Dead Ice

by Laurell K. Hamilton

  "That's another thing I don't like about necromancers: You can kill them, but that doesn't always stop them."

  "Treat necromancers like master vampires, Jarvis. Take the head and heart, burn all of it, and scatter the ashes in three different bodies of water."

  "Are you really saying that's what you want done at your death?"

  "It's in my will, so yeah," I said.

  He studied me for a minute. "You're afraid you'll come back."

  "Yeah, I am."

  "You're marrying a vampire, why don't you want to come back?"

  "Because the only necromancers I've seen come back aren't vampires, they're just super-killing zombies, and I don't want that."

  "You know you're a monster, don't you?" he said.

  Gillingham said, "Agent Jarvis!" like he'd shocked her.

  "I'm outta here. At least in St. Louis they're more open-minded than this."

  "I'm open-minded, Blake, I just think you're dangerous, more dangerous than anyone knows. Maybe more dangerous than you know."

  I shook my head, and said, "Bye, Teresa, I hope you don't drink too much of this man's Kool-Aid."

  She made a point of shaking my hand; good for her. I hunted up Manning and Brent to say good-bye and good luck. They did show me good still-frame pictures of the one zombie that "Sir" took with him. She was dark complected, maybe Hispanic, maybe Greek, or southern Italian like our missing bad guy. She was pretty, with long dark hair and brown eyes that were terrified in every picture.

  I said good-bye to all the agents in sight that I wanted to talk to. Larry was staying on with the rest of the Kool-Aid squad, but he apologized for Jarvis and seemed to mean it. I wished them all happy hunting and left for the airport. It was time for me to go home.

  61

  I'D LEFT MY SUV at airport parking, because I hadn't had any idea how long I'd be out of state. The men in my life had tried picking me up from the airport for a while, but it only worked if I had a set schedule. Crime-fighting was hard to schedule, but I didn't mind as I drove home from the airport in the soft spring dark, or was that early-summer dark? May was one of those months that could be either in St. Louis, late-summer cool or almost midsummer hot. The calendar could say summer started at some arbitrary astronomical event, but the weather really got the last vote.

  My phone rang and the Bluetooth headset actually worked again; I don't know why that kept surprising me. "Hello, Blake here."

  "Anita, it's Manny."

  "Hey, what's up?"

  "I hate to ask, but Connie and Tomas went to pick up her dress and Tomas's tuxedo from the bridal shop, and now Connie's car won't start. I've asked everybody I can think of to go get them."

  "They can't call AAA?" I asked.

  "Tomas has to be on a bus for State tonight."

  There was a time in my life when I wouldn't have understood how important that was, but that was before Sin got into sports, and I learned that colleges started scouting as early as junior high. "Okay, tell me where they are and I'll make sure Tomas is on the bus."

  "Oh, Anita, you saved my life. Seriously, Rosita will kill me; I wasn't supposed to work tonight."

  "I take it Bert persuaded you otherwise."

  "I have one kid in college and a big wedding to pay for; Bert didn't have to persuade very hard. But I am covered in animal blood, and if I get any of it on the wedding clothes at this late date Rosita and Connie will both kill me."

  I laughed. "Where are the bride-to-be and Tomas?"

  He gave me the address for Pearls of Happiness Bridal. I made him repeat the name, hoping I'd misheard.

  "I know the area, they've got an old cemetery near there. I'll make sure the clothes arrive unstained."

  "Thank you, Anita, I owe you."

  "You do, but Rosita is going to give me all sorts of wedding info about caterers and things, so maybe it will all even out."

  "Rosita and I married in her mother's backyard, but for our eldest daughter's wedding it had to be the big deal."

  "Rosita seems happier than I've ever heard her."

  "She's talking about starting a wedding coordinator business, can you believe it, my Rosita?"

  "Tomas is thirteen; she's probably seeing her days as a stay-at-home mom ending."

  "But a new business beginning just as I'm thinking of retiring?"

  "I didn't know you were thinking of retiring, Manny."

  "Rosita and I had always planned for it when I was sixty, less than five years away."

  "Maybe she'll go to work and you can be a stay-at-home dad for Tomas's high school years."

  "Bite your tongue," he said, "and thank you for the rescue."

  "No problem, Manny." We hung up and I headed for the bridal shop. I was probably going to have to start thinking about dresses myself soon. God, I hated to shop, and I shuddered at the thought of what kind of dress Jean-Claude would prefer for me. I really hoped he was joking about having crowns made for our wedding, but I was pretty sure he was serious.

  I did a group text at a long light, letting them know I was on the ground, and had to rescue Manny's kids, and that I loved them. I got love back from everyone but Jean-Claude, and he might already be onstage at Guilty Pleasures. He was just announcing acts, not actually dancing tonight, but he still turned his phone off so it wouldn't disturb the atmosphere he was creating for the customers, and yes, that last was his phrasing, not mine.

  The last time I'd seen Connie and Tomas had been the company picnic for Animators Inc. last year. Manny had warned me that his son had grown four inches since then, so I was prepared to not recognize Tomas, but Connie was twenty-five. I knew what she looked like, but I couldn't remember what kind of car she drove. Damn, I should have asked.

  I called Manny back, and asked. "Silver Chevy Sonic, and I'll send you both their cell phone numbers just in case. I'm about to have to turn my phone off for the ceremony."

  "It's okay, Manny, I got this." He thanked me again, and we hung up.

  I had no idea what a Chevy Sonic looked like, but rather than ask, when I stopped at a red light, I Googled the car and there were all sorts of pictures of it. It was a smallish, midsize car and sort of roundish. I was not one of those cops that could rattle off car makes and models, or give a great description of a car from a crime scene. If there was an animal involved, that I could describe like gangbusters, but cars puzzled me.

  Connie's car was in the parking lot. She'd even parked under a light, and close to the bridal shop, whose bright windows were advertising prom dresses more than anything else. I guess it was that time of year. It was brightly lit and neither of Manny's kids were in sight.

  I parked beside the car, got out, and peeked inside it. There was a large garment bag on a hanger laid carefully on the backseat. I guess Connie hadn't wanted to risk wrinkling her wedding dress. I didn't blame her. There were two small garment bags hanging up. One was probably Tomas's tux. No idea what the other smaller bag was, some mysterious wedding thing that I'd probably be learning about soon enough.

  Maybe they'd gone back into Pearls of Happiness, though I hated the name enough to never go near it. But if there wasn't a Combat Bride shop I'd probably go someplace equally saccharine. They had just gone back in to call AAA, though they both had cell phones. I took a deep breath, let it out slow, and tried to tell the tight feeling in my gut that they'd just gone back inside the shop for some reason. Being a cop of any flavor tended to make you paranoid. The paranoia wasn't always right.

  I went to the bridal shop, telling myself that they'd be there. Maybe they had to use the bathroom? It didn't have to be something bad. I just needed to tell the cop part of me to lighten up. It was so bright inside the shop that it almost hurt after being out in the dark parking lot.

  A woman in a nice but conservative black dress hurried forward, smiling. "Hello, I'm Anne, welcome to Pearls of Happiness, we're here for all your bridal needs, how may I help you tonight?"

  I wondered if I'd looked young enough, would the slogan have
been "for all your prom needs"? "Hi, Anne, I'm looking for Connie and Tomas Rodriguez; her car broke down and they called me to help out."

  "Oh, yes, Connie did come in and say something like that. She was going to wait for a friend, and her brother had some kind of important sports thing at school."

  I forced myself to smile wider. "Yes, Tomas is going to State. In fact, I need to get him to his bus ASAP, so if you could just tell them I'm here."

  She frowned and looked flustered. "They went back out to get the bridal gown; Connie didn't want to leave it in the car, you know how brides are."

  I didn't actually, but I nodded and smiled, and said, "The dress is in the car still, but Connie and Tomas aren't in the parking lot."

  "They're probably sitting in the car," she said.

  "I checked the car, that's how I know her dress is on the backseat and two other garment bags are hanging up."

  "And they're not in the car?" she asked.

  I took a deep calming breath. "No, Anne, they're not, and they're not in here?"

  "No, and"--she looked up at a wall clock--"oh my, they went out to get the dress half an hour ago. You're sure they aren't out there somewhere?"

  "I'm sure they're out there somewhere, Anne, because they're not in here, but they aren't in the parking lot." I resisted the urge to ask why she hadn't checked on them. She was a civilian, a soft, fluffy, easily flustered civilian, and it wasn't her job to serve and protect, or even to not be a fucking useless . . . It was my nerves talking. I would have been totally useless at her job here with all the sequined dresses and demanding brides; we all have our strengths. I told myself that as I dialed Connie's cell phone.

  I prayed, "Please let them have called a friend, her fiance, anything. Let me have made this trip for nothing, just as long as they're all right."

  Connie's phone went to voice mail. I didn't leave a message. I hung up and called Tomas. "Come on, come on, pick up, pick up."

  Anne the saleslady had picked up my anxiety by now and was hovering worriedly around me. I walked away farther into the shop for some privacy and because my nerves were enough without hers. The one thing I didn't like about the headset was that ambient noise could make it harder to hear.

  I left a message this time. "Tomas, this is Anita Blake. I'm here to see you get to the bus for State. Where are you and Connie?"

  I called Connie's phone back. Voice mail again, damn it. "Connie, this is Anita Blake, Manny sent me to get you guys. I'm at the bridal shop, where are you?"

  I didn't want to call Manny yet. There could be logical, safe explanations, but part of me knew that if Connie was so worried about her wedding dress that she didn't want it left in the car for a few minutes, she would not have walked off and left it in the car like this. My Spideysense had been tingling since I found the empty car. Sometimes it's not paranoia; it's just the truth.

  My phone rang; it was Connie's number. I hit the button on the earpiece. "Connie, where are you guys?"

  "I'm sorry, Anita, Consuela can't come to the phone right now." It was a man's voice. It seemed familiar.

  "Why can't Connie come to the phone?" I asked.

  "She's a little tied up, or should I say duct-taped."

  "Where's Tomas?"

  "He's nearby, but I wanted to talk to my sister alone." I could hear that he was in a car, driving. They weren't that far yet. Maybe.

  "Sister. Manny and Rosita only have one son."

  "That's right, Manny and Rosita only have one son, and two beautiful daughters," he said.

  I didn't like the way he emphasized beautiful, but I also knew the phrasing about Manny and Rosita was important to him. I just didn't know why. He hadn't told me not to contact the police. Thanks to being on the headset I could text and he wouldn't hear anything, like the text alert noise, not if I turned off my sounds. I knew how to do that, yay! I texted Zerbrowski while I kept trying to think of ways to keep the familiar voice talking. As long as he was talking he couldn't hurt them, or that's what I told myself.

  The text to Zerbrowski was simple: "Manny's daughter & son kidnapped. I'm talking on phone with the kidnapper."

  "So how can you be their brother, if they only have three kids?" I asked.

  "Half-brother," he said.

  Zerbrowski texted back: "where are you?"

  I got the address from Anne the saleslady.

  He texted that a car was on its way to my location now.

  I texted back: "I don't know if lights & sirens will spook him, or help?"

  "I'll make it a silent run," he texted.

  I trusted his judgment. I went back to talking to the nut job on the phone, and suddenly I knew the voice. Brent had called him a nut job just three days ago during the live feed. My pulse was in my throat, and I had to breathe carefully for it not to show in my voice. "So you're Manny's son from a different mother."

  "Yes, did he tell you about me?"

  I debated on what to say, and finally chose truth; I didn't always lie well enough. "No, but I know he was wild when he was young, and Rosita never sowed any wild oats."

  "She looks so dull and ordinary. How could he have chosen her over the Senora?"

  "Senora?" I made it a question.

  "The Senora--don't you know who I am, Anita? Don't you know who my mama was?"

  I had one of those moments when things click into place. "Oh holy shit, Dominga Salvador doesn't have two nephews, she has a nephew and a son. That's why you called yourself sir, like Senora."

  He laughed. "Very good. Yes, I felt like an outsider all my life. My brother, mother, and father all seemed so ordinary. I got straight A's, excelled at track, got a scholarship to college, and my brother just failed over and over. I was never like my family, and then I found out why. My mother wasn't my mother, my father not my father, my brother only my cousin. It was a revelation, Anita, a revelation that changed my life."

  "It's always good to figure out where you belong," I said, because I couldn't think of what to say.

  A uniformed officer was coming through the door of the bridal shop. I had my badge visible. I texted, "I'm on phone with kidnapper. Trying to keep him talking." and showed it to the officer.

  He nodded, and used a notepad that Anne brought him to write, "More units en route."

  More cops were coming. I just had to figure out a way to get information out of the kidnapper that would help us locate them. "My mother was dead, but my father wasn't. He had a nice family; they looked happy."

  I didn't like him using the past tense. "You came to St. Louis and found Manny, and have been watching him."

  "I saw his daughters and son; by rights they should have been my siblings. I could have been their older brother. I could have helped them, and my papa could have taught me how to raise the dead, but instead he taught you. He taught you everything he was supposed to teach me."

  "It was a job; I've taught new animators, too."

  "No!" He shouted it. "Don't belittle what my father taught you."

  "I'm not belittling it, just saying that Manny and I are work friends. He doesn't think of me as another daughter."

  "But he taught you, and my mother saw the greatness in you, Anita. I found people who would talk to me about the Senora. They said she wanted you to meet me. Said we'd have powerful babies together."

  "Manny told me that, just like Dominga wanted to have a baby with him, because it would be powerful."

  "And I am powerful."

  "Dominga didn't tell Manny she got pregnant."

  "You don't know that."

  "I do, because I know Manny; if he'd known he had a son he'd have tried to be in your life in some way."

  "He didn't want me."

  "I swear to you that Manny would have loved you if he had known." In my head I thought about him describing one of the nephews as just wrong from the beginning, and then I realized the nephew who was "wrong" wasn't the one Dominga had wanted me to breed with; it was the good nephew.

  "He rejected his true power when
he left the Senora, and me with it."

  "He described you as a polite, good boy, Max."

  "He mentioned me?"

  "Yeah, that the other nephew Artie was a screw-up, but you were great."

  "Arturo fails at everything, he has no ambition."

  "You have plenty of ambition, don't you, Max?"

  "I do, but I go by my full name, Anita. If my father really talked of me, then tell me my real name."

  "Maximiliano," I said.

  He lau ghed again, but it held a brittle edge to it now, as if the sound could break like glass if you hit it too hard. It was the kind of laugh that would eventually start gibbering in corners. I wanted Connie and Tomas away from him before that happened.

  "Yes, yes, I am Maximiliano."

  I wanted to ask him what happened with college, and that scholarship? I wanted to know how the good boy, Max, got to be the monster who tortured souls, but I wanted him to keep talking. There were more police now. Anne had pointed out Connie's car. They'd be looking for clues, and someone in a suit had written on the notepad, "Try to find out where he's taking them."

  I wrote back, "How?"

  He made some suggestions and I tried. "So where are you, Connie, and Tomas going tonight?"

  "Why, so the police can find them in time?"

  I did not like his "find them in time" at all. "I can't meet you for that coffee date if I don't know where you are."

  He was quiet for a few breaths. I thought I heard someone else make a noise. It was all I could do not to ask if it was Connie, but I didn't want him to know I could hear anything over the phone. I was afraid he'd hang up.

  The detective in the suit wrote, "Do not agree to meet with him!"

  I turned away from him. If he'd give me a location I could find him and find the kids. Manny's kids. Connie was almost my age, but she was still his kid.

  The detective grabbed my arm and waved the note in my face. I jerked free of his hand and waved my badge back at him. "You said it yourself, Maximiliano; the Senora, your mother, wanted you and me to hook up. I've seen your zombies, they're amazing. We could do amazing, scary stuff together."

  "I'm not crazy, or stupid, Anita." He sounded angry now.

  "I know that."

  "No, you don't. You think I'm crazy like my real mama."

  "I thought she was evil, more than crazy," I said.

  He laughed then. "That was honest."