Death Retires

by Cate Lawley

  “Apology accepted,” I said.

  Sylvie returned without Clive, her mission accomplished. “Why was it we could see and hear Ginny, but not Bobby?”

  “She’s much stronger than your Bobby,” Tamara said, swinging her bag over her shoulder. “Hop to, folks. No telling how close of an eye Mrs. G has on this place. Mrs. G.” Tamara shook her head. “I never would have thought . . .”

  “Well, maybe it’s her nephew,” Sylvie said as she opened the gate for us. “Although I don’t suppose it could be one without the other.”

  “What time is it?” I had notes at the house on the Gonzalezes. If only we had time to have a look at them.

  “We’ve got an hour and a half,” Tamara replied without checking a watch or cell phone. “Not much time for planning. Your house, Geoff?”

  “My house,” I agreed. “I want to have a look at Nicky Gonzalez’s family tree. We were interrupted before, but I think it’s time to find that family connection we’ve been suspecting.”

  “I’ve met Mrs. G, and if she’s got magic, she’s hiding it deeper than I can see.” Tamara’s bright green eyes met mine. Those eyes didn’t miss anything.

  “Or hiding it in a tree out back,” Sylvie said. “That’s what my grandmother used to say.”

  Tamara stopped. We were just crossing the street, so I offered her my arm in hopes she’d continue on. She patted it and said, “I’m not so old as that,” then continued across the street.

  Once we were safely tucked inside my house, Tamara asked Sylvie, “What was it that your grandmother used to say?”

  Sylvie shook her head, confused.

  “About the tree,” Lilac said. “That’s an odd saying.”

  “Oh. It’s a silly thing she used to say when I was little. She used to tell me the best place to hide secrets was in a tree out back or under a . . . rock . . . in the garden.” Sylvie sank down on the nearest surface, which happened to be an armchair in my living room. “I can’t believe I’d forgotten that.”

  “Maybe you didn’t. After all, you did put that rock in your garden.” Lilac shrugged. “Maybe that wasn’t an accident. Maybe that was your subconscious at play.”

  Tamara pulled the rock out of her bag—we hadn’t wanted to leave it vulnerable, sitting on my kitchen table—and handed it back to Sylvie. “See if it’s ready to give up its secrets.”

  Sylvie grasped the stone with both hands. “How do I do that?”

  “Not a clue,” Tamara replied. “I didn’t know your grandmother, but you did. I’m going to be busy throwing together some protections for us, so get to it. Lilac can help you.” She wagged a finger at me. “And you—you’re just lucky Clive didn’t want to hurt you. Ginny’s intent and his weren’t in agreement, or I wouldn’t have been able to stop him so easily.”

  I hated to state the obvious, but that wink was making me a little crazy. “What intent? Clive’s a ten-inch iron statue.”

  “If you say so.” Tamara made a beeline for my kitchen table, then dumped the entire contents of her bag on the surface.

  Why was I—former soul collector, a retired death, and not exactly a regular guy—the only one in the room who thought her comments about Clive were odd? The relatively normal people—relatively in Lilac’s case and completely in Sylvie’s—weren’t giving it a second thought, so I carried on as if iron statues commonly had opinions and intent. I also sent Clive another thank you. For all I knew, the little guy could communicate telepathically.

  While Tamara worked on protection charms and Sylvie and Lilac tried to pry the stone’s secrets from its swirling red and green surface, I retrieved the stack of papers Clarence and I had been putting together. Work histories, credit reports, phone records, bank statements, most of which I was certain had been obtained illegally.

  Flipping through, I retrieved the background check on Mrs. G and her nephew, Nicky. Or Nicolas P. Granger, as he was identified in Clarence’s documents. A quick scan revealed Nicky’s mother as Mrs. G’s sister. So, if Tamara hadn’t erred in her evaluation of Mrs. G, and she truly had no magic, that meant the juice was on Nicky’s father’s side of the family.

  Although, now that I thought about, I wasn’t sure how much good that did us. It wasn’t like the aristocracy or something, where a finite set of well-catalogued families held power. Magic was slippery. It skipped and jumped around. There was also a geographic component. Different regions had different beliefs, which, some theorized, led to different kinds of magic. That left a lot of uncertainty. Then again, rumor was that witches had an eye for genealogy and a head for names, so maybe Tamara would recognize one of these names.

  I scribbled down three family names, in the hopes that one would ring a bell and maybe we’d know what kind of magic was waiting for us at the other end of our meeting. Assuming we were even waiting for the meeting. For all I knew, Tamara was out there getting ready to raid Mrs. G’s house.

  At which point I saw explosions in my future, so I grabbed the stack of papers and the note and booked it back to the kitchen.

  Lilac and Sylvie had their heads ducked together, sitting next to one another on a sofa in the living room. They didn’t even notice me as I passed. Tamara looked up from a small mortar and pestle where she was grinding some mysterious concoction together.

  “Is that my mortar and pestle?”

  “Of course. You think I keep something heavy like that in my travel bag?” She continued to grind the coarse powder in the small stone bowl using smooth, even strokes. “I like this one. You have good taste, Geoff Todd.”

  “Clarence ordered it on the computer, actually. But since you like it, I’m sure he’d want you to have it.” Especially since I would never use it for edible substances again.

  Her eyes twinkling, she said, “He would, would he?” But she didn’t call me out on my fib. “What’s that you’ve got?”

  “Three family names attached to Nicky. His last name is Granger, but I’ve also got Nettles and Ainsworth.”

  Before I could ask Tamara if any of them sounded familiar, maybe even if one were a witch family, Sylvie called out, “Ainsworth? That’s my grandmother’s maiden name.” She and Lilac joined us at the kitchen table, returning the rock to its spot as centerpiece. “How did Ainsworth come up?”

  “Nicky’s paternal grandmother’s maiden name, making her your grandmother’s sister, perhaps? Just a moment.” I flipped through the stack of papers. “I don’t have anything here on Nicky’s grandmother, just her name—Prudence Ainsworth Granger.”

  “Oh.” Sylvie frowned. When she saw us waiting for clarification, she said, “Maybe it’s nothing? My grandmother’s name was Constance, and her little sister who died when she was a baby was named Temperance.”

  “Prudence, Constance, Temperance?” Lilac asked. “That’s an awfully big coincidence, given the circumstances. But your grandmother never mentioned a third sister?”

  “She did, but only to say they didn’t get on. I never knew her name.” Sylvie touched two fingers to her temple. “Please tell me this isn’t actually an inheritance dispute. I know what you said before, Geoff, but I couldn’t believe it.”

  Everyone at the kitchen table was conspicuously silent.

  Sylvie groaned. “Over a rock?”

  “It’s clear it’s more than a rock,” Tamara said. “Your grandmother imprinted such a strong signature on it that it awakened Lilac’s latent psychometry talent. That’s no ordinary rock.”

  Lilac’s eyes widened. “Is that what happened?”

  Tamara waved a hand at her. “Later. For now, we might know part of the reason your estranged family wants this stone, Sylvie, but we still don’t know what kind of magic we’ll be facing in less than an hour, or what’s inside that rock.”

  “Well, I don’t know,” Sylvie said. “Not either of those things. I didn’t even know the third sister’s name. I certainly wouldn’t have guessed that I have a distant cousin who wants my mysterious inheritance.” Sylvie sat down across from Tamara and
reached out to stroke a finger across the rock. “You’d think it would be obvious, what she’d been, what she could do. But I don’t know . . . I do know she could see the dead.”

  Tamara’s eyes lit up. “The dead? Or ghosts?”

  Sylvie shrugged. “They’re the same, aren’t they?”

  Tamara deferred to me. I supposed it was my area of expertise. “Someone who can feel, see, or hear ghosts is basically a medium,” I said.

  Lilac raised her hand. “Like me.” Then she frowned. “But I guess I’m not a very good one, since I got the detection part without the communication.”

  “Later,” Tamara mouthed.

  “In any event,” I said, “we sometimes casually refer to the dead and ghosts interchangeably, but they are different. Ghosts are a small subset of the dead. A medium’s magic involves ghosts, but there are others whose magic more broadly involves the dead. And the undead.”

  “And creatures like the construct that attacked Lilac,” Tamara said. “It was never truly alive.”

  “So, if Grandmother wasn’t a medium, what was she?” Sylvie’s gaze met mine, and I felt terrible that we were twisting precious memories of her grandmother.

  “Sorcerers, necromancers, practitioners of certain magical belief systems. There are a number of possibilities.” My words certainly weren’t comforting, but she wanted to know.

  “Those sound scary.” Sylvie’s voice was firm and her tone matter-of-fact, but she definitely looked worried.

  Lilac leaned closer, like a small child entranced by an especially compelling ghost story. “What I want to know is what’s dead, besides a ghost? I mean, everyone knows about zombies—”

  Sylvie choked.

  Lilac bit her lip. “I’m sorry. And we’re so short on time . . .” She settled into her seat. “I’ll be quiet. Promise.”

  “We’re no nearer to knowing what this rock does.” Tamara stroked it, as if it were a living thing and needed to be placated. “If anything, we’ve broadened the scope of possibilities. All we know for sure is that your grandmother wanted you—not her sister’s people—to have it. We can’t give it away knowing nothing more. It’s also unfortunate I didn’t recognize any of the family names. Without some knowledge of what to expect, it’s difficult to prepare for battle.”

  Battle? I didn’t let my concern show, because neither Lilac nor Sylvie needed to see me worried. But battle? I was mortal now. Things like battles made me break out in nervous hives. Worse, Sylvie and Lilac had no business anywhere near a supernatural conflict.

  “A battle is just another word for conflict, Geoff.” Tamara’s grass-green eyes looked into mine. “You really must learn to think quietly. But you’re not wrong about these two. Lilac, Sylvie, it’s for the best that you stay here while Geoff and I do what we can for Clarence.”

  Sylvie looked stricken. Then she stood up and stepped away from the table. “While you do what you can? I don’t think so. You don’t sound the least bit confident. And it’s my rock, stone, inheritance.” She gestured wildly at the rock. “I’m going with you.”

  “Me too.” Lilac stood up and moved to stand next to Sylvie. “But, um, I just don’t want to miss anything.” She gave Sylvie a sheepish grin.

  Sylvie nodded with a determined look. You’d have thought Lilac had just declared her unwavering devotion to the pursuit of justice for all, rather than expressing a keen fear of missing out.

  “So.” Sylvie placed her hands firmly on her hips. “What’s next?”

  Tamara gave Lilac and then Sylvie a soul-searching look with those intense eyes of hers. She must have been satisfied, because she said, “All right, then, since you’re so sure.”

  I didn’t get a second glance, let alone a soul search. Probably a good thing, because I wasn’t at all sure. But Clarence needed rescuing. And it was the right thing to do.

  “We’re off to ask for some help,” Tamara said. “Protection charms aren’t my particular specialty, and we could use some good supplies.” A reasonable enough plan. Being properly equipped always seemed a good choice when heading into . . . conflict. But then Tamara lowered the boom: “It’s time to get Hector’s help.”

  “Hector, as in the same man you told me not to disturb during daylight hours?” It was most certainly daylight. Our three hours were close to running out, but we were hours from darkness.

  This wasn’t sounding good. And that was without the added consideration of Hector’s unknown nature. His other-than-human nature.

  Lilac’s eyes widened. “Heavens above and hell below. I’m meeting a vampire.”

  With a disapproving frown, Tamara said, “Quit that. Vampires are nasty, dirty creatures. And you’d be hard-pressed to find a helpful vampire.” She shook her head, as if even the thought were outrageous.

  Vamps tended to turn my stomach, and after the first several hundred corpses as a soul collector, that was hard to do.

  “How do you think Hector, who is not a vampire”—I glanced in Lilac’s direction—“can help us?”

  “I think he might have a trick or two up his sleeve.” Eyes twinkling with mirth, Tamara said, “Hector’s a demon.”

  26

  Demons. As in fire and hell and brimstone . . . maybe? I hadn’t actually had any dealings with them. Hadn’t known they were more than myth until now.

  Soul collectors were kept in the dark about certain things: where collected souls were sent, whether the afterlife was indeed a better place, the existence of a heaven or a hell. Basically, anything that would impede a soul collector in his or her duty of ushering the departed on to their next stop. The existence of demons seemed to indicate certain answers to some of those questions.

  “Sure, let’s go visit the demon down the street. Why not?” Sylvie muttered to herself as we walked single file down the sidewalk.

  Tamara’s look-away spell was more likely to work when we weren’t bunched together, and we didn’t want Nicky and Mrs. G to know that we were going to Hector for help. One had to assume they were spying on the neighborhood, and that the sudden cooperation between the stone heiress, the witch, the medium, and retired death had put them on high alert.

  And I’d also be keeping an eye on things if I was illegally searching one neighbor’s house and stealing another neighbor’s cat. But that was me.

  Hector’s house, like Tamara’s, had signs of a supernatural occupant, but much subtler. I opened the gate to the front yard and felt a slight resistance as I entered the yard—except for that. I held the gate as Sylvie, then Lilac, and finally Tamara passed through, and each woman caused a ripple as she passed. Not subtle at all.

  Hector had basically posted the supernatural equivalent of a security sign in the yard. In addition to the barrier around the property, Hector’s yard couldn’t have been more different from Tamara’s. Neatly clipped grass, a fruit tree, a few blooming but magically impotent plants—pleasant, but not the yard of a person who spent much time tinkering in and with nature.

  The door opened before we arrived, and the tall man I’d only briefly glimpsed the day of the explosion stood there. He didn’t look particularly happy to see us.

  “Are you going to invite us in or glower at us?” Tamara asked with a slightly snippy tone. Someone’s harmony was out of balance again.

  Hector leaned against the doorframe, relaxing slightly. “I don’t know, witch. What trouble have you brought with you?” The smile he flashed first Lilac and then Sylvie was flirtatious. Not overly so, just enough to be charming, to make a woman think that she was attractive and he couldn’t help noticing.

  This guy was good.

  Tamara pushed past Hector—and since the man was bulging with muscles, it was clear he allowed her to. “No time for your devilish ways, Hector. We might be spotted outside.”

  “You think whoever you’re hiding from can get a look inside my security bubble?” Hector motioned for us to come inside, tipping his head at the women as they murmured quick introductions and then offering me his hand. His sha
ke was firm, but not challenging, and just the right length to say, “I’m self-confident, but not arrogant.”

  I was starting to not like this Hector guy on principle. Forget that he was a demon—whatever that meant—he was too perfect.

  “I’m not talking magic, Hector. They could use binoculars. I’m worried about the neighbors.” Tamara headed straight to the kitchen without hesitation or direction, so she was no stranger to his house.

  Hector closed the door with a thud. “That’s unfortunate. I had high hopes for the neighborhood. But given the recent direction it’s taken, I suppose I’m not surprised.”

  “Gentrification?” I asked, wondering at the connection.

  He smiled. Of course, it was perfect. “No, Geoff Todd, not gentrification.” He used my name as if he found it amusing. “The fact that our quiet little street has become a supernatural hot spot. We’re attracting all sorts. No offense intended. Your sort I welcome.”

  “Retired soul collectors.” We weren’t exactly a huge demographic.

  “Not exactly. I find soul collectors generally fall into two categories: chaos-loving and eternal optimists. You seem the latter.” He broke eye contact, turning his attention to retrieving drinks.

  His evaluation, when viewed within my experience, was surprisingly astute. Surprising since his direct contact with soul collectors had to be limited. I hadn’t even known demons existed, so I was either shielded from that knowledge because of a devilish connection or they were just rare.

  After producing cold cans of fizzy water and inviting everyone to sit, Hector said, “So, witchy lady, what exactly can I do for you?”

  Hector really was a hard man not to like, and I wasn’t seeing signs of his reported daytime moodiness.

  Tamara glanced at the kitchen clock. “We’ve got about twenty minutes to come up with a rescue plan for Geoff’s, ah, ward.”

  Clarence wasn’t my ward—not exactly. Semantics, I supposed, but labeling Clarence as my ward made me feel all the more responsible for his welfare and therefore his kidnapping.