Happy holidays! Hope you guys have a great rest of the night!
"This is ridiculous," Jace said. "We need to get him out of here." He stared at Magnus for a long while, before he came to a decision. He cocked his gun. "Well, if it comes to this-"
"Jace, shut up," Izzy snapped. "Magnus is cool."
Magnus felt oddly warm from the compliment, which probably shouldn't have been his first priority considering Jace had him at gunpoint.
Alec glared at Jace until he lowered the gun. Then he turned on Izzy.
"You talked to each other once at a hospital," Alec snapped, with the tone of one who thought Izzy's time with Magnus was not long enough for her to make a judgement call. If Magnus hadn't known better, he would've thought the annoyed dig was a result of jealousy.
Izzy rolled her eyes. "Max said he's cool."
Alec nodded reluctantly, like somehow his nine-year-old brother's judgement meant so much more to him than his sister's. Jace lowered his gun, with the same sort of Well, Max likes him so he's cool kind of look.
"Then what do we do?" Jace asked. "I mean, I have extacy if you want to-"
"No!" Magnus didn't feel like being drugged. "I can walk home."
"That's not the problem. The problem is that the second you leave, you'll talk. And not to mention, you'll know the way to our house." He glared at Alec. "We need to shut him up."
"Talk about what?" Magnus said. "I still don't have hard proof that this is even a drug cartel. If anything, Alec will be sent to jail for two years and get fine a few thousand dollars, because I watched him make a deal. But probably not. One eye witness doesn't exactly hold up in court."
Simon eyed his box of cocaine precariously and Magnus watched him visibly decide not to say anything.
"And I haven't seen what's actually in that box," Magnus added, for good measure.
Not a single one of them looked convinced that he wouldn't say anything. Not even Alec, which was actually kind of rude.
Obviously, he'd have to escape.
Magnus contemplated the situation. Simon was blocking the door. Izzy had a gun held lazily in her right hand, with her purse hanging off her left forearm and the keys to a car in her left hand. She was standing next to Jace, who was a little to Simon's right and had a gun in his pocket. Alec was standing to Magnus' left, a gun in his boot.
Magnus turned to Alec. "I'll take that clementine now."
Alec shrugged and Magnus followed him past Jace and Izzy and into the kitchen portion of the apartment, which was right next to Simon and the door.
Magnus could get passed Simon no problem. It was once he was out of the apartment that was the problem. How was he supposed to leave? He wasn't so sure that once he got into the lobby, with people around, that Jace or Izzy wouldn't attack him. Alec he'd like to give the benefit of the doubt, but what if he shouldn't? What if Alec's paranoid behavior was just a rude for Magnus to drop his guard?
He thought of Izzy's car keys. Would it be bad for a cop to steal a car to get out of the bad guy's clutches?
Alec opened the fridge and pressed a clementine into Magnus's hand. Magnus remembered when he first met Alec, when the guy had talked until he distracted Magnus enough to escape.
"Thanks," Magnus said. He began peeling his clementine.
"Oh, awesome," Jace snapped, walking over to the kitchen. He was still further from the door than Magnus was. "Now we're feeding him, too."
Alec shrugged. "He bought us roast beef. We owe him."
Magnus nodded. "It cost me a good $8."
"$7.99."
"Um, I'm pretty sure it was $8."
This wasn't a very good distraction. But Magnus was still able to move closer to the door, placing his clementine skin on the very end of the table.
Then the door opened.
A familiar-looking redhead walked through the door, Max in tow. In seconds, every gun in the room was shoved into a boot or a pocket or a flower pot. Simon placed the box of cocaine on the table, like it was a package of new shoes he just got from Amazon. Magnus kept peeling his clementine.
"Clary!" Jace yipped. He pulled the back of his shirt over the bulging gun in his right pocket. Clary smiled an innocent smile.
"Hey, guys. Max and I are finished at the library," Clary said.
Max bounded over to Jace. "Look, I got two new comic books!" he said. "And I bought the first Harry Potter book!"
Jace plastered on a wide smile. "Wow! That's awesome!"
"Hey, aren't you that guy from the hospital?" Clary asked. Magnus looked at her more closely, and he looked at the way everyone was fidgeting, and he smiled.
She had no idea what these guys, the Waylands or the Lights or whatever, were into.
And better yet, they didn't want her to.
And what explanation would they have for keeping a man prisoner?
"Yes, I'm Magnus. Nice to finally meet you." He held out a hand and she shook it. "Well, it was nice seeing you all, but I think I should be heading out."
Magnus moved to the door, trying to hide a smirk at the furious look on Jace's face.
Max ran over to Magnus and gave him a big hug. "Bye, Magnus!"
"No," Izzy said weakly. "Stay, we insist."
Magnus grinned, hoping it looked a little bit regretful. Izzy's polite smile dropped. "Ah, but I can't. I apologize. I have a party to get to and I need time to go get ready for it. I can't be late."
Alec's mouth was a tight line. "Understandable. Goodbye, Magnus."
"Bye." Magnus practically skipped out of there.
Ragnor stared at the files in extreme annoyance. "Maxwell and Isabelle Wayland," he grumbled. "215 W Sherman Street. We have to start there, obviously."
Magnus wasn't ready to return to the tiny little studio apartment on Sherman Street, but it seemed he had no choice.
"So Caterina has been treating Maxwell Wayland for how long?" Ragnor asked.
"Cat didn't give me any information besides the last name," Magnus said. "Patient-Doctor confidentiality. But if we get a warrant, which I'm sure we can, we can legally interrogate her."
"And we need to search the apartment they're living in," Ragnor added. "And we need to talk to Maxwell and Isabelle, just to see if they know anything about their brother's business. And if they do, we need to figure out just how deep Lex Light is in. We might uncover a whole cartel."
Alexander Light. That was his name. Or at least, that was his first name. Magnus wasn't stupid enough to think that Alec was using his real last name.
Ragnor's phone went off. He answered it and Magnus heard the surprise in his voice when he said, "Camille?" Magnus looked over at Ragnor. "Hold on, I'm putting you on speaker."
"Hi, boys."
"Hi , Camille," Magnus said. "How are you?"
"Oh, I'm great. How are you boys?"
"We'll be better once you give us some good news," Ragnor, ever the positive ray of sunshine, added gruffly.
Camille laughed. "I have a way for you to arrest Lex Light."
Magnus stilled. He shared eye contact with Ragnor. Ragnor was just about as excited as he was, which was not at all. "What did you find out, Cam?" Magnus asked.
"Well, as you know, I've developed a strong cover in the business," Camille said, almost bragging. "And I've maintained a strong relationship with Joaquín Guzmán, the C.E.O. of Mexico's Sinaloa cartel."
"And?"
"And he heard about Light's business. Sinaloa wants to strike up a deal with Light. He sent me to offer Lex the deal, and I did. I called him, he hang up ever so rudely, I called him again, and now we have a deal. Guzmán is paying Light a healthy $5,000 to get an audience with him."
An audience? How widespread was Alec's business that people paid just to talk to him?
"So we're crashing their party, I presume," Ragnor said.
"Sorry, no can do," Camille said. "Guzmán refuses to tell me where they're holding the meeting."
"Then how is this helpful?" Ragnor snapped.
"If the deal goes through, and believe me, it will, Guzmán rarely goes alone. He'll take me and I can clue you in on the location. Two drug lords in one night."
Sounded hella dangerous. "We'll have backup, obviously," Magnus said. He was mostly talking to Ragnor.
"Obviously," Camille said. "I have to go now. I don't want to be caught having this conversation. Goodbye."
Magnus and Ragnor couldn't get a word in before she hung up.
Magnus nibbled on his bottom lip and exchanged a look with Ragnor. Even with backup, this was going to be dangerous. They were now dealing with the C.E.O. of one of the biggest drug corporations in the world.
As scared as he was for himself, Magnus hoped Alec knew what he was getting into.