Banshee Blues (Bones and Bounties Book 1)

by Bilinda Sheehan

  Her words broke my heart. She was the last of the oaks, and I dreaded to think what would become of the trees in her care if anything happened to her.

  “I am sorry,” Samira said.

  Clary shrugged. “Unless you spend your free time chopping up forests, you don’t have anything to be sorry about.” She looked at me. “Wait, you said that MacNa is on the run?”

  “Yeah, he was challenged and ducked out on it. The Court wants me to bring him in so he can be reminded of where he comes from.”

  Clary nodded. “I might know someone who can help you track him down.”

  “Really?”

  “Have you heard of the bar called The Dearg Hand?”

  It sounded somewhat familiar, but I hadn’t ever set foot in it.

  “Over at the Spires?” Clary added, and I nodded. “Well, MacNa was a regular there, and one of his long-time friends named Daster works there.”

  A wide grin spread across my face. MacNa was nothing if not a creature of habit, and if his friend worked in the bar then he wouldn’t be too far away.

  “So, will you two be all right here?” I asked, taking in their wary stances, the tension in Clary’s shoulders more than a little worrisome.

  “Look, we’ll figure it out,” Clary said, shooting Samira her best smile. If she was making an effort, that meant there was hope, which was more than I could hope for. “Although, if that cat decides to use me as a scratching post we’re going to have all sorts of issues.”

  “Oh, it’s not mine,” Samira added quickly, and Clary shot me an inquisitive glance.

  “No idea, it just turned up,” I said with a shrug, grabbing my leather jacket and sliding an iron blade into the sheath at my back.

  I didn’t wait for her to answer, instead picking my way through the door and sighing at the sight of the last remaining pieces of wood that hung from the doorframe. The next time someone decided to invade my apartment and destroy everything, I was going to send them the bill even if they were already dead…

  Although, if a Faerie Court case caused the destruction, I could always send them the bill. I could already imagine the Queen’s expression when she received it. That alone would be worth the damage.

  “Don’t kill each other,” I called back to the two women. “And don’t let that cat in my bedroom.” I shuddered as I imagined the damage that little fuzz ball could do.

  Somehow, I couldn’t see myself striking fear into the hearts of my enemies whilst covered in tiny, marmalade-coloured fur. There was no doubt about it—in my line of business, cute was definitely overrated.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The hairs on the back of my neck stood to attention as I rounded the corner onto the street where my office sat. Something was definitely wrong, but for the life of me I couldn’t put my finger on it.

  The people making their way up and down the street didn’t pay any attention to the loon creeping along the sidewalk. After all, this was Falcon—people did weird shit here all the time.

  The front of my office looked much as it had the previous night, but I could taste the difference on the air, a sweetness that sickened me to my stomach. Something had obviously changed.

  I crossed the street, made it to the front door, and pushed it open. It was entirely possible that I’d forgotten to lock up as I was rushing out the previous night. Stupid, but possible.

  Stepping inside, I sucked in a deep breath and listened. The quiet sound of another’s heartbeat echoed within. Scratch that, there were multiple heartbeats.

  I took another step inside the building, and they seemed to draw a collective breath before pouring from their hiding places, their guns trained on me.

  “Freeze!”

  I contemplated ignoring them, but after last night’s fiasco getting myself shot again didn’t seem like the best idea. Raising my hands slowly above my head, I trained my eyes on the cop who seemed to be in charge.

  He pushed past the others, his wide shoulders indicating that he worked out during every spare second. Grabbing my arm roughly, he spun me around and slammed me down over the desk. His hands did a cursory sweep over my body, and he paused when he found my sheath.

  “What’s this?” he asked, drawing it out and setting it down next to my face.

  “Looks like a knife,” I said, regretting my smart answer when his grip on my arms tightened, causing the healing gunshot wound to throb in protest.

  I felt the snap of the handcuffs; the metal caused my skin to itch, but thankfully they weren’t made of iron. The cop jerked me up, but I kept my balance despite his attempts to make me stumble.

  “What’s this about?” I asked, keeping my voice neutral.

  “Darcey Thorne, we are arresting you for the murder of Martina Ricer and the attempted murder of Henry Archer,” tough cop said, turning me to face him once more.

  His eyes swept over my face, taking in my hair before he dropped his gaze to my body. I could feel his appreciation, and it made my skin crawl. I’d never understood human behaviour. The Fae dealt with creeps swiftly.

  “Are you human?” His question took me by surprise and momentarily stole the words from my tongue.

  If I answered, I would have to tell the truth. And if they didn’t know I was a Fae, I’d only have to deal with the human cops. As long as I could keep the Elite off my ass, I stood a chance of getting out of this mess without getting shot again, or worse.

  “Lawyer,” I said, and smiled sweetly.

  His expression hardened, and I knew I’d irritated him. He wouldn’t be nice to me, but he’d already forgotten to probe a little deeper into what I was. I pushed a little more effort into my glamour and felt his interest in me waning. The longer I could keep up the ruse, the faster I would be able to escape.

  I stumbled a little as he tugged me from the room, which added to my human persona. My ego could take a little battering, and I felt tough cop’s smug attitude ratchet up several notches.

  “You know, it was hard to track you down,” he blathered as we reached the unmarked cop car. He tugged open the back door and shoved me inside.

  “Was it?” I kept my face and voice as bland as I could.

  “No last known address, except for this place. We found it off your P.I records, but we didn’t think you’d be stupid enough to come back here.”

  I didn’t answer him, instead biting back all the acerbic comebacks that were tripping over themselves to launch out of my mouth. Murder seemed like enough of a situation to get out of without adding a charge of obstructing the course of justice to my plate.

  “I don’t know why you private investigators think you can do a real cop’s job,” he said, leaning against the back door.

  The urge to blurt out my true thoughts was almost enough to drive me crazy, but still I held my silence. Another cop crossed the street and nodded to me in the back seat.

  “Prisoner secure?” he asked, tossing the keys to the first cop, who’d started to straighten up. My hands were already free from the cuffs; it would have been painfully easy to snatch the keys from mid-air and show them who was boss, but I’d only run the risk of getting shot again. If I had Lunn’s ability to appear and disappear, I could have pulled it off…but I wasn’t, and so I was stuck in the back seat pretending to be just another sad sack caught for my crime.

  “Yeah, she’s not the talker I thought she would be,” the first cop said, sounding somewhat disappointed.

  “You’re clearly saying the wrong things.” The second cop slid into the passenger seat and threw me a cursory glance before returning his attention to the one sliding into the driver’s seat. “Captain wants this wrapped up ASAP. Something about it messing up his dinner plans with the Archers if we don’t.”

  I flopped back against the faux leather seat and closed my eyes. I was still listening; the more they believed I was disinterested in everything they had to say, the better my chances at gleaning as much information from them as possible. Information was always handy to have, particularly wh
en accused of a murder you definitely didn’t commit.

  This was the first time I’d been accused of murder. Except, of course, the last time I’d been escorted to Court by Lunn and the other enforcers, the iron shackles slowly rubbing the skin on my wrists raw. The Queen and her Court were a lot scarier than any human court could ever hope to be.

  “Did you see the crime scene?” new cop asked, dropping his voice to a whisper, and I could practically feel the look he gave me. It contained a healthy dose of fear and, if I wasn’t mistaken, awe. The second emotion raised my alarm bells.

  “Yeah, it was a mess,” tough cop answered.

  “Archer is in a bad way, too, babbling mostly…” the new cop said.

  Silence fell over the car, and I could feel the first cop’s sudden discomfort at the conversation’s shift in direction. He might have been an asshole, but from everything I’d gathered he was one of the good assholes—if such a thing existed. He undoubtedly treated the other female cops differently, his chauvinistic tendencies causing others to dislike him, but he was just as turned off by his partner’s sudden interest in the crime scene as I was. Had he picked up on the tone in the new cop’s voice? He seemed to be in awe over the state of the Martina’s body.

  The car sped through the streets, and I recognized the second we pulled into the police station because the tense atmosphere in the car eased up a little as the new cop hopped out. Sliding my hands back into the handcuffs, I waited until the door to my left swung open before opening my eyes.

  New cop’s hands wrapped around my arm, half-dragging, half-helping me from the car. He had an air of excitement about him that turned my stomach, and I almost expected him to start asking me questions about the crime scene.

  He didn’t, instead keeping his too-tight grip on my arm as he started to perp-walk me across the asphalt of the underground parking lot. He pressed a button on the wall and a rumbling elevator door opened to reveal a cage with the walls and floor made of iron grid. I didn’t want to step inside; if I so much as brushed against the walls, I would give away what I was. How would I explain away the smoking of burning flesh when there wasn’t a fire, or even a spark, in the vicinity?

  We moved inside, and tough cop quickly joined us. I hunched in on myself, trying to make my body as small and inconspicuous as possible.

  The elevator dinged and the door rumbled open, revealing a wide, open reception area. But instead of a friendly receptionist, several sour-faced police officers sat behind the desk, overworked and underpaid—it was written all over their faces.

  An older cop stepped up to the desk, his face the only one not wearing the same sour expression as his co-workers. His ruddy complexion, salt-and-pepper hair, and barely concealed smile gave him the appearance of a man who should have been at home enjoying his retirement, or else dressing up as Santa at Christmastime and visiting sick kids in the hospital.

  “Mikey picked up Darcey Thorne at her office,” new cop said. “She’s a suspect in the Archer case.”

  The Santa Claus cop looked me over and shook his head sadly, his blue eyes meeting mine for a moment before he looked down at the book in front of him.

  “Why get yourself tangled up in something like that?” he asked.

  “I didn’t,” I answered honestly, and his eyes jerked up to meet mine once more. He searched my face, and I knew he was looking for an indication that I was lying. But he wouldn’t find it.

  “Mikey, come on, get on with it,” new cop said, and I fought the urge to jab my elbow into his ribs hard enough to hear the satisfactory snap of bone. “If we believed every perp who walked through these doors the city wouldn’t be safe.”

  I bit down on the answer hovering on my tongue; it just wasn’t worth the hassle of setting him straight.

  New cop removed my cuffs, guided my hands to the front of my body, and snapped them on again. Mikey had laid out a fingerprint kit, and new cop wasted no time thrusting my hands into the ink and crushing my fingers to the card. It wasn’t exactly the best way to start my day, but at least I didn’t have to worry about my prints turning up in any database. Glamour allowed me to keep my secrets, and I could change everything about my fingerprints in an instant.

  “Can I get something to clean this off?” I asked, staring down at the inky mess covering my fingers and most of my hands.

  Mikey gestured to a sink behind the counter. “You can wash up there if you want to.” I smiled gratefully at him.

  New cop had other ideas. He jerked me back, towing me down a long hall. “Andy, you should let her get cleaned up, it’s only fair!” Mikey called out after us, as new cop—who I now knew as Andy—continued dragging me down the corridor.

  “He’s far too soft, it’s going to get him in trouble one of these days,” Andy said beneath his breath.

  I jerked my head around and stared up at him. His words held all the hallmarks of a threat, but they sounded wrong coming from the mouth of Mikey’s comrade. Weren’t they all supposed to stick together?

  Andy winked at me and pushed open the door to an interview room. After shoving me down into one of the chairs, he wasted no time fastening my hands to the middle of the bar on the table.

  The second he turned his back, I tested the strength of the bar. It flexed gently beneath the pressure I exerted. Freeing myself would be easy, but it seemed pretty pointless. I’d come this far, and now I needed to know what information they had on me. At least then I would know what I was up against.

  Dropping back against the chair, I closed my eyes and waited. The fun and games would soon begin, and once they did… Well, things would get a little more interesting.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I didn’t have to wait long. Minutes ticked by, and the silence was broken by the sound of the door opening and shuffling footsteps entering the room. Opening my eyes, I stared up at the detective—and he was definitely a detective. He looked just like the type you see on television, and for a second I held my breath and waited for everyone to start laughing at the great joke they’d pulled off on me.

  When that didn’t happen, I rolled the tension from my shoulders and sat up a little straighter. The detective sat in the chair opposite me and dropped a rather hefty file onto the table.

  There was no way they had a file on me. I’d been flying below the radar for a long time. I’d been careful…

  “Miss Thorne,” the detective said, “my name is Gabriel Martinez. I’m a detective here with the FPB and I’ve been assigned to this case.”

  I remained silent, studying the red sauce stain on his tie and the slightly off-white colour of his shirt that pointed to a man who lived alone in the world. Add to that the particular echo in his voice that only develops in those who have loved and lost, and it painted a picture of a man who had lost the one he cherished.

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” I said, unable to keep quiet any longer. The second the words left my mouth, his pain flooded the room and I sucked in a deep breath, the air hot enough to scald me all the way down into my lungs.

  “How do you know?” he asked, his voice gruff and tight with emotion.

  “I’m sorry, I really shouldn’t have said anything.”

  Being a Fae certainly had its benefits, but being a banshee was often just one shitty misstep after another. And this was just another one of those marvellous moments.

  “I’ll ask you again, Miss Thorne: how did you know?” His voice was beginning to lose the tightness that came with the shock of grief, and he was rapidly descending into full-on pissed-off mode.

  “I can see it in your eyes, hear it in your voice… I really didn’t mean to upset you.” I was as honest as I could be without blurting out the truth of what I was.

  He watched me for a moment, and finally seemed satisfied enough by my answer to brush over it.

  “You know why you’re here?” he asked, and I was impressed by how quickly he could rein in his emotions.

  “I’ve been accused of murder.”

  “We
have two witnesses who place you at the crime scene, and one of those witnesses saw the entire attack.”

  “Mr and Mrs Archer,” I confirmed. “She hired me to find her husband. She said they had an open relationship, and that she knew he was off with his mistress but was worried because he hadn’t come back for some sort of important meeting…”

  “So you admit to being there?” he asked.

  “I was there doing what she wanted me to do. The victim was already dead when I arrived.”

  “And how do you know she was already dead?”

  I hesitated. How the hell was I supposed to explain to him that I knew she was dead because I could smell the scent of death when I walked into the apartment? That, to a banshee, death had a particular pungent odour, one I would recognise anywhere? That I could smell the scent of his own wife’s grave dirt rising off his jacket in waves?

  “Is it not obvious?” I said, remembering the sight of her body and my initial reaction to it. “She was lying across the bed, not moving, not breathing, and she looked like she’d been hit by a ten-ton truck.”

  Detective Martinez flipped open the file and shoved a pile of high-resolution photographs toward me. I peered down at them, my stomach clenching uncomfortably as I caught sight of Martina Ricer’s eyes covered in the grey film of death. The dimming of the light in her eyes did nothing to hide the fact that she’d obviously suffered before dying.

  “Does this make you uncomfortable?” he asked, and I shot him a dirty look before returning my attention to the pictures.

  A nagging feeling in my gut told me there I was missing something that I would see if I just looked hard enough. But with no clue as to what that might be, I was lost.

  “Are you looking for something?” he asked me.

  “Clues,” I replied curtly before reaching over and sliding out one of the bottom pictures.

  “Some would think that you were enjoying the pictures, that you’re reliving the joy of the kill,” he said, and I let out a sigh as I dropped back against the chair.