Erin went to her desk. “That we can check easily enough.”
While the men watched, one with weary curiosity and one with deadly intensity, she called the morgue.
“Hi,” she said brightly when the receptionist answered, “it’s Monica from payroll. How’s your day going?”
The woman on the other end of the line grunted sourly. “It would be going a whole lot smoother if anyone would bother showing up for work. Neither the coroner nor his assistant have shown up today. And everyone’s acting like it’s my problem.”
Erin winced. Belinda hadn’t gone to work? She hoped Carver hadn’t caught her. “That’s terrible. I hope it gets sorted out soon.”
A sarcastic harrumph was the only response she got.
“So, why I’m calling. I have some expenses here for Dr Carver. I just needed to confirm the dates he was in California. Can you help me with that?”
“Sure.” Though it sounded like it would be a monumental sacrifice on her part. After some key clacking, the receptionist rattled off dates for the previous week. “Does that match your dates?”
Stomach twisting, Erin said, “That’s perfect. Thanks for your help.” She hung up without waiting for another grumbly comment. Looking up, she knew she didn’t have to say anything to the men. They already knew.
“There’s one thing,” Matt said.
“Which is?” Dev asked.
Their gazes met over Erin’s head, Matt’s pointed, Dev’s guarded.
“He’s too old. He’s about ten years past his expiration date.”
Dev shrugged. “Some sorcerers live to a decent age. Those who don’t practice often, or have many tricks.”
“He’s full-tilt whacko,” Matt said. “Bat-shit insane. Doesn’t that come from your tricks?”
“Yes. Each new spell, and each time it is triggered, damages the brain.”
“Jesus,” Matt breathed out. “You knew, didn’t you. Right from the start. You knew this guy was completely psychotic.”
A fleeting, self-mocking smile curled Dev’s lips. “He took a team of four gunmen into a heavily fortified mansion and no one survived. Not even his own people. They shot every person in that place. Innocents included. Then the rogue killed Elise. Turned her inside out. Then he flayed Friedrich from the waist down. His own team, he crushed their necks. By the time I got there, he was gone, but Friedrich was still alive. He told me about the spell, about selling it to someone in Brisbane, about the rogue who’d tortured him to get the information. He told me to torture me, too. So I would know there was a psychopath out there, with my spell, willin’ to use it. Friedrich triggered his last trick then. He immolated himself.” Dev lifted up his bandaged arms. “While he held onto me. I got free and left him there, to burn alive. I don’t regret doin’ that. You might want to call me a psychopath as well.”
Erin closed her eyes and breathed past the nausea.
“No.”
She spun around, stared at Matt.
Again, it was almost as if he was back, fully with them in the room. There was no silver in his eyes, no distance in his voice.
“He hurt you and your sister. He deserved it.” Matt turned back to the window, shoulders tight. He pressed his hands to the warm glass. “I don’t know how long this is going to last. It comes and goes. I don’t know why but sometimes I can resist it. Other times, it’s like I don’t remember that I should be resisting.”
Erin shot a desperate look at Dev. Could he…?
Dev shook his head, just as perplexed. “That could just part of it. I don’t know.”
“Part of the spell that’s turning my brain into rock?” Matt asked, tone wry. He faced the room again. “Brilliant.”
“How did you work it out?” Dev asked gently.
Tapping his head, Matt said, “Contrary to popular opinion, not quite solidified yet. Wasn’t too hard to work out, really. Not after encountering See No Evil and Hear No Evil this morning. Hey, does that make me Speak No Evil? My mother would probably disagree. She was always going on about my foul language.”
“Matthew,” Erin hissed.
“What? Now I’m not allowed to joke about it?”
“God.” She shot out of her chair and took over the pacing. “We have to find Carver.”
“I doubt he’ll be going home anytime soon,” Dev said. “Or back to work.”
“Wow.” Matt clapped, slow and sarcastic. “Genius at work.”
Erin glared at him. He smirked, then it faded.
“Sorry,” he said to Dev. “It’s the rocks talking.” Though it sounded like they might not have yet relinquished control.
Hoping he could manage to play nice for a while longer, Erin said, “We need to talk to Feeble.”
Both of them looked at her questioningly.
“She got one of the monkeys,” Erin explained patiently. “If we can find out how, hopefully it will give us another clue to follow. We have no other option at the moment.”
Matt gestured grandly toward the door. “By all means, after you, Sherlock.”
Stalking past him, heading for the door, Erin muttered, “You’re lucky your head’s as hard as rock. It’s the only thing keeping me from smacking you.”
By unspoken agreement, Erin and Dev made sure Matt ended up in the backseat of the BMW. All the way to Hawthorne, he mumbled darkly but that was the extent of Evil Matt’s appearance, thankfully.
Erin parked halfway down the street to the Tool Brigade’s house. “I don’t want them recognising the car,” she explained to Dev. “Both of you better stay here. No trouble, please.”
She got out before they could answer.
Heading for the old bungalow, she hoped desperately Feeble would have something to help them. She needed a direction to head in, a trail to follow. Anything so she wouldn’t feel completely helpless while Matt was lost to them bit by bit.
At the house, she paused. It looked closed up, as if no one was home. Maybe after the ruckus the day before, they had moved on. It was highly likely they were squatting. The police may have kicked them out, possibly even charged them. If she’d been on better terms with Courey, she could have called him.
With no other course, she stepped up and knocked.
No response.
She knocked again. Followed it with a, “Hello? Anyone home?”
Was that a footstep? A creaking floorboard?
“Hi,” she tried again. “I just need to talk to someone, please. I’m not with the police or anything like that. I’m a private investigator and I just have a few—”
The door swung open. A big girl stood there, glaring at Erin. “If I were you, I’d leave. Chop isn’t here, but he could came back any time. He wouldn’t want to find you here.”
“I only have some questions for—”
“Forget them, okay? I remember you. You were here yesterday, with that man. None of us are happy to see you again.”
“Razor?” a boy called from inside. “Who is it?”
Razor turned slightly. “JWs. I’ll get rid of them.” To Erin, she repeated, “You gotta go.”
Erin sucked back her irritation. This was only to be expected. “I understand how you feel, but this is important. I need to speak to Feeble.”
She laughed, short and bitter. “God, lady, you got no chance.”
At least she was getting out full sentences now. “If I don’t talk to her, someone will die. And after him, a lot of others. Please.”
Razor opened her mouth, then shut it. She glanced back into the house, then came out and shut the door behind her. “Look. Since yesterday, Chop’s gone a bit… crazy.” She flinched. “Well, crazier. He’s been getting worse since Scary disappeared. Now, he won’t let any of us talk to Feeble. She’s out with him right now.”
“Do you need me to call the police?”
“No! It’ll only make him worse.” Razor dug in a pocket and pulled out a battered card. “That guy, the one who came here, he gave this to Feeble.” She showed Erin one of Matt’s car
ds. “He hurt the guys, but… I didn’t know what else to do. I tried calling it, but it didn’t go through.”
Erin handed over one of her own cards. “This number works. Call when Chop and Feeble get back. Or before, if you need me, or anything at all. I’ll do everything I can for you. For all of you.”
Razor held the card like it might explode. She stared at it for a long moment, then finally nodded. She went back inside without another word.
Chapter 45
Erin got back into the car, not looking any happier than when she’d left. Grimmer, in fact. I snorted. Should have known her ‘nice guy’ approach wouldn’t get anywhere. There was only one thing that bastard Chop understood. And she’d stopped me from having a heart to heart with him yesterday. Bet she was regretting it now.
“She’s not there,” Erin announced, strapping in. “Things have got worse for them since Matt… since yesterday. I think we can count on the girl Razor to help us get Feeble out, but that’s all.”
“Goddamn,” Dev muttered.
“I gave her my card. Hopefully she’ll call when Feeble and Chop get back. Until then, it’s a waiting game.”
“Great,” I said. “Another stakeout. The last one ended so well.”
Erin started the car.
“Why are we leaving?” I demanded. This wasn’t how a stakeout was done.
“We can’t wait here. Chop might see us when he comes back. I don’t want to endanger any of them. Razor will call.” It was said with conviction.
“Now what?” Dev asked.
I sneered at the back of his ridiculous head. Suddenly, he was all cooperative and meek. No more rushing off to do his own thing now he was ‘working’ with Erin. If he touched her…
“Perhaps a visit to Kermit,” Erin suggested cautiously. “Maybe he can find another place the sorcerer has been.”
There was a lot of grinding silence from the front passenger seat, then Dev nodded. “Let’s do it. It’s about our only option.”
“Well,” I drawled a couple of turns later, “it’s not our only option.”
After a small moment, Erin said, “You are not allowed to go back to that house, Matt.”
So fucking typical. Always assuming the worst. Christ. She might as well be my mother.
“That wasn’t what I was talking about,” I said with a clenched jaw.
“Then what?” she asked, not quite keeping the snap from her tone.
It took some effort, but I didn’t bite. “Sunset.”
“What?” Dev looked from her to me and back. “What about sunset?”
Erin concentrated on the road. “Are you sure, Matt?”
Oh wow. Four words that contained an entire diatribe about all the things that could go spectacularly wrong, all because it was me. “It’s the only option. She’s the only who hasn’t hurt or betrayed Feeble.”
Dev focused on Erin. “Who’s she?”
Go on, I dared her silently. Tell him.
“She’s Mercy,” Erin said. “Matt’s partner. She’s the one who got the monkey from Feeble.”
“Great. Let’s use that connection.”
Connection? I rolled my eyes.
Erin shook her head. “I don’t know, Matt. What if she’s not… up for it?”
“Stop pretending like you care about her,” I snarled.
Another flash of confusion and worry from Dev. Jeez. Couldn’t we just dump the bastard? What good was he going to be now? Thankfully, he didn’t add any more dumb questions to the conversation.
“Fuck you, Matt,” Erin ground out. “I do care.”
I let the lie slide right past me. “Just turn the car around. By the time we get home it’ll almost be dark.”
Without another word, Erin did as I said. For once.
No one said anything more the entire way. Not verbally at least. With every shift in his seat, Dev expressed his confusion and anxiety. Each flex of Erin’s fingers on the steering wheel told me just what she was thinking. That I was off the rails, out of control. That I was wrong.
If I’d cared, I’m sure none of us would have made it out to the ’Cliffe.
As it was, we made it just as the sun sunk over the horizon. Erin pulled into my driveway, easing up behind a sight for sore eyes.
My Monaro, back from purgatory at long fucking last. Roberts had argued a rather good angle for keeping it until I replaced his Prado. I had, naturally, agreed with his logic. Hadn’t stopped me from then coaxing him into letting me borrow it tonight.
The good thing about loaning my car to Roberts was that, no matter what he personally thought about makes and models, he was very precious when it came to any car. Thus the black paint on the Monaro gleamed. It was polished to the point of looking white where the light hit it right. So damn shiny, in fact, it made Charles’ new car look like a dried up blood stain. The car he was currently buffing with furious little circles of the sheep-wool pad.
I snickered.
It must have had tones of evil about it because Erin twisted around and said, warningly, “Matt.”
“Whatevs,” I muttered and got out of the car.
Charles looked up, and all the anger he’d been misdirecting at his car suddenly found its true home. Me. He tossed the polishing cloth down and stalked toward me.
“Hawkins, that is absolutely the last time you leave anything of yours with my wife,” he snapped. “That rotten beast has run wild all through—”
“Oh, shut the fuck up, Charles.”
That stopped him dead in his tracks. He stared at me, completely nonplussed. Apparently, no one had ever talked straight to him in his entire life. Just as he was stammering his way back up to righteous indignation, Mercy woke up. The link between us opened and things began to flow. My irritation with Charles washed over her, and her healthy, healed everything came back the other way.
“You have no right—” he began.
“No,” I ground out. All the years of being subjected to Charles’ snarky, petty thoughts about me blended with Mercy’s keener sense of his layers of contempt and jealousy and confusion and resulted in, “You have no right. What gives you the right to sit in your perfect house, with your boat and your stupid car and your tiny dick that doesn’t even work properly—” Don’t ask me how I know that. “—and judge me? For Christ’s sake, you moron, you have no idea what’s going on in your own fucking home because you’re too bloody busy trying to perve on Mercy, or find out if I’m screwing her, or if I’m part of a cult or something. How many more toys are you going to have to buy, Charles, before your pathetically small brain works it out?”
He was spluttering and trying to look outraged, but it’s hard when you’re finally hearing the truth.
Behind me, Dev was scrambling out of the car, but I gestured and he was pushed back with a wave of telekinesis. He hit the car with a grunt more about shock than pain.
“Matthew!”
Dear Lord. Not her as well.
“Don’t, Erin. Just… don’t.”
For a fucking wonder, she listened and held back.
Now, back to Charles. He’d taken the chance to back off, to start to head for the house, probably to call the cops. Because he wasn’t the sort to deal with his own problems. I mean, Sue’d had to sort out his… performance issues. And he bought expensive crap rather than admit what was really missing from his life.
“Stop right there.” I waved and he tripped up.
Charles hit the grass on hands and knees, panting in fright.
“Charlie!”
“Stay inside,” he shouted at Sue frantically. “Call the cops. Hurry!”
“No, Sue,” I said, stalking over. “Stay. This won’t take long.”
She stood in the doorway, behind the security screen. The monkey was on her shoulder, bouncing up and down and squealing. He clutched at the screen, rattling the door. Pale and shaking, Sue tried to hold him back.
I stood next to Charles, looking down at him. What a complete wimp. I almost stopped right then.
He wasn’t worth it.
But Sue was.
Crouching, I lowered my voice so only he could hear me. “Are you really that self-obsessed, Charles, that you would ignore your wife’s wants and needs in favour of your own? Is that why you keep buying all these pointless things? The boat, the car. Is that all you care about? Status? The image?”
He shook his head in mute denial.
“Then what is it? Huh? What’s keeping you from listening to Sue? Why do you keep putting her off, saying you’ll talk about it later, in a year, in two?” I gave him some silence in which to answer, but he didn’t. “I know why. Do you want me to tell Sue?”
“You… you don’t know anything about it.”
I leaned in close. “Don’t I? Isn’t that what you’re afraid of? Isn’t that what goes through your mind every time you see me? How much does Hawkins know? Does he know I’m worried my wife likes him a bit too much? Does he know I’m jealous of his life? No wife, no ties, no responsibilities. No one to impress, and fail.”
He was shaking now, head hanging.
“Do you want to know something else I know?”
His head shook vehemently.
“Too bad. I’m going to tell you. For some inconceivable reason, your wife loves you. Enough to help you over your… little problem. Enough to smile when you play on your boat, or polish your car. Enough that she can do that while you ignore her.”
I don’t know if he was crying, but it looked like it. Still, when I grabbed him under the arm and hauled him back to his feet, his eyes were red but dry.
Somewhere, deep inside, I felt bad. Sick.
“Go inside,” I said to him, giving him a small shove in that direction. “Go in there, let Sue talk and listen.”
Charles took a shaky step forward, then ran. Sue had the door open for him, arms ready to catch him.
Marcel bounded out and scampered to me. He clambered up my leg, then arm and wound himself around my neck, chittering excitedly.
Sue glared at me over Charles’ head. Yeah, I don’t think Charles had anything to worry about on that score anymore. Not that he ever had, but the insecure jerk would never have figured it out on his own.
Night Call (Book 3): Rock Paper Sorcery Page 33