Marty Phillips (Book 2): The Taste of Blood

by Kieran Double

  “Karen’s not bisexual, Tasaria,” I said stiffly, though I knew absolutely nothing about her sexuality. Educated guess, then, so sue me.

  “Here’s me hoping anyway.”

  “You do that.” I turned to Susie. “You brought the laptop?”

  “Yeah,” she answered. I hadn’t told her what I had planned “Why?”

  “You’ll need it.”

  9

  Passing Through

  All that lives must die,

  Passing through nature, to eternity.

  (William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act I, Scene II, the Queen)

  “Are you sure this will work?”

  I turned to Karen. “Honestly, I have no idea whether this will work. I just thought it might”

  “It will work. Trust me,” Susie said confidently. “I’ve done stuff like this before.”

  “You have?”

  “Too many times. How did you think Mom got those pictures of Annie?” Susie answered. She was typing away quickly on my laptop, attempting to hack into the cameras of Karen’s building. We’d set up miniature cameras around the route up to Karen’s apartment. “Dad never gave her the password to our cloud. I had to hack it for her”

  “D’you mind teaching me stuff later?” said Tasaria curiously.

  “Maybe” conceded Susie. “There, done.” She scribbled down a few words. “Here, take this. Look it up, and enter the password. You’ll be able to see all the cameras in the room and all the ones we set up.”

  “We’ll review the footage tomorrow morning,” I said, glad of my tech-experts help. “If our guy comes in tonight, we’ll have him on camera.”

  “But we won’t have a name.”

  “Not necessarily,” I said. “This guy probably has priors. That means photographic identification.”

  “You have that kind of resources?” asked Karen.

  “Captain Schlaukopf still lets me use the Police Department intranet sometimes. I’m sure he won’t mind.”

  “And if that doesn’t work?”

  “We can just scare him off. Make sure he knows that we know who he is,” I said.

  “That probably won’t work, though. Will it?”

  “Don’t worry,” I reassured her. “A face might not be a name, but’s a lead, and we’ll keep a watch outside.”

  “We will?” said Tasaria. “Who’s taking tonight?”

  “You’re not working this, Tasaria,” I reminded her.

  “Hey, look, it’s either hanging around a hot girl’s apartment or getting outrageously drunk at ‘The Foxes Den’” Tasaria said coolly “Your choice, boss.”

  “Fine. But remember, don’t harass her either.”

  “Look… a little bit of conter fleurette, as the French say, is harmless. It’s nothing like sexual harassment,” said Tasaria. “And if it was, you’d be screwed.”

  “Call me if anything happens. If anything happens” I said firmly. “And, for god’s sake, if you see him, don’t use force.”

  “Why not…? That little creep...”

  “You’re not an officer of the law. If you attack him, any hope for a conviction is gone.”

  “You killed Michael Merkel.”

  It was Susie who answered. “He murdered Marty’s wife. It was personal. And Detective Muller had deputized him. It was different.”

  “Was it really?”

  “Just do what I tell you, and everything will be fine,” I said evenly.

  “Even if he gets away because of it.”

  “If he’s getting away from the scene, just follow him,” I said, frustrated. Brasoveanu’s seemed to have a habit of doing that to me “If that doesn’t work call 911, let uniforms chase him down. Damn it, Tasaria, it’s not that complicated.”

  “If you say so, boss.”

  “I do.”

  “Well, then. I had better obey, hadn’t I?” said Tasaria, kissing me on the cheek and leaving the apartment.

  When Tasaria had left, Karen said, “Is there something going on between you two?”

  “Not you too,” I complained.

  “I thought you were campaigning to make something go on between you two, Marty,” said Susie. “And now you’re complaining about people getting it wrong.”

  “What? Denial of the existence of the relationship is what makes the development of the relationship so exciting. Like Castle and Beckett in ‘Castle’ or Shawn and Juliet in ‘Psych’. Besides, making premature accusations stunts the growth of the relationship in the first place.”

  Karen giggled. “You seem well versed the in the art of dating.”

  “Of flirting, more like,” said Susie, “hasn’t got any action since my mother, and that was a one-night stand. All words, and no actions. He’s useless and these ‘glory days’ he talks about are complete BS.”

  “Oh, really? I bet you I’ll get a woman in bed before the week is out.”

  “You’re on, Marty. Fifty bucks says you can’t.”

  “Fifty bucks it is, then.”

  “Get prepared to lose.”

  “I’ll just get prepared to get laid.”

  “We’ll see who’s so confident in a week’s time,” said Susie, putting the laptop back in its sleeve.

  “Yes, we will,” I said, twirling a giggling Karen around in my arms.

  Tasaria was across the street, sitting in Nicolae’s Gran Torino. She seemed to have planned the whole thing out, as if she’d known how things were going to work out. It struck me then that a Brasoveanu was rather like Jack Sparrow. To paraphrase a famous pirate film, did they plan it all out, or did they just make it up as they went along?

  Both probably. It would have been hard to do a stake-out on a Harley-Davidson. So Nicolae had taken the bike – though he had been loath to leave his baby behind.

  “Remember what I said, and do not, under any circumstances, confront the bastard,” I said, leaning in the window.

  “Yes, I know,” said Tasaria. “Do not attack. Do not confront him. Call you or Susie if anything happens. Follow the creep, and call 911 if he’s getting away. We done, professor?”

  “Enough of the attitude, Miss Brasoveanu.”

  “‘Enough of the attitude’. What exactly do you mean by that statement? That you’ve had enough of my attitude. Or I’ve had enough attitude. And if you call it the attitude, what if I change it to a different attitude, one just as disrespectful? In any case, you’re being grammatically incorrect. Where’s the verb? There is none. A grammatically correct sentence has to have a verb in. It’s just wrong otherwise.”

  “Oh, shut up, will you?”

  “Only if you do first.”

  I sighed.

  It was two o’clock in the morning when Tasaria called. The years had trained my body to survive on very little sleep. Even so, I tumbled out of bed, half-blind. I left Susie in the office, sleeping.

  The streets of Seattle were quiet when I got into the Jag. I arrived outside Karen’s apartment about five minutes later. The cops and an ambulance were already there, the whole block was closed off. I leaped out of the Jag, pulling out my Glock and my Private Investigator’s license.

  In the center of the uniforms were a man and a woman, both in suites. Detectives. “Marty Phillips, Marlowe Investigations. What’s this about?”

  “Detectives Schwartz and O’Neill. Sexual assault and Child Abuse Unit” The man’s face flashed into that of a Lion’s, Löwenvolk. Dangerous man. I tried to ignore it. The Löwenmann, Schwartz, was the one who had spoken. His hair was blonde, his eyes dark brown.

  “That your employee over there? A Ms. Tasaria Brasoveanu,” said O’Neill, her hair a flaming mane down her back. She was indicating towards Tasaria and Karen over by the ambulance.

  “Yes, though she prefers Miss Brasoveanu. Makes her feel younger,” I answered, smiling. This probably wasn’t going anywhere good.

  “Are you aware that Miss Brasoveanu has a criminal record?” said Schwartz. He didn’t seem very comfortable either. I guessed he knew I was a Huntsma
n. The Verstecktvolk community was tight-knit. It was in the best interests of every Gefährlich Verstecktmann to know the local Huntsmen. “Fraud, assault, harassment, illegal possession of weapons.”

  “That sounds about right.”

  “And you employed her anyway?” said O’Neill incredulously.

  “Her family are family friends. Our grandfathers knew each other. I knew her in High School.”

  “But she doesn’t have Private Investigator’s license,” said Schwartz. “Does she?”

  “No. We applied for one, though. And she had a license as a PI in New York.”

  “What’s she doing on the West Coast?” said O’Neill.

  “I don’t know why. She just turned up a few days ago.”

  “And asked for a job?” said Schwartz.

  “Asked for somewhere to sleep actually. Then I offered the job. I needed the extra employee. Business has been booming the last few weeks, now that I’ve got my drinking problem under control. I just couldn’t take all the cases”

  “I doubt the license will matter much,” said O’Neill cautiously. “Given the circumstances”

  “Given the circumstances?”

  “The man in the back of our car…” said Schwartz. “He was attempting to rape Karen Arthurs, your client I understand, when Ms. Brasoveanu kicked down the door and pulled him off of her. She’d already dialed 911.”

  “She was just performing her duties as a concerned citizen,” supplied O’Neill, as if trying to counter her partner’s cynicism.

  Schwartz looked at me funny again. “Can I have a moment with you? Alone.”

  “Sure.”

  I walked to the corner of the street with Schwartz, as far away from everyone else as possible. I glanced into the back of Schwartz and O’Neill’s car. The perp had sunken eyes, his skin pulled taut across his face. He looked starved, of everything. Love, emotion, food. And I somehow felt sorry for him.

  “Look,” he said earnestly “I know what your kind of people thinks about mine. But I’m was a cop, and that comes first.”

  “Good. ‘cause your species doesn’t matter to me. My sister is a bit radical in her beliefs. And I don’t agree with her. Anyway, I legally adopted a Wolffrau. Next to one of those, you’re a cuddly toy.”

  “You’re not good at subtlety are you?”

  “Do I need to be subtle? I’ve made myself clear enough.”

  “Yes, you have. But I always assumed you’d be better than your sister.”

  “You’ve met her?”

  “She’s the Assistant City Prosecutor. I’m a senior detective. What did you expect? Thankfully, I’m on the list of Ungefährlich Verstecktvolk, and so are the rest of my family. She can’t touch me, legally. But that doesn’t mean she has to like me, and she doesn’t.”

  “I’ll, eh… have a word with her.”

  “And you think that’ll work?”

  “It will if Susie agrees with me. If not… I’ll take my chances.”

  “That bad?”

  “That bad,” I agreed.

  I went over to Karen and Tasaria at the ambulance. Neither of them was seriously hurt. Karen looked shocked. She had a black eye, bruises on her face and wrists. A blanket covered her thin frame, underneath, her clothes were disorganized. Tasaria was just cool, normal. It took a lot to disturb a Brasovneau.

  “How are you doing, Karen, considering?”

  “Better than I thought I would be, thanks to my bodyguard,” said Karen, smiling at Tasaria.

  “Be careful now, don’t give her any ideas,” I said.

  Then Karen burst into tears. “Oh my god. What must you think of me? He just came up behind me. I didn’t even know he was in my flat.”

  “You wouldn’t have,” said Tasaria flatly “He had a copy of your key – must have snatched yours a while back – and getting into the building mustn’t have been too hard.”

  “Anyway, he just came at me, pulling at my clothes. I screamed,” Karen said. “A few seconds later, Tasaria kicked down the door, and pulled him off. She roughed him up a bit and locked him the bathroom, waited for the police to arrive.”

  My phone beeped in my pocket. I ignored it. It went off again. I ignored it again. Karen was busy talking away. Tasaria was silent. “Aren’t you going to answer that, Marty?”

  “What?” I said, dazed. “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s Susie.”

  “At this time in the morning?”

  “I swear she’s got a tracker on my phone. Every time I say I’m somewhere I’m not, or when I do the opposite of what she told me to do, she seems to know where I am.”

  “GPS, my friend, GPS,” explained Tasaria. “Like they use for house arrest cases. With the right software – and I’m sure Susie has access to it – it’s quite easy.” She looked awkward, almost as if she didn’t really mean what she was saying, or, for that matter, care about it at all. “Marty, I think I’ll be leaving. I was just passing through anyway.”

  “What do you mean leaving?” I asked, realizing as I did the answer. “Tasaria, can I have a word, in private?”

  Tasaria didn’t say yes or no, just walked away, towards where I had talked to Schwartz. “You can’t make me stay, Marty.”

  “I can, and I will,” I said simply. “I need to.”

  “No, Marty,” said Tasaria, pushing herself away from me. “I need to be free. I’ve got the cops on my tail now.”

  “On your tail? If you think there’s any chance you’ll be arrested for something, you’ve got another thing coming for you. When Ashley decides someone shouldn’t be prosecuted, they aren’t. It’s as simple as that.”

  “No, it’s not, you idiot,” said Tasaria, slapping me. “I don’t give a fuck about any convictions. It’s having the cops look into my life, nosing around where they don’t belong.”

  “You’re afraid they’ll find out?”

  “I’m not afraid, of anything, Marty Phillips.” Tasaria walked away from me, towards the Gran Torino across the road.

  “Then why do you keep running away?” I called after her.

  She stopped and turned around slowly. “Is that what you think? That I just run away. Well, I’ve got news for you. Everyone does. Especially you, alcoholic. Now leave me the fuck alone.”

  Tasaria disappeared into the Gran Torino. I sighed deeply.

  Schwartz came up to me as Tasaria was pulling away. “We’ll need to contact you, to give evidence in the court case.”

  “Here.” I handed Schwartz a business card. He gave me his, then continued quietly, so no one else but I could hear. “She a Hunter, Phillips? It would explain all the convictions.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed, tucking his card away. “Just about to run away. Again. I’m getting the idea that they do that a lot.”

  “They lead that kind of life, Phillips,” said Schwartz. “They don’t choose it, it just happens.”

  “Yeah, well, I wish it didn’t just happen with Tasaria,” I said, clambering into the front seat of the Jag. “But, as usual, nothing ever really goes my way.”

  I turned the key in the ignition and revved the E-Type’s straight six-engine. In silence, I pulled out into the street, driving to Bergman Mansion, Tasaria’s destination. She would probably leave the Gran Torino there, then disappear.

  The race was on.

  10

  Torments

  And what did all, all the torments of the past amount to now?

  (Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky, Epilogue, Chapter 2, Pg. 558)

  I revved the Jag’s engine, putting the pedal to the floor. ‘Automatic for the People’ was still in the CD player. Fiddling around for a bit, I landed on ‘Drive’. I went full out on the Jag, not letting up.

  I probably ran a few red lights, and I was definitely breaking the speed limit. No one pulled me over. Luck of the devil had always been a Phillips family trait. The rhythm of the song became ingrained in my brain.

  I caught up with Tasaria pretty fast, ducking and div
ing cars around me. It wasn’t long until I caught up with Tasaria. The tail lights of the Gran Torino were just in front of me.

  It disappeared, turned right. I swore loudly, ignored the traffic, going as fast I could. I went up a block, using my handbrake to turn sharply. The Gran Torino was there, just in front of me, Tasaria at the wheel, shocked.

  I rammed straight into her, losing control, then swerving left. Our cars came level, side by side, nothing but air between. Tasaria and I looked at each other intently, only glancing at the road either side. Her look was questioning. ‘What the hell are you doing Marlowe? I’m no concern of yours, it seemed she was saying, I’m nothing to you.’

  But she was something to me, not everything, but something. I cared about her already, and I knew that leaving was the worst thing she could do. Maybe this was mad, maybe it wasn’t a good idea, but it was the only idea in my head. It was the only option, like marrying Annie.

  I needed to do this, even if I didn’t know why, and it made no sense. Sense was for other people, because, sometimes, the things that make the least sense are the most right.

  We were on the outskirts of Seattle now, speeding away from the hustle and bustle of the city. Soon it would be behind us, and so would Karen Arthurs and her hollow-eyed stalker. The countryside was ahead, twists and turns in the road. Like in Seattle itself, there were few people on the roads at this time of the morning.

  I was going nearly full speed in the Jag, a hundred an fifty-three miles an hour, but I was still falling behind the green Gran Torino. The Torino’s 5.8 liter Windsor V8 was stronger than my straight six Jaguar XK6 engine. And it had nine years’ worth of better engineering, forty-two years of use, not fifty-one. Even so, I knew the terrain better, and I was just as determined as Tasaria Brasoveanu.

  We were just outside the mansion, the lane and the driveway. Tasaria slid away at the opening of the driveway, so I reached it first. I turned across the driveway, blocking it, but the Gran Torino had recovered, coming straight for me. I braced myself for the impact, the crush of metal and the destruction of two beautiful cars.