Grave Witch

by Kalayna Price

Page 10

  Author: Kalayna Price

  Still, how many men in this city had long platinum blond hair? I squinted, but my bad eyes couldn’t make out any useful details. Not that it mattered. I twisted back around.

  “You go for it,” I told Holly as I drained my beer.

  “Oh no. ” Tamara plunked down her empty bottle. “If I’d known this was a hunting trip, I wouldn’t have come. ”

  Of the three of us,Tamara was the only one wearing jewelry serving no magical purpose, and that was a ring with a big fat diamond on it. As a charm witch she probably couldn’t resist the temptation to enchant the engagement band much longer, but she and her fiancé hadn’t even set a date yet, so she was still holding out. Holly and I had bets on how long she’d last before turning the diamond into a charm.

  I smiled at Tamara. “Don’t worry. This is a purely celebratory drink. ”

  “Exactly. And it looks like we need another round. ”

  Holly waved a hand in the air, and Mac brought three more bottles as well as another basket of chips and salsa.

  I lifted my beer. “To Amanda’s testimony, the first of many victim voices heard in court. ”

  “Good luck. ” Tamara tapped the rim of her bottle against mine.

  Holly’s bottle made a soft clink against mine, her movement restrained. “Alex, you know this will take time. The defense will drag this appeal through the courts. ”

  The first guilty verdict based heavily on a shade’s testimony?

  Yeah, I knew. In years to come this verdict would probably be a case lawyers cited, but no one would recall the details. Unfortunately, the DA wouldn’t let me work another case until he learned what the higher courts decided.

  Which meant I was stuck with private clients a while longer.

  I sighed into my beer, and the conversation moved on to what other cases we each had on our respective plates.

  I was probably a little too quiet and not as forthcoming as normal, because when the conversation paused, two pairs of eyes focused on me.

  “Well, actually, I was hoping you could help me out with my newest case,” I said, looking at Tamara. “I’d like to get a better look at Coleman’s body. Think you can arrange a meeting?”

  “It would be worth more than my job. Oh, and if that’s why you were at the morgue yesterday, I don’t want to know. ”

  I paused with my beer bottle halfway to my mouth.

  “You didn’t see the recording?”

  “There wasn’t one. I searched the hard drive. Not even a record of John turning the camera on. ” She frowned at her beer. “Which—if you did what I think you did—is a good thing. ”

  I dropped my gaze to the salsa and concentrated on filling a chip. How could the recording have disappeared?

  I grabbed another chip. Falin had seen the recording; he’d admitted to as much.

  Holly snatched the next chip I was reaching for. “Alex, tell me you didn’t?” Her voice dropped to conspiratorial tones. “Coleman had a living will. No magic was to be used on him before or after his death. ”

  I hadn’t known that, though it didn’t surprise me.

  I swirled the salsa. “I identified the Jane Doe vic. Her name was Bethany Lane. ”

  “Thank goodness,” Tamara said, obviously assuming—or at least, hoping—I’d been at the morgue only for John’s case.

  I didn’t correct her misconception.

  The silence built around the table. Tamara stared at her half-full bottle as if it held some secret deep in its depths. Shaking her head, she pushed it away.

  “I should head out. I have several bodies on the table, and just because they’re dead doesn’t mean they should wait. ” She stood, her stool dragging across the scarred wood floor.

  Boy, did I know how to kill a celebration or what?

  Holly and I waved good-bye. Then Holly drained her beer. Setting it on the table with a hollow plunk, she leaned in and nudged my elbow. “You are still totally being scoped. ”

  I glanced over my shoulder again. The man swiveled away as I turned, which was so not the most subtle move. He does look a hell of a lot like Detective Andrews.

  It couldn’t be, though—could it? I frowned as I turned to face Holly. “I seriously doubt he’s looking at me. ” Unless it is Andrews.

  “He totally is. I’ve tried to catch his gaze—nothing. He is major eye candy. You should go for it. ”

  “Are you forgetting?” I gestured toward my scraped and bruised face.

  Holly twisted a ring off her pointer finger, and freckles crawled across her nose, up her cheeks, and into her hairline. I blinked. I’d seen her without the complexion charm before, but the mask of freckles she hid never ceased to amaze me. She pushed the charmed ring across the table, then dug a compact out of her purse.

  When I didn’t put on the ring, Holly frowned at me—one of those tight, disappointed frowns that rearranged her freckles. With a sigh, I slipped the ring on my pinky.

  The spell tingled, sliding over my skin, and I tried not to grimace—I hated the feeling of foreign magic on my body. Holly specialized in fire spells, but the complexion charm felt like her magic. Recognizing the spell and trusting the caster didn’t alleviate my uneasiness with the magic washing over my skin. Holly’s gaze moved in an assessing pattern over my face, and the way her eyes narrowed told me the charm hadn’t worked as well as she’d hoped. She held out the mirror.

  Between Ms. Legal’s makeup miracle, and Holly’s complexion charm, I almost looked normal. Almost. The stitches still trailed down my forehead, and there was swelling, but at least I looked less like the poster girl for domestic abuse.

  Swiveling on my stool, I squinted. The man was facing the wall again. A gray jacket had been thrown over the back of his chair, and the sleeves of his oxford were rolled to just below his elbows. From where I was sitting, I could just make out the strap to a shoulder holster.

  Damn. It is Andrews. Is he following me?

  Only one way to find out.

  I slid to my feet, then hesitated, glancing back at Holly. “You won’t leave without me?”

  Holly was my ride home, and if she left me here I was screwed. My car was at the house. That whole not-being-able-to-see-after-raising-shades thing was a real downer when it came to keeping a two-ton chunk of steel between the yellow lines.

  “Not unless you want me to. ” She flashed me a knowing smile.

  I had a tendency to take guys home after raising shades. Nothing fought off the chill better than a stiff drink and a hot body against mine, but I was definitely not taking Andrews home. Holly flicked her fingers, urging me on. If she only knew. I wasn’t going to tell her who he was, not yet. I wanted to find out where the video had gone first. My feet were overly heavy as I made my way across the room, but I’d pasted on a smile by the time I sank into the chair across from Andrews.

  He looked up, his eyebrow lifting—a gesture I envied, as my sutures still prevented any cocky eyebrow lifting on my part—but his expression wasn’t the least bit surprised that I’d invited myself to his table. “Miss Craft, is there something I can help you with?”

  The smile that touched his lips was small, mocking.

  How could Holly call him eye candy? Okay, so he was easy to look at. But he was just so … irritating.

  “Falin. ” I used his first name to annoy him. “I was actually wondering if there was something you needed? You appear to be following me. ” I flashed some teeth at him.

  “Just stopped in for a drink. ” He lifted a glass, filled with more ice than clear liquid.

  A twist of lime clung to the side of the small tumbler, but I doubted the contents were anything but water.

  Mac was a good bartender; you had to really piss him off to end up with that much ice. Course, that’s also a possibility. I stopped forcing my smile.

  “What happened to the recording?”

  He didn’t
blink. His expression didn’t change. His features just sort of stalled, as if he’d paused his face.

  Then his eyes narrowed, and his chin jutted to one side.

  “Of Coleman?”

  I nodded. “The ME said there isn’t even a log of John turning the camera on. ”

  Falin slammed his tumbler on the table as he stood.

  He said nothing, but turned, grabbing his jacket in one movement. Then he marched toward the door.

  I pushed out of my seat. “Hey, I wasn’t done talking to you. ”

  No response.

  Had he seriously not known about the missing recording?

  Holly made her way over, her eyes wide. “I take it that didn’t go well. ”

  I gestured to the door, which had just slammed. “That would be the lead homicide detective on Coleman’s case. ”

  Her lips formed an O, her brows scrunching together.

  She doesn’t know him either? Where did Falin transfer from?

  Wrenching the complexion charm from my finger, I handed it back to her. She’d already paid the tab, so I swiped the rest of our chips into a paper napkin. Then I made my way to the door. “I’ll fill you in on the way home. ”

  ———

  “Oh crap,” Holly said, hitting the brakes.

  I glanced out the front windshield. It didn’t take a genius to guess what “crap” referred to. News vans lined the street outside the house. Reporters swarmed the sidewalk like mourners gathered around a celebrity grave. I saw several station call letters for national news channels.

  “Caleb is going to kill me,” I whispered, gaping at the cameras pointed at the house. Caleb enjoyed his privacy.

  My attracting a horde of reporters to his home wasn’t going to make him happy.

  I crouched lower in the passenger seat, trying to stay out of view. “There weren’t this many outside the courthouse, were there?”

  Holly shook her head and inched the car forward.

  As the car crept closer to the drive a couple of reporters caught sight of us. Then, as a whole, the milling mass turned and streamed forward, yelling questions at our closed windows. The car made slow progress, and Holly nearly committed vehicular homicide pulling into the driveway. The reporters obeyed the rules, though, and trespassed no farther than the front sidewalk. Of course, they didn’t have to enter the yard to yell questions or point cameras at us.