“What’s the local murder rate?”
“You’re looking at it. This double killing last fall, then the single one ten days ago. Before that, the last homicide was a domestic incident in 1999.”
“Lot of drug activity in town?”
“It has its share, maybe a little more. You can blame that on a depressed economy, though. It’s not exactly a hotbed of gangsta activity. Mostly kids selling pot from their lockers, the laid-off guy down the road dealing out of his garage, that sort of thing.”
“Do the police think it’s the same killer for all three?”
“Yep, but only because otherwise they’d need to catch two murderers, and that’s more work than they care to contemplate.”
“You’re going to make me guess what the supernatural connection is, aren’t you?”
“I was just seeing if you’d pick it up. It’s—”
I lifted a hand to cut him off. “Is the answer here?” I asked, pointing at the photos.
He nodded.
“Give me a minute.”
two
I studied the victims for some sign they’d been killed by a supernatural—puncture wounds, gnaw marks, weird burn patterns. But the only sign of trauma was the bullet holes.
Next I looked at the background for evidence that the victims had been used ritualistically. If so, then we probably weren’t dealing with a supernatural killer. There were black art rituals involving human sacrifice—usually high-level protection spells that required a life in forfeit for a life protected—but that’s a lot more rare among witches and sorcerers than Hollywood would have people believe.
If these were indeed ritual murders, then the most likely culprit was Hollywood itself, for suggesting that it’s possible to harness the forces of darkness through sacrifice. As if a demon really gives a rat’s ass about a dead human or two.
When humans ritually kill, though, they’re rarely subtle. Pentacles in blood are a particular favorite. Apparently, if you’re going to the trouble of proving what a badass occultist you are, you want to make sure the whole world gets it.
However, even if the killer was human, that was a concern for us. The agency takes a few calls a year from supernaturals freaked out because some lowlife in their city drained a victim’s blood or left occult paraphernalia at a crime scene. I tell them to chill—most humans are smart enough to know vampires and witches and demons are the products of overactive imaginations, and the police will quickly turn their attention to more plausible explanations.
Sometimes, though, exposure threats do bear investigating. We can never be too—
I stopped. I lifted the photos and squinted at them. Was that a faint line under each body? Part of a circle drawn in chalk and hastily erased?
“Do you have a better picture of this?” I asked, pointing at the line.
Jesse shook his head.
“What does the police report say about it?”
“As far as I know, nothing. I haven’t seen it myself, but my contact says it wasn’t mentioned.”
“Okay. But since it’s in a covered, unused area, the marks under the latest victim should still be there.”
“That’s what I’m hoping.”
All the magical races—witch, sorcerer, shaman, necromancer—had rituals that used chalk circles. The important part was the symbol presumably underneath these bodies. Once I’d noticed those chalk lines, I started picking up other very discreet signs of a true dark art ritual-flakes on the concrete that looked like dried herbs, a black smudge on the wall that I recognized as smoke from a burning brazier, an edge of silver, almost hidden in the latest victim’s clenched hand. A coin? An amulet?
“The cops must have seen that,” I said, pointing to the silver. “Or the coroner did.”
“I’m guessing yes, and I’m really hoping they’ll tell me what it is, but they may hold on to the information to weed out the killer from the cranks.”
I looked at the two earlier victims. One had her left hand fisted and the other’s right hand was palm down on the ground. Either could have been holding something.
“Who’s the client?” I asked.
“Me.”
When I glanced up, he looked faintly embarrassed. “See, that’s the problem with knowing Lucas. You get this urge to do pro bono work.”
“It’s called guilt.”
“No kidding, huh? I’m not a crusader, but every now and then something like this crosses my radar. A necromancer buddy with the Washington state police recognized signs of what looked like a real ritual. He can’t jump in without raising eyebrows, so he passed it to me.”
I took out my iPhone and logged in to our database, tapping the virtual keypad as he continued.
“Officially, though, the mother of the last victim hired me. I tracked her down and offered to investigate in return for her confirming that to anyone who asks.”
“A free PI. Bet she was happy.”
“I wouldn’t say happy. It took a lot of fast-talking to persuade her I wasn’t running a con. Even made me sign a waiver.”
“Did she seem reluctant? Maybe for a reason?”
“Nah, just a legal secretary who thinks she’s been at the job long enough to practice law herself.”
I turned around the phone to show him a list. “I plugged in what we know, and this is what I get. Eight possible rituals, more if whatever she has in her hand isn’t significant.”
“Whoa, and I’m still working from paper files.”
“Paige kludged together an app and hacked it into the proprietary software.”
“Whatever that means ...”
“No idea. To me it means we have database access on the road. Of course, I could just walk twenty feet and pull this up on a computer, but that wouldn’t be nearly as impressive. Would you like the list texted to you, e-mailed, or sent to our printer?”
“Okay, now you’re just showing off. Text it.” He handed me a card with his cell number and I punched it in.
“So I’m guessing this is what you need from us—you supply the details and we’ll access our resources to figure out which ritual you’re dealing with. If we’re lucky, what she has in her hand will answer all our questions. Well, except whodunit. That’s your job.”
“See, now this is why I asked to talk to Lucas,” he said. “If I showed him this, he’d be all, ‘Hmm, this bears investigation. I take it you’re on the case?’ And I’d be, like, ‘Well, I will be, right after I finish a job.’ Then he’d ask if I minded if he looked into it himself and say he’d hate to take a job from me and I’d joke that it’s not a paying one anyway and if he wants to take a look ...”
“So you actually brought this to us hoping we’d investigate it for you?”
His cheeks colored. “Shit. Could you just channel Lucas for a minute? Please? Make me feel like a generous colleague?”
“If you were truly generous, you’d be passing us a paying case. Being the accountant for this place, I’m all about the bills.”
As I picked up the photos, my heart beat a little faster. I could take this case. My first solo investigation. I’d been asking for one since I turned eighteen. By the time I reached twenty, I realized I had to stop bugging and start working my ass off to prove I could handle it.
I had a hell of a reputation to overcome, though. I’d made more mistakes as a teen than most people do in a lifetime. Paige and Lucas knew that better than anyone. They weren’t just my bosses—they’d been my guardians. I’d been twelve when my mother died, and Paige had taken me in, and she’d gone through hell because of it.
So I didn’t blame them for only letting me assist in investigations. Here, though, was a case I could handle, working under the supervision of a guy Lucas trusted.
So I said, as casually as I could, “My schedule is clear this week. I’ll look into it.”
Jesse looked over. Sizing me up. I knew that and I could feel my hackles rising, but I kept my mouth shut because I’ve come to understand that I can’t blame p
eople for underestimating me. Twenty-one might feel terribly grown up to me, but to others I’m still a kid, and insisting I can handle it would sound defensive, not mature.
“Lucas says you’ve been doing some investigative work,” he finally said.
“I’ve been part of the team since we opened. I’ve done research and legwork for the past five years. I’ve assisted on investigations for three. I’d even done a few small local ones myself. Yes, triple homicide isn’t small, but you’re looking for someone to do some legwork, presumably under your supervision.”
He nodded. “If you can help me, I’d appreciate that. Normally, I’d suggest you run it past Lucas and Paige but ...”
“Under the circumstances, they’re better off not worrying about me. I’ll tell Adam.”
“Okay. Thanks. I’m not dumping this case on you. I will jump back in as soon as I can. But this latest murder is already cooling. I hoped to get out there two days ago, but got sidetracked with this case I’m on. It’s a guy I’ve been chasing for two years now and he finally turned up in Portland. It’s just child support, but, well, the client really needs the money ...”
“And if you wait, he might bolt again.”
“Exactly.”
Frankly, I didn’t care what his motivation was. I just wanted the job.
If it was a ritual, it was magic, probably witch or sorcerer, and I was both. Add some demon blood on my mom’s side, and I was a damned amazing spellcaster. More important for this case, I had contacts in the black market and dark arts.
So I told Jesse I’d take it. I made it clear, though, that although I’d welcome his help when he was ready, I wasn’t doing the legwork and dropping the case. I was the primary on this. He agreed and left me with the file.
THE MOMENT JESSE was gone, I pulled up his photo file on the computer. Everything he’d said fit with what I’d heard about the guy, but double-checking is standard procedure around here, where we have to deal with everything from unstable clients to Cabal assassins. So I checked the photo. There was no question that the guy I’d talked to was Jesse Aanes.
Next I looked up the murders on the Internet and downloaded everything I could find, which wasn’t much. Ditto for the victims. I got a few hits on the latest one—Claire Kennedy—but nothing on the first two, Ginny Thompson and Brandi Degas. Yep, Gin and Brandi. Call me crazy, but naming your daughters after alcoholic beverages is just asking for trouble.
Next I worked on identifying the ritual. I’d just finished plugging in ideas for the silver object in Claire’s hand—coin, amulet, key—when I glanced at the clock. It was almost eleven. If I planned to get to Columbus today, I had to get going.
I grabbed my helmet from the back room and wheeled my bike into the alley. Not a bicycle, a motorcycle. I might live in the green belt, but I’d never quite embraced the lifestyle. I drove a 1950 Triumph Thunderbird that Lucas and I had restored together. It was a sweet ride, and a lot more fuel-efficient than a car, so I could feel virtuous without sacrificing the cool factor.
I zipped home, then called Adam. No answer. That was fine—I wasn’t calling to get his approval, just to let him know. Adam wouldn’t stop me anyway. He was my biggest supporter when I argued for getting out in the field more.
Paige had baked me cookies before she left, and I was filling a box to take when my cell rang. The Doors’ “Light My Fire.” Adam’s picture popped up, a god-awful one of him snapped before his first coffee on a ski trip last winter.
I’d been in love with Adam since I was twelve. I’d grown up secure in the knowledge that while other girls dreamed about their ideal partner, I’d already found mine. I just needed to wait until I was old enough for him to realize I wasn’t just his friends’ ward; I was his soul mate.
Sixteen sounded about right. By the time I actually reached sixteen, though, I realized it was way too young. No decent twenty-seven-year-old should be interested in a kid that age. Eighteen then. When eighteen passed, I told myself the gap was still too wide. Twenty? Nope. Twenty-one. It had to be twenty-one.
We went out for my twenty-first birthday, just the two of us. That wasn’t a sign of anything—we’ve always been good friends. When he asked where I wanted to go, I said the most expensive place in town, just to give him a hard time. Then I bought a knockout dress, got my hair done, even had a manicure. That night Adam would finally realize the smart-ass, irresponsible Savannah was gone for good. I was a woman now.
If he did notice, it didn’t seem to make any difference. I wasn’t his friends’ ward anymore. I was his coworker and pal and that was all I was ever going to be. Take it or leave it. I’d decided to take it. That didn’t mean, though, that my heart didn’t flutter every time I heard his ring tone.
“Let me guess,” he said when I answered. “You’re bored and lonely already.”
“Nope. Got a triple homicide with possible ritualistic overtones already.”
I gave him a quick rundown.
“Jesse’s a good guy,” he said when I finished. “You could use the experience. As the senior employee in Paige and Lucas’s absence, I’m making an executive decision.”
“You like that, don’t you?”
“Anything that gives me the upper hand. I promise not to lord it over you when I get there, though.”
“You’re at a conference. As boring as it might be, you’re stuck.”
“There are just a couple more seminars I want to sit in on, so I’ll leave early and come give you a hand. Jesse’s fine, but better to work with someone you know, right? We make a good team.”
True. But as much as I loved working with Adam, I really wanted this to be my first solo case. As solo as I could make it, anyway. So I said we’d discuss it later. He was fine with that.
“Now, you’re going to stay in Columbus, right? Not commute back and forth.”
“It’s only an hour drive. I have to come back or Paige and Lucas will know something’s up.”
“I’ll say I sent you out to do legwork for me.”
“But the office—”
“—will run just fine without you. Yes, I know you’d rather come home every night, but if you really want field experience, you need to get out in the field and stay there. It’s a small town. You have to meld in, become part of the community. It’ll be good for you, getting out, mingling, trying to fit in ...”
Mingling with humans. Trying to fit into human society. That’s what he meant. Damn.
I reluctantly agreed. He made me promise to call him with an update tomorrow.
three
I took the back roads to Columbus. Highways and motorcycles don’t mix. Neither do motorcycles and the Pacific Northwest. Like Lucas, though, I refuse to yield to the climate. I ride when I can, and have a rainsuit in my saddlebags. I could have taken Paige’s Prius, but the forecast was clear for the next week. So I was zooming along, enjoying the ride, when I passed a service station warning “last gas for ten miles,” which seemed odd, considering Columbus was only a few miles away. Still, I had under half a tank, so I stopped.
As I filled up, a couple of truckers stood outside a rig, the younger one checking me out, the older one checking out my ride.
“Marlon Brando,” the older guy said, nodding at my ride. “That’s the bike he had in The Wild Ones.”
The younger guy’s gaze slithered over me. “So are you a wild one, hon?”
The older one shut him up with a glare, then turned to me. “Where you heading? There isn’t much around out here.”
I doubted these guys were from Columbus, but if they were on this back road, they were probably familiar with the area.
Channeling Paige, I pasted on a big, friendly smile. “Columbus.”
“Why?” the younger guy said. “Nothing there for a girl like you.”
“And not the safest place either,” the older one said. “They’ve had themselves a few murders in the past year. Young women.”
This was easier than I thought. I only had to say, “Serious
ly?” and I got all the details. They didn’t tell me anything I didn’t read in Jesse’s reports, though. Not until they’d finished, and the older man said, “If you ask me, there’s something hinky going on in that town.”
“Hinky?”
“Buddy of mine stopped there last fall, making a delivery. Went in the wrong building and found one of them satanic rituals.”
“In progress?”
“Nah, from the night before, he figured. But it was all there. Pentacles. Black candles. Dead cat. He tore out of there like the devil himself was after him. Won’t stop in that town ever again.”
SATANIC RITUALS. I’D be a lot more excited about that if the ritualistic signs left near those bodies suggested anything like a black mass. Still, it was a start—a hint that something supernatural might be going on in Columbus. Which was good, because from the look of the place, I’d never have guessed it.
The articles on the murders had given me a good image of Columbus. Your typical small town struggling to survive, the kids shipping out to Seattle or Portland as soon as they could. There would be a subdivision for commuters, but mostly you’d see streets of small postwar homes fronted by tidy postage-stamp lawns. The downtown would be a patchwork of basic-service businesses that had been there for three generations.
As I drove into town, though, I joined every local kid in chomping at the bit to be someplace else, anyplace else. Ghost town was too fanciful a term for Columbus, conjuring up visions of porch swings creaking in the breeze and tattered vintage Coke signs flapping. This place was a zombie, rotting before my eyes, dead but still somehow functioning.
The population sign looked as if it had recently been reduced from four digits to three, even that estimate bearing an air of desperate optimism. I drove past three businesses on the outskirts of town—a boarded-up bowling alley, a used-car lot with three mud-mired clunkers, and a darkened gas station.
Waking the Witch woto-11 Page 2
