using her heat against him again.

At the same time, if she genuinely believed Cyrus wanted answers about himself, she might decide to investigate.

Rhea had access ordinary people did not.

Police databases.

Reports.

Records.

Maybe even information tied to rare-blood incidents.

Cyrus could not know whether she had actually done anything.

After thinking for a while, he shook his head.

"I can’t guess."

Rhea’s lips curved.

"That’s disappointing."

She looked at him over the rim of her glass.

Cyrus’s expression remained as composed as ever.

That only made Rhea’s thoughts more troublesome.

Whenever she looked at him, inappropriate memories had an irritating habit of appearing on their own.

She swallowed and pushed the distraction aside.

"I’ve been looking into rare-bloods."

Cyrus finally reacted.

His eyes shifted back to her immediately.

Rhea noticed.

There were few customers close enough to matter, and Malcolm was at the far end of the counter speaking casually with someone else.

Rhea had also deliberately kept her voice low.

There was little risk of an ordinary customer overhearing them.

Cyrus leaned slightly closer.

"You were researching different bloodlines?"

Rhea nodded.

"I checked quite a few sources."

She took a small sip of the cold drink in front of her.

"Old reports, unusual medical records, archived cases, things that never made it into normal publications."

Her expression carried a trace of satisfaction when she saw Cyrus listening more carefully.

This was one of the few topics that could make him visibly interested.

Rhea enjoyed that more than she should have.

Then her expression shifted.

"There’s a problem, though."

Cyrus waited.

"Among the rare-blood lines I found, very few had traits that matched yours."

The faint expectation in Cyrus’s eyes faded slightly.

"So you didn’t find anything?"

"Nothing that fits well."

Cyrus lowered his gaze.

Rhea watched him.

His disappointment was subtle.

For some reason, she found herself wishing it were stronger.

Not because she wanted Cyrus to suffer.

She simply wanted him to show that kind of vulnerability to her.

Only to her, preferably.

Rhea did not actually care very much whether Cyrus ever identified his bloodline.

She did not care whether his memories returned completely either.

The thing she wanted was Cyrus himself.

That had always been the important part.

The research served several purposes, but curiosity was only one of them.

Rhea also wanted to know whether Cyrus’s unknown bloodline had other surviving members.

That possibility bothered her.

If another person from the same bloodline appeared someday, especially after Cyrus lost more memories, he might instinctively trust them far more than anyone else.

Shared biology could become shared history.

Shared customs.

Shared language.

Maybe even family.

Rhea did not like that possibility.

If Cyrus was going to lose his memories, part of her would rather the loss be complete enough that nothing from before could pull him away.

Then his body could remember what his mind forgot.

That idea still appealed to her far more than it should have.

Rhea lightly ran her tongue across her lower lip and smiled again.

"You don’t need to look so disappointed."

Cyrus raised his eyes.

Rhea’s voice softened.

"I did find a few possible leads."

"What kind?"

"I searched using your family name."

Cyrus’s expression shifted slightly.

Rhea continued.

"There are a few isolated communities tied to people with the surname Calder. Some are old enough that the records are incomplete."

Cyrus listened without interrupting.

"I can’t say whether any of them have anything to do with you."

Rhea rested one hand beside her glass.

"But it’s something."

Then she added with deliberate warmth, "Your problems are my problems too."

Cyrus looked at her.

"I’ll help you figure it out."

The promise sounded sincere.

Strong enough that, if Cyrus were less cautious, he might have been moved.

Rhea knew how to speak in a way that made someone feel chosen.

Important.

Protected.

As though helping Cyrus was not simply something she was willing to do, but something personally meaningful to her.

Cyrus recognized the technique.

Dangerous women were often very good at this.

They slipped emotional hooks into ordinary kindness and waited for someone to swallow them.

Rhea had done it before.

Helena did something similar without seeming to realize it.

Daphne used care and guilt.

Vera preferred pressure and entertainment.

Different methods.

Same problem.

If Cyrus had been less resistant, Rhea might have convinced him long ago that she was the safest person in Grayhaven.

He gave her a small nod instead.

"Thank you."

Rhea watched him accept the words without giving her the emotional reaction she wanted.

Still, that was enough for now.

She finished the rest of her drink in one swallow.

Even if she found something truly important, whether she told Cyrus immediately would remain her decision.

She had, in fact, found several remote communities in old records where the Calder surname appeared with unusual frequency.

The information was incomplete.

No clear connection to Frostborn appeared anywhere.

That did not mean the connection was impossible.

It only meant she had not found proof.

Rhea had learned quickly that rare-bloods were very good at disappearing into incomplete records whenever they wanted to.

She looked at Cyrus again.

His family name was uncommon, but not unique.

That left too many possibilities.

Cyrus reached a similar conclusion.

There were ordinary human Calders everywhere.

Not many, perhaps, but enough.

His old village had also been buried deep in an isolated region.

Someone could search public databases for years and still never find anything useful.

If information about male Frostborn were easy to locate, someone would have already written about them.

Instead, even published rare-blood guides treated Frostborn as almost entirely female.

That alone showed how much information his people had successfully kept hidden.

Rhea’s investigation was probably going nowhere.

Cyrus did not tell her that.

If she wanted to spend police resources chasing dead ends, he was not going to stop her.

Rhea stood.

"I’m leaving early tonight."

Cyrus looked at the barely used bar stool.

"You’re only having one drink?"

"I have things to do."

She smiled.

"We’ll talk again."

Cyrus nodded.

"Thanks for looking into it."

Rhea’s eyes lingered on him.

The warmth there was not hidden at all.

She could wait.

Wait for his memories to break further.

Wait for him to need someone.

Wait for the day he stopped knowing which people around him were safe.

And if that day came, Rhea intended to make sure his body recognized her even when his mind did not.

She turned and left.

The entrance bell rang once.

Then the door closed behind her.

Cyrus began cleaning the area she had used.

His expression remained calm.

As far as he was concerned, investigating his bloodline through scattered human records was nearly the same as searching the ocean for one specific drop of water.

If Rhea actually managed to uncover something meaningful, Cyrus might genuinely owe her a reward.

He rinsed the glass.

When he looked up again, he noticed Malcolm staring at him from farther down the bar.

There was something unusual in the older man’s expression.

Surprise, perhaps.

Maybe curiosity.

The customer Malcolm had been speaking with earlier was already gone.

Cyrus had no idea how long Malcolm had been watching.

He looked back at the glass in his hand.

Had he made some mistake tonight?

Cyrus mentally reviewed his shift.

No incorrect orders.

No spills.

No customer complaints.

No missed payments.

Everything had been completely ordinary.

Malcolm also could not possibly have heard his conversation with Rhea.

They had been separated by too much distance, and Rhea had deliberately lowered her voice.

Unless Malcolm possessed hearing far beyond that of an ordinary human, there was no realistic way he could have caught the details.

Cyrus eventually dismissed the concern.

If Malcolm had a problem with his work, he would probably say so.

He never did.

The rest of Cyrus’s shift passed normally.

By the time Cyrus left The Full Moon Lounge, Malcolm still had not mentioned anything.

Cyrus headed home without giving the strange look much more thought.

Close to eleven that night, the lounge finally closed.

The illuminated sign outside went dark.

The last customers left.

Malcolm finished the usual cleanup and started bringing the planters near the entrance back inside.

A car pulled up nearby.

Not long afterward, Helena appeared beneath the dim mixture of streetlights and moonlight.

Her face remained expressionless as she approached.

"What was so important that you couldn’t tell me over the phone?"

Malcolm carried another planter through the entrance.

"I thought this was better discussed in person."

Helena followed him inside.

The lounge looked different after closing.

No customers.

No music loud enough to fill the silence.

Only the warm lights remained.

Malcolm set the planter down.

Then he turned toward his niece.

His expression had lost most of its usual teasing ease.

"I noticed something tonight."

Helena waited.

Malcolm thought again about Cyrus and Rhea.

The distance between them.

The low voice.

The words he should not have been able to hear as clearly as he did.

More importantly, the subject of their conversation.

Rare-bloods.

Cyrus’s unknown ancestry.

Abilities that did not match anything Rhea had found.

Malcolm had spent enough years around humans to know what ordinary people sounded like when they discussed rare-bloods as myths.

Cyrus had not sounded like someone discussing myths.

He had sounded like someone searching for his own origin.

Malcolm looked directly at Helena.

"Do you think there’s a chance Cyrus is like us?"

Helena’s eyes changed slightly.

Malcolm continued in a quieter voice.

"I mean that he might be rare-blooded too."