Heart thumping, Riga put the phone to her ear. She wanted him to tell her they’d caught the man, knew he wouldn’t. “Riga here.”
“It’s King. We’ve got a situation. Double homicide. Might be occult, but I’m no expert. Are you up for a consult?”
Her hand tightened on the phone. She tasted something sour. So it had begun. “Where and when?”
CHAPTER SIX
Riga stood outside the yellow police tape. Red and blue emergency lights flashed across the darkened street, casting weird shadows off the pines, the garbage bins, the parked cars. Neighbors stood outside, hands wrapped around their middles. Streetlamps glowed amber, their unnatural light flattening the scene, draining it of life.
The address the sheriff had given her belonged to a square-shaped apartment building. Police cars blocked a wide driveway cutting through the center of the building and into an uncovered, interior parking lot. A child leaned from a window in the shingled second story and watched the action.
Ash shifted beside her. “This neighborhood doesn’t usually see much excitement.”
“That’s a good thing.” She would have preferred Donovan’s presence, but someone needed to stay with the twins. “And thanks for getting my car from the rest home. You’re sure you weren’t followed?”
He rolled his eyes. “I wasn’t followed.”
Riga tightened her suede safari jacket around her waist. Of course Ash hadn’t been followed. He knew how to spot a tail, and he knew how to lose one.
Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out the phone she’d borrowed from Donovan and called the sheriff. It didn’t surprise her that her husband kept the sheriff on speed dial.
“I’m outside,” she said.
“I’ll be right there.” The sheriff hung up.
A few minutes later, Sheriff King emerged from an apartment and caught her eye. He waved her over.
“I’ll wait here,” Ash said.
She ducked beneath the tape, and a uniformed officer moved to intercept her.
The sheriff got there first, his parka taut around his gut. “It’s all right, sergeant.” He raised his voice. “Ms. Hayworth is a specialist on the occult and is consulting on the case. This way, Ms. Hayworth.” He led her into the parking lot. Officers poured in and out of an open door.
So she was Ms. Hayworth now? Not that she minded, but the sheriff’s titles changed with the circumstance. “What happened?” she asked. And why the hell did he want the press to think there was an occult angle to this crime?
“Someone jimmied the rear window, shot the two occupants.”
“Why do you think this was an occult crime?”
“Odd symbols on the walls. Hold up.” Grasping her elbow, he gently tugged her backward.
An EMT piloted a gurney weighted by a black body bag out the door. A second gurney followed.
Riga extended her senses, pushing her aura into the apartment. She felt nothing, but dread of what she would find leadened her heart.
“All right.” The sheriff handed her a pair of latex gloves. “This way.”
He led her through a simple, tiled entryway, coats hung on one wall, boots and shoes in a neat row. Turning a corner, he walked into a living room. A U-shaped, faux-leather sectional faced a big-screen TV. Blood soaked the couch in two places, spattered the cream-colored throw rug.
“Two shots and it was over,” he said. “They didn’t know what hit them.”
A red swastika dripped on one wall.
She snapped on the gloves, diverting herself from the horror and death. At least the victims had been spared the knowledge of what was to come. Bile rising in her throat, she pointed to the swastika. “Is that—?”
“Blood.”
She swallowed. It wasn’t the worst crime scene she’d investigated. So why was her skin jumping, her heart fluttering against her ribs? “The swastika symbol predates the Nazis. Before Hitler, it represented good luck or good fortune, obviously not the case here. Whoever painted this did it for the usual reasons — to represent white supremacy or Nazism, as a symbol of hate, not the occult.” And the sheriff would have known this. Why had he brought her here?
He grunted, pointed. “And that?”
An Orthodox cross hung upside down above the door they’d entered through. Twelve inches above the cross, someone had scrawled words in Cyrillic lettering with a thick black pen.
“It’s Russian,” she said. “Were the victims?”
“Serbian.”
“Who were they?” she asked.
“I can’t tell you their names. Not yet.”
She approached the cross, translating the words above it aloud. “The cross is the plague of demons. Have you got a chair or ladder I can stand on?” She slid one finger between her wrist and the latex glove.
He strode into the entryway and shouted to the officers outside. A female deputy hurried inside carrying a stepladder. Riga set it beneath the upside-down cross and climbed up, found a circular hole in the wall. “Looks like a nail fell out at the top of the cross.”
The sheriff bent, picked up a nail with his gloved hands. “This one?” He handed it to her.
Gingerly, she inserted it into the empty hole, tested it against the hole at the top of the cross. “Seems that way.”
He rubbed the back of his neck. “So it just fell off? What’s that stuff about demons then?”
“It’s a not-uncommon saying on Orthodox crosses.”
“But the victims were worried about demons.”
“A demon didn’t shoot them.” She would have sensed that darkness. “Or paint that swastika. Why did you really bring me here? What aren’t you telling me?”
“You’ve got your instincts, I’ve got mine. Thank you for your time, Ms. Hayworth. Send the invoice to my office. I’ll see you out.” He followed her into the entryway.
“Did you find anything on the man who killed the store clerk?”
“Not yet. No sign of your man in the care facility, and no one admitted to recognizing him from the description you provided.” He opened the front door for her. “Maybe the sketch tomorrow will jog your memory.”
“The clerk, what was his…?” She stepped outside, froze. A dented, yellow VW sat parked in the spot in front of the door. Her mouth went dry, her heart turning over. “Does this car belong to the victims?”
He tilted his head to the side. “To one of them.”
Head spinning, she braced her gloved hand against the door frame.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“This car,” she croaked. “It was in the parking lot at the senior facility.”
“There were a lot of cars in that lot.”
“I stopped beside this one. I was getting my keys out. That’s when I saw him, the man with the gold watch.” Her fault, her fault. These people had been killed because of her, just like the clerk in the liquor store. But Gold Watch hadn’t done this. She’d have felt his demonic energy. He must have an accomplice.
“How can you be sure it’s the same car?”
They were wasting time. Someone else was vulnerable, a target. A target she’d made of them. Chest tight, she walked around the car, paused beside its left fender. “It was dented here. How many new, yellow Beetles with dented front fenders are there at Lake Tahoe?” She raked her fingers across her scalp. “He thought the car was mine. That’s why he came here.”
“Hold on—”
“There was a Prius too, a blue one. You need to find whoever owns it.”
“Do you have any idea how many blue Priuses there are—”
“The owner of this car was connected to that facility somehow. The Prius owner will be too.”
“The man who killed the store clerk had a shaved head?”
“He didn’t have any hair. I couldn’t tell if he shaved it off or it was natural.” Her eyes widened. “The swastika… You think he’s a skinhead?”
“Let’s keep that to ourselves.”
She took a step back, understanding f
looding her veins. “You thought he might be involved. That’s why you called me in. And you want people to think it’s occult and not a garden variety hate group. Why?”
“It’s too early to jump to conclusions. And that upside-down cross with the demon saying is weird. I’m just gathering facts. And you did say the man seemed unnatural.”
He was lying. She knew it as certainly as she knew Brigitte watched from above — perched on a tree branch or telephone pole or rooftop. “The Prius—”
“We’ll find whoever owns the Prius. I’m taking this seriously, Riga.”
She released a long breath. He was withholding information, but he was a good cop. And the police had resources she didn’t. They’d find the Prius owner long before she could. “He may have an accomplice.”
“Why do you say that?”
Because Gold Watch hadn’t set foot inside this apartment. “Mrs. Norton heard two people talking.”
“Your Mrs. Norton has dementia.”
“Not always,” Riga said.
“Not according to the Sunset Towers.”
“Then Sunset Towers is wrong. I spoke with Mrs. Norton, and for a time she was lucid.”
He wove his arms across his barrel-shaped chest. “In your medical opinion.”
“She was lucid.” And Riga wasn’t going to win this argument. She changed the subject. “Did the neighbors hear anything?”
He lifted a bushy gray brow. “How do you think we got here so fast?”
“Gunshots? What time?”
“Riga…”
“I need to know.”
He hesitated. “Six fifteen, and I didn’t tell you that.”
“Nothing else? No cars driving off? No odd men lurking about?”
He glared at her.
She held up her hands in a warding gesture. “All right. I had to try.”
“Send me your invoice.” Turning on his booted heel, he strode into the apartment.
She returned to Ash, standing by Donovan’s black SUV.
“Well?” he asked.
“It may have been the liquor store killer. If so, he’s got an accomplice, and Mrs. Norton was right.”
“He might be watching.”
“I know.”
“If anyone tries to follow,” he said, “I’ll lose him.”
“I know.” But if the killer was watching, he’d have her license plate by now, be able to track them like he’d tracked the VW.
Ash reached into the SUV for a water bottle. Grabbing a handful of loose earth, he poured the water over it, smeared mud on the plates.
She smiled briefly, hoping the gesture wasn’t too little, too late. “I like the way you think.”
Ash wiped his hands on a rag, and she got into the passenger seat.
“Let’s see how good this guy is,” Ash said, getting behind the wheel. He pulled into the street. They drove down a steep hill, stopping at the highway, waiting for a break in traffic. No headlights illuminated them from behind.
He turned east on Highway 50, aiming away from her house on the winding, two-lane road, and they joined the flow of cars. A minivan cruised ahead of them. A pickup truck, headlights high, drifted behind their bumper.
Ash accelerated, overtaking the van, then an ancient Ford. They drove in silence, passing a campground. “We’ve got someone,” he said.
“How can you tell?” In the darkness, one pair of headlights was much like another.
“I can tell. Don’t turn around.”
She hadn’t intended to but said nothing.
He turned off the highway, up a hill and into a residential neighborhood. There were no street lamps here, and even with the car’s headlights on, she strained to see. They rounded tight bends. Riga caught flashes of a car’s headlights behind them.
“This isn’t the best road for a car chase.” Her hand dipped inside her purse, felt for the gun she carried.
“He’s not chasing, just following.” Ash rounded a tight curve and shut off the SUV’s lights, accelerating. He stopped short, rocking Riga forward, the seatbelt catching her in the chest. Ash backed the SUV down a hill, gravel crunching beneath their tires.
Riga was blind, assumed he’d found a driveway.
“Get down,” Ash said.
Drawing the gun from her purse, she ducked low.
Ash slid down in the seat and accordioned his legs beside the wheel. Headlights flared, illuminating Ash, chin on his chest.
A car rumbled past.
They stayed in that position, frozen in time.
Ash straightened, started the car. Lights off, he glided down the hill.
“You’ve got some night vision,” Riga said.
“It’s my training. You can do it too if you practice.”
“Did you catch the plate of the car following us?”
“Dark colored Ford Escape. The plate was obscured.”
He drove her home, his irritation plain whenever he caught her glancing in the rearview mirror. Ash parked in the driveway and saw her inside the high-ceilinged foyer.
“Tomorrow,” he said. Feet silent on the stone tiles, he vanished out the front door.
A crushed flower bud, pink and red and orange, lay on the polished, round table. Riga picked it up and sniffed it, trying to calm her roiling stomach. If she were on her own, if she didn’t have to worry about the twins, her niece, would she go public? Let the killers know where they could find her to draw them in? She crushed the flower in her hand, let it drop. Riga couldn’t be sure anymore.
She walked down the two steps into the living area and stopped short. Donovan sprawled, shirtless, asleep on the rug before the crackling fireplace. Atop his chest, the twins slept on their bellies like exhausted mountain climbers. They wore only diapers.
A laugh burst from her lips, and she clapped one hand over her mouth.
Donovan raised his head and let it thud back to the oriental rug. “You’re back.”
“What happened here?”
“They wouldn’t stop crying. I tried that skin-on-skin technique the nurse told us about to settle them.”
Walking to him, she knelt beside her husband. “It must have worked.”
He smiled. “I’m strangely proud of myself.”
“I can see that.”
“How was your night?”
“Nothing overtly occult about the crime and no demonic energy,” she murmured. “But the two people who were killed are connected to the senior facility. I was beside their car when the man with the gold watch found me in the parking lot.” She peeled Emma off her husband. Her daughter made a small noise and settled against her chest.
Wrapping an arm around Jack, Donovan sat up. “You think he was looking for you.”
“Or his accomplice was. Whoever did it painted a swastika on the wall.”
Frowning, Donovan got to his feet. “To let us know he’s part of a hate group? Convenient. Who were the victims?”
“King wouldn’t tell me their names. They were Serbian, and they lived in a modest apartment. There was an orthodox cross on one wall. It had lost its top nail and fallen upside down – King’s excuse for calling me in.”
“Excuse?”
“He knew there was nothing occult about this crime. I don’t think he wanted it to get out that a local hate group might have been involved.”
“Interesting. What else?”
“The cross was a talisman of sorts against demons.”
“Which Gold Watch avoided by using a non-demonic accomplice?”
“It makes sense,” she said. “That cross may have worked. Tonight’s killer may have been completely human.” She rubbed her brow. “Maybe we should send the twins away.”
“Where?”
“You’ve got casinos elsewhere. You could take them—”
“I’m not leaving you.” He caressed her cheek. “Between your wards and my security, no one will touch them.”
“Mrs. Norton walked right past our guards.”
“Better a harmless ol
d lady than a real threat. Now we know there’s a gap in our security, and we can fix it.”
“And I’m worried about Pen. She’s too calm about this.”
“Have you spoken with her about the risks?”
“We were interrupted. I’ll talk to her tomorrow. But the twins—”
“Ash is conducting a security review. When he finds out how Mrs. Norton got through, he’ll fix it, and he’ll search for any other vulnerabilities. If he finds any, we can decide from there.”
Riga bit the inside of her cheek. He was right. If her family was on a demon’s radar, they were safer where they had home field advantage.
But she didn’t want that thing anywhere near her home.
She needed to find the demon first.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Riga tiptoed past the crescent-moon night light and double-checked the baby monitor. Would it always be like this? Her gut twisting with anxiety over her children’s safety? She gazed at them, asleep, oblivious, fragile, and tears warmed the backs of her eyes. She blinked them away. She needed to focus, not indulge in warm fuzzies.
Tail wagging, Oz observed her movements.
She pressed one finger to her lips and backed from the nursery, cracking the door so the dog could leave if he needed to. Riga knew he wouldn’t. She might have been the one to rescue the dog, but he’d decided he belonged to her children. Perhaps Oz had always known. Perhaps that was why the massive Ridgeback had come into their lives, when she was pregnant and hadn’t yet realized it.
In the white-carpeted hallway, Donovan yawned, slipping an arm around her waist. “Not much longer, and they’ll be sleeping through the night.”
“I live for that moment.” The twins were a bit behind schedule, and Riga blamed their tardiness on them being twins. The babies insisted on curling up together, but one would kick, and the other would wake, and then they’d both be shrieking.
Donovan nuzzled her neck, and electricity rippled through her skin. But he smothered another yawn.
She turned to him, her fingers brushing the cross-shaped scar near his chin, and kissed him, her lips lingering on his. Even through her aches and exhaustion, his response heated her blood. But she could see he was tired. He woke early to go to work, and was home by six every night to be with her and the children. As hard as he worked, for Donovan, family always came first.
The Hermetic Detective (A Riga Hayworth Paranormal Mystery Book 7) Page 5