by Tess Adair
“That’s not what I would have told you,” said Logan carefully.
“Not that they were any help when she turned up dead, either.” Alana’s voice was cold, her eyes empty. “They basically said there’s no point in hoping they’ll ever find the killer.”
Logan’s eyes narrowed in resolve.
“There’s always a point in hoping,” she said.
Alana gave her an appraising look.
“But why in the world should I rest my hope on you?”
Logan pressed her lips together, apparently considering what angle she should choose.
“I’m not a cop,” she said again, quieter this time. “I’m a private contractor. That means I don’t work within the pre-existing system, and I’m not bound by any of the biases of that system.” She took another beat, then nodded to herself, like she had made a decision. “And it means I’m privy to my own methods of information-gathering. In this case, I have information they didn’t have.”
At long last, Alana seemed interested in her pitch. She narrowed her discerning gaze.
“If you really have this information, why not bring it to the police? Wouldn’t that be easier?” She raised an eyebrow suspiciously. “What is my sister to you?”
A deep sadness seemed to wash over Logan’s features, but it was gone in seconds.
“Innocent.”
Alana paused at that, but her suspicion didn’t fade away entirely.
“Is that so?” She shook her head slowly. “I wish I could believe you, just like that. But Ariel was the one who trusted strangers, not me.”
Logan nodded and leaned forward.
“The person who did this,” she said, her voice quiet and precise, “I can’t promise you he’ll ever see the inside of a courtroom. But I will find him, and I will deliver justice. In fact, I’ll do it whether you help me or not.” At this, Logan’s expression softened, her eyes pleading along with her words. “But it’ll happen faster if you do. And faster means fewer chances for him to do it again. Fewer bodies for him to leave in his wake.”
Alana Huntsman’s eyes flashed, a white rage turning into resolution.
“What do you need from me?”
The right side of Logan’s mouth twitched, as if it wanted to smile, but she wouldn’t let it.
“I just need to know where Ariel went the night she disappeared. That’s all.”
Alana considered this for a moment. She glanced over at the doorway, as if she worried her mother might walk back through. With a sigh, she turned back to Logan.
“Fine. I’ll tell you. But I want to know what your information is first. What is it that you know, that the cops don’t know?”
Logan glanced briefly at Jude, but Jude wasn’t sure if she wanted her input, so she kept her mouth shut.
“I have a suspect,” said Logan after a long moment. “A woman hired us to find her son, and I have reason to believe he may be our killer.”
“Do you have a picture?”
“Yes.”
“Show me.”
Logan hesitated for a moment, studying the young woman sitting before them. Alana had her sister’s hair and eyes, but the grim, bitter resolution on her face looked nothing like the smiling, carefree girl Jude could still see in the pictures on the shelf. Finally, Logan seemed to make up her mind, reached for her phone, and showed its screen to Alana. Alana stared blankly at the image. Eventually, she nodded her head, but she still said nothing.
“I’m going to find him, Alana,” Logan reassured her. “I’m going to find him and make him pay. Does that sound good to you?”
Alana’s eyes hardened. Her mouth was a thin line, her fingers tightened around her arms like a vice.
“Nothing in the world sounds good to me,” she answered. “But I’ll take it.” She took in a measured breath. “You’ll want to check out the Fox Trot. She didn’t tell Mom, but I know that’s where Ariel went that night. It’s a club in the financial district, a few blocks from the water. I bet you a million dollars that’s where he found her.”
“Okay,” said Logan, nodding. “Thank you.”
“We can’t pay you.”
Logan shook her head. “You don’t have to.”
“Good.”
“Good.”
“One more thing, Ms. Logan,” said Alana, her cold eyes burning as they pinned Logan down.
“Shoot.”
“I want proof,” she said. “When you find him, whatever happens—I want proof that he’s paid for it. I’ll leave it to you to decide how.”
Logan nodded slowly.
“You have my word.”
Chapter Eight
The Human Beast
Jude felt numb as they walked away from the house. She never wanted to do anything like that again. She couldn’t shake the images of Alana Huntsman’s hard-set chin and her mother’s downcast eyes, and she didn’t know when she would.
Is it always like that? she wondered. She glanced over at Logan, but she couldn’t bring herself to say it out loud.
Is that what it was like…for Violet Buchanan’s family?
Like flicking water off her hand, she shook the thought away from her.
Logan came up beside her as they progressed down the street, away from the house.
“You seem upset,” she said. “Is something bothering you?”
Jude glanced at Logan, but her expression was unreadable. For a moment, she said nothing; she was too afraid she’d be taken for a child, like Alexei kept suggesting. What if Logan expected her to take this all in stride?
But the longer they walked in silence, the harder it became to keep hers.
“I just…”
She took a deep breath.
“I feel so bad for them,” she admitted at last.
Logan nodded.
“Yeah, I know. I do, too.”
“You do?”
As soon as the words came out of her mouth, Jude cringed at how silly she must sound. Logan gave a small chuckle.
“Of course I do. What kind of monster do you think I am?”
Jude nearly gasped.
“Oh, no! That’s not what I meant! I meant—well, I thought I was just being, like, weak or stupid or something—”
“Not at all.” Logan shook her head. “There’s no weakness in empathy.”
Jude let out an audible sigh of relief.
“Cool. That’s…well that’s good to know.”
“It’s both appropriate and perfectly normal to feel bad. It’s not like we can help them. In the long run, I mean.”
“What?” Jude faltered, coming to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk. “Why—why would you say that? Don’t you think we’re gonna find Todd Phillips?”
“Yes, most likely, we will.”
Realizing Jude was no longer walking with her, Logan also came to a stop, turning back on one foot to face her. She shrugged, as if it were the most casual thing in the world.
“How much do you think that will matter to them?” she asked, dispassionately. “I mean, years from now, when the shallow rush of revenge has long since faded out—how much will it matter then? Ariel will still be dead.”
“But—but if we catch the person who did it—I don’t know—won’t that give them closure, or something? Won’t that help?”
Logan smiled ruefully at nothing in particular, then cast her gaze at the sky, like it might know the answer better than she did.
“Closure’s a nice idea, I suppose.” She shrugged again. “Won’t bring her back, but it’s a nice idea.”
Jude had a funny feeling in the pit of her stomach. It felt like she was standing on an edge, and there was something very, very bad just on the other side. She turned away from it, hoping that if she pretended it didn’t exist, then it might go away all on its own.
Her hands twisted in the pockets of her shorts as she took another breath.
“But…if you don’t think it matters, then why do you even do it?”
Logan smiled.
&nb
sp; “I didn’t say it doesn’t matter,” she said. “It matters to the next person he might hurt. It matters to the safety of the public. It matters in the broad scheme of the universe.”
She looked behind Jude, at the Huntsmans’ home half a block back, as if she might be able to see them through its façade. Then she looked back at Jude.
“It matters to me.”
Jude felt herself squinting her eyes, like that might help her understand. She was pretty sure Logan was trying to comfort her, but she did not feel comforted.
“But…if there’s nothing we can do to help them…”
She could see a kind of resigned sadness in Logan’s features, but she could see something else, too. Resolve, perhaps.
“It isn’t always about the end result,” she said. “Sometimes you have to fight for the sake of fighting. Sometimes you have to fight when you know you can’t win, simply because it’s the right thing to do.” She cocked her head to the side, like she was examining Jude. “Do you see what I mean?”
It’s not about the end result, she repeated to herself, trying to instill the words within herself. You just…do the right thing.
But would she always know what that meant?
“I’m not sure,” she answered honestly.
Logan nodded and smiled, then took a step forward and gave Jude a reassuring pat on the shoulder.
“Hey, it’s been a long day. Let’s come back to this esoteric shit some other time, yeah? I’m gonna call us a cab back to Alexei’s place, and then we’ll get something to eat, all right?”
With that, she pulled out her phone and took another step away.
And Jude was left alone with her thoughts.
For once, it wasn’t a place she wanted to be.
Logan stood in front of the mirror in the guest bathroom, examining her scales.
They’re not scales, she told herself. They’re just…demon parts.
She let out an audible sigh. The purplish-black markings that stretched across the tops of her shoulders were hard to the touch, and if she didn’t know better, she’d swear they got bigger every single year.
Do I know better? she wondered, leaning in closer and using her left hand to tap at the hardened skin. Maybe this is how demons age.
Half-demons, I mean.
This time, she didn’t bother to sigh.
Digging a sports bra out of her bag, she slipped it over her shoulders, pulling the front fastenings closed with finality. She had to wonder if a time would come when she would no longer be able to wave away the markings by calling them tattoos and pointing to the lone real tattoo on her body, as if that proved her point.
She looked at herself in the mirror again, before pulling a plain black shirt over her head.
And how long has it been since Alexei saw—?
A sudden knock at the door jarred her out of her thoughts.
“Logan,” came Jude’s voice through the door, “you coming out? Dinner’s here.”
“Out in a minute. Thanks.”
She listened to Jude’s footsteps as they faded beyond the guest bedroom’s outer door. A part of her didn’t want to follow, didn’t want to join them.
When the marks had first shown up, they’d been little more than skin discoloration. Only in recent years had they hardened, taking on a completely different texture than normal human skin. It had been so much easier back then, only a few years ago, to hand-wave her differences. Her demonic irregularities.
She sighed again. For the moment, at least, it didn’t matter. They had a job to do, and she had to focus on that job.
Or else she might get Alexei killed.
So, she took in a deep breath, and as she let it out, she made it a point to brush away her smaller, self-centric fears. When her mind was as clear as it could be, she stepped out of the bathroom, walked through the guest room, and entered into Alexei’s living room once more.
Containers of Chinese food had been set out on Alexei’s kitchen table, and Jude and Alexei now sat eating from them in a tangibly awkward silence. Logan went over and accepted the carton Jude handed her without question.
“So,” she said, looking into her own food container in the continuing silence, “are we all clear on the plan?”
“It’s not much of a plan,” said Alexei, skeptically. “Step one, go to club. Step two, look around.” He glanced at Jude. “Unless that’s too complex for you, of course.”
Jude rolled her eyes.
“You know, the trouble with being good-looking,” she muttered, barely audible enough to hear, “is that nobody tells you when your jokes aren’t funny.”
To Logan’s surprise, Alexei chuckled.
“Not a problem you’ve experienced, I imagine,” he responded. His voice had gotten breezier, his eyes more mischievous than calculated.
Jude seemed to notice, too.
“Maybe I’m just better at figuring out when people are lying to me,” she said, a little louder and more confident this time.
“Touché.”
Logan glanced back from one to the other, simultaneously glad that they were almost getting along, and annoyed that neither of them had actually answered her question.
“Should I take that to mean yes, we are all clear on the plan?” she asked.
“Um, actually,” said Jude, ducking her head, “how exactly am I going to get in? I mean, I’m, you know…not twenty-one…yet.”
Logan guessed from the tone of her voice that she was afraid they would leave her behind.
“We could probably bribe the bouncer,” she said, considering it. She wasn’t particularly keen on illegal behavior, but she also knew that Jude would be in no real danger, as long as she was with them.
“There’s no need,” said Alexei with a shrug. “I actually…uh, I know the guy at Fox Trot. Well, there are two guys who rotate. I know both of them.”
Logan raised an eyebrow at him.
“You do?”
“I know a lot of bouncers.”
“Is, uh, is that what your clients pay you for?” asked Jude from across the table, a small smile playing on her lips.
Alexei’s eyes snapped back to her.
“Among other things.”
“Okay,” said Logan, clapping her hands together. “Is that it for questions?”
Alexei sighed.
“I’m still not convinced this is where we’ll find Todd,” he said. “But since I don’t have anything else lined up for the evening, I suppose I’m on board.”
“Fantastic. Jude?”
“Do I, uh, need a weapon or anything?”
“No,” Logan shook her head. “If anything goes down, I want you to hang back and keep yourself safe, at all costs.” She glanced over at her. “You do still have the powders Knatt gave you, right?”
“Yep.”
“That’s all you should need.”
Jude still looked uncertain, but she nodded anyway.
Logan nodded too, in the hopes of reassuring herself as much as anyone else. She had to believe that she and Alexei could keep Jude safe if anything happened, but her favorite hope was that nothing would.
She wanted a boring night, where their target revealed himself and did absolutely nothing else.
With that in mind, she bent to her plate and began to prepare herself for something else.
Alexei did, indeed, know the bouncer at the Fox Trot, though that didn’t particularly surprise Logan. Alexei’s social skill was his currency—when he wanted it to be, of course.
Inside the building, they had to traverse down a long hallway that had been painted a dark color and lit with red lights. A base beat throbbed through the walls at them, though Logan hesitated to call it music. As they rounded the last corner at the end of the hall, entering into the main room of the club, the sudden, cacophonous wave of sound briefly overwhelmed her senses, like a feedback loop causing a blowout.
For nearly two whole seconds, she paused in the entryway, left hand immediately coming up to left ear, ho
ping to block the sound. Closing her eyes, she took a breath and recalibrated. Just like that, she turned the volume down on the world.
“Everything all right?”
Alexei’s breath was warm on her cheek. He smelled like mint, though it was almost difficult to tell in the din.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” she said, dismissively.
The club looked like every other club she’d ever been to: dark at the corners, lit only with strobing, colored lights that turned the mass of bodies pulsing at its center into an ever more chaotic mess. The twin scents of sweat and alcohol drenched the air, and the incessant beat downed out everything else.
One look at Jude drove home the fact that she’d never been to a club before. Her eyes went wide, her mouth agape.
Apparently giving up on vocal communication, Alexei motioned at her, indicating that she should go the right, while he went to the left. She nodded her agreement, then motioned to Jude to come with her.
All around them, bodies writhed incessantly, pushing and pulling in rhythm. In the dim tinted light, they looked like aliens, shadows and highlights twisting their forms into strange shapes. Logan heard a hiss from above, and smoke billowed out of unseen machines, falling on the crowd like a fog. Though nobody else could hear it, Logan sighed: the smoke would likely obscure what few remaining scents she could have picked out.
So instead, she scanned the room with her eyes, doing her best to take in as many faces as she could. In the shifting light, it took a little puzzling out to discern facial features, but she did her best.
She’d only been at it for a few minutes when she froze, recognizing the pallor and profile of one Todd Phillips.
That was easier than I thought.
With a swift and graceful motion, Logan reached back and grabbed Jude’s hand, steering them further to the right, until they stood close behind a cement pillar, giving them cover to spy. She gave Jude a nudge and pointed her in the right direction.