Smoke and Mirrors - 35

Daniel stretched and turned to look Mor and Jared. “That property has changed hands more than a whore on a good night.”

Mor snorted. “Now that definitely says it all. I guess that means we have to track down each and every owner.”

“The ones who aren’t human,” Jared pointed out.

“Nope, all of them, because a Supe could have used a human as a front when they purchased it,” Daniel contradicted.

“Probably would have in the last fifty years or so. Are we counting out whoever owns the warehouse?”

“No. We check each and every one of them since the first Europeans landed here.”

“Do you think the records actually go back that far?” Mor asked.

“What’s not in the city archives, I’m sure we can dig up elsewhere, through the Supe Council or a couple of people I know who’ve been around for a very long time and are interested in the city’s history,” Jared told her.

And dig it up they did. The following morning they had a complete history of the property including its original owners before and after the fire of 1788 that had partially destroyed the city.

“These three we can eliminate out of hand,” Jared commented, pointing to the names which were starred. “One of my sources knew the family and verified that each of them was human.”

“Would we be remiss if we didn’t consider the ones who came after them, at least for now?” Mor asked.

“Let’s just put them on the back burner and see what we can find out about those two,” Daniel tapped two of the names at the beginning of the list, “Mr. John Fitz John whose construction company sat on the site in the early eighteen hundreds and Madam Gravier nee St. Pierre. She and her second husband built their home on the property soon after the second fire.”

“Marie St. Pierre?” Jared asked.

Daniel flipped the page to the information they had, slim as it was in some cases, on each of the property owners. “Yes. Why?”

Jared shook his head. “Something about that name niggles at me, although of course it’s a fairly common one.”