“She was, yeah. Detective in her own right now. I’m training a few other girls, but they work in other precincts. The Queen’s a huge advocate of me training the women—I’m not going to patronize them, like some of their other trainers, and I’m a master in a fighting style that gives anyone the ability to take down a larger opponent. It gives the girls an edge they need.”
“That right? Gerring mentioned you also know a way to revive someone who’s stopped breathing, like a drowning victim.”
“You have to get to them quick,” I warned. “Within five minutes. But yes, I know a way to do it. I’ll be happy to teach you. I’m trying to teach as many people as possible how to do CPR. It literally saves lives.”
“I imagine so—” Colette stopped dead and peered at something across the street. “Hmm. Looks like trouble. Jamie, we might need to rescue a girl.”
I followed her gaze and immediately saw the problem.
People get a certain expression when they’re panicked and in trouble—part fear, part apprehension. Their eyes dart in all directions, they hunch in on themselves, and there’s a scurrying quality to their gait, like a mouse trying to find a bolt hole before the cat catches up. This girl was definitely a mouse being stalked. She was a pretty thing—blonde curls, petite frame, dressed in some silky-lacy contraption of the latest fashion. Young, too. If she was in her twenties, I’d be surprised. She spied us staring at her and relief crossed her face before she darted across the street, ignoring the outraged honks of the drivers as she dodged cars.
I watched her, of course, but I also kept an eye on the opposite side of the street. She was running from something. I wanted to know what. I had a feeling I knew. A man stopped dead and watched her too. He eyed the traffic, as if gauging the right moment to follow her across.
Something about him felt off to me. He was dressed alright, in a plain suit like a young clerk would, but his hat hung low on his forehead, shielding his face. No call for that at this time of the evening. There was barely enough light to see by. My instincts said he was trouble. I was inclined to listen to them.
Blondie wasn’t even fully across the street when she started talking, her soprano voice high with panic. “Please help me! He’s been following me for five blocks now—I can’t shake him!”
Colette didn’t even look surprised. She held out an arm, and the girl nestled straight into it like Colette was some great oak that would shelter her from a storm. “Don’t you worry, child. You’ve found the right women. I’m a Magical Examiner with the Kingston PD. This is Detective Edwards. You point that man out to us, we’ll take care of it.”
The girl looked outright relieved she’d happened into two cops off duty. “He’s the man with the hat low over his face, the one in the black coat and pin-striped pants.”
“Thought so,” I muttered grimly. “Colette, can you take my bag? I’ll grab him.”
“Sure thing.”
I transferred the bag over to her and cracked my neck to either side, loosening up a bit. I hadn’t had a good chase in ages. I saw a slight break in traffic and took off, going at full speed because why not? I could see the panic on his face as I went straight for him.
People in Kingston, they’re used to all types. Weres, supernats, magicians, the works. Still, it always surprised them when I approached with superhuman speed. Probably because I looked fully human, so they didn’t expect anything out of the norm with me. He turned to run, but of course it was too late by that point. I caught up to him before he got more than three feet.
Clamping down on his coat, I whirled him into the nearest storefront, his face meeting the brick with a not-so-kind smack. Fortunately, I had a pair of handcuffs on me and reached for them.
“You can’t do this!” he protested. “I didn’t do anything to her!”
“Way to confirm you were stalking her,” I drawled, slapping the first cuff onto his wrist.
“I wasn’t going to do anything to her. I just wanted to follow her.”
“Woooow. You’re a total douchebag. Dude, seriously, that just creeped me right out. You know what we women think of men like you? That it would be better to douse you in gasoline and light you on fire than let you roam around.” I leaned in and breathed, “You scared her so bad she ran into the arms of complete strangers to get away from you. But it’s not your day, sicko. I’m the Shinigami Detective.”
He whined in the back of his throat, rolling his brown eyes at me, properly terrified now.
I grinned back at him. “And I don’t like men like you. Up you come. We’re going to the precinct.”
“I didn’t do anything,” he babbled at me, fighting me every step. “But I didn’t do anything to her!”
“You stalked her for five blocks. I’m a witness. You’re screwed, dude.”
Colette and our scared victim caught up at this point, although the girl looked vindicated now that he had cuffs on. She looked at me with big blue eyes, and I could see the hint of elvish blood in her elongated ears and the slim lines of her face. She looked like a doll. Poor girl. She probably caught all sorts of wrong attention from her looks alone.
“I need you to come to the precinct with us, get a full report on him,” I told her. “Then you can go. I’ll put in a restraining order so he can’t get anywhere near you.”
She stayed planted in Colette’s shadow but gave me a game smile. “Thank you so much, Detective.”
“And the next time this happens, I don’t want you to run. You stand your ground. Scream your head off. Tell everyone around you he’s stalking you, that you don’t know him. Someone will respond and help, if you don’t feel like you can handle it yourself. Trust me, I’ve seen that play out several times. These guys, they pick on girls who are quiet by nature. They’re cowards. You make enough noise, prove you won’t go quietly, and they’ll disappear rather than deal with you.” I shook the guy in my grip, leaning in to snarl between my teeth, “Because real men don’t get a kick out of scaring women. Sicko.”
She bravely nodded. “I’ll do that next time.”
He glared back at me, which was an odd juxtaposition considering he was still shaking like a dog with its tail between its legs. Didn’t like being called a sicko coward, huh? Tough luck. That’s exactly what he was.
Colette didn’t like him any better. She glared at him as if mentally calculating whether she could get by with hexing him or not. In the end, she seemed to reconsider and didn’t. (Pity.)
We grimly marched the three blocks back to the precinct, and I hauled him directly into a jail cell. He could rot there for the night. I didn’t do more than get his name so I could process him. If he missed work, tough. I wasn’t doing this man any favors.
It took more than a few minutes to process things, get the girl’s statement, and all that. I was running late for my Girls’ Night, so I sent off a quick message we’d start an hour later than planned. Fortunately, everyone was well aware crap just happened with me sometimes. I wasn’t always able to be on time.
Colette soothed the girl and got her settled into a taxi, safely on her way home. We caught one ourselves, hoping to speed up the process of getting back on track to my apartment. As I settled into the seat, I said, “I find it interesting she went directly for you. That happen often?”
“Oh yes. Most women, they look at me and think: No man would cross her. I often look down and discover a woman’s shown up in my shadow, evading some man’s unwelcome attentions.” Colette shrugged, resigned to her status as protector of strangers. “I’ve magic to help keep us all safe. And most men don’t cross me, that’s true enough. Does this happen with you too?”
“Hmm, sometimes. I think it’s because I’m in a suit, they get the impression I’m capable of defending them. I usually flash a badge at some point, reassuring them I’m a cop, and then deal with whoever’s hassling them. It’s sad women have to do that. But it’s also kind of funny if it happens when I’m out with Henri.” Remembering the last incident, I couldn’t help but
laugh. “He’s got this lecture he unleashes on any man scaring a woman. More like a rant.”
“Oh, I’ve heard it,” Colette assured me dryly. “He’s said it more than a few times in my hearing. He’s very much the gentlemen, our Henri. Doesn’t understand why any man would be hateful to a woman. And he takes it as a personal affront when they do.”
“I feel this urge to tell Henri all about tonight and point him in the direction of the idiot.”
“I don’t see why you shouldn’t.” Colette grinned at me like a co-conspirator.
I grinned back. Yup, it’s official. I liked her.
Of course, that meant I had to properly corrupt her, right?
Girls’ Night, from what I could hear, was in full swing upstairs. The laughter, thumps, and occasional “whoops!” told heaps. Jamie always introduced some Earth game—sometimes drinking games, sometimes absurd things. Like that Twister game with people’s limbs going everywhere. I’d nearly broken my neck playing that one with her.
I was ostensibly sitting in my chair, studying my notes on mine and Seaton’s secret project, but in truth I couldn’t focus on it very well. My attention kept being diverted upstairs to the sound of feminine laughter.
I heard a scratch at my window and turned to see purple fur pressed against the glass. I cast off a spell to open it, as I was too lazy to get up and undo the latch myself. Clint squeezed in a second later, hopping lightly down to the sofa and regarding me with his bright gold eyes with something like desperation.
“Stay here?” he asked hopefully.
“All the attention was too much?” I asked in understanding. It wasn’t the first time he’d ducked out mid-party.
He nodded fervently. Taking my question as tacit permission, he curled up at my side, stretched out along my thigh. I gave him a good belly rub, starting him purring.
Slitting open one eye, he reported to me, “Jamie happy.”
That was the one thing uniting the two of us: the happiness and well-being of the woman upstairs. I’d forever be glad I’d gone to such trouble to acquire Clint for her. “Thank you, Clint.”
With that reassurance given, he settled in, purring away. I idly stroked him as I returned to my notes. As long as Jamie was happy, we could both be at our ease.
Seaton and I were, lamentably, working on the wards once more in his study. We’d used Jamie’s suggestion of physical passes and presented the idea to Queen Regina. She’d agreed it was an option worth trying and formally approved it, if only because she was tired of the heightened security and willing to take any possible solution offered. I was not, however, of the mind to question that.
The wards were very, very complex after so many generations of people tampering with them. We had to redesign them carefully. Any alterations we made might conflict with some other facet of them. In fact, we erected a mini-model of the palace in Seaton’s study so we could try out the wards on a smaller scale, test them before performing alterations on the real thing.
Seaton frowned and poked at part of the design. “I think if we simply add the instruction of the card’s recognition, it’ll be fine. There’s nothing that should conflict.”
“I agree, but we have to design something much like the mark we use on everyone else. Otherwise we’ll need more than a one-line adjustment.” I grimaced. “Although I’m not sure if the marks will adhere to anything but skin.”
“I don’t think they will. They’re not designed to.” Seaton glared at the design of the mark in question, an innocent enough looking paper that sat between us on the table. “The question stands: Do we try to alter this just enough that it will adhere to something aside from skin? Or add another layer of complexity to the wards?”
“While we’re asking questions that may not have a good answer,” my partner intoned as she sailed into the room, “I’ve got one. Where can the non-magical people get their hands on Raskovnik?”
I hadn’t seen much of Jamie in two days. I’d spent most of Scribe Day buried in the lab at the precinct with Colette helping her catch up on the workload. I’d heard her Girls’ Night in full swing on Scribe Day, of course, but even at Colette’s welcome party yesterday we’d barely had a chance to talk. With so many cases weighing on me, I’d left early to work with Seaton on this blasted problem. We were at the start of an official work week now, so I wasn’t surprised Jamie was back on the trail of the thieves. I was surprised to see her now, though, as it was barely mid-afternoon. We weren’t supposed to meet and discuss the case until dinner this evening.
Seaton shook his head, shoving a lock of hair away from his face. “That’s rather an oxymoron, Jamie. Oh, hello, Gibson.”
“Gentlemen,” Gibson responded with a nod as he followed Jamie in. “How goes it?”
“We’re debating the merits of how to approach this, so, well enough, I suppose,” I answered with a shrug. “But back to your query. You’ve still had no luck with the usual places that grow or sell Raskovnik?”
Jamie dropped into a chair, looking vexed. “Not a lick of luck. No one’s missing any. People have kept a very tight control on it since the last case that used it. But the thieves got hold of it somehow.”
“We took a trip into Bristol, thinking perhaps they’d gotten it from there,” Gibson added. He took the only other available seat that didn’t have a stack of papers in it, eyeing the mini-palace with keen interest. “But there’s only two suppliers there, and one of them hasn’t even had stock in it for the past three months. We’re at a dead end on this so far.”
Jamie grumbled, sounding like a bear yanked early out of hibernation. “But there’s not a lot of unique leads to follow, either.”
I frowned in thought. I saw why they were so frustrated. One would think the Raskovnik would provide them with a vital clue, as it should be easy to track the theft of it. But that clearly wasn’t proving to be the case.
Seaton abandoned the wards for a moment, leaning back with his hands comfortably folded over his stomach. “Hmm. What about the passenger list?”
“Ah, we got that this morning. None of us are really willing to compare lists, so we were trying to find an easier lead to follow through on.” Jamie wilted in her chair. I think if we’d been in my lab, she’d have already started the hunt for chocolate. “We press-ganged Foster into helping.”
“Menial tasks are good for the soul,” Seaton said solemnly.
Gibson gave him an analyst’s salute. “Truth.”
A hunch stirred in the back of my mind. I edged my way toward it, as I wasn’t quite able to frame it into words. “Have you decided yet either way if this was an inside job or not?”
“Meh, we’re still sitting on the fence on that one.” Jamie shrugged but her eyes were sharp on me. “Why?”
“So, there’s enough evidence to suggest there was at least inside knowledge being passed to the thieves?”
“Yes,” Gibson confirmed, interest also piqued. “I’m of the opinion that even if this person wasn’t actively helping, they were at least passing on information. Why?”
“We know the thieves figured out a way to enter the baggage cars without raising suspicions,” I pointed out. “Why limit that skill to only one occasion? It could very well be that someone shipped Raskovnik by train at one point. They could have stolen a strand or two at that time and bottled it.”
Jamie’s face lit up in a smile that unfolded in stages. “The shipment information on those declarations are never really detailed. No one would know a small amount was missing, not if the shipment changed hands in a different city. Henri, I could kiss you. Why didn’t we think of that?”
I flushed. I hardly thought the suggestion was worth this much praise, although it was heartening to see her enthusiasm. “My question is only viable if someone did, in fact, ship Raskovnik in the week prior to the robbery.”
Gibson snapped his fingers in realization. “Right. I’d almost forgotten that. The Raskovnik is only viable for about a week after it’s been picked.”
&n
bsp; “It starts to lose effectiveness after seven days,” Seaton corrected him, still at his ease. “It’s viable to use for about nine days, it just won’t open any serious locks. I’d say to be on the side of caution, look ten days prior.”
Pulling out a slim notebook, Gibson made a note. “Looks like it’s back to the precinct for us, Jamie. We need to pull some records.”
“Yaaay,” she deadpanned, heaving herself to her feet like an old woman with a bad hip. “I really wish more people had phones. It would save us all this running back and forth. Thanks, Henri. We’ll look into it. Frankly, if this doesn’t pan out, I don’t know where else to look.”
“I don’t either,” I admitted. She’d kept me abreast of the situation, so I knew where she had checked. I hope this worked. Neither she nor Gibson had much in the way of clues. As they left, my attention gravitated back to the problem at hand. Which would be easier: changing the wards’ settings or the mark’s design?
Jamie’s head popped back in around the doorframe. “Guys, just a thought. But wouldn’t leather work? For putting the mark on a pass, I mean.”
I stared at her, the question echoing through my brain like a lonely spoon dropped into a bucket. I turned to Seaton and found him copying my movement perfectly. In near sync, we both asked, “Why didn’t we think of that?”
Laughing, Jamie winked at us. “You’re welcome. Have fun, boys!” Her laughter carried down the stairwell as she exited.
“We’ve truly stared at this problem too long if the obvious doesn’t occur to us,” Seaton groused, glaring at the roof above him as if he could see the ward even through the shingles.
“Let’s just get this done,” I told him, fatigue pulling at me. “I’m tired of focusing on this problem. I want to investigate with Jamie.”
“I know you’ve been chaffing at the restraints here,” he said with some sympathy. “By all means, let’s prove this will work, and then I can draft other magical help to craft all the necessary passes.”
Breaking and Entering 101 (The Case Files of Henri Davenforth Book 4) Page 11
