“Then we’ll work well together.” The bearded man finally extends a hand in greeting. His grip is rough—rougher than I’d expect based on his tailored suit and well-manicured nails. “Ryan Jameson.”
I get a strange feeling when I touch his skin. But I wave it off as nerves—after all, if I get this case, it could be big. Might even snag a client or two away from Sherlock after I crack it.
“Tess Skye.” I point ahead, past the host’s podium. “Lead the way to the boss man, then.”
Ryan and I weave our way through the loosely packed tables, past a raised stage where jazz and blues bands feature on weekends. As we walk, I stare at the back of his suit jacket, curious just how much of my story he and Hex Davis might have heard.
Few people know that I’m a Soulwalker. Or that I worked for Dominic Rillo, trying to bring him down from the inside. Or just how much danger this town was truly in over the past year. Or…
I clamp down on the thoughts racing through my mind as we reach a door with a little emblem of a fox. This is likely in honor of Emmy, who’s a fox shifter.
“Ready to meet the man?” Ryan presses his rough hand against the solid mahogany. The door opens a crack.
Then there’s a shrill scream from the front of the Red Whale, followed by a loud crash.
Three
My first instinct is to hit the deck and draw, hand already on the Glock 22 adorning my hip. But it’s not that type of emergency—more of a social meltdown than a threat to anyone’s well-being.
I recognize Stacey Knight, one of Emmy Davis’s best friends—some might say coconspirator, given their frequent antics together—teetering through the Red Whale.
Except she’s not in human form.
A little dragon about the size of a golden retriever or black lab—pink, no less—trips across the floor as everyone stares. Her thick nails clack against the hardwood as she bumps into just about every chair on her way back to where Ryan and I stand. Each time she collides with a piece of furniture, a little puff of smoke shoots from her nostrils.
I can see why she’s killed it on TikTok.
I can also see why Ryan looks about ready to kill her.
Calling her a disaster would be an insult to the apocalypse.
Stacey finally skitters to a halt in front of Ryan and headbutts his loafer. Her little horns leave a scuff mark on the Italian leather.
“You cannot keep acting like this, Miss Knight.” He rubs his temples like he has the worst tension headache imaginable.
Her response is a snort and another shrill scream. A middle-aged couple a few tables away gets up and hurries toward the exit.
Ryan clenches and unclenches his fist, then says like he’s talking to a misbehaving dog, “Upstairs.”
He holds the door open. The little pink dragon winks, then haughtily marches up the carpeted stairs. Ryan and I follow at a safe distance behind, lest she wipe out and turn into a little pink bowling ball.
No such additional theatrics ensue, fortunately. She flops onto the landing and, after sprawling on her belly for a few seconds, stumbles back to her feet and sways toward the back office.
Ryan grabs my sleeve lightly and says beneath his breath, “Do not share anything with her.”
“And miss out on a sweet collab to bump my Instagram numbers?” I maintain my best poker face. “You’re asking a lot here, man.”
“I’m serious.”
“If you know my story so well, then you know I’m not about to partner with a drunk pink dragon for social clout.”
“Just…be careful what you say around her is all.”
“Shit, where were you when I was at the academy?” I roll my eyes. “With advice like that, I might still be a cop.”
Ryan rubs his temples again, like he’s realizing that a heavily intoxicated miniature pink dragon might be the least of his problems tonight. Stacey starts ramming her snout against the office door, interrupting any further discussion.
The door creaks open, and an imposing voice says, “You will shift yourself back.”
Fire and smoke spew from her nose.
“Otherwise you will leave.”
A whine.
“You know the rules.”
Stacey huffs and glances back at us. Her blue eyes shimmer with tears. Then her wings gradually transform into human shoulders, skin turning from pink to a salon tanned bronze. After about thirty seconds, she’s fully human, curled up on the carpet, sobbing.
The door opens fully, and Hex Davis, bearing a blanket, leans over. He wraps Stacey up and leads her into the office. Ryan and I follow behind.
It’s less of an office than a penthouse suite that takes up almost the entire second floor of the Red Whale. Instead of standard lighting, everything is lit in a soft red glow, which makes it feel like we’re trapped inside a car’s taillight. Ryan heads to a bar stocked with top-shelf liquor and takes a seat. I join him and watch as Hex places Stacey on a couch. She curls up, babbling to herself.
Hex shoves his large hands in his pockets and slumps slightly as he heads over to join us. In person he’s tall—much taller than I would have suspected from all the photographs online.
“Hex Davis.” In a deep voice with his hand extended, he says, “I’m thankful you accepted my invitation, Tess. I apologize for the interruption.”
“Nothing I haven’t experienced before.” I shake his thick hand.
Hex sits down on the barstool next to me and sighs. “Would you like a drink?”
“Not right now,” I say.
“Get her a drink, Ryan.”
Ryan does so, retrieving a whiskey for me. I put it on the table and say, “So what can I do for you, Hex?”
Ryan cringes slightly when I use Hex’s actual name. But I’ve never been one for ceremony.
“At this point, I just don’t know.”
Not quite the answer I was expecting. But intriguing.
I say, “Well, you can start by telling me what you do know.” He wears a glassy look, so I prompt him further with, “About your daughter.”
“Right.” The faraway look disappears, and he’s back, Hex Davis, famed businessman, eagle-eyed as ever. “It’s funny.”
“What’s funny?”
“You try to give your kids everything.” Hex swirls a glass of what looks like vodka before slugging it down in a single gulp. “To shield them from all of life’s pain.”
I nod, even though, not having kids myself, I don’t really follow the complete emotional gist.
“But life has a way of kicking everyone’s ass.” He sighs, staring into the empty glass. “And there’s no escaping it.”
“So why call me in now, after two years?”
“Everyone else has been unable to procure many leads.”
“Any leads, from what I’ve heard on the news.”
Ryan hunkers down on his stool, looking like he wants to crawl into a hole and die.
For his part, Hex wears a surprised expression, then chuckles. “That would be more accurate, I suppose. And I hear you have certain…abilities.”
My stomach does a belly flop. The last year working “with” Dominic Rillo was something akin to hell. His goons killing scientists and people of note so I could harvest their memories from their corpses…all to make him a fortune.
Another year or two of that, and who knows? My abilities, as Hex so generically dubs them, could have given Dom the entire world.
I’ve never been egotistical—confident, sure, but there’s a line. My Soulwalking traits, however, aren’t exactly something I advertise. Not because I’m ashamed. But because I’m afraid of what other people might try to do with them.
I pick up the drink in front of me and take a sip. A little bit of the apprehension wears off as the whiskey settles in my stomach.
Maybe these are people I can trust.
You know what they say, though: trust, but verify.
So I look Hex dead in the eye and say, “I am a very good investigator, yes.”
“Though your reputation precedes you there, those are not the abilities to which I refer.”
I shrug. “Anything else would be just a rumor.”
“I see.” He rubs his palms together, still holding my gaze. “So you deny being a Soulwalker?”
The word is like a bolt of electricity straight to my spine. I stiffen, and it’s all I can do to avoid dropping the glass.
“I thought we weren’t going to discuss business in front of her.” I nod at Stacey, who’s sound asleep on the sofa.
“Stacey won’t remember a thing,” Hex says.
But Ryan says, “She’s right.” He walks over, picks her up, and then carries her to another room.
When Ryan returns, he sits down in a leather armchair with his legs crossed. “Proceed.”
I glance between him and Hex, still caught off guard. “Who told you I was a Soulwalker?”
Hex says, “Then it’s true.”
I get up from my chair and growl, “That’s not what I fucking asked.”
Ryan rises from the cushy leather seat. His hand rests on his hip, where I can now see a pistol that was previously concealed by his blazer. “Everyone stay calm.”
“It’s okay, Ryan.” Hex stands up too, looming over me as he takes a step closer. My head just barely reaches his chin. “We are okay, aren’t we, Tess?”
I can feel his hot breath against my cheek. “That depends on your answer to my question.”
Behind me, Ryan says, “Javier Diaz owed me a favor. From many years back.”
I spin on my heel. Competing thoughts collide in my mind.
One, I’m going to murder Javy the next time I see him.
And two—well, it’s hard to exactly form the words. I drain the whiskey glass. The drink further softens the nervousness. “Then—you—you’re—”
“An Immortal, yes.” Ryan relays it like someone would the weather report.
It makes sense. I believe him.
I don’t know why, but I do.
“And here I thought you guys were rare or something.” I’d known Javy for a couple years before learning what he was. In fact, I just found out two weeks ago. But it feels like I’ve known for a lifetime.
“So does that answer your question?” Hex asks. We’re still close enough together that I can feel his vodka-laced breath.
I step back, bumping against a glass table. My head swims in fog. Something’s not quite right. But I say, “Kind of.”
“Good,” Hex says. “Then we can proceed.”
“Proceed with what, exactly?”
“With this.” Hex claps and Ryan disappears behind the bar. Plastic squeaks against the hardwood as Ryan drags a body bag into view. Without explanation, he unzips it in front of the sofa.
A young woman’s lifeless eyes stare blankly up at nothing. Frosty crystals cling to her fake eyelashes. Even the mascara has been frozen in time. Her skin glows red in the light, but I can tell it’s pale as winter snow.
“This is Delia Wolfheart,” Hex says. “One of Emmy’s best friends.”
The name is familiar. Stacey, Delia, and Emmy were inseparable.
Delia was found dead at her condo in Northern Ragnarok the same day that Emmy disappeared two years ago. Official word from the coroner was homicide by suffocation. There were a number of competing theories: kidnapping and murder. Or that Emmy killed her best friend and ran.
Or, perhaps, just plain bad luck: a coincidence of epic proportions.
That explanation seemed the least likely of them all.
“How is she still—”
“Cryogenic stasis.” Ryan brushes a few ice crystals from his pants. “Her parents believe they’ll be able to revive her at some point.”
I stare at the corpse, a bad feeling spreading through my chest. “Did you steal her body?”
“On loan from her parents,” Hex says. “I trust you’ll take good care of her.”
“I trust you have no idea how it works.” Soulwalking doesn’t leave a trace.
At least not on the body.
On me…well, I can remember dozens of fragmented slivers of lives. Little memory flashes bubble up from time to time. It can be unpleasant, suffice to say.
“I can’t say that I do understand what you go through,” Hex says. “And I’m sorry to ambush you like this.”
“No you aren’t,” I say.
“I truly am,” he says. “But I would do anything to get my daughter back.”
I roll up my sleeves and shake my head. “Fine. I’ll call my Navigator.”
“This is rather urgent,” Hex says.
“After two years you can’t wait twenty minutes?” Suspicion boils up, then—strangely—dies away.
Of course he’s impatient. He misses his daughter.
But without a Navigator to guide me, I’m liable to lose my way and become lost in the host body forever. So a solo walk isn’t an option.
Before I can pull out my phone to call Finn, though, Ryan grabs my forearm. “I have a better idea.”
“What the hell are you—” I try to jerk my arm free of his grasp. But I might as well be fighting a granite statue.
He wraps my fingers around Delia’s frozen wrist and holds them there.
I twist, but his grip is ironclad.
And after what feels like forever—but is actually only seconds—the Soulwalk begins.
Four
A Navigator is my tether to the real world—so I don’t lose myself. But call it idiocy or impatience or something else: I’m out here at the Red Whale without backup. Then again, it’s called Tess Skye Investigations, not Tess Skye and Associates.
That’s the problem with running your own show. When shit goes wrong, you have no one else to blame but the person staring back in the mirror.
Of course, I didn’t anticipate performing a Soulwalk tonight.
But it does serve as a reminder to exercise more caution in the future.
If I survive that long.
Because when my frozen eyelashes crackle open, I immediately know I’m in some deep shit.
My skin—Delia’s skin—is colder than an arctic frost. It’s hard as glass, and about as brittle. Her blood feels like slush coursing through her damaged veins.
A little spark of a memory bubbles up.
Her. Emmy. Running through Delia’s house, pulse racing, being chased by…
I don’t know. It fades as quickly as it appears.
Upon entering a body there’s usually an onslaught of that person’s past memories. Here, nothing else follows.
When I sit up, it feels like my abdomen might crack in half.
I stifle a shiver and glance at my actual body.
There I sit, bathed in the red glow of this second-floor penthouse office, slumped against a stool. My long brown hair is draped over my shoulders as the blank eyes hold a vacant stare into the ether. My fingers still dig into Delia’s wrist—which now, I guess, is mine. I feel slightly light-headed. Having an actual out of body experience will do that.
I must say, though, those kickboxing self-defense classes down at the gym are paying off. The figure is looking pretty good.
The lines between Delia and I start to blur. I shake free of my body’s grip.
Then I’m grounded in Delia’s rickety frame.
“Welcome back, Miss Skye,” Ryan says.
I wriggle my toes. The frozen nails scratch against the vinyl body bag like a fork raking across a dinner plate.
“Did it actually work?” It’s Hex’s deep voice. The words warble and oscillate in my frostbitten ears.
I prop myself up against the coffee table. That proves to be a mistake—its edge digs into my cold flesh like a diamond-sharpened blade. When I pull away, I can feel the lukewarm trickle of blood down my back.
“Ow.” My lips have trouble forming even a simple sound.
“It’s really Delia,” Hex says. “You brought her back.”
“I don’t know how long she’ll hold up in this state,” Ryan sa
ys.
“She only needs to hold together long enough to get me paid.”
“Paid?” What does Hex mean? My head throbs. I’m still disoriented from the unplanned Soulwalk. Probably because my brain is a frozen pile of mush. Here’s the interesting thing about Soulwalks: damaged bodies, mortally wounded bodies, any of them are fair game for me to perform my little feat of magic on.
But there’s a catch. The worse their condition, the shorter—and, typically, more painful—the ride.
And, of course, there can be other side effects, too. The main one here being that two years in cryogenic deep-freeze seems to have destroyed most of Delia’s memories.
“Let’s go.” Ryan grabs me by the shoulder and yanks me upright. “We have an appointment to keep.”
“Appointment?” I ask, still confused.
“Yes,” he says with a shark-like grin. “You’re about to be reunited with Mom and Dad.”
Five
I’m handed a t-shirt and jeans, ordered to dress hastily, and then herded out the Red Whale’s rear exit. No paparazzi greet us in the empty lot as I’m pushed into the back of a luxury SUV with tinted windows. The burrs in my frozen skin catch on the fresh leather.
I rub my knees as we pull out of the lot, trying to get warm.
It’s no use. I might as well be trying to melt an iceberg with a blow dryer. Still, I persist as Ryan navigates the SUV through Ragnarok’s downtown streets, taking me who knows where.
As a little warmth seeps into my frozen limbs, a few more memories rise from the depths.
Delia and Emmy as kids. Swimming in the Rok River.
A little older. Sneaking booze out of Hex’s house to drink out in the Groves. Not quite as opulent a spread as I would have expected, based on the Red Whale.
And then that final fateful night. The two of them being chased by something unknown through Delia’s house. It runs on a loop, like a jammed tape deck sputtering to play a tune that’s too damaged to finish.
But I can feel it. The cold terror, over and over. And it’s not just my frozen chest.
The ride can’t take much longer than ten minutes, but it feels like it lasts hours. We finally park on a normal looking residential street shaded by trees. My brain is still too fried to recognize the actual location.
Smoke Show (Tess Skye Book 2) Page 2
