Andrea sighed. “I’ll start processing the house.”
The phone did work and Teddy Jo answered on the second ring. I had once read that every day offered a new lesson. The lesson for today, among other things, seemed to be that bargaining with the Greek angel of death should be avoided by any means, because it cost you an arm and a leg.
“Seven thousand,” Teddy Jo’s gruff voice announced over the phone.
“Four.”
“Six five.”
“Four.”
“Kate, the thing cost me five grand. I’ve got to make a profit.”
“First, it’s used.”
“Now look here,” Teddy Jo growled. “It’s not a Cadillac. It’s a body freezer. The value doesn’t drop because you drive it off the lot.”
“I don’t know what sort of bodies you stuck in there, Teddy. You might have put a leucrocuta in there. Those things stink.”
“It’s not like the dead gonna care. They can’t smell shit, and they themselves ain’t gonna get to smelling any better.”
He had a point, but I didn’t have to admit it. “Four five.”
“How’s the business going, Kate?”
Where was he heading with this? “Business is going fine.”
“The way I heard it, you ain’t doing shit. So the fact that you’re calling me about a body freezer says to me that you suddenly have a body in dire need of freezing. That means you finally landed a client. Now then, about four minutes after death, the body cells experience oxygen deprivation, which raises the level of carbon dioxide in the blood, simultaneously decreasing the pH, making the body environment more acidic. At this point the enzymes begin to cannibalize the cells, causing them to rupture, releasing nutrients. This is called autolysis or selfdigestion, and the more enzymes and water organs contain, the faster they degrade. Organs like the liver and brain go first. Before you know it, your body is putrefied, the skin sloughs off, and all of your evidence has degraded down to nothing. So you’ve got to ask yourself, is it worth it to keep arguing with me and risk losing the body and the client, or should you just give me my damn six thousand dollars?”
God damn it. “If you know that I haven’t got any clients, then you probably know that I can’t afford to pay you through the roof for the freezer.”
Teddy Jo fell silent for a long second. “Five grand. My last offer. Take it or leave it, Kate.”
“Three grand now, with two one-thousand-dollar payments within sixty days and delivery to my office.”
“Business is so bad you’ve resorted to robbing honest folks now, is it?”
“Teddy, it’s a damn body freezer. It’s not doing you any good in your shed and people aren’t lining up around the corner to take it off your hands.”
“Fine. Screw it.”
Finally. Something went my way today. “That was a nice bit with the autolysis. Been going to night school in your spare time?”
“I’m an angel of death. I don’t need night school, woman. You should just give up on this detective shit and start killing people for a living. It’s simple, honest work, and you ain’t got the brains for anything else.”
“Yeah, yeah. I love you too, Teddy.”
I hung up. The down payment on the freezer would take a big bite out of my remaining five grand, and I had to keep money on hand to work the case. I could always ask the Pack to up my budget.
I’d rather eat dirt.
CHAPTER 7
IT TOOK US FOUR HOURS TO PROCESS THE SCENE. WE dusted the workshop for fingerprints and lifted enough partials to use up a whole roll of tape. Crawling on my hands and knees looking for evidence and taking samples of the urine stains did a number on me. My knee was a trouble magnet—first my aunt ripped it up, then the marathon of fights to the death that made me the Pack’s alpha female had nearly done it in. I’d hobbled around with a cane for a month, a circumstance aggravated by the fact that I could only use said cane in my quarters, because doing it in plain view of the Pack telegraphed weakness. Now the knee had developed a steady annoying ache, and I had this absurd feeling that if only I could jam something sharp in there, the pain would go away.
We finished the workshop and walked the house. It was a spacious log cabin, all clean honey-colored wood and oversized windows. Adam led a simple life. I found enough clothes for a couple of weeks and a few dog-eared books, mostly engineering, physics, and magic theory. Andrea cataloged the groceries and reported lots of peanut butter and jam in the fridge. The Red Guardsmen’s cabin came equipped with cooking utensils and an assortment of pots and pans hanging from the hooks in a wooden frame. The layer of dust on the pans told me they hadn’t been touched in a while.
I found a picture of a young blond woman by Adam’s bed. She was looking over the ocean, her face serious and tinted with resignation and sadness. Adam’s wife. I bagged it and put it into our Jeep.
We took everyone’s statements, made everyone sign everything, and drove back through Sibley’s twisted roads onto Johnson Ferry. The traffic mess at the bridge had dissolved. An MSDU Humvee painted in blotches of slate gray and charcoal sat on the shoulder. Next to it a short, stocky man with dark brown hair packed an m-scanner into a van with PAD written on the side. The man’s red hoodie read WIZARD AT LARGE.
I pulled over to the shoulder.
“Do you know him?” Andrea asked.
“Luther Dillon. He used to moonlight for the Guild a couple of years back. Hang on a second, I’ll be right back.”
I slipped out of the car and walked back along the shoulder, hands in plain view.
Luther saw me and sighed dramatically. “Stay away. At least three feet.”
“Why?”
“The Order fired you for screwing up. Hence, you are besmirched. It might rub off on me.”
If Andrea wanted to kill Ted, she would have to stand in line. “I didn’t get fired, I quit. And considering that I wrapped up your troll for you, I expected a warmer reception.”
Luther bowed and clapped. “Bravo! Bravissimo! Encore, encore! Was that kind of what you were hoping for?”
“That will do.”
From where I stood, I could see the path leading down the slope and under the bridge to the troll’s bunker. “How did it go?”
“He’s sleeping like a baby.” Luther shut the van’s door and leaned against the vehicle. “Ate two hours out of yours truly’s already-busy schedule, too.”
“The least you can do since your wards failed.”
Luther pushed from the car. “My wards don’t fail. They’re gone.” He made a fist and snapped his fingers open. “Poof! No residue, no trace, nothing. Never seen anything like it. It’s as if . . .”
“They had never been there,” I finished. Déjà vu.
Luther focused on me like a pointer on a pheasant. “You know something.”
When in trouble, stall. “Me?”
“You. Tell me.”
“Can’t.” First, the wards around Adam’s workshop. Then here. Crossing the bridge was the fastest way out of Sibley.
“Kate, stop screwing around. If someone is going around the city yanking wards out of the ground, I need to know about it.”
“I can’t, Luther. Client confidentiality.”
“You want me to haul you in for questioning?” Luther said. “Because I’ll do it. I’ll do it right now. Watch me. I know people who will gently persuade you to be forthcoming.”
I looked at him. “You really need to work on your threats. I can’t tell if you’re threatening me or inviting me for tea.”
“The two aren’t mutually exclusive. One cup of the tea at the station and you will tell me everything you know out of sheer self-preservation.” He held his hand out and bent his fingers back and forth in the universal “bring it on” gesture. “Out with it. Or else.”
Andrea stepped out of the Jeep and leaned against the bumper. Apparently she felt I needed backup. If we were lucky, Grendel wouldn’t tear through plastic and devour de Harven’s corpse in Hect
or’s back.
“Luther, to haul someone in, you have to have probable cause, which you don’t.”
A faint scrape of a foot against dirt came from behind the van. I leaned to glance around Luther and saw a man walking up the path from the water. He wore black pants, black boots, a gray shirt, and a black tactical vest over it. Black aviator shades hid his eyes. Add dark blond hair cropped short and a clean-shaven jaw, and you had yourself a genuine Agent of Law Enforcement. Shane Andersen, knight of the Order.
Luther sighed.
“You think he’s got ‘government badass’ tattooed on his chest?” I murmured.
A faint grimace skewed Luther’s mouth. “And ‘I’d tell you but I’d have to kill you’ on his ass.”
Luther wasn’t hard to irritate, but there was some genuine hate there. “What did he do?”
Luther glanced at me. “He called me ‘support.’ I’m not support; I’m the damn primary on this case. Without me, they’d still be trying to mince the troll into a meat pie.”
Shane hero-swaggered his way to the top of the path and stopped before us. “Hello, Kate.”
“Hi.”
He glanced at Luther. “Is she bothering you?”
“No.”
“Mm-hm.” Shane lowered his glasses on his nose and gave me his version of a severe stare.
I leaned a little toward Luther. “Is this the part where I faint in fear?”
Luther bit his lip. “He might also accept falling to your knees and holding your hands in humble supplication. Makes it easier for him to slap the cuffs on.”
“Your presence here is a distraction,” Shane said, obviously savoring every word. “You’re keeping a PAD officer from his duties. Move along, Kate. There is nothing to see here.”
Asshole. Let’s see, two MSDU vehicles, cops down by the river. Too many witnesses. My brain served up a headline: BEAST LORD’S MATE PUNCHES KNIGHT OF THE ORDER IN MOUTH, KNOCKS OUT FOUR TEETH. Yeah, not today.
“Sorry, Luther, I’ve been told to move along.” I shrugged. “Got to go. I’ll call you if anything. Oh, and, Andersen, if you’re still having trouble with that bug up your ass, let me know. I know a guy—he’ll pull it right out.”
I turned to the Jeep. Just in time, too—Andrea started walking toward me, focused on Shane like a bird of prey. Time to get the hell out of here.
“It’s a shame about your being kicked out of the Order, Daniels,” Shane called. “Losing your home like that, too. I always thought you were capable. I know people who could’ve helped. If you’d just come to me, I could’ve made things easier on you. Life is tough, but at least you wouldn’t have to prostitute yourself to that creature.”
“Dude,” Luther exhaled.
Andrea picked up speed, her eyes furious. I had to get her out of here now. She was barely holding on to the edge of reason as it was. If she pulled her gun on him, she’d go to jail, and not even the Pack lawyers would get her out.
“Being in the Order doesn’t make you untouchable, Shane.” I kept walking.
“Women sell themselves because they’re starving, because they’ve got kids to feed, because they are addicted,” Shane said. “I don’t condone it, but I understand it. You sold yourself for four walls on Jeremiah Street. Was it worth climbing into bed with an animal every night?”
I ran into Andrea. She tried to push past me and I blocked her. “No.”
“Step aside.”
“Not now, not here.”
“Hello, Nash,” Shane called. “You want me to box your guns and send them to your apartment? Save you the shame of coming to the chapter?”
Andrea gripped my arm.
“Later,” I told her. “Too many people now.”
Andrea clenched her teeth.
“Later.”
She turned on her heel and we went back to the Jeep. I slid Hector back into the traffic.
“That bastard,” Andrea squeezed out.
“He’s a loudmouth who likes talking shit. There is no law against being an asshole. Let him hide behind his shield for now. That’s all he can do.”
Andrea squeezed her hand into a hard fist. “If I still had my ID . . .”
“You would be the best of friends.”
She glared at me.
“It’s true,” I told her.
She didn’t answer.
The first ten years of her life, Andrea was the punching bag of her bouda clan. She’d spent the last sixteen making sure she would not feel powerless again. She had never walked the street without the added weight of the Order’s ID. She was used to being a good guy, respected and even admired for what she did and who she was. She was never pushed around by anyone with a badge, because she carried one. But every choice had consequences, and now these consequences were hitting her right in the face.
“We can’t even do anything to that worm,” she ground out.
“Not now.”
She turned to me. “I don’t think I can do this.”
“You can,” I told her. “You’re a survivor.”
“You don’t know what it’s like.”
I laughed. It sounded cold. “You’re right, I have no idea what it’s like to take shit from people I could kill with my eyes closed.”
Andrea exhaled. “Okay. Sorry. That was a stupid thing to say. I just . . . Argh.”
“In the end, Shane doesn’t matter,” I said. “As long as you avoid him and don’t give him an opportunity to hurt you, he’s powerless to do anything except lather up some spit. However, if someone were to do something stupid, like shoot at him from some roof one night, we’d have real problems.”
“I was a knight,” Andrea said. “I’m not just going to start shooting every dickhead who mouths off to me.”
“Just making sure.”
“Besides, if I shot him, I’d do it so nobody could trace it back to me. I’d shoot him somewhere remote, his head would explode like a melon, and they would never find his body. He would just vanish.”
This would be a long climb uphill, I just knew it.
FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER WE MADE IT TO THE OFFICE and met Teddy Jo, who was waiting with the freezer in the parking lot. I gave Teddy his down payment, we wrestled the freezer into the back room, and then I spent an hour chanting preservation spells and laying down wards just in case de Harven decided to rise in the middle of the night and have himself another ant party.
It was eight o’clock by the time I turned off the highway to the narrow dirt road leading to the Keep. I was tired and dirty, my leg hurt like a sonovabitch, and I hadn’t eaten all day. You’d almost think I was back to working for the Order or something. Except I was working for myself.
I could relate to Andrea. My life had been much easier with the Order ID, too; I could bully people into answering my questions, I had access to criminal records, and if I did end up with a body full of ants, the Order would take care of it for me.
Still, I wouldn’t trade my small office for anything in the world.
We had a lot of evidence, and none of it made much sense. De Harven had dropped the sleep bomb. That much we knew. The kava kava residue on his hands confirmed it, and we found a gas mask in the corner of the workshop.
He’d deployed the sleep bomb and gone into the workshop. Then something had happened that concluded with his death and Kamen and the device disappearing. Perhaps de Harven had tried to steal the device or harm Adam, and Adam had retaliated by killing him. Except Adam Kamen looked like he would have a hard time baiting a fishhook, while de Harven was a trained killer.
Suppose Adam did somehow best de Harven. Why take the time to sacrifice him? Besides, Adam’s résumé had ‘magical theorist’ written all over it. Guys like him built complex devices. They wouldn’t urinate on the walls, turn the flesh of their attacker into ants, and then disappear into the night with a device weighing upward of three hundred pounds. Pulling off that kind of magic meant complete dedication to the deity to which the sacrifice had been offered. Devotion meant consta
nt worship, and worship required ritual. The guards had never even seen Adam pray.
The cut on de Harven’s stomach bothered me. An inverted crow’s foot. It had to be a rune. There was no anatomical reason to cut the body that way, and runes were associated with neo-pagan cults and often employed in shamanistic rituals, which was consistent with the magic at the scene. Runes predated the Latin alphabet. Ancient Germanic and Nordic tribes used them for everything, from writing down their sagas and foretelling the future to bringing the dead back to life.
Runology wasn’t my strongest suit, but this particular rune I knew very well. Algiz, one of the oldest runes, associated with sedge grass, and Thor, and Heimdall, and a number of other things depending on who you asked and which runic alphabet you used. Algiz had a universal meaning: protection. As a ward, it was completely reactive. It served as a warning or provided a defense, but in any case, Algiz wasn’t going to do anything to you until you messed with it. It was the most responsible way for a runic magic user to protect his property, because Algiz would never attack first.
Why put it on a body? It didn’t protect the body; it didn’t warn anyone of anything. I’d been breaking my brain against it since I had seen it, and I’d come up with nothing. Zip, zilch, zero. And none of the gods from the Norse pantheon were strongly associated with ants.
Something was going on here, something bigger and uglier than it appeared. The fear in Rene’s eyes bothered me. It started as a mild concern when I first saw it, getting worse and worse as the day progressed, and now it had matured into a full-blown anxiety. You have a lot of friends, Kate. You have a lot to lose.
Voron’s voice surfaced from the depths of my memory. “I told you so.”
I took a deep breath and tried to exhale my worry. Too late for warnings now. I was Curran’s mate and the female alpha of the Pack. The welfare of fifteen hundred shapeshifters was now my responsibility. Whatever storm was brewing in Atlanta, I’d find it and fight it. If it was the price of being with Curran, then I would pay it.
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