Dag battled back the urge to seize her again and shake her. Perhaps he could rattle some sense loose inside that head of hers. Instead, he turned his glare on the door. “Are you certain?”
Kylie shrugged. “Try it yourself.”
He shouldered past her in the narrow space of the stairwell. The knock he gave packed a bit more force than the human’s had. So much, in fact, that when his knuckles made contact for the third time, the panel shuddered and clicked before swinging an inch or two inward.
He took a single breath and froze.
“Wow, it must have been unlocked. Maybe he really is in there.” She stepped forward, her face alight with curiosity. “Should we just go in, or—”
Her hand reached out to push open the door and made contact before he could stop her. She didn’t press hard, but it was enough. The door swung halfway open, and the distinctive, sickly sweet miasma of death rolled out over the threshold.
“Don’t,” he snapped. “Wait here.”
He could smell the blood and the taint of expelled waste that accompanied death, but no other fragrance greeted him in the small apartment. Instinct told him the killer was long gone, but he would make certain before he allowed the female to enter.
The body of a young man lay in the center of the main room, half on a layer of worn beige carpet, the other half sprawled over a grimy expanse of gray vinyl flooring. His throat had been slit in a stroke so deep the white bones of his spine peeked out through the gaping hole. Another, equally deep wound bit through his chest from his sternum nearly to his pelvis. Blood pooled beneath the corpse, already congealed on the slick surface of the tile and soaked deep into the pile of the carpet. The male had clearly been dead for hours.
“Got in himmel.”
Startled, Dag reached down and twitched the edge of the man’s clothing to cover the worst of the abdominal wound. His gaze shot up to find the disobedient female had not only not remained outside while he checked the apartment, she had walked right up beside him and stood gazing down at the dead body with an expression of mixed horror and compassion. Her brown eyes had softened, and she held a hand over her mouth that she only removed to speak.
“Is that him? Is that Dennis Ott?”
Deciding it would be worthless to chastise her right then, especially since his senses told him the danger had passed and they alone occupied the apartment, Dag shrugged. “I do not know, but who else would it be?”
Kylie finally lowered her hand and wrapped her arms around her torso as if giving herself comfort. “I don’t know, either. A roommate? A friend? Lover? His feet are bare, though—just socks—so chances are he lived here. No reason otherwise for him not to be wearing shoes this time of year. It’s not like anyone in here has been trying to protect the carpet. At least, not in the last decade.”
Dag nodded. “You are correct. I noticed the lack, but did not consider the significance.”
“Does he have any identification?” When he looked at her curiously, her shoulders twitched. “Some guys carry their wallets around all day. Maybe he’s got a driver’s license in his pocket.”
From the way she jerked her pointed little chin toward the body, he gathered she had no intention of checking for herself. He didn’t blame her. While he had seen death on countless occasions, he doubted this human had. She appeared too young and innocent to have encountered the sort of violence to which he himself had become inured. Mortals felt a natural reluctance to stray too close to the blatant work of death.
He crouched beside the body, careful to avoid the blood, and used his long reach to pat the pockets in the victim’s black denim jeans. In the first two he found nothing, but when he crossed to the man’s left side, he felt objects in both front and rear pockets. From the back he withdrew a leather wallet, also black, the leather already soaked and stiffened by blood. He held it up for Kylie to take while he investigated the front pocket.
She took the item gingerly, two fingers very carefully plucking it from his hand by the driest corner she could find. Stepping around the blood pool, she set it on the edge of a small table and flipped it open. “It’s him. Here’s his license. It’s got a picture.”
Dag grunted and withdrew a key ring and a folded piece of paper from inside the worn jeans. The objects had been spared the worst of the blood spatter, the note hardly smudged. Uninterested in the keys, he tossed them onto the table near Kylie and unfolded the crisp paper.
Sally’s
Alley 423
10:30 P.M.
Wile E. Koyote
He read the short note aloud and looked toward Kylie. She remained beside the small table, fiddling with the dead man’s key chain and frowning.
“That’s from last night,” she said. “I’m Wile E. It’s one of my online IDs, and that’s the place and time we were supposed to meet. I guess now I know why he didn’t show. And here I was mad at him for standing me up.” The corners of her mouth pulled down, and her dark eyes took on a haze of guilt.
“He was already dead,” Dag confirmed. He found himself trying to gentle his normally gruff voice. The female appeared distressed enough without thinking him annoyed with her. More annoyed than usual, that is. “We will have to find a new lead to pursue.”
Kylie nodded, not looking at him. Her gaze had dropped to the tangle of keys and baubles in her hand. Instead of setting it aside and joining him in leaving, however, she blinked and peered closer at a thin rectangle of black plastic. Her fingers fiddled for a moment, and a small but powerful light shone briefly from the narrow end.
She made an excited sound. She enjoyed artificial light that thoroughly?
“I have one of these,” she said, and attacked the complicated mass of metal and plastic until she had separated the miniature black flashlight from the rest. “I picked it up at a trade show somewhere. Some company had them for a giveaway. It’s a mini LED flashlight on this end—” She pressed a small button on the side and the light shone briefly once again. “But on the other end, it’s got a portable USB drive with a surprising amount of storage space.”
Dag shook his head. “I think this is where I ask you more questions.”
She gave a shallow snort. “It’s so weird to be talking to someone who doesn’t even get basic tech. I need to give you a crash course in digital living, big guy. It’s an electronic archive, basically. A small device that stores large amounts of data so you can transfer it between locations and devices.” She gazed up at him and lifted an eyebrow. “I wonder what was so important to Mr. Ott that he carried it around with him wherever he went?”
“Take it,” he said, glancing around the space. “I am unsure it will prove to have any significance, as I see nothing to indicate that he was deep in the inner workings of the Order. But no other item appears important to our investigation.”
Kylie looked dubious. “You can tell that just by looking around? Maybe he didn’t like early demonic apocalypse as an interior decorating choice.”
He wondered if he would ever get used to a human who questioned his every word or action simply on general principle. In the past, most of them cowered when they saw him, if they didn’t run screaming in terror. But not this female. She made him want to scream.
“The Darkness is a pollution,” he explained, struggling for patience. “Humans who have close contact with it over long periods of time are altered by it. They begin to carry it around with them like an illness, leaving traces of it behind. The places where they spend the most time are usually heavily contaminated with its stench.”
She wrinkled her nose. “All I can smell is blood and general stink.”
“Exactly. He was not working closely with the Order for long, if at all. He had certainly not participated in any of their darkest rituals. Those actions leave stains that cannot be disguised. Searching him out may yield us nothing we can use.”
“Hey, we had to start somewhere.”
“True, but we are finished here. Come. We should not continue to linger.”
He led her outside, engaging the lock on the knob before pulling the door closed behind him. “This dwelling has other occupants. They will begin to notice the smell soon enough.”
“Ew. It’s still winter. That could take days. Besides, that’s just wrong.” She shook her head. “I’ll send the police an anonymous tip when we get home. I can send an e-mail they won’t be able to trace back to me. It’s the least I can do.”
The alley beside the house and the street out front were deserted as they walked back to the vehicle, for which Dag felt grateful. He hated when his work caught the attention of humans, especially ones who believed they had some sort of authority over him. They had no grasp of what he fought against, and never possessed the necessary training or skill to defend themselves, let alone to face what he and his brothers had been summoned to face.
Kylie’s words stayed with him as he folded and crammed himself back into the passenger seat of her torturously small automobile. “Why do you say that? The least anyone can ever do is nothing. To do anything beyond is therefore not the least.”
“It’s an expression, Gol—er, Dag,” she said as she engaged the motor and maneuvered away from the curb. “And it’s true. Human beings should treat each other with respect and decency. Which means that if I know of someone who has died and needs to be returned to his family for a proper burial, then I make sure he gets found. It may not be the least that it’s possible to do, but it’s the least I can possibly do.”
Her solemn expression and the firm set of her jaw gave evidence that she felt strongly about her words. Dag found that both surprising and fascinating. Through his long centuries of existence, he had dealt most often with only two types of humans, Wardens and nocturnis. The first fought evil and protected their fellow man as a sworn duty, not out of deep feelings for them, and the second quested endlessly for dark power, uncaring of who or what they destroyed in their endless and insatiable search. To encounter one who did right because it was right counted as a novel experience and made the small female even more interesting to him.
He would need to take care, he realized as they made their way back to Boston, not to let his fascination with the human get out of control. While his brothers might be willing to accept the risk inherent in taking to mate a female Warden who must stand with them to face the latest nocturni threat, to Dag the danger was simply too great. He had lived a thousand years with his duty as his sole companion; he could live a thousand more without giving in to the weakness of emotions. It would be better that way.
For everyone.
Chapter Six
“Odem yesoydoy meyofor vesoyfo leyofor,” beyne leveyne iz gut a trunk bronfn.
“Man begins in dust and ends in dust,” meanwhile it’s good to drink some vodka.
The Guardian remained silent on the trip back to the brownstone, but this time the quiet felt different. On the way over, it had felt as if he were trying to conserve his strength to deal with her; now it just felt like brooding.
Kylie didn’t know what he had to stew about. Not only had she totally behaved herself on their little field trip, but she thought the thumb drive currently burning a hole in her pocket had real potential to at least point them in the right direction. Once they got home, they could take a look and move forward from there. She just wished she could offer him some reassurance more convincing than, “I’ve got a feeling.” So far, he didn’t seem to find those words all that persuasive.
Maybe if she sang him the song from the Buffy musical … But no, she wasn’t that cruel, and she couldn’t carry a tune in a waterproof bucket.
In the end, she decided the only way to deal with Mr. Grumpy Pants was to just forget about it. Don’t think about him or his moods and just go on with life the way she would on any other day. Or, you know, any other day when she was hunting for the leader of an evil cult bent on bringing about the end of the world. And who hadn’t had one of those, right?
Because Kylie had a generous soul, she didn’t ignore Dag completely. In fact, when she swung by her favorite deli to pick up lunch, she even got something for him, too. Pastrami, no less. If that wasn’t the act of a selfless woman, she didn’t know what was.
She also avoided chattering at him, since he seemed to have no discernible appreciation for the art of conversation. No, he appeared more inclined to take the strong and silent thing to a new level of macho. Honestly, sometimes she wondered about the toxic effects of testosterone in the bloodstream.
When they returned to the house, she headed straight for the office, where she settled behind her desk with a fresh bottle of soda, a crisp dill pickle, and a monument to rye bread and the kosher deli tradition. Dag hovered in the doorway and scowled. It made for a change of pace from the glower.
“Do you never consume a proper meal?”
Kylie paused with half of her sandwich halfway to her mouth. “Do you never take the stick out of your butt?”
He reared back, his expression going from cloudy to tornado warning. “What are you suggesting, human?”
“It means relax, which is some advice I highly suggest you take. You look like a fault line about to crack.” She took a huge bite of meat and bread, and stared at him while she chewed.
“And you appear not to be taking our mission seriously,” he accused, dropping his own lunch beside hers. Presumably to add greater emphasis to his looming and scowling. “Do you fail to comprehend what is at stake here? Do I need to explain what will happen to you, your family, your friends, your world if the nocturnis succeed in freeing the Seven from the prisons in which they have been bound?”
Kylie washed down the pastrami with a hit of cola, her own expression turning grumpy. Not only was the Guardian a bad influence, but now he was talking down to her. She hated being talked down to. It went on the list right next to being ignored and losing.
Okay, fine, she had a pretty extensive List. Capital L.
“Look, brick boy, I comprehend everything just fine,” she snarled, leaning back in her chair, her jiggling foot going still in a sure sign of irritation. “But I also comprehend that pacing around every second of the day grumbling about what might happen isn’t a very effective strategy for stopping those things from happening. We have a plan, we have the first clue we were looking for, and we know what our end goal is. To my mind, that means the best strategy is not to get all pissy with each other, but to concentrate on the task at hand until we decide what the next task is. You think you have a better idea?”
“Yes. I will rip the heads of the nocturnis from their bodies and throw them into the fires of hell.”
“Okay, first of all, ew. And second of all, go for it, stud.” She opened her eyes wide and pressed her fingertips to her open mouth. “Oh, wait, that’s right. You can’t. Because you don’t even know where they are. Which brings us back to my point; that the best thing we can do is follow the clues that lead us in their direction. Once we find them, you can get to ripping. I’ll avert my eyes.”
Kylie watched as the gargoyle struggled with his anger, his hands balling into fists and the muscle in his jaw twitching like a Mexican jumping bean. She continued plowing through her sandwich, and her foot resumed bouncing. What could she say? She had a weakness for good pastrami.
Abruptly, Dag let out a muffled roar, flashed a bit of fang, then relaxed. “I do not like waiting,” he admitted, grabbing the white takeout bag and dropping into King David’s chair like a pouting toddler. “And inaction annoys me. To have been denied more than paltry resistance by the nocturni scum who attacked you yesterday, and then to be faced with no real target to pursue today has put me out of sorts. Without a battle before me, I am rendered useless.”
Okay, that she could understand, even relate to. Kyl
ie hated feeling like her hands were tied, too.
Like she said, it was a big list.
“I get it, but I’d hardly call you useless,” she said, crunching into her pickle. She chewed a minute then elaborated. “Of the two of us, you’re the only one who really understands what we’re up against. I couldn’t have gone into Ott’s apartment earlier and known right away that the nocturnis were gone and that he wasn’t very high up in the chain of command. That was all you.”
Kylie paused and frowned. “That does bring up a good question, though. It’s been bugging me since we first talked to Wynn and Knox. I get that in the cases of the others, the nocturnis knew about them beforehand—where the other Guardians were and that the other girls had magical abilities. But I can’t figure out why anyone from the Order would go after me. I mean, I didn’t know about you guys ahead of time; I didn’t really even think of my skills as anything other than nonmagical; and they might have known you were a Guardian ahead of time, but they didn’t attack you. They attacked me. What’s up with that?”
Dag unwrapped his sandwich, his expression thoughtful. “I had not considered such a question, but perhaps the answer lies in the clue you believe we have collected.” He gestured to the thumb drive she had dumped on the desk in her hurry to get to lunch. “If the dead man was indeed a member of the Order, perhaps he was the one who brought you to their attention. If you indicated curiosity about their business, you may have piqued their interest.”
“I suppose you could be right.” She wrapped up the second half of her sandwich and set it aside. No one had a stomach big enough to finish one of Saul’s finest in one sitting. “And I guess that means it’s time to get back to work.”
Kylie took a long swig of soda, cracked her knuckles, and reached for the thumb drive, plugging it into a free USB port. When her machine recognized the device, she scanned it for viruses (because hello, not stupid) and found it clear. “Okay,” she muttered to herself. “Let’s see what this puppy has to tell us.”
Rocked by Love (Gargoyles Series) Page 7
