Secrets and Things (MxM)

Chapter 45 - Can't a man catch a break sometimes?

"Assden, you're getting extremely off track here and it's not appreciated."

"Please, I'm very appreciated."

I growled in frustration. "Aiden..."

"Sorry, sorry. As I was saying, they were good friends but all went to shit after Rothwell–"

"Tell me later. I've reached the venue." Luckily, the outside was fairly empty so I managed to land in the shadows, hidden from everyone else. I drew back my Oddity and I walked out and head towards the entrance but then it hit me that I actually had no idea how to get inside or what obstacles I had to get past. "Yeah, so what the fuck do I do now Aiden?"

"Right, you can just walk into the place. They had the guest list all online so I just hacked it and inserted your name there."

"My name?"

"Well, I put Bob Ross."

"... you didn't."

"Oh but I did."

"I fucking hate you. Not only is my face completely out in the open, but I also have to walk in with a stupid ass name."

"Oi, you do NOT insult Bob Ross like that."

"Shut up Assden."

Grumbling was the only response I got before I ended the call. I finally got to the entrance of the hall and as expected, it was guarded by a security guard. Said guard monotonously asked, "Name," as soon as I stop in front of him.

I'd rather much get caught sneaking in. "... Bob Ross."

The man's face remained blank, not even fazed by the name as he looked through the list on his iPad. Time seemed to drag on before he gave me a small nod and opened the door for me. I sent a quiet "thank you" his way and I entered the grand hall.

I'm not exaggerating when I say it's grand. The entire room was gold with white accents. Almost all flat surfaces were made out of marble and the room had four marble pillars at each corner of the rectangle room, further elevating the grandness. Tables were surrounding the edges, a bar to the left of the entrance (a posh bar) and a dance floor dead centre of the room, accompanied by a large, crystal chandelier. If this doesn't scream money, I don't know what does. I looked around, directing my attention to the guests and found that there was a theme ongoing. Females seemed to be wearing white and the men were wearing black suits, which was lucky on my part since it allowed me to blend in with my work clothes. I saw some familiar faces. Not people I personally knew but famous, important people. This was a high end party and I now had seven minutes to find the dude so it's pretty justified when slight panic began bubbling within me.

I walked around, in hopes of finding someone suspicious while simultaneously redialling Aiden. As soon as I heard the line pick up, I gave him no chance to talk. "Ok, I'm in. I have no clue where to start and I'm really fucking mad at you. Like I really want to break your neck right now. Not the point. Quick rundown is that everyone is loitering around the tables and are beginning to migrate towards the dancefloor. Meaning dinner just finished. A couple of people are at the bar and the birthday girl is in a gold dress I think. This is inferred from the fact that out of all the white dresses, she's the only gold dress. So I'm just going to assume that's nori. Anyway, what do I do now? Do you have any other leads?"

"WHAT DID I DO THIS TIME?"

"What. do. I do. Now."

"Right, the dude managed to keep his appearance off the internet quite well, which begs the question of how a social influencer got talking with someone with no face and didn't think anything weird about it. REGARDLESS, the only thing I found is that the dude has a tattoo behind his left ear and his helix is pierced on the right. I think he has black hair and he's the same age or a bit younger than Nori."

"Well, it's something to work with. Not good enough but it's something. I don't know how to look behind people's ears non-creepily though."

"Eh, I'm sure you'll manage. Also, another important thing is that there are four bombs going off at the same time–"

"FOUR?!"

"–but they're not as explosive as the usual. That being said, they're attached on the four pillars in the room, if I'm not wrong so it's going to bring the building's entire support system down so you gotta either stop him from detonating in... five minutes or get everyone the fuck out of there before the entire ceiling collapses. No pressure."

"No pressure he says. You're an ass. Wait, why can't I just, remove all the bombs before they go off and throw 'em in the ocean or the sky?"

"Because, the bombs he bought can be set up so if someone tries to forcefully remove it, it'll go off. Now I don't know if he did that but it's too much of a risk to find out."

"So my only option is to find the guy since I have no way of yeeting everyone out of the room."

"Essentially, yeah. Now tell me why I need to be preparing for my funeral. Again."

"You had the fucking guest list right?"

"Yeah..."

"Why didn't you warn me that we had celebrities and important people attending this damn thing? I thought it was just going to be other influencers from YouTube and TikTok. Not fucking CEOs of massive corporations."

"I still don't see the issue here..."

"The issue is, our job is to bring down evil people right? WELL KNOWN evil people. Meaning, I've come in contact with them a couple of times without anything covering my face, pretending to be a janitor or something to sneak through."

"Oh, now I get your point. But it's highly unlikely they'll remember you anyway."

"It's also highly likely that someone will recognise me because there have been many times where I have met high-end people due to my job or because of Leo. It's always his fault at the end, isn't it? Whether he is here or not, he will somehow manage to fuck me over one way or another."

"lol. Look, I briefly skimmed over the list and no one stood out or seemed recognisable so I think you'll be fine. You have more urgent matters right now. Like finding Rothwell?"

"Yeah, yeah." I began scanning through people, studying the back of everyone's head. I had a timed goal in mind that I would see through till the end.

I was so invested, I didn't notice a familiar pair of hazel eyes heavily observing me from a short distance away, since the moment I stepped into the hall.