by T. G. Ayer
The Divide is a narrow chasm that sits just beyond the Veil in a space between the Graylands and the Ether. It’s where the essence of the spirit lives. Here in the Divide nothing else exists except that one person. All around them, smoky lines of color told a story about the life and times of that person. Along with experience, the aura also revealed their inner motivations, their truest deepest nature, and if they harbored darkness within. The Aura doesn’t tell me anything tangible either. It is left up to interpretation, but a little experience with reading the spirit Aura went a long way.
Right now, I could tell that the man was guilt-ridden. And completely innocent. Despite his cool aloof nature, I could see clear trails of pinks and reds, both colors indicating the heart, and love.
Shadows, gray blues and blacks indicated anger, lies, and worse, evil. The darker it was the worse the person was, or the worse they had been. The problem with the Aura, was even those who had been rehabilitated couldn’t escape the mark of the darkness on their essence.
Which made it all the more difficult to rifle through the darkness to find the good. But in Santiani’s case, although flecked with darker gray here and there, for the most part the man seemed to be good. He was a little too good to be true, but I had to accept that what the cops from the Glades precinct had said had been true. Despite his shadows, which could be attributed to being a ruthless businessman, I could tell he’d never done anything wrong or anything illegal or criminal or cruel.
The Aura worked in such a way as to reveal both what the person knew was bad and what they didn’t recognize as bad. The ever-present universal measure of good and bad was a strong indicator in the Divide. And Carlo Santiani’s aura confirmed his essential honesty.
His aura has also confirmed his innocence.
I blinked, sucking in a harsh breath as I relaxed against the back of the chair. Being in the divide was hell on a girl’s lungs. It felt as if I hadn’t taken a breath in hours. I forced my body to relax, to stop the panic from taking over. Mages, as much as we were no longer just human, had to contend with the form of mere humanity. And unlike some mage’s, I didn’t possess special powers which would serve to protect me.
I’d taken a risk going into the Divide without ensuring I was properly protected.
When Drake heard about this he was going to lose his shit.
Chapter 28
And I’d thought Illyria’s betrayal of Kai was bad.
I thought about the craziness as I showered and gave my hair a good shampoo. I felt somewhat unclean after Kai’s injury and Santiani’s revelation. My mind remained on Kai and how she was recovering. I got a breakfast of toast, coffee and soft scrambled eggs, then texted Logan for an update. His response came no more than a minute later.
Still unconscious.
Prognosis is good. It’s a shifter thing.
Relieved, but certain I was too wired for sleep, I pottered around the house, enjoying the silence, and deciding the furniture needed polishing. I sprayed and rubbed wood to a gleaming shine while my mind buzzed.
My mind insisted on returning to Gina. Gina’s alleged seduction of her own father was way worse than Illyria’s betrayal of Kailin. I was still hoping Santiani was hallucinating the whole thing. Still, something didn’t sit right. Could Gina’s surveillance of the family at the mall mean she was scouting out a new older man to seduce? But why a man with a family? Why not a single guy?
Did she have a thing for family men?
And was this something she did often; teenage serial seduction?
At least the wraith’s betrayal would be easier for Kai to stomach — even with the stab wound — than Santiani would Gina’s actions. I couldn’t even fathom what the man was going through. The expression of self-loathing on his face had been enough to bring tears to my eyes and magnify my desire to smack some sense into the girl.
Santiani’s implication of Gina’s behavior had made me wonder if there was a connection between the dead families and Gina, but I shook my head. It was just too far-fetched. I had to admit I’d seen a lot of shit in my lifetime but I was finding it hard to drop this kind of crazy at the feet of a fifteen-year-old girl. No matter how much of a rich-bitch she was.
Besides, even if I did like Gina for cannibalistic murder — just because she liked cooking and that somehow could be connected to her father’s disease — I needed more information to make the case to myself before I even said such crazy nonsense out loud to anyone else. There was enough insanity in the world right now without me adding to it.
I knew two people who would help with information.
The first on my list was Captain Murdoch, the human in charge of the CPD. His mage wife Chloe and I went way back. To be honest, so did Captain Murdoch and I. He’d had my back ever since Chloe, a sensitive who worked as a therapist and did consultations for the CPD, had taken me under her wing.
I’d go to her at the odd time when I was super stressed and couldn’t handle the pressure of what I dealt with when cases went bad.
Chloe’s gentle touch filled with magical energy was enough to calm even the most hysterical person down. Which was probably why her husband called her in one day, a very long time ago, when a little girl had been brought into the station, the only survivor of a family killing.
If it hadn’t been for Chloe, her kind words, her calming touch, her mothering, I’m sure I would have lost my mind that night.
Today, Chloe and her husband were a combo deal. Which I’d never seen as a problem. They’d always had my back. The only issue was I’d recently gotten their home blasted to smithereens.
Demons had come looking for me while I’d made a visit to the Murdoch’s home. The Captain had given me files pertaining to a case I’d been investigating, and on one particular visit with him, I’d been tracked only to have the demons obliterate the building.
Both the Captain and Chloe had seemed to understand, had never blamed me for the incident but something had changed. Not in their feelings for me. More in their availability to help.
It could be my imagination, but they’d seemed less available. I had to wonder if they were dealing with the ramifications of the accident; insurance, the loss of personal items, bearing the brunt of losing top secret files.
Had there been forms to fill in for all the files lost in the resulting fire?
Had his superiors been curious as to what the captain had been doing with so many files in his home?
Had anyone made the connection between those files and the cases of a certain infamous tracker?
I shivered at the thought of the consequences of that fire, acknowledging my fear that perhaps the destruction of Captain Murdoch’s home meant the destruction of our symbiotic relationship.
I sighed, throwing the dust rag into the laundry basket and stowing the polish into its drawer. Today I was in an anal mood. Probably because I was tired. I needed sleep, but before that, I needed to make a little more sense of things.
Especially things related to Gina.
I sat at the kitchen table and projected quickly, the path to Gina now easy to find and navigate. This time I found her sitting on a park bench watching the family from the mall play frisbee and eating breakfast on a blue-and-white checkered tablecloth laid out on the grass beneath an oak. Unaware of their surveillance, they played and laughed and ate. It was pretty obvious to me that the family unit was healthy and comfortable with each other.
Was that something Gina liked about them? Perhaps the challenge of breaking them up enticed her?
Slipping back into my body, I headed to Steph up in the comms room.
We’d erected a hidden communications hub in the attic, hiding it inside a safe room that was soundproof and hack-proof. Well kitted out, it had the most modern technology, including a bank of monitors covering one wall. Steph was sitting on top of one of the desks, cross-legged with a keyboard balanced on her knees. So much for paying for perfectly good chairs.
“Morning, boss,” she said as she chewed a sl
ice of half toasted bread.
“Hey.” I stood in the doorway not wanting to give her the impression that I was sticking around to chat.
“You look like crap. Go sleep.”
“Well, thanks so much.” I rolled my eyes. “Need you to check something for me.”
“Shoot,” she said as one of the monitors above her showed a new blank document being opened.
“Find out if anything unusual occurred prior to the deaths that had to do with the fathers of each family, and if there were any accusations of affairs or inappropriate behavior with young girls. Keep the original search parameters of families, and unusual ensuing deaths.”
Steph’s eyebrows rose as she typed my request. “What are you thinking?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know yet. Just a hunch that could be nothing. Text me what you find.”
I had to wonder if this was all just a coincidence and that Gina may have a very good reason for stalking this man. Had he done something to her? To her father? Was he blackmailing her? Or had he been the one to seduce her first?
My head hurt with the possibilities.
Chapter 29
Considering I was about to ask the Captain for such a huge favor, I decided it was best to do it in person. I sent a text to Chloe asking if it would be okay to come by. To say that I was nervous, would have been an understatement.
It took a few minutes, but I received a text back inviting me over for breakfast. Even though I had already had mine, I didn’t decline; a second breakfast was a small price to pay for keeping the peace between myself and the Murdoch’s.
I was about to teleport over to the Murdoch’s apartment when Steph rang me.
From upstairs.
“Is it so hard to use the stairs?” I asked as I answered the call.
She sniffed. “I’m in the middle of something.”
“So what’s so important you had to ring me?”
“I’m walled.”
“What?” I scowled. Sometimes Steph’s word games were hard to figure out.
“Walled. Stone. Fire.”
I scratched my head. “Oh,” I said with a grin. “Firewalled?”
The sound of slurping rang in my ears. “Yep. I can’t get through. Anything with that parameter combination is drawing a blank. It’s all top top-secret shit. If I go any further I’m going to end up ringing the wrong bells.”
I sighed. “Fine. I’ll talk to Captain Murdoch. Maybe he can un-wall you.”
She snorted but I was already teleporting to the couple’s apartment and unfortunately there was no cell reception in the Ether.
I arrived outside the apartment door, not yet confident enough to materialize in their front hall like I’d done for all these years. Since their home had been destroyed, I’d been filled with remorse and guilt. I wondered if I was just doing this to myself, self-releasing or manifesting or whatever they called it.
Flicking the doorbell, I waited only seconds when a very disapproving Chloe answered the door. Her eyes sparkled, only with anger and not joy at seeing me.
“What the hell are you doing?”
“What . . .” I hesitated, unsure where to start.
“Get your ass inside here. What if someone saw you?” she snapped, grabbing me by the elbow and tugging me inside. Shutting the door, she turned and glared at me. “Can you explain to me what that was about?” She pointed at the door, her tiny little finger holding far more ability to instill fear in me than even the most blood-thirsty demon.
“Er . . . I didn’t want to barge in on you. Figured I’d knock just in case.”
Chloe took a step toward me, forcing me to back away. I couldn’t get far because my ass was up against the hall table and there wasn’t anywhere to go. I looked at her, sheepish and a little amused.
Chloe Murdoch was tiny. If she was five foot she’d be lucky. With her long auburn hair twisted into a low bun, wisps escaping around her face, she should have looked like someone’s grandma. Instead she had the old-worldly grace of movie stars from the fifties and sixties.
“Chloe. Stop threatening the poor girl.” Captain Murdoch stood on the threshold looking at us with a smile on his face.
Chloe snorted. “I’d do more than threaten if I knew it would make a difference. She’s been part of our lives since she was twelve, always arriving inside our house like she belongs here, and now suddenly she thinks it’s okay to knock on my damn door.” She sniffed then, gave me a glare, then turned on her heel and stormed off down the hall.
I looked up at the Captain’s face not sure whether I should be amused or upset. “I don’t know what I did.”
Murdoch came to my side, peeled me away from the hall table, and guided me to the lounge. “Be patient with her. So much has changed for her. Losing our home was one thing. She’s terrified of losing you too.”
“But why would she think that?”
Murdoch sighed then turned to face me. “Imagine what it would feel like if your child has always entered your house with their key and then one day, after a fight, begins to use the door. Wouldn’t you feel like a line has been drawn in the sand? That maybe a wall was being built that one day you would not be able to surmount?”
“I had no idea she felt this way.”
He tilted his head. “How could you when you’ve stayed away from us all this time.”
I swallowed hard, trying not to cry. “I wasn’t sure I’d be all that welcome. I am a constant reminder of everything you both lost. Not to mention the very reason you lost it all.”
Murdoch patted my arm then beckoned me to the kitchen. “Things happen that we cannot control, Mel. And besides, we have always been aware of the dangers of being associated with any number of the kids Chloe deals with, or even the troubled ones I come into contact with.”
He was smiling so kindly that I didn’t know what else to say. I followed him into the kitchen, noticing the modern industrial styling of the concrete countertop, stainless steel sink, handles, light fittings, and stove.
The apartment they were renting was so unlike their own home that I wasn’t comfortable in it at all. If I felt out of place in it, then surely they would too. But Chloe seemed totally at home, piling bacon and eggs onto plates and topping off the last of the pancake tower.
It felt like the old days, when she’d taken me home and tried to coax me out of my voluntary vow of silence, plying me with food and games until I finally gave in.
We ate and chatted about inconsequential things, the odd brush of Chloe’s fingertips against mine relieving my stress. She seemed calmer now, the mundane tasks of cooking and eating pushing aside her emotional strain.
I’d even forgotten I wasn’t meant to be hungry to begin with.
At last Captain Murdoch sat back, rubbing his rounded belly with a satisfied smile. Neither of them looked troubled, and I wanted to yell out that they’d just lost their whole world and should be at least a little upset.
Murdoch leaned forward and patted the back of my hand. “What’s the matter, Mel? What’s going on in that busy little head of yours.”
I sighed, figuring the best thing to do was to ask. “I need help finding info on a case.”
He nodded. “Santiani?”
I shook my head. “You sent him?” Shoulda known.
Murdoch smiled. He’d never admitted to me when he sent someone my way. For reasons of his own he preferred to play those cards close to his chest. “Heard he was in a coma.”
I didn’t bother to ask how he knew that.
“He’s out of it now. Feeling a little better from what I saw, but the prognosis isn’t good.”
Murdoch’s face darkened. “You need to do whatever it takes to get to the bottom of this case, Mel. Even if not to save Santiani, but at least to prevent another man like him from being killed.”
I sat forward. “You know him?”
Murdoch nodded. “We grew up together. I wasn’t always a cop, you know.”
Chloe’s inelegant snort made me hide a smile
.
Since he had a personal interest in Carlo Santiani, I said, “Well, I need help getting into a bunch of restricted files.”
Murdoch nodded. “I’ll get you the accesses.”
“Can you tell Steph? I may not be around.”
“The case?” he asked as he pushed his plate away.
I shook my head. “No. I’m helping a friend out.”
Murdoch nodded. While we spoke, Chloe cleared the table but when I tried to get to my feet in order to help, the captain grasped my arm. I sat, giving him a curious look.
He eased a two-inch steel tube from his pocket and placed it in my hand. “Take that. Have it checked.”
“Am I supposed to guess what it is?”
His eyebrows bobbed. The Captain’s version of an eye-roll. “Carlo’s blood. The hospital investigators called in the FBI, who called in Sentinel.”
“And you want an independent opinion?”
He nodded.
“What tests am I running?”
“Magical ones,” said Chloe as she sat heavily into her seat. For the first time she was showing her age, tiny crow’s feet lined the corners of her eyes, and shadows bruised the skin beneath them. I looked from her to the Captain, and back.
“You think there is magical influence behind his illness?” That would make sense. Steph and I had already discussed it and it would explain the speed of the course of his progression.
She nodded. “His blood work didn’t make sense. The hospital has a low-level mage on call and his opinion is that Carlo’s blood contained magical properties. A presence of a demonic spirit or, at the very least, a trace of a demonic entity.”
“Like an infection?” she nodded. “Was it the cause or just part of the problem?”