The Accidental Detective: Finding Her Boss

Chapter 4

                

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As soon as the sleek black vehicle arrived at Saint Roe's shelter, it immediately became the center of attention for the many individuals eagerly queuing up to find a safe haven for their weary bodies.

"Whew, that's a lot of people," Loriatte whistled, "how are we going to find that guy through all this?"

"We? I'm sorry, who's we?" Zayden looked over at his unwanted passenger, giving her a pointed look.

Her eye's narrowed at him, "we are 'we', in case you forgot mister, we're in this together."

He rolled his eyes in frustration as he spoke firmly, "We're not discussing this, you can resume playing 'little miss journalist' later. Right now, I need to focus on my job," he said sternly. "Stay in the car. Once I'm finished, I'll take you to your new location, where you can go back to your typical routine of prying into people's lives, and I will proceed with my investigation undisturbed. I can do without any hindrance from a troublesome journalist!"

The girl inhaled deeply, "continue talking to me like that and see what happens," she gritted out.

Zayden  smiled sarcastically, "awe that's cute, you think you're intimidating," he rolled his eye's, "Now be a good little girl and stay in the damn car, and we won't have any problems."

"I'm seeing your lips move but all I hear is a buzzing noise," She studied her nails, being nonchalant at the burning glare he was sending her way.

"Stay. In. The. Car." He gritted out for the last time before jumping out of the car and shutting the door angrily behind him.

Despite not even knowing her name, the girl was getting on his nerves to the point where he had to resist the urge to draw his gun and shoot her between the eyes.

He took a couple steps before stopping and exhaling angrily through his nostrils.

"I told you to stay in the damn car," he said slowly, yet Loriatte could hear and feel the anger in his voice, but she didn't let it make her knees buckle with fear.

It was weird that he was so intimidating and scary, yet she wasn't scared of him, but somehow terrified of her sweaty kung-fu panda boss.

"As if I would ever take orders from you, buzz buzz motherfucker," she spat as she walked past him, strutting confidently.

Zayden bit the inside of his cheeks, fighting the urge to wrap his big hands around her neck.

He angrily and quickly walked ahead of her, an attempt to show that he was still in charge.

The girl rolled her eyes, but followed him to the front of the line where they were met with a man who was probably in his late fifties, and was in charge of checking people in.

"Hey back of the line you two!" Someone yelled from the line.

"Yeah get in line and wait like everybody else!" Another added.

They both ignored the people, well Zayden ignored them while Loriatte awkwardly and shamefully smiled, looking down at her feet.

"Hi, I'm det-"

"Nobody cares who you are mister, back of the line," the man said not even bothering to look at the two as he let a man and a woman in.

"That's not what I'm here for, look sir-" Zayden tried again but was once more cut off by the man.

"Then you either leave or get in the back of the line like everybody else," the man said not sparing Zayden a glance.

Zayden huffed, "does it fucking look like I'm homeless to you? I'm in the middle of a very important job, and you're standing in my damn way, now let us through!"

Loriatte looked awkwardly between the two men, along with everyone else in line who looked on in silence and suspense.

The man finally looked at Zayden, and not nicely mind you, "Look here kiddo, this is my turf and what I say goes and if you're not here to get shelter like the rest of these folks, then I suggest you get your high and mighty over-privileged ass out of here, right now!"

"Do you know who you're talking to? I can get your-"

Loriatte quickly cut in before Zayden could get another word out.

"We're!" She stepped in front of Zayden, smiling apologetically at the man, "we're really sorry to intrude sir."

The man huffed looking away.

"You seem like a nice man, and I respect that you take your job so seriously. You know, it's very hard to find a man so authoritative and passionate these days...so manly..." she smiled as her hand went up to touch his name tag, "Lance."

With a bashful cough, Lance turned crimson as the young woman's gaze fell upon him. It had been five long years since his ex-wife had departed, and Lance had grown accustomed to the absence of female attention. But now, here stood a stunning young lady before him.

"Are you single...Lance?" She spoke softly, her hand snaking from the name tag to his shoulder.

Lance coughed again, scratching the back of his head "well I-I-uhm-I'm not seeing anyone right now, no."

"Neither am I," she smirked.

Zayden didn't even know what was going on anymore, and neither did the people in line, but to say that the guys didn't wish to be in Lance's shoes would be a lie.

Lance grinned widely, revealing his crooked yellow teeth, he quickly ripped out a piece of paper from the book he had and scribbled down his number.

"Here uhm, give me a call. We-we could go out to uhm McDonald's or something," he handed the piece of paper over to her.

Loriatte purposefully brushed her fingers with his as she took the paper, the smile never wavering from her face.

"Sure, but can you help me with something first?" She asked, biting her bottom lip.

"Anything."

"You see, my brother-in-law is searching for his son who ran away from home a few days ago. As the step-aunt, I volunteered to help in the search. Have you, by any chance, come across this young boy?" She took the photo of the boy from Zayden and showed it to the man.

Zayden stood there baffled.

"Oh, yea I've seen this boy, comes around here often," the man nodded, "Oh and there he is."

As soon as everyone turned to look at him, the boy's body tensed with fear, certain that his parents had sent someone after him. Without a second thought, he took off running in the opposite direction, with Zayden right at his heels after tossing his car keys to Loriatte.

"Thank you, Lance, I'll call you for our date," Loriatte waved at a blushing Lance as she hoped in Zayden's car and drove after the detective and the runaway.

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