Summoned to Thirteenth Grave

by Darynda Jones

  He looked away, suddenly uncomfortable. “Charley, what you did for Cookie, for Amber … I can never repay you.”

  “Sure you can. I take installments with no money down, but I’ll have to run a credit check. I ain’t no scrub.”

  He stopped and gave me his full attention. “What does that even mean?”

  “No idea.”

  He sat down with a soft chuckle, so I took advantage of his light mood.

  “I have a strange question for you.”

  “So, you really are back.” His irises sparkled with mirth.

  I swatted his hand. He surprised me and caught it, lacing my fingers into his. He’d been there for me my whole life. When no one else knew what to do with me, I could always count on Ubie.

  “Okay, this might sound strange, but you were at the hospital with Gemma when I was born, right?”

  His brows slid together, wondering where I was headed. “I was.”

  “Do you remember anything unusual?”

  “Besides your mother dying?”

  A pinprick of pain stung the core of my being. I ignored it. “Yes, besides that. Did anything suspicious happen?”

  He lowered his head in thought. “No. Not that I can recall.” He slowly removed his hands from mine and leaned back. “But you have to understand, pumpkin, all I thought about back then was becoming a detective and sex. And not necessarily in that order.”

  My mind was racing so hard, trying to figure out what on Earth my mother’s death would have to do with the hell dimension taking over the world twenty-eight years later that I almost missed it.

  Almost.

  I raised my gaze back to his. “What about Dad? Did he mention anything unusual? Did he suspect foul play? Did he investigate?”

  “No. Not that I know of.”

  I planted my shoulder blades on the back of my chair and crossed my arms. I must have misread him. Odd but not completely out of the ordinary. Emotions weren’t finite. They could be tricky. Maybe he’d been more upset about my mother’s death than I’d ever realized.

  “What about when Gemma passed out?”

  “Yeah,” he said, running a hand through his thick head of hair, “I found her in the hall by the nurses’ station. They checked her out, but she was fine.”

  “And no idea why she fainted?”

  “Nope.” He pressed his lips together and shook his head, and I fought with every ounce of my being to tamp down my knee-jerk reaction to the fact that my uncle Bob, the man I’d loved as much as my own father, was lying straight to my face.

  I sat there stunned. Reyes must have felt the spike of adrenaline rush through me. He walked up and eyed us both. “Everything okay?”

  “Great,” I said, hopping up. “If you remember anything, will you let me know?”

  “Of course.” He stood as well and gave me another hug, the lie he just told me, the third one tonight, still shuddering through me from the top of my head to the tips of my toes.

  If someone would’ve said to me, “Hey, Charley, what’s the last thing on Earth you think will happen tonight?” I would’ve said, “My uncle lying to me.”

  He never lied to me. My father lied at least twice a day, most the time in a futile attempt to spare my feelings where the woman he married, the woman who abhorred me, was concerned, but this guy? This wonderful man? Never.

  And yet there we stood, the lie wedged between us.

  “Thanks, Uncle Bob,” I said, forcing a smile.

  “Anytime, kiddo.”

  As Uncle Bob joined his wife at her worn-out desk, Reyes feigned an interest in snogging and bent until his face was centimeters away from mine.

  “What’s up?” he whispered against my mouth.

  Still stunned, I fought tears, and whispered back, “My uncle just lied to me about my mother’s death.”

  Reyes’s surprise was as evident as mine. He tilted his head in question, but I shook mine softly. We’d discuss it later when we were alone, but try as I might, I could not come up with a rational explanation as to why my uncle would lie. If he’d suspected foul play, he totally would have followed up on it. Unless …

  I could hardly fathom where my thoughts were leading me, but it would explain why, if Uncle Bob did know something, he wasn’t telling me the truth. Had he suspected my father in some way? Maybe he did but he couldn’t prove anything, so he’d kept it under wraps.

  Still, the very notion was inconceivable. My father loved my mother. I felt that love every time he talked about her, though admittedly that was rare. But what else could Ubie be hiding?

  Then again, maybe it was me. Maybe he blamed me, and I was reading that disapproval as deception. Not likely, but neither was Ubie lying to me. Especially about my mother’s death.

  Reyes watched me as my brain ran through scenario after scenario before saying, “Don’t jump to any conclusions before we know more.”

  “I won’t,” I promised.

  And thankfully, before I could break that promise, a little boy peeked out from behind a metal cabinet.

  “There you are,” Amber said, sneaking up beside the boy and tickling his ribs. Or pretending to tickle his ribs, as he was incorporeal and she was not.

  But he laughed nonetheless and jumped to the side, exposing himself to me at last. He had scruffy brown hair with huge eyes to match and wore only a pair of boxer shorts and a plain white T-shirt.

  I took a cautious step closer. “I see you two are getting along.”

  Amber nodded as Quentin came up behind her. He flashed that brilliant smile at me before warming me with a hug.

  “How are you?” I asked when he let me go, my signing only a little rusty after a hundred years of nonuse. Quentin had been born deaf and lived at the New Mexico School for the Deaf in Santa Fe during the week most days, but this was a special circumstance, so Cookie pulled him out of school. With the permission of the sisters, of course. On the weekends, he lived at a convent in Albuquerque with another of my best friends, Sister Mary Elizabeth.

  He lifted one shoulder and said, “Good.” Then he added the mainstream gesture for okay, his blue eyes shimmering in the low light. “You?”

  “Better now that I’m back on Earth.”

  He laughed as Amber chased the little boy around the commons area.

  “He’s cute,” Quentin said.

  “He’s adorable,” I agreed. “Did Reyes get everyone out?”

  He nodded and said, “Finally,” in a dramatic gesture. It apparently took an act of God for Reyes to convince the sisters at the convent to let him fly them out of the city. The mother superior insisted that, if anything, their jobs required them to face the creatures of hell head-on.

  “Not these creatures,” he’d said to them. “Not this hell.”

  In an act of desperation, he offered to make a sizable donation for upgrades to the convent if they’d leave for a few days.

  If it was sizable enough to sway the stalwart mother superior, the offer must have had several zeroes at the end. It was one thing to stick to your guns and do your perceived duty, but it was another to be stubborn to the point of ridiculousness. The convent, like all old buildings, needed a lot of TLC.

  “Are you okay?” I asked him.

  Giggling and panting, Amber walked up to join us.

  “Yeah,” he said.

  She stepped close to Quentin, their arms touching, their fingers grazing against each other’s. Their romance was the sweetest thing. Amber was so dedicated to him, and Quentin was head over heels. It was a perfect pairing despite the age difference of three years, which was a pretty big deal in adolescence.

  But I’d glimpsed their futures. I wasn’t clairvoyant by any stretch of the imagination. That was Amber’s department. But I had witnessed the fact that they’d still be together when Beep faced Satan. And they’d be fighting right alongside her. I felt if there were ever a destined love, it was theirs.

  But I’d sworn to Quentin, by all that was holy, if he touched her before her eight
eenth birthday, I’d skin him alive.

  He didn’t believe me, but I swore it nonetheless.

  “Have you guys learned anything that can help us out with this little guy?” I asked them, talking and signing at the same time.

  I knelt down, hoping to the draw him closer, but he stared from where he stood, several feet away.

  “Yes,” Amber said. “He got sick. That’s all he remembers. But he knows his name.”

  “Oh, yeah?” I gave him my best Sunday smile, but he continued to stare.

  “It’s your light,” Amber said. “He’s not sure what to think of it.”

  “I’m sorry, hon. I promise my light is completely harmless.”

  He took a step closer, casting a wary glance toward Reyes, who was hanging back, leaning against a wall, arms crossed at his chest.

  He got that a lot. Looks of suspicion. And doubt. And lust. Mostly lust. Many of the glances originated from Thelma and Louise. My eyeballs.

  Amber and Quentin lowered themselves onto the concrete floor and sat cross-legged, so I followed suit.

  Another step.

  “What’s your name?” I asked him.

  “Meiko,” Amber answered when he didn’t.

  I sucked in a soft breath. “That’s my favorite name ever.”

  One more step.

  “Did you say Meiko?” Uncle Bob asked from across the room. Both he and Cookie were watching us. “That name sounds familiar.”

  I looked over at him. “From a case?”

  “I’m not sure. Let me do some digging.”

  “Thanks, Uncle Bob.” I looked back at Meiko. “You don’t remember what happened to you?”

  He shook his head and took another step. After another wary glance in Reyes’s direction, he turned back to us, raised his hands, and laughed.

  When I questioned Amber and Quentin with raised brows, Quentin rolled his eyes.

  “Your light. It’s blinding. It shoots out of you and creates these flutters of embers, like sparks floating in the air.”

  “Like lightning bugs,” Amber added.

  “Seriously?” I asked them. “It’s that cool?”

  Amber snorted. “Like I said, I can finally see what all the fuss is about.”

  “I shoot sparks. Who’d a thunk?”

  “You should see her when she’s angry,” Reyes said from behind me. “It’s like a lightning storm.”

  I swiveled my head to face him. “No way. No way am I that cool.”

  One corner of his mouth rose, his expression soft.

  “Gah, I wish I could see it.”

  When I turned back to Meiko, he was almost upon me. He reached out, trying to capture the light particles in his hands.

  I sat perfectly still, not wanting to scare him. “I’m so sorry you were sick.”

  He laughed again and reached above my head. “It’s okay.”

  Thrilled that he spoke to me, I forged on. “How old are you?”

  He held up five fingers.

  “Wow. Do you know your mommy’s and daddy’s names?”

  “No.” He put his hand on my face as though fascinated, then his other, his small mouth widening across his handsome face. “Just my mommy. Belinda Makayla Banks.”

  “Oh, that’s wonderful. I’d like to get in touch with her if I can.”

  He shook his head. “You can’t find her.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “No one can.”

  “I’m pretty good at finding stuff.”

  He saddened. “It won’t matter.”

  I gestured toward Cookie. “Belinda Makayla Banks.”

  “Belinda Banks?” She rose from her chair. “A girl with that name went missing some— How many years has it been?”

  “Oh, you’re right,” Ubie said. He snapped his fingers trying to think back. “That was a while ago. Maybe ten years?”

  “She was never found?” I asked them.

  “Not that I recall,” he said, looking at Cookie for confirmation. “It wasn’t my case, but I don’t think a body was ever recovered.”

  Still holding on to my face, he patted my cheeks softly. “That’s because she’s locked in a box.”

  I stilled. Quentin tapped Amber’s shoulder in question. She signed what Meiko said, and then he stilled as well.

  A chill slid up my spine. “Your mommy is locked in a box?” I said for the benefit of Cookie and Uncle Bob.

  Cookie sucked in a sharp breath.

  Meiko nodded. “It’s where he keeps us. Mommy says Grandma is looking for us, but he keeps us in the box so she can’t find us.”

  I placed my hands over his ever so softly. “Sweetheart, is there anyone else in the box with your mommy?”

  “Just my sister.” He poked my chin softly, as though testing me out. “She’s older. She thinks she knows everything.”

  Without moving my head, I glanced at Cookie and Uncle Bob. “He has a sister.”

  Cookie’s hand flattened over her mouth. Uncle Bob hadn’t gotten past the stillness of his state of shock.

  “Cook, I need intel.”

  “Sorry. Oh, my God.” She ducked her head and tapped furiously on her keyboard.

  Reyes had stepped closer, but so far, Meiko hadn’t noticed.

  Quentin touched my shoulder, his face full of concern. “His mother and sister could still be alive.”

  I nodded and held up a pair of crossed fingers. “Sweetheart, what’s your sister’s name?”

  “Molly Makayla Banks the first.” He rolled his eyes, and I almost cracked a smile. Only a little brother.

  “Yes!” Cookie said in full eureka mode.

  I put my hands on Meiko’s face.

  He let me.

  “Belinda Makayla Banks went missing after walking home from a friend’s house ten years ago this March.”

  When she stopped talking but kept reading, I nudged her with a “Cook.”

  “Right, sorry. Hon, she was fourteen years old. She didn’t have any children.”

  I bit down but kept my expression neutral. “Are your mom and sister okay?”

  Meiko shrugged, then went back to jumping for fireflies. “Yeah. They’re okay. My sister’s not the boss of me, though. Mommy is.”

  Uncle Bob walked over to us. “I’ll find out whose case this was and get everything I can on it.”

  “Thanks, Ubie.”

  Meiko shouted a word with every jump. “This! Is! So! Fun!”

  “Meiko,” I said, trying to coax his attention back to me. “Do you know the man’s name?”

  “The man?” he asked, jumping for a particularly high spark of light.

  “The man who took your mother? Who keeps her locked in a box?”

  “Of course.”

  I put my hands on his face again. Forced his attention back to me. “Can you tell me what it is? The man’s name?”

  “I guess, but it won’t matter.”

  “Can you try me anyway?”

  Giving in, he lifted a slim shoulder. “It’s Reyes Alexander Farrow.”

  I turned to my husband about the same time his jaw hit the floor.

  8

  I’m not really into the whole “rise and shine” thing.

  Most days I just caffeinate and hope for the best.

  —BUMPER STICKER

  “You’re kidnapping fourteen-year-old girls and keeping them in locked boxes?” I asked him after Amber took Meiko to her room to rest. Quentin went to his room, which was right next door to Amber’s. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.

  I hoped Meiko wouldn’t realize he didn’t need sleep and would stay with her. It was after midnight. The kids needed their z’s.

  Uncle Bob and Cookie were still trying to figure out what was going on as well. It’s not every day one gets told her husband has been keeping a woman and a couple of children locked in a box for ten years.

  Reyes had sat back at the table, in shock. “Why would he say that?”

  “I have no idea, but he saw you. And while h
e wasn’t overly fond of you, he didn’t recognize you.”

  He did a deadpan thing.

  “You know what I mean,” I said, waving off his legitimate reaction. “That means this guy is, what? Going by your name? Why would someone go by your name?”

  “Maybe this is a setup,” Uncle Bob said. “Maybe someone wants Reyes worried about this to keep his mind off something else.”

  “Like a hell dimension expanding within our own?” Reyes said. “It’s him.”

  I shook my head. “Reyes, why would Lucifer do this? More importantly, how would he do it? Meiko’s a real boy who really died. Would Lucifer kill a child just to distract you?”

  “Do the words in a heartbeat mean anything?”

  “True. He would, but this would be an awfully elaborate setup. Either way, I don’t care why or how. We need to find them.”

  “Which is exactly what he would want. Us distracted by this case instead of finding a way to close the Shade.”

  “I can do both,” I said, offended. “I’m great at multitasking.”

  “Dutch, we have priorities.”

  “Yes, we do. I am prioritizing my need to find Rocket.”

  Cookie perked up. “Oh, good idea. He can tell us about your mother’s death.”

  “Actually, I was thinking he could tell us if Meiko’s mother and sister are still alive.”

  “Oh, yes. That, too.”

  “Any thoughts on where they are since someone”—I scowled at my husband—“leveled his home?”

  Reyes winced. “I’ll rebuild it. Once we close the hell dimension, I’ll rebuild it.”

  I tousled his hair, expecting a glare of annoyance for my efforts. Instead, I got a sheepish shrug. He really felt bad about leveling the abandoned asylum Rocket and Blue lived in. That made me much happier than it should have.

  “Do you know where they are now?” I asked him.

  “Since Rocket won’t have anything to do with me, Osh had to bring them here.”

  A gasp of delight escaped me. “They’re here?”

  He arched a brow in affirmation.

  “They’ve been here the whole time?”

  Another brow.

  I held my fists over my heart and said, “This is so great,” before taking off down the hall. I got about thirty feet before I realized I had no idea where I was going. I shouted back to him, “Where am I going?”