by McKenna Dean
“Believe me, I know.” Knight’s tone was dark, his glower invoking images of dissection labs and scientists conducting tests of unspeakable cruelty. When he went on, however, I had to marvel at his cynicism. “What’s the best way to protect yourself in that circumstance? Align yourself with the devil. Think about it. We’re in a race now to produce bigger and badder atomic weapons so that each country can reign supreme over the world. What if one country had an army of supernatural beings on its side? Werewolves, vampires, and the like?”
“There aren’t any vampires.” At least, I hoped not.
“That you know of.”
He had a point. A terrible point.
“So.” I pulled the word out as if it were made of taffy. “You think I should investigate Redclaw.”
“The way I see it, if Redclaw isn’t behind Margo’s death, then they know who is. After all, both parties want me to work for them.”
I frowned. “You say it’s a secret branch of the government. You’re forgetting the possibility of a criminal organization.”
“All the more reason for you to be down in the labs tomorrow. The answers aren’t on the street. I’ve exhausted all those possibilities long ago.”
“And you’re forgetting I’m on thin ice here. Officially, I’m confined to the reception desk.”
The smile came back in full force again; the sun coming out from behind a cloud. “You’ll think of something. You’re resourceful like that.” He collected his hat and settled it on his head. “Though I’d suggest if you’re planning to make a habit of investigating, think about blending into the background. Horowitz said a certain Miss Climpson came by the precinct. When he described a dishy blonde in a red coat, I knew at once it must be you.”
Chagrined, I snapped back. “Perhaps I should do all my investigations dressed like this.” I swept a hand up and down my form, including everything from the curlers to the bedroom slippers and the kimono in between.
“I see nothing wrong with that.” His crooked smile slid across his features into a sly grin. “I think you look quite fetching.”
And before I could even sputter in indignation, he had opened my window and slipped out again.
Chapter Twelve
Knight, I decided, enjoyed throwing people off balance.
His breezy flirtation of the night before had less to do with perceiving me as an attractive woman and more to do with pushing my buttons.
Little did he know a master had installed my buttons: my mother. The interesting side effect of having a master button-pusher in your life is similar to receiving that new polio vaccine. It can render you immune to the poking of others. Recognizing his actions for what they were now, I felt certain I would handle Knight better in future dealings.
As I headed into work the next morning, I gave consideration to his provoking comments about a possible relationship between the government and shifters, and how I might go about proving or disproving it.
Knight was correct about one thing—I wouldn’t find the answers sitting behind a typewriter.
Unfortunately, Miss Climpson thought that’s where I belonged. I entered the office to find a mound of paperwork stacked on my desk, and no sooner did I place a file in my outbox than two more appeared. I would have been suspicious she was creating busywork for me except for the fact there was a lot of traffic in and out of the office. Russo and Miss Snowden both came in several times over the course of the morning, along with an influx of other people I’d never seen before. The phone never stopped ringing, and Miss Climpson’s perpetual frown deepened as she hurried in to Mr. J’s office with her dictation pad. A quick glance through the open door revealed a large number of new markers on his wall map. A smaller state map of New York was festooned with enough red pins to pass for a Christmas decoration.
Because of the increased activity, I ended up with quite a bit of Climmy’s overflow typing. From her pinched expression and pursed lips when she handed the files over, I could tell she wasn’t happy about having to delegate, but for the most part, the information in the files was meaningless to me. A missing dog. Strange lights reported at night on a country lane. A box of valuable antiques stolen out of the back of a car. A runaway teen. A case of sudden amnesia without an obvious cause. A woman who thought a dangerous beast was living in her refrigerator. A town that experienced a total failure of all mechanical devices at one time, which sounded like an electromagnetic pulse to me. My time spent researching scientific articles in the library suggested thermonuclear reactions generated EMPs, so it seemed reasonable to expect an influx of emerging shifters from that town in the near future. If the major world governments didn’t sign a weapons’ testing ban soon, the day would come when shifters outnumbered the rest of us.
I still considered myself one of “us”, despite Ryker’s suspicions about my genetic makeup.
My probation remained in effect. Dr. Botha had yet to arrive, which meant I had no pretext for going down to the lower levels. I suspected it would annoy Knight when I didn’t show up in the labs, but try as I might, I couldn’t even find an excuse to leave my desk, save for my lunch break.
Miss Climpson was so stressed by the increased workload she left me alone during her own lunch break, something she patently hadn’t wanted to do, given the pursed lips and sideline glances tossed in my direction as she left. Either Ryker had taken my security improvements to heart or else no one trusted me to not make off with artifacts again because now there were two guards on duty in the reception area. They were cut from the same cloth as Russo—which is to say taciturn—with a tendency to dress like greasers in jeans, white T-shirts, and leather jackets. One even sported a pompadour.
I believe they would have been inclined to be a bit chatty, but Miss Climpson must have put the fear of God in them. The guard with the pompadour gave me a grin and a wink from time to time, but both of them kept their distance, even when Climmy left for her lunch.
When the delivery man arrived with a package needing a signature from Ryker, the two guards stiffened to alertness like actual watchdogs. The delivery man cast a wary eye in their direction as he pushed both package and clipboard toward me.
I buzzed Ryker’s office from Miss Climpson’s desk, but there was no response. After explaining that Ryker did not appear to be in the building and I had no idea when he would return, I failed to convince the delivery man to come back later. He tapped his watch and insisted the sender had paid for express delivery.
In the end, I signed for the package. It was the first time in memory something had arrived in this manner. Always before, someone like Russo or Miss Snowden hand-delivered sensitive items. The box, wrapped in brown paper, seemed harmless enough, and the delivery man was anxious to be off, so I scratched my name on his clipboard and placed the box on the corner of my desk.
It was addressed without salutation—just “Ryker”—care of Redclaw Security. There was no return address. The label was handwritten in spiky, bold lettering. The package weighed about the same as a sweater box, and for a brief moment, I thought it might be an article of clothing from one of the retailers. I soon dismissed that notion. If it had come from a department store, the name would be on the label. Dismissing it as none of my business, I turned back to my mindless typing.
Not ten minutes later, I lifted my head to sniff around me. An acrid odor seared my nostrils. Something was burning.
“Do you smell that?” I asked the guards.
Both began testing the air, nostrils flaring as they sniffed about.
“Something’s on fire. Chemical, I think,” said Pompadour, only to have the other guard contradict him.
“No, electrical.” He looked about uneasily, as if he could spot faulty wiring through the walls.
For all I knew, maybe he could.
“Could it be coming from the lower levels?” I pointed toward Mr. J’s office.
Pompadour shook his head. “Nope. It’s somewhere in this room.”
All eyes turned to the box
on my desk, where a small curl of smoke wafted upward from the wrapping paper.
“We need to evacuate the building.” The second guard made for Mr. J’s office, but I stopped him.
“Don’t be silly. Maybe that’s exactly what someone wants us to do.” I pointed to Pompadour. “Give me your jacket.”
He clutched his lapels as though I might jerk his jacket off him. “What? No!”
“You can get another one. Leather is the best thing for transporting the box. Hurry!” The smoke was thicker now, a black oily plume that made me cough.
His cohort punched him on the arm. Pompadour gave in with a heavy sigh, removed his jacket and held it out. I snatched it from his reluctant hands and tossed it over the box.
“Get the door.” I waved the other guard back when he would have followed us. “You watch our backs in case this is a trick to get us out of the office.”
After draping the jacket around the box, I scooped it up and hurried to the door. Intense heat now radiated through the thick leather. It felt as if I was carrying a bucket full of lava. I stumbled as I entered the hallway, and Pompadour steadied me with a hand under my left arm, causing a slight twinge of pain. I’d almost forgotten about the bullet wound.
A quick glance toward the outer door had me rethink my plans to get the box outside the building. There was no telling what would happen if the thing exploded in the street. Even if no one got hurt, it might draw the wrong kind of attention to Redclaw.
I held the box, wrapped in the jacket, stiff-armed in front of me. “To the restroom—hurry!”
Pompadour skirted around me to fling open the door to the public washroom. Hesitating just long enough to make sure the facilities were empty, I heaved the package out of the jacket and into the sink. In a flash, it burst into flames.
Pompadour and I jumped back, shielding our eyes from the furnace-like heat. Something about the color of the flames wavering in the tiny tiled room reminded me of the spectrum of light surrounding Ryker when he was in phoenix form.
As soon as the conflagration had begun, it died down. Several objects lay within the black ashes that were all that remained of the original box.
“Be careful,” Pompadour cautioned as I opened the tap. The cold water sent thick, black smoke billowing up from the remnants of the package.
Within the wreckage of the box lay two items. One was a stack of folded cloth, black with an iridescent shimmer where it caught the light. The other was a small metal box about the size of a cigarette case. A cursive R emblazoned the lid.
Taking out my handkerchief, I attempted to pick up the metal container, but it was still too hot, so I left it for the time being. When I brushed my fingers over the clothing, to my surprise, the cloth was cool to the touch. Water beaded on its surface and ran off as I poked at the material.
“What is it?” Pompadour asked, sounding petulant, and yet not hurrying forward to take over the investigation.
I picked the item of clothing up by the shoulders. It almost flowed as I unfolded it. “As near as I can tell, it’s a catsuit.” I frowned at the offending article.
“A whatsit?” Pompadour whined.
“A catsuit. An extremely form-fitting—” I gasped when the material seemed to undulate in my hands. I let go, but the cloth curled around my wrist and hung on. I wished for my ray gun, which I’d left in my desk, and wondered how to explain having to shoot a piece of clothing.
As if sensing my distress, the cloth released its hold and collapsed in a heap among the ashes.
“Did that thing just move?” Pompadour put his hand in his pocket, as though reaching for a weapon of his own.
“Yes, but I think it’s okay. Be ready to act if it should move again, though.” I had a horrid vision of cloth rising to envelop and smother me, and my hand shook as I reached for the metal case.
This time it was cool enough to touch. I shook off the water and pried the lid open. Inside, was a note written in the same bold handwriting from the outer wrappings.
Ryker—
I hear you’ve been flitting around town on fire again. It must be inconvenient to leave your clothes behind when you’re pretending to be a moral, upright citizen. The suit is made of dragoncloth, and as you can see, can withstand even your flaming temperatures. The best part is it conforms to whatever form you shift into.
Still think we shouldn’t make use of the technology available to us?
The sender signed the note with a single initial, “R.” The paper was brown around the edges and a little crispy to the touch, but otherwise intact.
With more assurance than I felt, I draped the catsuit over my arm. “I think it’s okay to head back into the office.”
Pompadour shrugged. “It’s your funeral.”
He followed at a slight distance behind me down the corridor. When I opened the door to the office, the second guard crossed the room to join us.
“There’s something alive in your desk.” Guard Two chucked his head back over his shoulder at my workstation. “I heard it moving around in one of the drawers.”
The three of us went to my desk. I laid the catsuit over my chair. After a quick nod at the guards, I eased the drawer open. We stared down at the contents: a couple of legal pads, a rubber stamp and a bottle of ink, a little dish of paper clips, and my clutch. As we watched, the purse twitched and flopped.
I blew out a sigh of relief. “Oh, that’s nothing. It’s just my purse.”
The purse holding the little ray gun, to be precise.
The guards exchanged a side glance with lifted eyebrows but said nothing as they took their former positions. I gave the clutch a comforting pat and shut the drawer, then folded the catsuit and placed it on the corner of my desk with the note on top before taking my seat at the typewriter again.
It didn’t surprise me when Ryker blew into the office as though propelled on fury and caffeine. One day I would discover how he kept tabs on the office in his absence. Was he aware of Knight’s nocturnal prowling? If so, why did he allow it? The thought raised all kinds of questions I couldn’t answer, so I set it aside. I stayed calm, continuing to type as Ryker pulled up beside my desk.
“Package arrived for you.” My comment was unnecessary, but the way his nostrils flared as he read the note rather amused me. Crumpling the paper, he placed it in his pocket and reached for the cloth.
I stopped him. “Er, a word of warning, sir. The suit has some rather interesting properties. It moved when I touched it.”
The faintest smile touched his lips. “I’m not surprised. I take it you read the note?”
“It wasn’t intentional, sir.”
“Understood. Never mind. Though his methods are less than conventional and frequently alarming, I don’t believe my brother would hurt me.”
Before I could process the notion of Ryker having a brother, he changed the subject. “Which reminds me, Dr. Botha should be here on Friday. I’m interested to see your genetic profile. The more information we have, the better we can help others. Someone will escort you to the lab for testing when he arrives.” He collected the suit and stroked it absently when the material flowed over his arm like a living creature. That hint of a smile was still on his face when he met my gaze. “Quick thinking on getting the package out of the office, Bishop.”
So. Perhaps no longer in the doghouse?
I watched Ryker leave with a sigh and returned to the odious typing he’d once promised I wouldn’t have to do.
Later that evening, a cold rain fell as I left the office. The thought of stopping on the way home for dinner held little appeal. Even though the score from the bullet was healing as expected, my arm ached just the same. I just wanted to get back to the apartment and settled for the evening. I needed to finish my mending. A television wasn’t in the budget, otherwise I might have sat down for a half hour with Dragnet while I sewed. I could now see the appeal of losing one’s self in mindless entertainment at the end of a long workday. At least Em’s shower was this weekend.
As much as I dreaded the long train ride out of the city, a change of scenery would do me some good. With any luck, the rain would stop and I could look forward to a brisk walk by the shore. I did my best thinking when walking.
I toyed once again with the idea of getting a little dog for company, but dismissed it as impractical. Mrs. King would never allow it, which meant moving, and I’d be hard-pressed to find rooms as cheap. Besides, who would let the dog out when I was at work all day?
As soon as I took my seat on the bus home, I opened the police report on Margo Knight’s death that had arrived earlier that day. I’d kept it under wraps until now, not wanting to field any awkward questions about it. As I feared, the report shed no further light on the matter. Perhaps I was going about this all wrong. What if her death was the end of her story? Perhaps I should look into Margo Knight’s life instead. I could ask Knight what he knew of her background, talk to her relatives, and see if there was another reason for her death we didn’t know about. The thought was encouraging, and once I got home and had a quick meal of tuna salad on crackers, I felt cheered enough to paint my toenails.
I’d just put on the second coat when I heard the telltale scratching at my kitchen window. Hobbling into the kitchen with cotton balls stuffed between my toes to prevent the polish from smearing, I flipped the switch and sighed when I saw Knight outside the window. I would have to do something about the fire escape.
“What are you doing here this time?” I asked, stepping back so he could climb in the window. At least my hair wasn’t in curlers.
Rain blustered in behind him, slicking his coat and making it shine in the overhead light. He removed his hat and tossed it on the counter before draping his dripping outerwear over one of the kitchen chairs. “’It ain’t a fit night for man or beast’,” he quoted with determined cheerfulness. “How’s the arm?”
“The arm’s better, thank you.” Grudging gratitude tempered my irritation. Having to keep the gunshot wound secret from most acquaintances meant there was no one to offer any sympathy.
