Exhaling some frustration of his own, he pointed vaguely at the sun through the plate glass window, which was already starting to sink in the sky.
“There are astrological reasons.” He looked back at his tablet, now using both hands to manipulate the size of something on his screen. “Related to rituals,” he added, turning his head as if looking at something on the screen from a different angle. “It’s not so simple to explain. I told you the algorithm was somewhat complex... and that it involved several variables, including astrological ones...”
“No, you didn’t.”
“Well... I meant to,” he said without a pause. “This particular system of astrology has to do with rituals, as I said. If our target is following the pattern I think he is following, we can expect three separate incidents related to this particular stage of the ritual... .and the third should be tonight. Unless, of course, we stop him.”
I stared at Black’s downturned head, frowning.
Sighing again, he raised his upper body, leaning his palms on the bar counter and looking at me directly.
“It is difficult to explain,” he repeated. “It has to do with wedding rituals from our home world. Wedding rituals of our people,” he added, in case I missed that part. “Clearly, our killer has weddings on the mind. He seems to have mixed feelings about them... wouldn’t you agree?”
I folded my arms tighter, biting my lip.
“You’re saying you’re from another planet, Mr. Black?” I said tersely.
“Dimension,” he said, leaning back over the tablet and using his fingers to slide the screen again. “Earth... but not this one. I’d really rather not talk about all that until I can get a look at your blood, if you don’t mind.” His voice grew preoccupied once more as he frowned at the screen. “Why don’t we table that whole aspect of our discussion, doc? Now that I know you didn’t ‘immigrate’ here knowingly, so to speak, I’d rather have something more concrete to show you before I explain things that are going to significantly alter your relationship to just about every aspect of your life... as well as your feelings of kinship towards the vast majority of this world’s inhabitants.”
My mouth opened. Since I couldn’t think of anything to say to that however, I closed it a few seconds later with a snap.
“There are a number of clues your Inspector Tanaka has missed,” Black added, without lifting his eyes from the screen. “Not his fault, really. I only noticed because I knew what I hunted. He would have no reason to look where I was looking.”
“Meaning?” I said, my voice terse once more.
He looked up, exhaling in open impatience as he stared at me.
“This is all going to be much more difficult and time consuming, if I have to walk you through even the basics of what I am doing every five seconds to keep you from having some kind of negative emotional reaction,” he said. “I confess, I still want you with me. I would prefer if we could approach this in partnership. But it’s going to be really tedious if I have to explain every single reference that comes up relating to our race. Can we please just table such things until we have the luxury to discuss them at our leisure?”
Closing the leather cover over the tablet with a magnetized-sounding snap, he stared at me, as if waiting for an answer.
“Y-yes?” I said, fighting with whether to be angry or not.
Or maybe whether it was worth arguing the point.
“Good.” Exhaling in relief that time, he looked away, gazing out the window at the slowly dipping sun as if summoning every last ounce of his patience.
He faced me once he had.
“There are others here... of our kind,” he explained in a short voice. “That’s all you really need to know for now. I have no idea how many, so don’t even ask. At least three. Likely not more than a few dozen, and frankly, that is pure optimism on my part. You are the first female I have encountered...” He hesitated, his stare flickering down my body. He seemed to shake something off before adding, “I have reason to believe that at least one of our kind here is ideological in an anti-human sense. He is also, I suspect, well-funded... and not particularly fond of me. But he is not located here.”
“On this... world?”
“In this country,” he corrected. Frowning at me, he said, “Why in the gods would I bring him up if he was still in our home dimension?”
Not sure what dimension he was talking about at that point, for either of us, I started to ask, then decided to drop it. After all, he’d asked twice.
“Russia,” he said, frowning back at me. “He’s in Russia. In this dimension.”
At my blank stare, he sighed again.
“Truly,” he said. “That is not important now. I only bring it up in case it becomes relevant in relation to the rogue I’ve been tracking... the one who might be killing these human females and combining rituals from that other dimension and this one.” Staring off into the distance, a more thoughtful look on his face, he added, “I admit I am curious if these deaths are the work of one of ours who has simply gone insane... or if it is part of some more deliberate orchestration. Something with an end-goal that has wider implications.”
“For who?”
He pretended not to hear my question. He glanced over my body with another of those appraising stares. “I admit, the coincidence of finding you here, at the same time, strikes me as overly...” He paused, as if searching for the right word.
“...Coincidental,” he finished.
For a long-feeling number of seconds we just looked at one another.
“The Velaquez family didn’t really hire you, did they?” I said.
He gave me a disparaging look. “They could not even afford my consultation fee.”
“How did you get them to say they had hired you?”
He gave me another look that translated more or less as really?
I bit my tongue, then pressed on. “So you’ve simply been looking for this... rogue... on your own? And you think he might be the murderer?”
“Yes.”
“Why are you looking for him, if no one is paying you?”
He frowned again, staring at me. “He is one of ours.”
The silence deepened.
“Would you like to accompany me, Ms. Fox?” he asked.
That time, his voice sounded formally polite.
He really wanted me to go, I realized.
“How are you going to get there without Nick following you?” I said.
“By leaving now,” he said, checking that expensive-looking military-style watch. “Well. Perhaps ten minutes from now. Soon.”
“Now?” I said, startled. “I thought you said––”
He sighed in open impatience.
“I would prefer to conduct surveillance beforehand,” he explained. “I can’t find enough recent pictures of the exhibit layouts to get a sense of where he might stage this. I need to walk the grounds. I thought we could do that while they are still open... during business hours, I mean. It is not practical to remain inside for the duration, given what my staff tells me regarding the most efficient means of circumventing their security protocols. But we could go, look around, then eat dinner while waiting for my team to finish prep.”
Glancing at my hand, the one wearing the engagement ring, he paused before making a strangely fluid gesture towards the ring itself.
“It may have to be a long dinner,” he said.
I shrugged. “Ian’s out of town. Your timing is good, on that front at least. Although he’s out of town most of the time these days...”
Trailing, I realized I was already talking as if I was going with him.
For a long moment, he only looked at me.
Then his eyes dropped back to the ring I wore.
“There are other things we could do, of course,” he said somewhat cagily. “To pass the time.”
I gave him a warier look. “Meaning?”
“I suppose sex is out of the question?” he said. He cleared his throat, going on in an al
most carefully polite voice. “While we wait. Clearly, you’re in a relationship. But I don’t know what kind of agreement you and this... Ian... operate under.”
I let out a bewildered snort. “What?”
“I mean no offense.” He met my gaze with those riveting gold eyes, his face still polite but essentially unapologetic. “It’s a more pleasant way to pass the time than most. And I wanted to... clarify things. I admit I’m reacting to being around a female of my own kind more than I’d accounted for. Likely more than you realize. But you needn’t worry on your own behalf,” he added more sharply, maybe at something in my face. “...I am more than capable of controlling myself, Miriam.”
Flinching at his use of my first name, I continued to stare, fighting somewhere between asking him what the hell he was talking about, reminding him what I’d walked in on that afternoon, making some mention of him being an active suspect in an ongoing investigation of multiple homicides... and giving a flat, unequivocal no on the sex part before I did any of that and confused the issue more.
I ended up falling roughly on the last of these.
“No,” I said, incredulity leaking into my voice. “Absolutely no. Most definitely not on the agenda, Mr. Black. And yes, I’m in a relationship. I’m engaged. And no... that’s definitely not okay with me or Ian. Absolutely not. No.”
He nodded, seemingly unfazed.
Then he just stood there, his expression calm. It occurred to me after a few seconds more that he was still waiting for my definitive answer.
Not about sex.
About the other thing.
“And yes,” I blurted. “I’ll go. To the gallery, I mean. And to dinner at least, depending on what we find. But no... .funny business, Mr. Black. Dinner. That’s it.”
He gave me another of those curt nods.
“Understood,” he said. “Yes on the gallery and to dinner... with a pending ‘maybe’ on any subsequent B&E. Absolute no on any funny business between us. I agree to your terms.”
From anyone else, it would have sounded like he was making fun of me.
From Black, it sounded more like an awkward attempt at reassurance. Perhaps even some kind of informal contract. When he said it, he even held up a hand in a strange sort of peace gesture. Or maybe it was more of a promise gesture––like a boy scout’s salute, but less formal and he used all of his fingers.
As soon as it got quiet again between us, I wondered what the hell I was doing.
I’d given him a yes before I even let the rational part of my brain weigh in.
Nick would kill me. Arrest me, anyway.
He might even have grounds at this point, although I couldn’t for the life of me think what those charges would be, since I was no longer officially on the case and Black had invited me into his home completely of his own volition.
Of course, if I accompanied Black into the Legion of Honor that night, Nick would definitely have grounds to arrest me. And how on earth would I explain that? I could just picture telling Nick I’d broken into a museum in the dead of night with a murder suspect to see if a serial killer from another dimension might show up.
The thought made me smile... if involuntarily. Then again, maybe I was giving the dark humor part of my brain a little too much free reign right now.
I knew some part of me was hooked, though.
I could admit that much to myself.
Remembering that Nick might know exactly where I was already, my humor faded still more. He might be waiting for me or Black to leave the apartment even now. After all, when I came here, it was with the understanding that Black remained in police custody.
Nick would have someone tailing Black. I was sure of it.
“Hey,” I said, glancing at Black. “When they let you out. Did you happen to notice––”
“They definitely tailed me here, yes.”
Black turned towards me from where he’d been putting the headset from the glass table into the pocket of a long coat I hadn’t seen him put on.
He wore boots now too, I noticed.
I frowned at his words. “I thought you said you couldn’t read me.”
“I can’t in the usual way. But I still catch things, here and there. And you aren’t trying to hide yourself from me as much as you had been before, in that police station.”
He said it matter-of-factly.
I thought about that, then shoved the possible implications of those thoughts from my mind. I tried to decide where his accent originated instead. Sometimes it sounded almost Asian. He didn’t look Asian, but he could be some obscure mix.
“He didn’t come himself,” Black added, shoving a smartphone with a wide screen into a different coat pocket. “...Tanaka,” he clarified. “He might be out there now, of course, but he had someone else follow me from the station, likely in the hopes I wouldn’t recognize the tail. There is still a good chance he doesn’t know you are here, Miriam. Whoever he sent would likely not have been looking for you.”
Before I could decide how to respond, he turned, heading for the corridor to the right of his foyer. I assumed his bedroom lived down there, given that he’d disappeared and reappeared from the same direction when he’d gone to fetch the blond.
The memory brought a faint smile to my face.
Then a more noticeable heat.
“I’ll be right back,” he informed me, glancing over his shoulder. “Just grabbing a few supplies.” Without slowing his steps, he spoke over his shoulder again. “...And don’t worry. We can get out via the roof. Your homicide detective won’t see us, even if he is down there.”
“The roof?” I muttered.
But Black had already gone.
I glanced upwards, as if I would be able to see what he was talking about through the wood-beamed high ceiling. Did he really have a helipad up there? It was the only thing that made sense. But was he seriously saying he was going to helicopter us out of there, just so we could commit crime undetected by the SFPD?
That didn’t strike me as particularly inconspicuous.
Then again, as they always say... the rich really are different.
HE DID TAKE me out via helicopter.
He flew the damned thing, too.
It was only me and him, and for the first time that day, I found myself wanting to ask him about his security company, as well as about his military background.
Five black-uniformed security personnel waited for us on the roof when we took the stairs up there after spending some time in the immaculate offices of Black Securities and Investigations.
On the other side of that copper-coated door, I’d discovered that the offices really did form a kind of island on the segment of floor not taken up by Black’s residence. As a result, unlike his apartment, it had no windows. None that I saw, anyway... which I supposed wasn’t a terrible thing for a security company, although pretty redundant considering how hard it was to even get up here. Smokey glass walls partitioned much of the offices off inside the business suite, too, so a fair bit of privacy existed even between Black’s agents.
I saw a lot of computers, of course, as well as a number of people doing what looked like research. I saw a lot of people on hands-free phones, too.
I only saw maybe twelve employees total on the main floor, but I suspected a lot more people worked for him who might be elsewhere. I glimpsed a few windowless offices in the back as well as a number of storage lockers that some part of me wondered about.
It was not a small-feeling operation.
It didn’t feel huge either, but it definitely felt bigger than the name implied. Big enough that I wondered why I’d never heard of it before today.
All of his employees were polite. Deferential even.
Not just to Black... to me, too.
I got a few curious stares as we walked by, with a number of women and men double-taking me as I walked past. Black took me into a back room before we went up to the roof, and I soon realized in surprise that he’d done it so I could grab a change of cl
othes. Of course, when I thought about that, it made perfect sense. I didn’t really want to be wearing a suit and heels during our break-in that evening, no matter how good of camouflage it might be beforehand.
He had clothes in a lot of different sizes... women’s and men’s.
It made me curious about his business all over again, but I didn’t ask.
He instructed me on a few articles of clothing, including an armored vest, boots... and a shoulder holster for a gun. When I protested I didn’t have a concealed carry license in California, nor could I legally use any of his guns, I expected him to tell me it wouldn’t matter given what we planned on doing that night.
Instead, he said he’d already taken care of that.
I had absolutely no idea what that meant.
He gave me a faint smile. “This is the point that concerns you?” he said. “Illegal possession and carry of a firearm during our planned breaking and entering?”
I folded my arms. “I can potentially explain the latter.”
“Can you?”
“Just... stop dodging the question,” I said, waving a hand at him.
“I’ve made you my employee,” he said, handing a dark dress shirt to me over the partition I’d been using to try on clothes. Seeming to feel my reaction to his words, he added, “On a temporary and purely consultative basis, of course... at least until we can hammer out the details on something more permanent.”
Looking over the partition, I gaped at him––again for maybe the twentieth or thirtieth time that day––then shook my head, pulling the shirt he’d handed me around my shoulders and buttoning it up. Only when I’d finished and was in the process of sliding an arm into the shoulder holster did I peer over the dark gray partition a second time, lifting an eyebrow.
“Fuck,” he said, smiling faintly. “Stop flirting with me, doc. You’re distracting me horribly.”
I flinched, pulling my head back behind the partition, and I swore I heard him smile again. When I looked around the partition at him next, my face carefully blank, I saw zero apology in his eyes.
“We don’t have a forensic psychologist,” he explained. “It’s a legitimate business expense. I’ve decided I need one on permanent staff.”
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