by Devon Monk
“He was a Closer. I don’t know what that means.”
“Well, that means you have a possible motive for revenge. Closers were magic users who took people’s memories away. Magically,” I added. “So the secrets of the secret organization could remain secret.”
“Jesus,” she said.
It was still strange to me that people were so surprised by that. I’d been born and raised in the Authority. Since before I could talk I’d known the price for stepping too far out of line—and getting caught—was having your memories wiped.
“He must have known something,” she said.
“Or he was part of Closing someone’s memories and they decided they didn’t like it much.”
“Enough to kill?”
I slipped my fingers in my jacket pocket, digging for cigarettes. Found them, lit up without asking her opinion on it. Sat on the edge of the bug-infested bed. She really had chosen a shit hole of a motel. I wondered why.
“Closers could take memories away,” I said. “Change lives. Make a person forget those he loves: spouse, children, siblings, parents. Give a person an entirely new past. A new identity. Make it so he could never use magic again.” I took a drag on the cigarette, exhaled. “So, yes. I’d say someone could be angry enough at a Closer they’d want him dead.”
She grappled with that for a bit, which stalled her in buttoning her shirt and jeans. I did not mind the view.
“How did he kill him?” I asked.
“What?” she said. Okay, she was a little more shaken by her brother’s past as a Closer than I’d expected.
“How did your brother die?”
She seemed to pull herself together. She shook her head. “I don’t want to say. Not yet. But I can show you.”
The cigarette had almost burned down, so I took the last drag to kill it. Looked around for an ashtray, didn’t see one. I flicked it on the carpet with the other cigarette burns and wiped my boot over it.
“It would be a start. But I’m not saying I’ll hunt anyone down for you.”
“He was a good man,” she said. “Had a wife and a baby girl.”
“I’m sorry for their loss. And yours. But I make no promises here.”
She had kicked off her boots to pull on her jeans. Her top three shirt buttons were still undone, showing just the edge of her bra and breast.
For a second, I wondered what was wrong with me. The old Shame would have promised her anything, fucked her in this dirty hotel, then left her with nothing but a pile of lies.
Was it possible I’d contracted a conscience from all the hell I’d been through? Picked up a terrible case of morality and a Zayvion-like sense of right and wrong?
Who was I kidding? I’d always had a moral code. I never used a girl who wasn’t consciously using me right back. And I never promised someone something this important, something their heart was riding on, and broke my word.
Okay, maybe it wasn’t all that moral, but it was a code.
“There are other people I can approach to do this,” she said.
“I know.”
“I have information that could mean the difference between people in this town staying alive or not.”
“I know.”
“I have information on the missing girl who was found dead up in Forest Park.”
“So do the police.”
She shook her head. “They don’t know what I know.” She paused, studied my face. “You don’t care, do you?”
She was wrong. I cared. A lot. Especially if anything happened to harm Zay and Allie. And yes, even if anything happened to Terric.
“I’m not promising to care. Not even about your brother’s killer.” It was blunt. Honest. “But I want to see how he was killed. And I want to hear about the missing girl.”
She didn’t look at all surprised. Still, she considered me for a long moment.
“Not here,” she said as she tied up her boots. “Let’s do lunch instead. Also, I think you should pay for the room.”
“How about I don’t file kidnapping charges instead?”
She glanced up. Smiled. “You know I could kill you from a rooftop if you approach the police.”
“Oooh. I like it when you talk dirty.”
She stood. Stepped up close to me.
I thought maybe I ought to kiss her. Maybe I ought to talk her into seeing things my way, Shamus-style.
“You still haven’t given my boyish charms a chance,” I said.
“To seduce me?” she asked.
“To make you never want to be with any other man as long as you live.”
She laughed, truly laughed. It was a musical sort of thing that filled the silent places in me.
“You think very highly of yourself, don’t you?”
“Not at all. I am painfully humble.”
She closed the distance between us. Close enough I could smell her perfume, a very light vanilla scent that made me want to lean in closer and taste it on her skin.
“And what if I took you up on it?” she asked, tipping her head up to meet my eyes. She was breathing deep and slow. Waiting. Wanting.
“You would not be disappointed,” I said softly. I lifted my hand and gently pushed her hair away from her face.
A key turning the bolt on the door clicked. We both looked that way.
She pivoted, a gun suddenly in her hand, but I knew who was on the other side. Knew the heartbeat.
I grabbed her arm and pulled her up against me, turning to foul her shot.
“No,” I said. Just as the door opened to show the man standing there.
Davy Silvers.
“Sorry to interrupt. Shame, I need to talk to you.”
Davy looked like he was barely old enough to drink, although he’d shown me his license once that said he was twenty-three. Blond, sort of an easygoing-skater-kid look, complete with a turquoise beaded necklace. Most people had no idea he was the head of the entire network of Hounds in Portland. And since Hounds used to be the best at tracking illegal spells back to the caster, he liked the anonymity.
The reason I knew his heartbeat? He was the only man I knew who had been more screwed over by magic than Terric and me.
He’d made it through the apocalypse, but not before he’d been infected by poisoned magic, and then had been kept alive by Eli “the Cutter” Collins. Collins was brilliant, as most sociopaths are, and was a hell of a magic user. Eli had also been kicked out of the Authority for the horrors he’d done with magic. So even though Eli had literally carved spells into Davy’s skin to keep Davy alive, I wasn’t sad when I’d heard Collins had left Portland for good.
“Friend of mine,” I said to Dessa.
She scoped Davy out like she was filling in a missing person report. Then she lowered the gun.
“Outside okay with you?” Davy asked.
“Sure,” I said. “Outside should be fine.”
Davy didn’t shut the door, just leaned there with it propped open, looking like he wasn’t paying very close attention to every detail of the situation.
“So,” I said to Dessa, who stepped out of my arms. “This was fun. Thanks for the drink. Try not to kill anybody I wouldn’t kill.”
I started toward Davy.
“I’ll see you real soon, Flynn,” she said.
Yes, it was a reminder of our lunch date. And also a threat. I would have been disappointed by anything less.
Chapter 9
Davy had a beat-down old pickup that had been left to him by a good friend. Allie once told me it was the truck Martin Pike used to drive. Pike had been a hell of a Hound, and a mentor to Davy.
I put on my sunglasses, even though it was still dark out, then made straight for the truck, glancing around to try to get my bearings. Lots of tall fir trees, some pine sprinkled in. The buzz of a busy road tickled the edge of my hearing, but none of these things were distinct enough to stand out from any other corner of the northwest.
“Where the hell?” I asked.
And that’s
when it hit me. I was in St. Helens, northwest of Portland, somewhere off Highway 30. A dead zone. Back when magic was broken, but strong, there were only a few places off-grid that were naturally magicless. This was one of them.
“She really knows how to cover her bases,” I said.
“Get in,” Davy said as he walked around to the driver’s side of the truck. He didn’t give me hell for being drugged, trunked, and tied up by some strange woman, which is how I knew whatever he had come to tell me was not good news.
“Who’s hurt?” I asked.
He opened the door, got in.
I swung up into the passenger’s seat.
Davy started the engine and refused to say anything until we had tires on asphalt. Pretty soon the Highway 30 signs flashed by at the side of the road, white in the darkness.
“It’s Joshua Romero,” Davy said. “He’s dead.”
I leaned my head back against the headrest and took each emotion as it came: anger, sorrow, anger, loss, anger, acceptance and anger.
Joshua was a nice guy out of Seattle, a Closer who’d thrown his lot in with us Portlanders when we were trying to convince the Authority we weren’t crazy, while simultaneously saving the damn world.
“How?” I asked, dragging through my memories for him mentioning health issues.
“Murder.”
“The hell. How?”
“Magic.”
Okay. Maybe this wasn’t my call anymore, since I hadn’t really been the head guy in charge of anything magic related for more than a year, but there was too damn much murdering by magic going on lately. Especially since killing someone with magic simply should not be in ninety-nine percent of the population’s reach anyway.
“Do you, does anyone know who?” I asked. “Or when? Or how exactly? As in what kind of magic? Tell me they had Hounds on the scene. Tell me the police up there didn’t just think Hounding and tracking back a spell is some kind of Ouija board voodoo trick.”
“I don’t know yet. I just got the call.”
“How long has Terric had you tailing me?” I asked.
He glanced at me. “I’m not following you for Terric.”
“Who, then? Allie? Zayvion? Please tell me it isn’t my mother.”
“Shame. Joshua is dead. Can we put you and your problems on the back burner for a minute?”
Like I said, he wasn’t as young as he looked.
“Gladly. Where did it happen?”
“He was found in his car. In a parking garage on Burnside.”
“Whoa, hold on. He was in Portland?”
“Yes. And it looked like he’d gotten in his car and dropped dead behind the wheel before he ever had the chance to turn the key.”
“Where’s his family?”
“They were in Seattle. They’ve been taken in. They’re nowhere anyone can find them now.”
I nodded. So the Authority was still doing its part in trying to protect magic users and families of magic users. But Joshua wasn’t a Soul Complement to his wife—they didn’t use magic together and couldn’t break it to make it powerful.
So why was he targeted?
“What was Joshua doing?” Here’s where being out of touch was working against me. I didn’t even know if Joshua was still working a magic-related job, or if he’d washed his hands of it all and finally opened that restaurant he’d always dreamed of.
“I don’t know all the details, but he was still involved in magic. Rehab, I think. Finally put his counseling degree to use.”
“Rehabbing magic users?”
“Helping place people who used to use magic, or were harmed by magic, into magic-free or low-magic jobs. Most of those people still live here in Portland since this is where magic went bad. You know how it is for us all. To have that kind of power fade away. Hard adjustment.”
“Last time I was paying attention, it took a hell of a lot of work, and a hell of a lot of people, like a hundred or more, to pull on enough magic to do anything harmful to someone,” I said.
“That hasn’t changed.”
I was silent. So was he. We were close to Portland now, traveling on well-lit roads.
Davy had probably already come to the conclusion I’d been trying very hard to ignore. The only person strong enough to use magic to kill someone with it was a Breaker. A Soul Complement.
“We’re looking for two people, aren’t we?” I said.
Davy nodded.
“Balls.”
“At least it will be a short list,” Davy said.
That was the upside of Soul Complements being rare.
“Unless there’s a pair out there we don’t know about,” I said.
He nodded. “That’s what we were thinking.”
From the tone, I knew Davy wasn’t telling me everything. “We? Who are you working for, Davy, my boy? Police? Overseer? Perhaps a little freelancing with government black ops?”
“Right now? The Overseer. He has a Hound on every known Soul Complement.”
“And how long have you really been following me? Come on now, tell Uncle Shame.”
That got a quick smile out of him and he looked my way. “About a week. Do you know that you talk to yourself a lot?”
“Yes.”
“What’s that all about?”
“It’s an Irish thing.”
“It sounds more like a crazy-guy thing. I mean, it’s practically full conversations. Arguments. You go on and on, Shame.”
“It’s a pity we’ll never get to the bottom of this mystery,” I said.
Davy smiled. “Never say never to a Hound. Also never say mystery, come to think of it.”
“How about drop it? Or where are we going?”
“Or how about you tell me about your date back there?”
“Nothing to say, mate,” I said.
“Nothing? You staggered out of the bar like you’d drained half their stock, but I only saw you go through two beers and four shots over six hours. With lunch.”
“So?”
“That’s not enough to get you drunk.”
“So?”
“So either you were faking it or she dropped something in your drink.”
“By the way, do you know who she is?” I asked.
“I know she had a rifle trained on you. On more than one occasion.”
“Jesus, Silvers. You didn’t want to tell a man he was in some sniper’s crosshairs?”
“Like you didn’t know. I’m curious as to why you haven’t told Terric about her.”
“Who says I haven’t?”
He gave me a look, then turned his gaze back to the road.
“I’ve seen that man he’s dating,” he said a little more quietly.
Didn’t have to fill in the blanks. I knew he was talking about Terric’s bruiser.
“Dash mentioned he didn’t approve of the situation,” I said. “You have any information on Jeremy I should know about?”
“He’s tied into an old family of Blood magic users. Used to deal spell-laced drugs. They have connections in the region. Some say Black Crane. Powerful people who made a lot of money while magic was hot.”
“And now that it’s cold?”
“They still have connections. Power. Deals in place.”
“Do they have anything on Terric?”
Davy didn’t say anything for a minute. Slowed for a light, then turned left. “Not that we can find.”
So he had been checking in on Jeremy. Nice of him. “There’s that ‘we’ again. Who asked you to check in on Terric’s love life?”
“Allie and Zay. Plus, Terric’s my friend too, you know? I keep an eye on my friends. And he’s been . . . different since he’s been with Jeremy.”
I didn’t say anything so he just kept on talking.
“You want to know what I think, Shame?”
“I really don’t.”
“I think Terric wouldn’t be trying to keep Jeremy alive if you were around. I think he’d instead use that Life magic to damp down the Death magi
c that’s killing you.”
“Killed,” I said. “Not killing. Other than the whole breathing thing, I’m not much alive, mate.”
“Sure,” he said. “You’re as dead as I am. Magic changed us. Made us into . . . something else. You don’t see me whining about it.”
“You know what you don’t see me doing?” I said. “Being a prick.”
“Or admitting I’m right and you don’t like it.”
“There must be someone else’s business you can dick around in,” I muttered.
“Oh, there is. Plenty of people’s. None quite as fun as yours.”
“I’m so pleased you find me amusing. Also, you do realize that Terric put Jeremy’s cancer into remission? That means something to him. To both of them.”
“I know. It means something to Jeremy’s doctors too. And his family. As a matter of fact, some members of his family, powerful people, are taking very close notice of what Terric can do with magic.”
And there it was. The angle I hadn’t seen. If Jeremy’s powerful family saw Terric as a way to hold off illness, cure diseases, or hell, put a new kick into the drug-of-the-week they were cooking up, then Terric was suddenly a valuable commodity. Someone worth controlling.
Maybe even someone worth hurting.
“Does this have anything to do with the government hunting down Soul Complements?” I asked.
“That’s . . . news. Want to fill me in?”
“Aren’t you working for the Overseer?”
“Working, yes. It’s not like he invites me into his bedroom to talk over his day.”
“I probably shouldn’t,” I said. So I did anyway. “The Overseer called a meeting. Hell, I guess it was this morning. What day is it?”
“Friday, but only by a few hours.”
“Okay, so yesterday late morning the Overseer fired Terric and me, put Clyde Turner in our place, and told all the Soul Complements in the room that the government had declared it Breaker season and was most likely hunting us down.”
“All the Soul Complements? How many were there?”
“Me and Ter, Zay and Allie, Doug and Nancy, and two other couples I don’t know.”
“What did they look like?”
I did a quick recap of the cougar and the younger man, and of the hipster pair.
