By the time I crossed the street to Key’s apartment building, I’d agitated myself into a shitty mood. I’d barely slept. The morning was cold, and I’d forgotten my coffee in the car. I hated the secrets I was forced to keep, as much as I did the encroaching sense of guilt.
I lied to protect them. It was the one belief I’d held fast to all these years: keep humanity safe. If I started doubting my methods now, where did I go from here?
The tinted front entrance sat four steps down inside a little alcove. As I moved for the stairs, a rustling at my left made me jump. I’d been so engrossed in my pity party for one, I hadn’t noticed the woman standing near the line of overgrown hedges.
“Ronnie,” I barked. “What the hell?
“Sorry,” she said, her amused tone implying otherwise. “Creed’s upstairs. Third floor. Elevator is inside to your right.”
“Thanks.” I started forward again.
“I hear you’re going to a costume party.”
Stopping short, I squinted at her. “Creed told you?”
“He did. The team offered him good money for pictures of our barracuda as a pregnant nun, so don’t be surprised if you catch your date snapping away.”
“Creed isn’t my date. And the mayor’s event is a bit classier than that. I hope,” I frowned. Going down a step, I stopped again. “You’re not serious about the pictures, are you?”
Raking back the wind-whipped strands pulled loose from her ponytail, she shrugged. “Shit happens when you miss the morning meeting—five times in a row.”
“It hasn’t been five.” Has it? “Damn. Is he mad?”
“About the same as always. But there were donuts,” she pointed out happily.
“Told you.” Descending the remaining steps, I opened the door and glanced back. “You’re not coming?”
“Creed wants me out here in case our suspect shows. It looks like he’s abandoned the place, but you never know. If we catch him, it might be the break we need.”
I left her with a friendly, “Stay warm,” and went inside. Opting for stairs over the elevator, I jogged up to the third floor. Officer Connors was in the hall. He nodded with an extra-long smirk, and I knew Ronnie wasn’t kidding about the pictures. Thankfully, Connors let the expression do the taunting for him and stepped aside.
In less than ten seconds, I’d scanned the main living space. The furnishings were sparse and old, the paneling gouged, the fake-wood floor scuffed. There was no TV, no pictures or knick-knacks. The kitchen sat along one wall. Except for a microwave and coffee pot, the counters and shelves were bare.
Following faint voices, I wandered past the living room, hall closets, and a bathroom, to the bedroom at the end. A mess of covers lay twisted and tangled on the mattress. The bedside table held a blinking digital clock. The dresser: nothing but dust.
Evans, Harper, and another tech were near the closet. I almost didn’t see Creed. He was on the other side of them, inside the small space. The floor creaked as I crossed the threshold in the bedroom, and they all turned. The tech excused herself and ducked past me. Evans shot me a look of warning before stepping back from the closet. Harper rocked on her heels, feigning interest in the camera in her hand.
Creed looked out from the closet. His blue eyes met mine, clouded with irritation. Accusation and worry tightened his jaw.
“Okay,” I surrendered, throwing up my hands. “One of you needs to start talking, because you’re all giving me the creeps. What’s so—”
“The closet,” Evans said. “There’s a false wall. We almost missed it.”
“We did miss it,” Harper jumped in. “If you hadn’t insisted something felt off,” she glanced at him, “we would never have found it.”
Impatient for the other shoe to hit me in the head, I begged, “Found what?”
Harper slid to the side. “You should see for yourself.”
Creed had yet to say a word. He watched me move up and peer inside the closet. The overhead light shone down on the old ironing board leaning against the right wall. On the left was an even older vacuum. There were no clothes or shoes, no hangers on the wooden pole.
“I give up,” I said. “What am I missing?”
“This.” Gripping the pole, Creed gave it a twist, eliciting a solid click from somewhere behind the paneling. He pushed on the back wall, and it swung inward to darkness. Creed ducked beneath the pole and stepped forward. His presence activated a motion sensor, triggering a set of recessed lights. The last one came on as I joined him.
Turning in a circle in the ten by ten space, I took it all in. “Wow.”
Norman Key was a busy man.
Tacked-up pictures, papers, maps, even scribbled-on pages of a desk calendar covered two walls of the spacious hidden room. The third wall displayed an array of firearms and blades. A black, hooded face mask hung from a peg near the door.
“We should check the rest of his prior addresses,” I said. “There might be more hidden rooms like this.”
Creed broke his silence with a curt, “Already on it.”
Forcing myself not to ask about his unpleasant tone, I scanned the photos and notes. There were addresses circled on maps; pictures of shitty motels and abandoned buildings; shadowy figures and darkened windows. Only a handful were photographed in broad daylight. Most were fuzzy, taken at night, and from far away. The same subject appeared in a number of photos. Dressed casually, in jeans or sweatpants, in most of the shots she was crossing a dark street. Several were taken in front of the same building. There was a neon sign in the window. Like her, it was blurry, but readable. Sal’s Gym.
There were other pictures. Different angles, different locations and distance. But the subject was consistent. Me.
Creed stepped closer. “Should I assume, from here on out, that every psycho in the city wants to kill you?”
I didn’t answer him. I couldn’t. Never would I have imagined that this was why Evans wanted me here so badly. Gant must have ordered me watched, I thought, struggling to think past my shock. Nadine said he ran background checks on all the supernatural players in town. But why engage in such extreme surveillance, when I hadn’t looked his direction until this week?
I cleared my throat and tried to remember Creed’s question. “We don’t know the person who took these is psychotic.”
“Right. Healthy men build shrines to women behind their closet walls.”
“I wouldn’t call it a shrine,” I said, though that was exactly what it was. “And there’s no indication here that anyone wants to kill…” I lost the words, and the argument, as my attention landed on another picture. The edges were torn, the colors faded. I was dressed in shorts and a tank top, perched on the hood of a car. The license plate wasn’t visible. The building to the side was nondescript. The parking lot could have been anywhere. There was no way to tell it was in a small seaside town, nothing like Sentinel City. No way to know the car was stolen, or that Ronan had lifted it from a parking lot the night before.
There was a camera in the backseat. I remembered him taking my picture, but I never knew he developed the film. Yet, here the image was, in the secret arsenal of our hit-and-run suspect, with a big, red circle around my face and a knife sticking the photo to the wall—a knife I gave Ronan many years ago. He is alive, I thought.
And he’s here. And Jace knows it, too.
Because they’re both working for the Market.
Son of a bitch. That’s who Jace was protecting at Juicy Bits.
Ronan must have been the man who jumped Creed. But if he’d been re-trained by Naalish, why was he sent back into the field so soon? According to Aidric, the queen took Ronan for punishment. And she wasn’t one to rush a reprimand. Not unless she needed him for a specific assignment. Like the newly created position Oren spoke of. If that was the case, Ronan wasn’t merely an operative on assignment, and his involvement wasn’t coincidence.
Ronan was Drimera’s new liaison to the Market.
It made sense. He had a pri
or relationship with the organization, plus contacts and decades of experience with the city’s criminal underworld. He was a perfect fit for the position. And, being newly retrained by Naalish, he’d be sure to run straight back to report any issues. But then why take all these pictures of me? Were they for Gant or Naalish?
Creed reached past me and pulled the knife out of the wall. He examined the photograph. “This looks older than the rest. Either Norman Key has been watching you a long time or…” Seeing something he didn’t like in my stare, his tightened. “Who took this one?”
I was too stunned to lie. “My ex-boyfriend.”
From the bedroom, Evans piped up. “Ex, as in, your dead ex?”
“No,” I said. “Ex, as in, I thought he was dead ex.”
“Wait—” Evans crowded into the room. “He’s alive? When did that happen? And why does he want to kill you?”
“He doesn’t,” I argued. “I had no proof he was alive. And I didn’t think it mattered to you.”
“Why wouldn’t it matter?” Evans shot back. “You’re my friend, and he threw you under the bus.”
“And I used him as bait. So, I guess we’re even.”
With a loud wince at the tension, Harper stepped out into the hall.
“Thank you for worrying,” I said, checking my temper. Evans meant well, and we’d argued enough lately. “But it’s not like there’s a big, red X over my face.”
“Because he’s waiting to cross out your face after you’re dead.”
Creed broke in with a loud, “Enough!” He turned to me. “Is this the same ex who owned the strip club?” I nodded, and he exploded. “Goddamn it, Nite! If he’s still running the club, then he hired Nicholas Dane to drive that semi. He must have hired Norman Key, too, to take out our investment banker. And, apparently, you.”
“Our relationship was rocky,” I said, “but he’d never put a hit out on me. He loved me.”
“Then how else did Key get your picture?”
And Ronan’s knife, I wondered, staring at it. What the hell is going on?
Seeing me waver, Creed cut short my musings with a brisk, “I want to know everything about—what was his name?”
“It’s…” Fuck… I thought, as the wobbly leg I was standing on collapsed. It was so obvious. I should have seen it. “Ronan Locke.”
Creed put it together in record time. “Locke as in…?”
“Key,” I breathed. “Ronan didn’t hire Norman Key. He is Norman Key.”
His voice a snarl of resentment, Creed took a step. “You’re telling me this apartment belongs to your ex-boyfriend?”
“It would seem so.”
“And you had no idea?”
“None. He’s had a lot of aliases over the years. But this is a new one.”
“Then he runs the Market? He’s behind all of this?”
“Ronan’s a lot of things. Thief. Thug. Blackmailer. Fence. Bodyguard. A low-level crime boss. But he’s not a killer by trade.” Not anymore, I thought. Not since he left the Guild. “Ronan isn’t capable of running an underground black market, catering to the rich and famous. But he’d make a great middleman.”
“For?” Creed’s stare was boiling over with challenge.
It was obvious he suspected the man, so I said it. “Arno Gant.”
Creed turned to Evans. “Have Harper call her whole team down here. I want every inch of this place examined, as many times as it takes, until we find a way to track this guy down.”
Evans nodded and left the bedroom.
I expected Creed to tear into me then, to accuse me of withholding evidence and demand to know what proof I had that Arno Gant was alive and sitting at the head of the table. But his focus (as usual) stayed exactly where I didn’t want it: on Ronan. “Maybe your ex isn’t a criminal mastermind or a hitman. Though, with all these toys, you’ll have to work damn hard to convince me of that one.” Creed stabbed the knife into my picture, pinning it back in place. “If you’re right, and he’s none of those things, then you know what he is.”
“Our snitch.” It wasn’t a terrible theory. Ronan had never been cold-blooded. He had limits. If those limits survived his recent time with Naalish, and he realized he was in over his head, he’d do something about it. Like last time, I thought, when Ella Chandler died on his watch. Afraid of the repercussions, he’d come to me to pull his ass out of the fire.
But why didn’t he reach out to me this time? Why would he leave body parts lying around or plant matchbooks in evidence bags? He wouldn’t. “This isn’t right. No matter how much trouble he was in, Ronan would never involve the police. And why all these fucking pictures?” I said, flicking one of the images on the wall.
“Gant must have him targeting you for a reason. Maybe that’s where he drew the line. He was okay doing the dirty work, until it involved you. All this crap your ex has dumped in our laps, he might be trying to warn you without tipping off his boss.”
“It’s possible,” I said, distracted, as I entertained another disturbing thought. Did Oren know? When he dropped the tidbit about the Market’s lyrriken liaison, did he know who it was? Did he withhold the operative’s name, because he knew he’d have no chance of convincing me to back off if Ronan was involved?
“Whatever the motive,” Creed said, “Ronan Locke will lead us to Arno Gant. We have to find him.”
“I agree. But you’ll need to buy me some time.”
“You mean, I need to cover this up, so you can go hunt him down?” Creed’s narrowed eyes said that wasn’t going to happen. “Even if I lie to Barnes for you, again, I’m not the only one who saw your face on the wall. Not to mention how swimmingly it went last time we went off-book with Bastian Rand. Half a city block went up in flames.”
“If you tell Barnes about this, he’ll put me on lockdown.”
“Because that’s where you should be. You were involved with our suspect, Dahlia. A suspect who either loves you or wants to kill you. Hell, it could be both. Or neither,” he threw in. “Maybe, he is trying to shut this shit down the same as us. The point is, we don’t know. And until we do, you need protection.” He crossed his arms. “I’m thinking a cell.”
I frowned at him. “You can’t apply human logic to supernatural crimes.”
“I’m applying compassion and common sense. I’m trying to keep you safe.”
“If you lock me up, you’ll never stop Gant.”
“Because you’re the only one who can?”
“I know things you don’t, Alex. I’m sorry if that pisses you off.”
“Your knowledge doesn’t bother me. It’s that you keep it all to yourself. One person holding all the cards is a mistake. It puts every man and woman on the UCU in jeopardy.”
“My secrets are in place for a reason. Telling the team—”
“Forget the team. Tell me,” he pleaded, “so I can direct them better. So I know what I’m sending them into. I can’t keep fighting with blinders on. And you can’t be a lone hunter and a partner at the same time. If you want to stay with this task force, this partnership, then I need the truth. All of it. Or you’re out. I know what I’d prefer,” he said, “but I want your decision by the time this case is done.”
I didn’t reply. I wasn’t sure how. I hated how insightful the man was.
I had been trying to live in two worlds; to have the best of both; to protect both. But if it came down to my lies keeping Alex Creed safe, the choice was easy.
If it came down to leaving…not so much.
“A few days,” I said. “That’s all I’m asking. From the looks of it,” my gaze swept over the pictures, “if I don’t find Ronan, he’ll find me.”
“And if you turn up dismembered in some back alley?”
“It won’t be your fault.”
“Like hell.” Creed pulled in an angry breath. Releasing it through clenched teeth, he ran a rough hand over his face. “Any of your psychic vibes kicking in?”
I shook my head. “Nothing at the moment.”
I scanned the photos. Most were taken at night, zoomed in and grainy, without landmarks or street signs. “I don’t know. Ronan must be scouting for Gant or surveilling potential targets. But unless forensics can clean them up, it’ll be impossible to get a location off any of these.”
Creed yanked a pair of gloves from his pocket and shoved them at me. “Take a closer look. The pictures. The maps, the weapons. All of it. There must be something here.”
Creed walked off. I almost called him back and tried to smooth things over. I’d pushed hard, making him debate (not for the first time) what took priority: solving the case or playing by the rules. I didn’t like the ultimatum he gave me anymore than I did forcing him to continually question the laws he lived by. But, I think he knew: right and wrong had become squiggly lines for me a long time ago.
Wanting to avoid the pictures for a moment, I started with the weapon racks. Two spots were empty. One was meant for a sword, the other a pistol. It was a nice collection. Ronan wouldn’t readily abandon it to be confiscated. He’d wait for the heat to die down, then come back and clear the place out.
I wondered how long it was since he’d been here. There was no scent of him, only a hint of bleach. Gant’s cleaners must have been by. Not that there would have been much to erase, if Ronan wore his yeren-lined uniform inside the apartment.
Using one of the gloves, I pulled the hood of the peg. Eager to have more than a scrap at my disposal, I took it to the bedroom window to inspect in the natural, morning light. Slightly less stretchy than my sample, the black fabric of the hood was silky and incredibly lightweight. It was possible the threads were spun by a creature. Gant was good at using every useful part of those he butchered.
Smoke & Mirrors Page 26