Scars of her Blood • Shadowhunters

Chapter 16: Interesting Developments

By the time Celia and Benicio returned to her apartment, it was very early morning. Celia took a long, cold shower to clear her head. Then the two of them met again in the living room and started researching Tia Tamayo. The thought of getting drunk, which Celia had actually looked forward to, was gone. They had to find out if there was any connection to someone who knew Celia well enough to leak such an information. On top of that, Celia felt reminded of the night with Eileen, who had seemed to know an awful lot about her. By now, Celia was wondering how many leaks she would discover if she dug deeper into this.

It did not take them long to analyze the entire life of Celia's last opponent: she was 32 years old, the second daughter of Salvador's younger sister and had been in the army for twelve years. There was nothing suspicious about her, not a single loose end, nothing on her record in the army, no recordings on anything out of the ordinary.

But then Benicio looked up from his phone:

"Celia..."

"What?", she mumbled, not expecting anything ground breaking.

"The announcement for the duel was made 24 hours before it started."

"Yeah, so?"

"So, that reminded me of something we have not looked into yet: I'm sure they did not schedule the tournament for the day following the decision. So why were you not informed earlier? Not even Álvaro knew earlier, otherwise I would have been here earlier."

Celia starred at him. She had entirely forgotten about that.

"I'll have to..."

She was interrupted by Benicio's phone ringing. Celia could immediately recognize Álvaro's voice and hear the beginning of the conversation: "regresar acá". Come back here... Celia sighed. Benicio will have to leave. Benicio put the phone on the table so that Celia could listen better.

"César wants you back in Mexico immediately... Sorry.", Álvaro continued, "see to it that you guys finish up whatever you are doing. Is Celia with you?"

"Yes...", Celia mumbled.

"Enana, I'm sorry I have to take Benni from you again, but that wasn't my decision. I just wanted to tell you that you did an absolutely awesome job at the duel last night. There are videos going around, so we were able to analyze it already."

"Thanks."

"Well, that's all from me, do you have anything to discuss?"

Celia did not answer immediately, as she was lost in thought.

"Celia? Is there something you need to tell me?"

"No... No, Benni will get you caught up on everything, when he comes back."

"Okay, then we'll talk later again."

He hung up and Celia handed Benicio the phone back.

"Why are you making a face like that?"

Celia did not answer him, just stared at the laptop in front of her. Even though it had only been two days, it had felt really good to be together again.

Benicio came over and hugged her:

"It's not like I am moving to Edom... also, since when are you so clingy?"

"Since you are the only thing keeping me alive."

Benicio did not know what to answer for a second. Neither of them knew what to do when it came to emotions. Even though the two of them were only really opening up to each other – if at all.