by J. C. Staudt
“Nope, don’t see it here,” he says. “Reckon I lost track of it and never got another batch.”
“Well if you do, call me as soon as it comes in. I’m very interested. Here’s my cell.” I give him Arden’s number, since that’s the only cell I carry anymore. “What kinds of blood do you have on hand?”
“Oh, lots. I know you like troll.”
“Yeah, give me two vials of that.”
Durlan lifts his brow. He’s used to me coming in here with my spare change, scraping together what I can afford for a vial or two of powder whenever I need to bolster my lab supply. That’s all changed since I lost my cleaning job and gained a fortune. I’ve been buying some of my residue off the streets using AnonymCity because it’s easier than breaking my disguise to come here. Phone booths might’ve worked for Superman, but that was back when they had phone booths. Demon blood is hard to find even on AnonymCity, so I’m hoping Durlan will come through for me.
By the time I’m done picking out blood to buy, there’s a row of vials ten deep and a bill totaling over a thousand bucks. Durlan gawks when I take out my wallet and tally a stack of hundreds on the counter. “Keep the change,” I tell him, swiping the vials into my coat pocket. “Call me if you find that blood.”
He nods, speechless, as I exit his shop Between and return to the real world.
Chapter 7
Lorne Savage’s penthouse apartment occupies one-fourth of the forty-second floor of the Nachtenbank Center, namesake of the eponymous worldwide financial institution. In a city where the altitude of a person’s living quarters is roughly equal to his social and financial standing, the penthouse is prime positioning for the eldest son of a powerful family. His live-in girlfriend Danielle “Dani” Lewis is a new addition, and I can’t say I like what she does to the place.
“Oh, thank god it’s you.” Dani pulls me in and slides her slender arms around my waist.
I stand confused, arms raised, while she squeezes.
She’s gaunt, runway-model-thin, her eyes sunken and sleepy. Her tousled hair smells of cigarettes and liquor. “You’ve got to find him. I’m going out of my mind without him. God, I haven’t eaten or slept all weekend.”
She leads me into the living room, where a slim cigarette smolders in a black plastic ashtray beside an empty bottle of Kentucky bourbon and its accompanying glass. Shades are drawn tight over the panoramic windows spanning two sides of the apartment, and the recessed ceiling lights are half-dimmed.
“You’re sure Lorne didn’t mention going out of town?”
“Of course I’m sure,” she snaps. “He wouldn’t go anywhere without telling me.” When she moves ahead of me into the kitchen, her gait meanders. She doesn’t seem to notice her pink silk negligee clinging to her hip, or the cheek peeking out below.
I avert my eyes and take a seat at the island breakfast bar, where her cell phone sits beside the sink. “You’ve checked everything. Texts, voicemails, emails. Your calendar.”
“Everything,” she confirms, picking up her phone. She leans on her elbows and plays with her lip while she scrolls. A locking sound, and she puts it down. “Yeah. I’ve checked everything.”
“When did you see him last?”
“Friday morning before he left the house.”
“Did he tell you where he was going?”
“No. When he’s out, he’s working, and I don’t bother him about it. He doesn’t like when I bother him about it.”
“Does he ever talk to you about the company?”
“Oh, sure. He talks about Savage Systems all the time. He’s obsessed with it.”
“Does he go into much detail?”
“About what?”
“Business deals he’s making. Capital he’s raising from investors. That sort of thing.”
She shakes her head.
“Carmine told me he was planning to visit the PTO on Friday morning. Does that sound familiar?”
“The PTO?”
“The Patent and Trademark Office.”
She scrunches her face, trying to remember. “Maybe. He might’ve said something.”
“And did you hear from him after he left the house?”
“I texted him, but he didn’t respond. Sometimes he doesn’t. He’s busy, you know. Sometimes I don’t hear from him all day, so I didn’t start worrying until he didn’t come home for dinner. I called and texted him a bunch of times.”
“May I see?”
She hesitates, then opens Lorne’s text thread and hands me her phone.
Dani - Friday, 5:40pm - Hey honey hows your day? Havent heard from u…
Dani - Friday, 7:24pm - Babe. U ok? Dinner tonight?
Dani - Friday, 7:55pm - Lorne. Txt me back srsly
Dani - Friday, 8:03pm - Lorne.
Dani - Friday, 8:25pm - Lorne forreal
Dani - Friday, 8:39pm - I swear if your with that slut from the art show im gonna flip
Dani - Friday, 8:50pm - Tell me you arent
Dani - Friday, 8:59pm - This is bullshit
Dani - Friday, 9:01pm - Answer me
Dani - Friday, 9:11pm - Lorne. Answer ur fucking phone. If it isnt true tell me
Dani - Friday, 9:18pm - Are u there?
Dani - Friday, 9:27pm - Ur phone keeps going to voicemail
Dani - Friday, 9:33pm - Fine. You know what fck it. Im going out
Dani - Friday, 9:54pm - Dont bother coming home. I wont be here
Dani - Friday, 10:47pm - At the club getting crazy. Tons of hot guys here
Dani - Saturday, 2:02am - Jus got Home where th fuck ar uu?
I hand the phone back. “Is there anything else you can tell me? Anything about his mood on Friday morning? Anything you talked about the night before? Were you fighting? Was he nervous? Excited? Normal?”
“Pretty normal,” she says. “We weren’t fighting. Oh, there was one thing. Wait here.”
While she’s in the other room, I step on the kitchen trash can pedal. The bag is almost full; an orange rind, toast crumbs, two eggshells, coffee grounds, and a few fatty scraps of raw chicken in a Styrofoam supermarket tray. Beneath that there’s half a garden salad, lettuce leaves still crisp, vinaigrette dressing still wet. Today’s breakfast; yesterday’s dinner and lunch. A lot of food for someone who hasn’t eaten all weekend.
By far the most interesting thing in the trash can is a slip of paper, torn off the corner of a regular sheet. It’s stuck to the side, greasy with salad dressing. There’s a name handwritten on it in black ballpoint: Giga Motts.
Dani’s footsteps approach from down the hallway; I stuff the greasy slip into my pocket and take a big step away from the trash can.
She enters the kitchen and hands me a business card. “I found this on Lorne’s nightstand. He’d be pissed if he knew I was touching his stuff. You know how he is.”
“Yeah,” I lie, reading it.
Oberon Consulting
Nels Oberon, CEO
Beneath that is an address in midtown.
“You know anything about these people?”
She shakes her head.
On the back of the business card, written in the same black ballpoint handwriting, are the words BI Tech. “Any idea what this means?”
She looks. Shakes her head. “I don’t know, I’m sorry. All I remember is him taking these out of his wallet the other night and setting them beside his lamp.”
“Is there anything else? Anything at all you think might give me a better shot at finding him?”
She hesitates. “There was one other thing. Probably not important.”
“What’s that?”
“He said he was worried about Carmine.”
“About Carmine? What for?”
“He said she’s been hanging out with some weird people lately.”
“Funny. She says the same thing about him.”
“Why, because of all the business meetings? I don’t think he’s gotten himself into anything too crazy. I hope.”
“Lorne’s got
a good head on his shoulders, but if he’s in hot water it wouldn’t be the first time.”
“I’m kind of afraid of that.”
“I’ll do everything I can. Expect a call from me in a few days.”
She frowns. “I thought you were supposed to be like an expert at this stuff.”
I’m not sure how to respond to that. Even experts need time to gather clues. “I want to find him just as much as you do.”
She smiles, tears welling in her eyes. “Thank you. So much.” She hugs me again.
Her affection feels awkward and out of place, and I don’t return the gesture.
Before leaving the forty-second floor, I knock on the doors of Lorne’s three neighbors. Only one answers. A brunette in a fur-lined coat, purse slung over one shoulder, keys in the other hand. “We’re not interested,” she says pointedly.
“Oh, I’m not selling anything. I was hoping I could ask you a few questions.”
“I’m in kind of a hurry.”
“I’m sorry to bother you. My brother lives across the hall, and he’s gone missing.”
She pauses. “He’s your brother? The one with the loud parties and the music and the yelling?”
“That’s him. Lorne Savage. Can you tell me the last time you saw him?”
“Walk with me talk with me,” she says, rapid-fire.
She locks her door and we take the elevators together.
“I saw him coming home from work maybe two weeks ago,” she tells me. “My husband and I don’t know him very well. We were pretty close with the people who lived in that apartment before him. They were quieter. Home more often. I don’t see him around much.”
“He’s a pretty busy guy. Have you noticed anything strange? Anyone snooping around up here, or any weird behavior from him or his girlfriend?”
“If you consider them fighting all the time normal, then no. Everything’s been the same as always. The walls in this place are thick, but sometimes we can still hear them screaming at each other. It’s gotten so bad a couple times we almost called the cops.”
“Yeah, just between you and me, I’m not a big fan of that relationship either. Hopefully one of them sees the light and moves on.”
She nods. “I think everyone around here would get a lot more sleep.”
“If you do happen to run into him, will you give me a call?” I hand her one of Arden’s business cards; one of the ones I found in his wallet the night I killed him.
“Bounty hunter, huh?” she says with a smirk. “That’s convenient.”
I smile politely as the elevator door opens into the lobby.
“I’ll let you know if I see him,” she promises, leaving the elevator. “Good luck.”
I don’t bother returning to the forty-second floor to wait until the other neighbors get home. I assume they’re dead-ends too, and conclude they’ll have just as little to offer. I hit the road instead, bound for the address on the Oberon Consulting business card. I’m halfway there when Quim calls.
“Yello.”
“Got something for you,” he says.
“Shoot.”
“Lorne’s record of filing is already up in the PTO database. Savage Systems, Incorporated is listed as a holding company established to develop, license, and brand emerging technologies. Says here Lorne’s filed in corporate partnership with Brian P. Biddix.”
“Bisquick. What a rube.”
“Lorne’s the rube for starting a company with him. This brother of yours sure knows how to pick ‘em.”
“Or they know how to pick him.”
“Leeches gonna leech.”
“You know it. Find anything else?”
“I’ve checked with the police, the morgue, and every hospital in the city. Lorne hasn’t showed up anywhere. Now I need to go do the work I should’ve been doing all morning and getting paid for.”
“Not so fast, QuimTak. Two more things I need.”
Quim groans. I can envision him flailing his head like a loose spring.
“See what you can dig up on a Giga Motts. Also, Lorne’s girlfriend gave me a business card from a place called Oberon Consulting. I’m on my way to check it out.”
“Again,” Quim stresses, “these are both things you can do yourself using the internet. It’s not hard.”
“Quim. I’m boots on the ground. I’m taking names and running game. You’re my info guy. This investigation goes nowhere without your expertise and my—”
“Pigheadedness?”
“Tenacity.”
A pause. “Interesting.”
“What’s that?”
“Giga Motts is quite a fellow.”
“You’ve already found him?”
“Remember that internet thing I was talking about?”
“Shut up. What does it say?”
“Giga Motts is an alias. His real name is Gilbert Mottrov.”
“Mottrov. He’s a vamp.”
“How do you know?”
I hesitate. “I’ve heard of him.”
“I’d think twice before you poke around in his affairs. His extracurriculars are alarming, at best. He’s the head of an organization called the Order of the Raven.”
“Sounds spooky. What do they do?”
“Their website says they’re, and I quote, New Detroit’s most prominent social activist group, a non-profit organization with thousands of members intent on affecting change where it’s needed most. Weekly meetings focus on issues such as income inequality, education reform, fair housing, and other pressing concerns affecting our society on a local, national, and global scale. And it gets better. Mr. Mottrov is currently on the NDPD’s watch list due to suspicion of money laundering, racketeering, and conspiracy to commit murder.”
“You found that on their website?”
“No. That, I had to hack. I’ve got a lifeline to the police database.”
“So Gilbert Mottrov is a business mogul, a crime lord, and a social activist.”
“Not to mention a vampire. Which is really the only part of this that matters. Mottrov Multinational’s chief income stream comes from their medical manufacturing division. They currently produce a line of revolutionary blood transfusion machines, and they’ve been in the dialysis game for years.”
“Vampires who build machines to process human blood. Hmm.”
“I know. Big surprise, right? You think they aren’t doing something sketchy with those?”
“Here’s the bigger question. What was Lorne doing with Gilbert Mottrov’s nickname on a piece of paper in his kitchen garbage can?”
“Beats me, but if you go sticking your nose in Mottrov’s business you’re going to get hurt. What was that other company you mentioned?”
“Oberon Consulting. Lorne’s girlfriend gave me their CEO’s business card. On the back, someone wrote BI Tech.”
“What was that?”
I spell it out for him.
“One sec.” I hear him typing, hemming and hawing to himself as he reads. “Okay. Oberon Consulting provides business process solutions to help companies compete in today’s demanding economic climate. Blah blah blah… here we go. With over thirty years of experience in the marketplace, Oberon Consulting is equipped to handle its clients’ every need thanks to its state-of-the-art Behavioral Indication Technology.”
“BI Tech. Does it say anything more about it?”
“Nope. Sounds like a fancy term for a bunch of nothing.”
“They are consultants.”
“Ouch. Shots fired. They look legit to me.”
“Lorne’s probably thinking about hiring them to help with his startup. Every lead is worth looking into in a situation like this. I’m here at their office, so I’ll let you know what I find.”
“Unless it’s urgent or you uncover something mind-blowing, please don’t call me until tonight. I really need to focus on getting my work done.”
“Oh, absolutely. And when I find my missing brother in a ditch somewhere five hours later than I should’ve, I’l
l just tell him we had to work around your busy schedule.”
“Come on. That’s not fair.”
“I’m glad you agree; it wouldn’t be fair to him at all. Call you in a few minutes.”
Chapter 8
At the end of the third-floor hallway in a dingy commercial building in midtown stands a frosted glass door with Oberon Consulting etched into the clear. It’s like something out of an old noir film, a detective agency on the outs with a single proprietor haunted by his dark past. When I give the glass three sharp raps, the balding forty-something man who answers in purple tie and black pinstripe suit is anything but dark.
“Hi there,” he says with a smile. There’s something keen in that smile. Something one might classify as slimy, or lawyerish. Or, if one wanted to be particularly mean to forty-something men in purple neckties, used-car-salesman-y.
“Hi. My name’s Arden Savage. I’m investigating the disappearance of my brother Lorne.”
“Lorne’s missing?”
“You know him.”
“Yeah I know him. He was just in here on Friday.”
“What time was that?”
“All afternoon.”
“Would you mind if I asked you a few questions?”
“Sure. Come on in. Nels Oberon, by the way.” He shakes my hand.
The room reminds me of a psychiatrist’s office; desk, armchair, big leather couch you could drown in. The desk is neat but lived-in. He waves me toward the couch and assumes command of the armchair. “Please, have a seat.”
“Thanks.”
“So have you called the cops?”
Something in his tone gives me pause. “I kind of do this for a living.”
He rubs his palms on the armrests. “That’s right. He told me about you. Private dick, right?”
I force a smile. “Something like that. Lorne’s been missing almost three days now. Friday afternoon was the last time you saw him?”
“Sure was. He got here around three, stayed ‘til maybe five-thirty. He’d just come from the PTO.”
