"So how are we going to split the work?" Brittney asked.
Alec considered a moment. "We'll have you and Harper handle the police. The rest of us will find out what we can about the missing painting and who might have stolen it. Conner, I want you to go talk to your informants. See if any of them know something. Chloe, Sarah, I want you two at the gym."
Chloe groaned. "Do I have to?"
"Yes," Alec said. "And I'll start researching the painting and Eklund. Maybe I can find a connection between him and the painting to see why it matters so much to him that it's returned."
"Alright," Harper said. "Well, Brittney and I have something to do before we head to the station. We're moving in to our new house today."
She saw a shadow flit across Alec's face but he simply nodded. "Alright. Well be quick about it. We want to take care of this as soon as possible, alright?"
Harper nodded. She knew Alec had reserved feelings about her moving in with Brittney. It wasn't that he didn't like the idea of them living together, he was just a bit worried about her finally leaving his apartment. While they were working on their last case, Harper had gotten shot. Alec had taken care of her during recovery and admitted his feelings for her. They'd both decided that a romance between them wouldn't work out for many reasons, the main one being that he was a vampire and couldn't age.
Then there was the fact that Harper's great-grandmother, Ileana, had been involved with Alec when he had first become a vampire. Harper knew she could never compare to the romance the two of them had shared. It was something of a legend.
Brittney stood up. "Come on, Harper. Let's go get busy."
Harper nodded and followed her to the door. She spared one last look at Alec, and then headed out to where her and Brittney were parked.
"One car?" Brittney asked.
"Sure," Harper said. "We'll take mine." With a little help of some of Chloe's magic dust, her shoulder had healed in less than two weeks. She'd enjoyed being able to drive again and to walk more than a mile without being in severe pain. They got in Harper's car and headed to their new house. It wasn't too far from Afterlife, which they both liked considering how much time they spent there.
"I still can't believe we got this at the price we did," Brittney said, once they'd pulled into their driveway. They'd forgone an apartment in favor of a real house. One with three bedrooms, a spacious kitchen, and a nice giant window in the living room to let the sunlight in. "When are we going to have our housewarming party?"
"Once we figure out what we're doing for furniture," Harper said with a laugh. "I don't think everyone's going to want to stand the entire time."
Brittney nodded. "Right. Well, I had a thought on that." They walked into the house, and Brittney slid her phone out of her pocket and pulled up a website. "We can order from these guys. They deliver within a day, their prices are decent, and they'll set everything up for us."
Harper took Brittney's phone and browsed through the selection. She saw a desk that she absolutely loved, and their beds were decently priced. The living room set was within their budget, and they even sold dishes.
"This is perfect," she said. "Come on, let's figure out what all we want to buy."
They spent the next two hours sitting cross-legged in their new living room, looking through furniture on Harper's new laptop. They eventually decided on a simple color scheme for the majority of the house. Then they both took turns ordering furniture for their bedrooms. Brittney went her typical route and picked out a nice, if a bit uninteresting, bedroom set that would work well with any color design. Harper, on the other hand, had a more artistic flair and chose stuff that she thought would represent her better. They paid with their Afterlife credit card, scheduled the delivery for the next day, and then locked up the house and left.
They drove over to Brittney's current apartment and changed into suits. Harper still felt a bit uncomfortable in hers; she wasn't used to wearing slacks or blazers. She slipped her FBI badge around her neck and tucked it beneath her blazer and shrugged it off. She'd have to get used to it; this wouldn't be the last time they'd be called upon to find out information from the police.
"You ready?" Brittney called out.
"Yeah," Harper said. They met in the living room in front of the door. "I'm as ready as I'll ever be."
THREE
Chloe followed Sarah out to her car, complaining the whole way. "I hate working out," she said as they climbed inside. "You know I hate working out."
"We're not going there to work out," Sarah said. "We're going there to try and get information about this painting. Don't forget to buckle up."
"With the way you drive? Of course." Chloe clicked her seatbelt in place and glanced at her best friend. "Seriously, though, what does Alec expect us to find out?"
Sarah shrugged as she started the car. "I don't know," she admitted, "but you have to admit that the gym's a pretty good place to pick up information. Everyone goes there, bad and good alike. Someone might be talking about it. You never know. I've gotten plenty of information there in the past."
Chloe sighed. "I know," she said, "I just don't like it. I'm going to have to at least pretend to workout otherwise I'll draw suspicion."
"It wouldn't hurt you to workout a bit more anyway," Sarah said. "I keep telling you, the more you workout, the better you'll feel. Don't you want to be in-shape?"
"I am in shape," Chloe said. "And I've told you. My levitating abilities are directly affected by my slim figure. If I start bulking up, I'm going to have problems with it. I don't see why I couldn't have gone with Brittney, and why Harper couldn't have come with you."
Sarah shrugged once more. "It was Alec's idea. Besides, we haven't spent much time together since everything happened."
"You mean, since you turned into a fury and flew off into never-never-land?" Chloe asked. "I know. I'm sorry. I haven't been avoiding you, I've just been busy."
"I know," Sarah said. "But I could really use my best friend to talk to. I killed two people, Chloe. It's eating away at me. Those men might have had families. They might have had children. Now those children will grow up without fathers. Somewhere, there are parents who are going to grow old without their sons. There could be widows..."
Chloe shook her head. "They asked for it, Sarah. They were going to kill Harper and Brittney. Besides, even if you hadn't killed them, they wouldn't be with their families. They'd be in prison. In my opinion, you just cleaned up the city a bit more than we usually do. Nothing to be ashamed of there."
"So you're alright with killing humans now?"
"No, of course not," Chloe said. "I'm just saying you picked two humans that deserved what they got. And you defended your friends. So stop beating yourself up over it."
Sarah sighed. "I'll try."
"Do you really believe they were good fathers? Or good husbands? Or good children, for that matter?" Chloe asked. "Good men don't traffic drugs. They don't prey on people like Peter. They don't threaten to murder someone to get them out of the way."
"I know."
"Then stop it," Chloe said.
Sarah nodded.
"Have you been taking care of your women?" Chloe asked. "The battered ones? I haven't heard you talking about any of them lately. Not since you unmasked the ghost and got her to give up on her vengeance."
"I've taken a little break," Sarah admitted.
"Well go back to doing it," Chloe said. "You're not yourself when you're not helping others. Those women need you, and so do I, and so does the rest of the team."
"I know."
Chloe nodded, satisfied with that answer, at least for the moment. When they got to the gym, they both swiped their passes and went inside to change. Chloe put on her gym clothes, feeling tired already. She hated working out. She'd much prefer to run and do yoga. It kept her flexible and fast; two of the most important traits to a fairy.
Still, she knew that Alec had sent her for a reason. She had good hearing, and she paid attention. "Treadmills?" she a
sked hopefully. Sarah shook her head.
"Nope. We're going to be boxing," she said. "I want to make sure you're still coordinated enough for a fight."
Chloe groaned and followed her over to the boxing ring. She grabbed a pair of gloves and slipped them on her hands. They were a bit big, but she didn't care. Everything was a bit big on her. She had a small frame and was used to it by now. Most people didn't believe she was twenty-nine. The first time she'd met Harper, she'd carded her.
They each took a ready stance in the ring, with their left foot forward and their hands raised to guard their faces. They circled around each other, each looking for an opening. Sarah threw the first punch, but Chloe caught it with her arm, and threw one of her own. Sarah danced backwards, out of reach. Chloe knew she stood no real chance against Sarah; the other woman was extremely muscular, worked out daily, and had been boxing since she was eight years old.
Still, she tried her hardest, knowing that Sarah would be looking for that. She didn't want to disappoint her. Besides the fact that they were best friends, Sarah would use any sign of weakness as an excuse to encourage her to come to the gym more often. After a while, Sarah ducked under one of her punches, and came right up to Chloe's face.
"Keep boxing," she whispered. "But listen to the men on our left."
Chloe nodded.
They began fighting again, but neither of them were really trying. They were both listening to the conversation near them. Neither of them had the power of Sight, so they couldn't tell what the men were, but if Chloe had to wager a guess, she'd say that at least one of them was an incubus. He had the stereotypical lined tattoos that their kind seemed to favor.
"Little shits are all over Vegas. There's been four museum break-ins. The police have no idea who's behind it, of course."
"Why are they breaking into museums?"
"It's obvious, isn't it? They want money."
"Don't they care about exposure?"
"Of course they do. Haven't you noticed all the lengths they go through to avoid security? Nobody can quite compare, really. The rest of us could really learn from them."
There was a loud snicker from the other male, before he said, "Except they are drawing attention. It's all over the news. People think there's this crazy-good thief in the city. Of course, nobody mentions that the doors are locked from the inside, or that there's nothing on the security feeds. Then people would start asking questions, and they don't want that."
The two men moved away from the boxing ring, and left Sarah and Chloe there. Their eyes met, and at once they both said, "Goblins."
Then they burst out laughing. Chloe couldn't believe it; she hadn't seen a goblin in years. Of course, that was their nature. They stayed out of the public spotlight until they decided they wanted treasure. She was a little embarrassed that they'd missed the robberies at the other museums. If they'd known about those, they could have connected the dots without visiting the gym. There was only one creature that would bother with robbing museums for priceless art.
"Come on," Chloe said. "Let's head back to Afterlife. We can tell the others what we found out."
"But we haven't even finished our workout!" Sarah said.
Chloe glared at her, and Sarah seemed to wilt a little under the ferocity of her gaze. "Alright, alright," she agreed. "We'll head back. Come on, let's go get showered and dressed."
The two of them headed back to the locker rooms. They made their showers quick, and dressed even more quickly. Together, they went to Sarah's car, hopped in, and headed back to Afterlife.
"Of course it would be goblins," Sarah said. "Just what we need. Little pests."
"Oh come on," Chloe said cheerfully. "It's not that bad. I mean, it could be worse. It could be an evil demon trying to steal art to... I dunno, trap people inside of or something equally as sinister. At least goblins are fun!"
"You have a warped sense of fun."
Chloe laughed. She felt much better now that they were out of the gym and on their way back to Afterlife. They'd almost reached the nightclub when a car came out of nowhere. The driver was wearing a hat and sunglasses. He veered to the left, and then slammed his car into the front side of the car.
There was a shattering of glass, a loud crunch of metal, a loud scream from Sarah, and then the airbags deployed, and Chloe sunk face first into hers and saw only darkness.
She only passed out for about a minute, and then woke. At first, she felt confused. Why weren't they moving? Then it came back to her, and she quickly struggled to unbuckle her seatbelt. She leaned over and grabbed Sarah's hand and felt for a pulse. There was one, but it was weaker than usual. She looked over her best friend in horror; she had suffered quite a few cuts from the breaking of the windshield, but the worst one was on her forehead. It was gushing out blood.
"Sarah," Chloe said, "Sarah, come on, you have to wake up. Come on, Sarah."
Sarah's eyelids fluttered.
"Come on," Chloe repeated. "Come on, you can do this, Sarah. Wake up. Look at me."
Sarah opened her eyes and caught Chloe's gaze. "How bad is it?"
"It's not so bad," Chloe said. "Don't you worry. You're going to be just fine. I promise. We both are. We just have to get out of the car, Sarah. We have to get out, okay?" She fumbled with Sarah's seatbelt, and then opened her door. She dragged Sarah across the middle console, and together they struggled out of Chloe's side of the car.
"Can you walk?" Chloe asked Sarah.
Sarah nodded, though she looked shaken. She swayed on her feet and Chloe put an arm around her waist and helped her move away from the totaled vehicle. There were people running towards them; pedestrians and other drivers who'd stopped to help. A man quickly took Chloe's place in supporting Sarah, and a woman took Chloe's hands and pulled her further from the wreckage.
"Are you alright?" the woman asked. "Are you hurt? I've called 911 already. They'll be here shortly. But I'm a nurse. Where does it hurt?"
"It doesn't," Chloe said. "I'm fine. My friend, though... where'd she go?"
She looked around and saw Sarah sitting on the back of a pickup truck, looking bloody and beaten. "My friend," she repeated. "You have to help her if you're a nurse. Please. It was her side that got hit."
The nurse nodded and rushed over to Sarah. She quickly began dabbing at the cut on her forehead, trying to stop the bleeding. Chloe thought of her mother then, saying that head wounds bleed a lot. She grimaced. Even if that were true, it was still a lot of blood.
She heard the wail of the ambulance before she saw it, and felt a great sense of relief. There were professionals on their way to help Sarah. She was surprised when one of the paramedics approached her after stopping the ambulance.
"You'll need to come with me," he said.
"Why? It's my friend that's hurt."
"You're hurt too. We need to check for internal bleeding, and a concussion. You have a nasty bump on your head. My guess is from the air bag."
"Aren't those things supposed to prevent you from getting hurt?" Chloe said grouchily.
"They do," the paramedic said. "In this case, it stopped you from ramming your head into the dashboard, which would have hurt a lot worse. Now come over to the truck and let us get you checked out."
Chloe followed him without complaining, and took a seat in the back of the vehicle. They closed the doors behind her. She realized they were going to the hospital. She might have asked them to stop, but she was fairly certain they were taking Sarah to the same one, and she needed to check on her and make sure she was alright.
"It's not too bad," the paramedic said, checking the bump on her forehead. "I'm just going to check your vitals, alright?" He hooked her up to a blood pressure monitoring machine, put a pulse oximeter on her finger, and listened to her breathe with his stethoscope. Then he shined a light in her eyes to check her pupils, made sure she could follow his finger with her eyes, and checked her reflexes. "Not too bad at all," he confirmed. "You seem perfectly fine. Of course, I'd recommend getting a
CAT scan, or an MRI after taking a hit like that in the head."
"I'll be fine," Chloe said.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
The paramedic nodded and picked up his clipboard. He made a few notes on it, and then scribbled his name and the date at the bottom.
"Is my friend in another ambulance?" Chloe asked.
"Yes," he said. "She took a harder beating than you, unfortunately, but I think she's going to be alright. We'll get her checked out at the hospital, make sure there's nothing severe to worry about."
Chloe nodded, but his reassurances didn't help her panic. If Sarah was badly injured... or worse... no, she wouldn't think like that. He said she'd be fine. If she wasn't fine, he wouldn't have said that. Doctors weren't allowed to give false hope. Were they? Chloe mulled this over during the drive. She could hear the ambulance sirens from both the vehicle she was in, and the one that was transporting Sarah. If it wasn't an emergency, they wouldn't have the sirens on, would they?
When she got to the hospital, she climbed out, stretched, and headed immediately for the other ambulance. They were taking Sarah in on a stretcher. Her heart seemed to skip a beat, and she rushed after them.
"Are you immediate family?" One of the doctors asked.
"Yes," Chloe lied. I mean, it wasn't really a lie, she told herself. They might as well be family. Both of Chloe's parents had died when she was a teenager. She'd been on her own since. She'd never had a problem making friends, but she'd never had many close ones. She'd always kept everyone at arms' length, afraid to lose again. Then she'd met Alec and then Conner and finally Sarah. She'd made them into her family, and she'd never regretted it. Not once.
"Is she going to be alright?" Chloe asked.
"Yes," the doctor said. "She's going to be just fine. We're going to take her down and get some pictures to make sure nothing is broken, and she's going to need stitches on her forehead, but her vitals were alright, and she's responsive. That's a good sign."
"I saw her get brought in on a stretcher," Chloe said.
Kinda Like Van Helsing (Afterlife Book 4) Page 2
