Fire Brand (City of Dragons Book 6)

by Val St. Crowe

  “When?” she said.

  “Well, they seem to meet on the third Wednesday of every month. So that means the next meeting is next Wednesday,” I said. “Which is perfect, because we’ll go and kill some nasty water monsters and then get up the next day and cook Thanksgiving dinner. Scheduling-wise, it couldn’t be better.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Are you kidding me?”

  I shrugged. “I’m just saying…”

  * * *

  “So, why are we going to see Rowan Lynch again?” I said to Lachlan. We were parking the car outside her house.

  “Because she’s high priority on our suspect list, and we haven’t been doing anything to try to eliminate her,” said Lachlan. “Or to prove it’s her either.”

  “But we don’t have anything specific to ask her?” I said.

  “No,” he said. “But maybe we can shake something loose. I think if we don’t, it’s probably time to take her down from the top of the board.”

  “But that only will leave Paloma,” I said. “With the possibility that she’s working with Henry Gilbert.”

  “Maybe that’s not a bad thing?” said Lachlan. “Because maybe then we’ve just got one person to concentrate on, and that means we can tie this up quick.”

  “Unless it’s the wrong person,” I said. “What if it’s someone we’ve eliminated?”

  “We eliminated nobody,” said Lachlan. “We just deprioritized them.”

  “What if it’s someone we don’t even know about?”

  “How’d they do it, then?” he said. “They didn’t get in the room through the door or the camera would have picked them up.”

  “Maybe they climbed through the window,” I said.

  He smirked. “Great. Now I’ve got that possibility running through my brain.” He shut the door to the car.

  I shut mine too. We headed up the walkway to the door of Rowan’s house, which was a cozy little thing tucked into a development on the south side of the city.

  “I hate this case,” I said. “Any other case, we’d have alibis. We’d have ways of eliminating suspects. But everyone’s got opportunity in this case, so we can’t cross anyone off. And without physical evidence… Lachlan, are you sure we even can solve this case?”

  He eyed me. “Someone’s negative.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I’m just… I’m worried.”

  “It’s because of the Eaglelinx stuff,” he said. “That seems hopeless at the moment, but we’re going to figure that out. And we’re going to close this case before Thanksgiving too. Go into the holiday light and free, ready to celebrate.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “You don’t think so?”

  “I’m all for the power of positive thinking, Lachlan, but I think you’re jinxing us.”

  We reached Rowan’s door.

  Lachlan knocked.

  We waited.

  Nothing happened.

  “It would be just our luck that she’s not even home after we drove all the way out here,” said Lachlan, sighing. He knocked again.

  We waited some more.

  And then the door opened. Harlem was standing there, the half-gargoyle kid who was Beckett’s son. When he saw us, his eyes lit up. “Hey, it’s you guys. The police officers. Whoa.”

  Lachlan chuckled. “How are you doing?”

  “Good,” said Harlem. He peered around us. “How come you don’t drive a police car?”

  “Oh, I do,” said Lachlan. “It’s in disguise, though. I have a flashing light I can put on the dashboard if I want.”

  “Really?” Harlem grinned. “Can I see it?”

  “Maybe later,” said Lachlan. “We have to ask your mom if it’s okay. Is she home?”

  Harlem’s face fell. “No. She’s at work.”

  “Oh, that’s too bad,” I said. “We were hoping to talk to her.”

  “Does this mean I can’t see the light?” said Harlem.

  “Your mom leaves you here while she goes to work?” I said.

  Harlem shrugged. “I wanted to switch to night school so that I could be with all the other gargoyles, but it’s harder to sleep during the day than I thought. Anyway, the neighbor Mrs. Grady comes and checks on me every couple hours.” He pointed at the house next door.

  Harlem was around ten years old. I guessed it was okay for him to be home alone if he was sleeping, but… well, I wasn’t sure if I’d let Wyatt do that. I could hardly wrap my head around Wyatt being ten years old, but I didn’t think I’d feel any less protective of him at that age. Anyway, Lachlan and I were lucky to have so many people to help us with our kid. A woman like Rowan was all on her own.

  “Come look at the light,” said Lachlan, heading back for his car.

  “Oh, wow,” said Harlem, smiling from ear to ear. “Thank you.”

  “Sure,” said Lachlan, chuckling. He started across the walkway and Harlem hurried after him, practically skipping. I brought up the rear.

  Lachlan showed Harlem a dome light. He set it up on the dashboard of the car and turned it on. Immediately, the thing began flashing blue and bright.

  “Whoa,” said Harlem.”

  “Got a siren too,” said Lachlan, switching it on.

  I held my ears.

  Harlem whooped. “Yeah!”

  Lachlan grinned.

  The two enjoyed the chaos for a minute before Lachlan turned it all off. “Well, there you go. That’s my dash light.”

  “It’s really cool,” said Harlem. “Thanks for showing it to me.”

  “Not a problem,” said Lachlan, putting it back under the dashboard.

  “What were you going to talk to my mom about?” asked Harlem.

  Lachlan hesitated. He looked up at me, almost as if he was seeking guidance.

  But I didn’t know what to tell him. I knew that it had seemed as if Rowan wanted to keep Harlem out of the investigation. I also knew that it was illegal for us to question the kid without a parent or guardian present. So if Lachlan was asking my advice, I’d tell him to change the subject.

  “We just wanted to ask her about your dad,” said Lachlan.

  “Really?” said Harlem. “Huh. What’s so special about my dad? Is it because he’s a gargoyle? Mom says that makes me special, even if the other kids at school said mean stuff about my wings.”

  “It does make you special,” said Lachlan. “But no, that’s not why we wanted to talk to her. Did your mom tell you about what happened to your dad?”

  “Something happened to him?” Harlem furrowed his brow. “What happened? Is it bad?”

  Lachlan flinched. He cleared his throat. “Sorry. You should talk to your mom about that.”

  “Well, maybe we should go check on him,” said Harlem. “I don’t know if we’d be able to tell, though. He’s stone right now. I don’t turn into stone, not like him, but he’s stone in the day time.”

  “Yeah,” said Lachlan. “He is. So, maybe it wouldn’t be a great time to check on him. Maybe you should stay here and try to go back to sleep.”

  “Stay here?” said Harlem, looking more confused. “Where would we—”

  “Lachlan,” I said, “maybe we should drop this.” The kid clearly didn’t know his father was dead. Rowan hadn’t told him that. It wasn’t our place to drop that bomb on the kid.

  He glanced at me. Then he turned back to Harlem. “She’s right, Harlem. We shouldn’t be talking about this without your mother with us. Because anything you tell me without her here, I can’t use in the investigation.”

  “Okay,” said Harlem. “But about my dad—”

  “No,” said Lachlan. “I don’t think you should tell me anything else about your dad. Not unless I ask you when your mother’s around.”

  * * *

  We took a long lunch that day, brought home some takeout to share with the boys and Vivica. After lunch, Lachlan went back to the office, but I stayed home with Wyatt to play with him for a while. And then I put him down for his nap.

  I spent that
time pacing the house and trying to think of some way to try to stop Eaglelinx.

  Everything I thought of was something we’d already shot down.

  I got frustrated with myself for not coming up with any original ideas. I sat down at the kitchen table and lay down on it, resting my forehead on the cold, smooth wood.

  Figure it out, I ordered myself.

  But I was getting nowhere. And thoughts of the menu for Thanksgiving were starting to crawl into my brain. I was wondering how long it took to cook green bean casserole. Was it longer than it took to make mashed potatoes? Potatoes had to go on the stove for twenty minutes plus boiling, so it took around thirty minutes. Of course, that wasn’t counting peeling time.

  Argh.

  Eaglelinx.

  I could figure out Thanksgiving later. But I did need to go grocery shopping sometime soon.

  Maybe I should even do that this afternoon. Like after Wyatt woke up, we could go to the store and get what we needed, or at least all the shelf-stable stuff. I might want to make a trip closer to the day for produce and meat and things.

  Of course, what did I need? Potatoes? Green beans?

  Potatoes kept forever.

  I could get frozen green beans. I could get a frozen turkey.

  Should I get a frozen turkey, or should I get a fresh one? I couldn’t remember which way was better. Lachlan was in charge of the turkey, though. I’d have to ask him.

  Anyway, that was how I ended up spending my afternoon. I texted Lachlan questions about the turkey, but he was clueless. So, frozen it was. Wyatt and I went to the store. He stuck his fists in his mouth and chewed on them the whole time. He was drooling too.

  Damn it. I was pretty sure that meant he was teething again. And I thought we were supposed to get a break now. What the heck was coming in now?

  I hated teething. He had so much trouble sleeping when he was teething, and I’d always dose him up on Tylenol, but I was never sure if it was bad to give it to him every day for a week or more. I wished Wyatt could talk and tell me whether or not his gums hurt.

  Argh.

  When I got back, I was too exhausted from grocery shopping to cook food. Anyway, I hadn’t bothered to buy anything but Thanksgiving stuff, which was sort of stupid of me, I realized. I should have done some other grocery shopping at the same time.

  Annoyed with myself, I went through the freezer, looking for something easy to cook. I found a bag of pasta and sauce and vegetables—some ready-made, meal-for-two thing that I must have bought a few weeks back. I could throw it in a skillet and have food in ten minutes or so. Sounded perfect.

  I texted Lachlan to ask when he wanted dinner.

  He texted back that he was going to work late, so not to wait for him. Just eat without him.

  I made dinner.

  I ate. Wyatt ate a few noodles. He also threw a good bit of food on the floor. I made half-hearted attempts to stop him, but I wasn’t in the mood to deal with it. I determined I’d just clean the floor after he was done.

  Wyatt went to sleep only about an hour and a half after dinner. By the time I cleaned up dinner and tossed him in the bath, it was time to read stories, nurse him, and put him down.

  Tonight was Connor’s night to come over to be night nanny. I called him and asked if he’d come a little early. He usually didn’t show up until around when I was going to sleep. I told Connor that I wanted to go back into the office to see Lachlan, and having the gargoyle there would be a big help. He said he’d be right over.

  When Connor arrived, I headed out the door. I told him he could call me if he needed to.

  I knew that I could have stayed home, but I felt like I needed to pitch in with the case. I wondered what it was he was working on, anyway. Maybe some kind of research.

  He was surprised to see me. “Penny, I thought you were done for the day.”

  I sat down at his desk. “I couldn’t stay away. I want to help. What are you doing?”

  “Oh, just annoying stuff,” he said. “I’m trying to work on different angles for motive. Why would someone kill Beckett? Did you know that over the years, he’s had a lot of death threats and problems? People mail him bomb scares. Sometimes they threaten to destroy venues where he’s going to be speaking. That kind of thing.”

  “I didn’t know,” I said. “But it makes sense that he’d have that sort of trouble.”

  “Well, I’ve just been wading through them all afternoon, hoping to find some kind of connection to Henry Gilbert or Paloma or another of the suspects. I tried to get a hold of Rowan Lynch again, but she’s not answering her phone, and I decided I wasn’t going to drive out there again.”

  “That makes sense,” I said. “No point in wasting a trip. Well, can I help with the research?”

  “Sure,” he said. “I’ll get you set up and tell you what to look for. You can use one of the floater computers.” He got up to head to the back of the room, which was where the floater computers were.

  “Can’t I just log onto Christy’s?” I said, pointing. My login would allow me to access my files, not Christy’s, even though I was technically on her computer. I had a network profile that loaded on any of the police computers.

  Lachlan considered. “I guess she wouldn’t care. But I bet if you move one of those pictures of the dogs out of place, she’ll have a fit.”

  I grinned. “I’ll be careful with Lala and Booboo.”

  At that point, we heard a door slam. “So typical,” said a voice. “No one’s here after the sun goes down.”

  Lachlan and I both whirled.

  Paloma Stanley was standing on the other side of the room. She was wearing a black pantsuit with four-inch high heels. She fluffed her wings. “Oh, look. If it isn’t Detective Flint and his associate. You really are still here. The woman at the front desk said you were—”

  “She should have buzzed me,” said Lachlan. “I’d have come out to meet you.”

  “Oh, she tried,” said Paloma, “but I wasn’t going to let you blow me off. I’m here to see you, and you’re going to talk to me.”

  “Of course,” said Lachlan, grabbing a chair and pulling it up next to his desk. “Why don’t you have a seat?”

  Paloma walked across the floor, her heels clickety-clacking with each step. She didn’t look happy. When she reached us, she looked down at the seat, then up at both Lachlan and me. Finally, sniffing, she sat down.

  Lachlan sat down too. I pulled Christy’s chair over and sat as well.

  “Frankly, Ms. Stanley,” said Lachlan, “I was under the impression that you weren’t very pleased with either of us and that you didn’t want to speak to us.”

  “I’m not pleased,” she said. “But I can’t avoid speaking to you. You’re the people who are supposed to be solving my uncle’s murder.”

  “We’re working on it,” said Lachlan. “That’s why we’re here late.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Here late. I’ll have you know, it’s midmorning for me.”

  “I appreciate that it must be difficult for you to be stone all day,” said Lachlan. “I bet that’s hard.”

  She gave us a chilly smile. “But it’s not your fault, so why don’t I shut up about it?”

  Lachlan sighed heavily. “That’s not what I said.”

  “You might as well have.” She studied her fingernails.

  Lachlan gave me a look while she was turned away, and then he went back to her. “What can we do for you?”

  “You can solve my uncle’s murder, that’s what.”

  “Well, we’re doing our best.”

  “You’re not doing anything,” she said. “I don’t understand what could possibly be taking so long.”

  Lachlan’s lips parted. “So long? Ms. Stanley, do you have any idea how long it usually takes to solve a murder?”

  “Well, not exactly,” she said. “But I watch television.”

  “And they wrap it up in forty minutes?” said Lachlan. “Well, here in the real world, it typically takes a little lo
nger. Months, even years. Penny and I happen to be very good at our jobs. We’re working much quicker than normal.”

  Paloma made an odd noise in her throat. “You get a kick out of putting me in my place, don’t you? ‘Just tell that little gargoyle woman what-for and she’ll shut up.’ That’s what you think, isn’t it?”

  “No,” said Lachlan. “I can promise you that’s not what I’m thinking.”

  “You’ve been through a lot, Ms. Stanley,” I said. “You come from a difficult background. You’ve had to struggle. All gargoyles have. And then being the niece of Beckett Stanley couldn’t be easy either. Now, losing him, it must seem as if the entire world is against you.”

  “Don’t try to patronize me,” she said. “All you’ve done since you opened this case is twiddle your thumbs. You haven’t figured anything out.”

  Lachlan sat back in his chair. “What is this? Is this some kind of calculated performance to make us think that you aren’t actually guilty?”

  “Guilty?” said Paloma. “What are you talking about?”

  “Did you kill your uncle?” said Lachlan.

  “No,’ she said. “Why would I do that?”

  “That’s the problem I have with it,” said Lachlan, shaking his head. “Why?”

  “I can’t believe you’re accusing me of something like that,” she said. “I’m the one who figured out that he was murdered. If I hadn’t pushed for the autopsy, everyone would have thought he simply had a heart attack.”

  “Yeah,” said Lachlan. “And that’s your alibi. That’s the thing you can point to and say, ‘See? If I had done it, I wouldn’t have done this.’ But it doesn’t prove anything, Paloma. You were in that hospital more often than anyone else was. You came to see your uncle daily and you stayed with him for hours. You would have known about the storage closet, would have been able to see what was stocked there. You could have easily googled the names of the drugs in there until you found something that would serve your purpose.”

  “You really think I’m a suspect?” She gaped at us. “I told you who did it. It was Samuel Jacobs.”

  Lachlan laughed. “Did you know that Samuel Jacobs is a vampire?”

  Paloma screwed up her face. “What?”

  “It’s true,” I said. “We went to see him, and he was turned probably twenty years ago. He’s been living with a vampire ever since. He denounces any involvement with the Brotherhood, and says he has nothing against Beckett anymore.”