Sinners and Saints

by Jennifer Roberson

  When given the go-ahead to set out at the front of the line, Kelly fell into place, walking easily. As a park ranger she undoubtedly was very well acquainted with the mountains and trails, and certainly accustomed to the altitude. Remi put me in the middle, which I found annoying, but I understood why. Kelly may have been the one kidnapped by an ancient angel, but I was the one moving like I was older than God.

  She checked her path, noted footing, then turned around to walk backward briefly. I was concentrating on my own footing, and Remi had the lantern—lighted, now, though I thought we were possibly getting close to false dawn. Down below, across the highway, the big cinder cone was beginning to brighten out of the blackness as faint light seeped over the horizon.

  “You know—” Kelly began.

  And then something streaked out of the foliage, knocked me hard into Remi so that we both went down, and when we got ourselves untangled enough to sort out what the hell had happened, Mary Jane was gone.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Remi scrambled up from the ground, literally leaped over my legs, and took off after Kelly. I sat up and pulled the phone from my pocket, tried Ganji. Tried him a second time when the call dropped out. Was very grateful when he answered.

  “Is Shemyazaz with you? Are you still at the cave? Is he still at the cave?”

  The light African accent was always pleasant to hear. “The angel is with me, yes. He has told me why he wants the other Grigori. ’Tis a tale.”

  “Look, something just grabbed Mary Jane.” I thought maybe Yaz had changed his mind about using her for an exchange. I reached down, grabbed the gear bag and lantern. “Thanks, man. I have to go. I’ll see you whenever.” I disconnected, stuffed the phone into my pocket and took off after Remi.

  I did not attempt to race down the mountain, which would have ended singularly badly for me, but I did indeed jog as much as possible without tripping over a root or rock and taking a header. The problem was, I didn’t think Kelly’s abductor had carried her away via the trail. My vague impression, muddled as it was, was that I was slammed into Remi and went down, that something grabbed Kelly and headed over raw terrain, eschewing the trail. Remi may have done the same, hoping to catch up. I cut corners where I could, but I was in no in shape to handle cross-country.

  Had to be Jack the Ripper. Yaz was out of the picture. I seriously doubted other demons would be going after Kelly. She didn’t mean anything to them. She had value for the Ripper.

  Lantern light bobbed and swung as I made my way down, sliding now and then with so little grip left in my bootsoles. Remi in his slick-soled cowboy boots was likely having a much harder time. I was huffing hard, trying to catch my breath and very aware of an unhappy belly. And every time I jammed boots against the ground it reinforced the headache.

  Then my phone rang, and I stopped, dumped the bag so I could pull the cell from my pocket. The screen flashed Remi’s name. “You got her?” I asked urgently.

  He was breathing hard. “She’s gone. She’s gone, Gabe! Tell me it’s Yaz, okay? Let it be that son of a bitch burned-ass angel.”

  “It’s not,” I told him soberly. “I called Ganji. Yaz is at the cave. Has been.”

  “Oh, damn. Oh, dammit. It’s got to be the Ripper. God dammit!”

  “I’m coming down,” I told him.

  “I’m near the parking lot. That trail will feed right into it. Look for my phone’s flashlight.”

  And then he was swearing again, and I didn’t blame him. We had a human kidney in the freezer, and Remi had said the original Mary Jane Kelly in London was cut up worse than any of the preceding victims. I just hoped like hell Jack wanted to keep our Kelly whole for a while.

  That set my belly to rolling again. I tucked the phone back into my pocket, grabbed up the gear bag, hit a jog once more. At the steeper sections I had to slow and lean back so gravity didn’t tip me into a face-plant.

  By the time I saw Remi’s flashlight I had little left in the tank. Loose hair slapped against leather jacket, my uneven breathing was noisy even to myself, and my throat kept sticking to itself because I was sucking in air, swallowing, and shoving it right back out again.

  As I arrived, Remi took one look and grabbed the gear bag. “Can you make it to the truck?”

  I was hoarse, but got it said. “Just go!”

  He went, and I went.

  In the truck, as he threw it in gear and swung the big vehicle into a hard U-turn, he told me we were going straight back to the Zoo, and he was getting on the computer to see if he could get through to whomever in heaven sent us messages. Before he could suggest it, I was already on the phone to Grandaddy.

  The message I left was not polite.

  * * *

  —

  Remi did immediately head for the common room and the computer. I went in with him to drop off the bag, the lanterns. Both of us had mud smears on clothing and skin from being knocked to the ground by the demon. In the kitchen I grabbed bottles of water, took one in to Remi while I sucked down the other.

  The sofa bed remained extended, made up for Mary Jane. Her daypack was on the floor by the side table. It just served to underscore how worrisome was the situation.

  I left Remi to the computer, hit the bathroom and my bedroom to clean up, change clothes. I had little left; Cassandra had disappeared wearing tee and jeans borrowed from me, and I wore my other tee and jeans. This left me with a couple of long-sleeved Henley pullovers and the many-pocketed black BDU pants popularized through use by tactical units, or my road leathers. I went with the BDUs, ponytailed my hair, went back in to see if Remi had any news.

  He heard me come in. His attention remained on the computer, but he brought me up to speed. “I can’t get into the deep web, the dark web, or whatever web it is heaven uses to contact us. All the browsers just bring up the usual home tab screens. But there’s bad news on all of them.” He swiveled the chair to look at me. “Someone is burning places of worship again. And it crosses denominations, as happened the other day: church, synagogue, Mormon temple, a mosque, even a Quaker meeting house.”

  “Demons,” I said. “Equal opportunity arsonists. And I’m betting we know why: they’re taking holy ground out of play. No safehouses for us.”

  Remi nodded. “They can’t enter; we know that. But investigators are finding bits of highly incendiary Molotov cocktails among the remains. Plus what’s to stop surrogates from finding actual human pyromaniacs? They’ll do it for kicks, and they can go two-steppin’ right on up the aisles to set their fires.”

  I pulled one of the dining table chairs over closer, sat my ass in it and sprawled. I was beat, and the headache remained nagging background music. “It will take time to rebuild all those structures, and they won’t be consecrated—or whatever is done with the various faiths—until they’re whole and ready for worship.”

  Remi looked thoughtful. “I wonder . . . any way to suggest to the preachers and priests, imams, rabbis, etc., to do whatever they do early?”

  “Coming from us?—probably not. I mean, we could write letters, e-mail them, call them, but I’m betting that’s the kind of thing that should be handled by those higher up the angelic food chain. Would you listen to a cowboy and a biker telling you to hold whatever rites and ceremonies are usually done? And, you know, claim to be kid angels with training wheels?”

  Remi nodded. “And that may well be what’s got Grandaddy so tied up. He’s said we’re not his only ‘grandkids,’ so to speak. Might could be he’s travelin’ hither and yon trying to sort things out.”

  “He took the Ripper’s handwritten letter with him, so we can’t even have it looked at by an expert. We can with the last photo he sent, though, because Jack wrote on the back of it.” Then I winced, because the most recent photo was of Mary Jane Kelly. And that reminded me. “Picture’s still in the truck.” I pushed myself out of the chair. “Toss me your keys; I’ll
go down and get it.”

  Couple of minutes later I was tromping down wooden stairs, hanging on to the bannister. I exited under the back door bug light into the darkness, popped the truck locks, leaned into the back to find the photo and envelope. It was as I was doing that, with my ass hanging out in plain sight, that I heard the growling. Deep and low and threatening.

  Oh, shit.

  Frozen in place, I reminded myself that everyday ordinary dogs growled, not just Cerberus. Everyday ordinary dogs sometimes wandered randomly and might even show up behind a cowboy dancehall. Everyday ordinary dogs might be scavenging around the dumpster for scraps. And they might even feel they had a right to guard those scraps. Maybe even claim the dumpster itself as territory.

  I made a giant leap for Gabekind up into the back seat and slammed the door behind me. Which naturally trapped me inside the truck, but I wasn’t too proud to admit that I was not prepared to brave the dog-populated outdoors quite yet. Not until I at least put an eye on whatever beastie was nearby.

  I called Remi and got voicemail, so I left a very brief message as I unholstered my revolver: “Cerberus is out back. I’m in the truck. I’m not sure tempered glass is good enough against Hades’s pet monster.”

  As I disconnected, I reflected that I’d better do some research on gun suppressors, since I was pretty sure the local constabulary would not be thrilled to know there was gunfire at the Zoo again.

  In general, except for some specialized models, silencers—suppressors—aren’t effective on revolvers because of the gap between cylinder and barrel. Gap equals noise. And while I was somewhat of a gun specialist thanks to Grandaddy, I’d been in prison for eighteen months and had no clue what the manufacturers were up to. The Russian Nagant was out there, but I didn’t know if anything had been done with the Taurus line.

  Of course, last time I shot Cerberus it hadn’t fazed him.

  Well, hell. How do you get rid of a mythological but apparently real three-headed monster dog who couldn’t be killed by bullet or knife blade, even specially treated? I was pretty sure the earthquake had sent him heading for the hills last time. But I was also pretty sure my angelic spit would not summon a quake.

  My phone rang. Remi wanted to know if Cerberus was still there. Because, he said, he’d actually grabbed a machete from Lily’s armory and wiped it down with holy oil.

  Huh. Decapitation might work. But. “Are you good enough to lop off three heads at the same time?”

  “I don’t know if I’m good enough to lop off one head,” he answered, “but it might could be a tad more effective than bullets and knives that do no damn good against him. Anyway, I’m headin’ for the door. I have an idea, but you won’t like it.”

  “Let me guess—you need me to play bait.”

  “Well, I can’t really get at him if he’s tryin’ to dance with me.”

  I dropped an expletive. Remi said he understood my feeling that way.

  So I stuck the key in the ignition and turned it over far enough to work my window. I lowered it a third of the way down and placed my right leg on the seat with my knee bent under me, and my left leg braced against the floorboards, gun at the ready.

  I saw the porch light blink off and on to let me know Remi was heading out the door. I released a noisy breath, muttered, “Praise the Lord and pass the mashed potatoes,” then banged around inside the truck in hopes of attracting a monster.

  The dog shot out from behind the dumpster, jumped up against the truck door, bounced on his heavily muscled hind legs, and licked the truck window with a giant tongue.

  One, and only one, big tongue.

  “Well, you’re not Cerberus,” I said from behind the window.

  The dog continued bouncing and licking glass, anointing it with substantial swipes of saliva. He was a big, muscled, steel-gray male, crop-eared and huge-headed, with a long, whippy, madly waving tail and large die-for-you brown eyes.

  I stuck the gun back in my holster. The dog whined at me through glass as his tail beat the air. I opened the door slightly, intending to work my way out with heavy boots first. The dog stuffed his big nose into the crack, followed up with his massive head, and shoved the door completely open.

  Then he politely sat down in the dirt and stared up at me, waiting for God knows what.

  I heard the screen door and saw Remi come out with the machete. The dog twisted his head on a thick neck to give the interloper a quick examination at distance, then turned back to stare at me. Again with the eager waiting.

  “I am fresh out of dog cookies,” I told him. He continued waiting anyway.

  Remi ambled up, machete dangling. “Looks like you caught yourself a big bad pit bull.”

  The big bad pit bull just grinned at me and raised a duststorm out of dirt with the power of his tail.

  Remi smiled slow. “Or maybe he caught you.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  I said, “He looks too nice to be a stray.”

  Remi just looked at me, expression utterly bland, brows raised slightly.

  I felt wholly justified in my defensiveness. “Well, he does.”

  Remi still just looked at me, expression neutral and brows raised a little bit higher.

  I, on the other hand, scowled. I recognized the expression, the classic I know what’s coming. “Look,” I said. “I’m not leaving him out here to maybe get hit by a car on Route 66. Tomorrow morning I’ll find the animal shelter, take him in to see if he’s microchipped.”

  Remi lifted one empty hand and the machete, body language all hands-off, no argument. “Fine.”

  I scowled a little harder. “Why are you acting like a parent?”

  “I’m not acting like a parent. I’m acting like a guy who’s got no dog in this hunt—” And of course he smiled broadly, the asshole, “—and has no comments on the matter.” And then the smile fell away as he saw the envelope in my hand. “You found it.”

  I hesitated until he extended an open hand, then gave it to him. His expression was no longer neutral. Probably mine wasn’t either.

  Remi headed back to the door. I looked down at the pittie and found bright canine welcome in his expression. I told him he could come along but just for the night.

  He laughed at me. He did it silently, but he laughed at me. I could see it in his wide, upturned mouth and bright eyes.

  Someone was missing him. I knew it.

  Inside, I went through to the restaurant kitchen to find a metal bowl, filled it with water. I had no proper dog kibble, but did carve him off some cooked chicken breast I found in the big industrial fridge, cut it up into smaller chunks. He might have found plenty of scraps around the dumpster, but I wasn’t taking any chances.

  I turned to find a good spot in the kitchen to set out food and water and found the pit sitting politely. He had a big white splotch from belly to chest, tan points on his cheeks and legs, and the rest of him was a blued-steel color. The brow wrinkles twitched as he looked from the bowls to my face, and back again. He was fit and sleek. He did not have the heft and height of a mastiff breed, but I was betting eighty pounds of solid dog.

  “Someone,” I said, “has trained you very well, and I’ll bet they are missing you something fierce right now.”

  I stuck both bowls down on the kitchen floor for him. He waited. I told him he could eat, and he dove in with tail waving. I made myself a chicken and mayo sandwich, then wandered back into the bar to grab a beer and headed to a booth. I half collapsed into it, took stock of my condition. Headache, check. Belly ache, check. Aching joints, check. Road rash and bruises, hell yes.

  The beer tasted bad. The sandwich tasted bad. I pushed both aside, stared blankly at the table a moment and realized in my head I heard my own voice saying, “—red rum red rum—”

  It was considerably easier to just slide down sideways and end up flat on my back in the booth, legs han
ging out and feet on the floor. Which is where I stayed until the dog came out, sat down close and rested his massive head on my knee.

  I pulled myself upright. “Okay. Yeah, you probably need to go out. C’mon.”

  As I crossed the floor to the back, I realized the mud dried into the channels of my lug soles was falling off in little clumps. Well, I’d poke around looking for a broom once the dog’s business was finished.

  I opened the back door, the screen door, stepped out as the dog pushed by me into the watery yellow light. But I stopped short, because lying on the abbreviated back porch was yet another manilla envelope.

  I made several pungent, vulgar comments about Jack the Ripper, bent and picked up the envelope. Much as I wanted to, I couldn’t ignore it. I also couldn’t just hand it to Remi without viewing it myself.

  I planted my butt on the edge of the porch, legs propped against dirt. I used the KA-BAR to slit open the envelope, then dipped inside to grasp and pull the photo free. Purposely I looked at the back first, to read the message and put off a little longer looking at the image.

  Jack’s message was written in long-hand. He’d given up on letters clipped from newspapers and magazines.

  ‘Anyone. Anytime. Anywhere.’

  My stomach did a slow roll. I remembered too well the image of the woman he’d killed in Mary Jane’s place. He had said the order didn’t matter.

  The dog came back from his outing, pleased to find me down on his level. He snuffled at me, pushed a nose into my free hand, snuffled more. I ran a hand over his big head. “Okay, guess I’d better take a look.”

  I turned it over. Mary Jane Kelly. Our Mary Jane.

  She was seated in a plain wooden chair facing the camera. She was clothed, thank God, but buckled into some kind of harness on her upper body. Her arms were crossed, wrists fastened to the harness up high by her shoulders. Ankles were in leather cuffs and buckled to the chair legs. She was gagged. Her eyes, as she stared out of the photo, were absent the bright sparkle I’d grown used to. They were dark. Lost. The visible portion of her face was drawn. She did not appear to be drugged, but terror lay in every line of her body, in the stark contours of her face.