by King, R. L.
Stone stiffened. Three of them at once? “What did you do?”
“They shoved their way in. I didn’t want to shoot them because I knew they weren’t themselves, but it’s damn hard to corral three different people when there’s only one of me. While I had hold of two of them, the other one managed to slip past me and grab you. I thought the whole place was gonna go up. You stiffened up like somebody’d hit you with a hot wire. I grabbed ’em and threw ’em out into the parking lot—fortunately they weren’t that strong—then slammed the door shut and braced it. That was about the time you screamed, and then there was this bright light everywhere. Next thing I know, Jason appeared outta nowhere on the bed, and you keeled over on the floor. Jason was pretty much out of it at that point, too.” Lopez’s breath was coming faster as he told the story.
Stone stared at him. “How did you get us out of there?”
“I knew I had to, before those things figured out a way to get us, or else the desk clerk called the police. So I flung open the door with my gun out. Weirdest thing—they weren’t there anymore. I spotted them heading back toward the office, looking like they had no idea what the hell they were doing out in the parking lot. I got the truck over by the door and got you two into it. By that time Jason had come around a little, but he wasn’t much use yet. I drove like a fuckin’ choirboy back here. I figured if those things were out looking for us, better to be someplace with wards.”
Stone smiled, shoving himself up a bit on the pillows. “Listen to you, Stan. You’re an old hand at this already.” Sobering, he looked at Jason. “And you,” he said. “Tell me what happened to you.”
Jason shuddered. “I don’t remember a lot about it. I was drunk off my ass, walking back to the motel from the party. Then all of a sudden there was this guy in front of me. I said something to him and he answered, but his voice was weird. All gravelly, and like he didn’t really understand English. And his eyes were—” Again, he shuddered.
“Glowing red-orange?” Stone asked.
“Yeah. I got outta there in a hurry. Went back to my room, slept it off for a while, then called you. Figured you’d bite my head off if I called you in the middle of the night.” He grinned at Stan. “Al needs his beauty sleep, see?”
Lopez nodded gravely.
“Go on,” Stone growled.
Jason turned the grin on Stone. “By the way, where were you? Why didn’t you answer the phone?”
“I—wasn’t home at the time.”
“Ahhhh,” he said knowingly, nodding. “Al, you dog.”
Stone glared at him. “Are we going to discuss my night life, or are you going to tell me what happened? Remember, we’ve still got a murderer out there.”
That wiped the grin off Jason’s face. “Murderer?”
“I haven’t told him much about what’s happened yet,” Lopez told Stone. “I figured it’d make more sense to wait till you woke up, then compare notes. That way we don’t have to repeat ourselves.”
Stone nodded. “Please, Jason, continue. We’ll get to the rest later. I need to know why they took you.”
Jason sighed. “Okay. So I make the call and then a little bit later there’s a knock on my door. I open it and the desk clerk guy is there. He’s got another guy with him who looks like the janitor or something.” He shrugged. “I don’t remember much after that, until I showed up in the room again tonight.”
“Anything?” Stone asked. “Everything you remember could be potentially helpful.”
Jason thought about it. “It felt like I was kind of mostly asleep, you know? I was in a room with nothing in it. It was just white. No sense of time or anything. I had no idea I was there for several days until Stan told me.”
“Did they speak to you at all?”
He shook his head. “No. Like I said, I was out of it. I think they might have drugged me or something. I was tired all the time. Not hungry, really, or thirsty—just so tired. I felt like something had drained all my energy, or—” He stopped, because Stone was staring hard at him. “What? You come up with something?”
“That could be it,” Stone whispered. “That could be why they were holding you.”
“What, draining my—” Again he stopped, his eyes getting wide. “Holy crap, Al.”
“What?” Lopez demanded.
“You mean they could take my energy?” Jason said, ignoring Lopez’s question. “I thought I had to be willing for that. I sure as hell wasn’t willing.”
“It’s the only thing that makes sense,” Stone said. “Perhaps they were using your energy to supplement their own—to allow them to do more on this plane than they normally would be able to.” He sighed. “I don’t know. I’m still not thinking too clearly yet. Perhaps we should continue this in the morning, after we’ve all had a chance to sleep for a while.”
“No way,” Jason said firmly. “You’re gonna tell me what’s been going on. What’s this about a murderer?”
Stone looked at Lopez, and between the two of them they gave Jason the summary version of what had occurred over the past couple of days. Had it really only been a couple of days? So much had happened that it felt like much longer.
Jason listened with growing horror, especially during the part about Lindsey’s murder and Stone’s arrest, and then again when they got to what they’d discovered under the huge oak tree up above Creek Road. “Shit...” he breathed. “Just—shit.”
“I’ll give you this, Jason,” Stone said. “You don’t discover small problems.”
Lopez stood. “We really should get some sleep,” he said. “We gotta figure out how to deal with some things tomorrow—like how we explain where Jason’s been, for example. Remember, he’s still wanted as a person of interest for Ashley Reed’s murder. And we need to determine our next steps if we’re going to find this Faces thing.”
“We can think about all that tomorrow,” Stone said. Already he could feel himself starting to fade again. He didn’t think there was anything seriously wrong with him beyond exhaustion: his arm and shoulder hurt where the ethereal cord-snake had bitten him, but aside from angry red marks, there were no wounds. However, he knew his brain was operating in a fog right now, and that was no way to make life-or-death decisions. He’d just have to trust that the wards around the house would keep them safe. “Just—everybody stay inside. I’m not convinced that if you go out right now, that thing won’t be waiting for you.”
“No problem, Al,” Jason said firmly. “Whatever happened to me, I don’t ever want it to happen again.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
When Stone came out to the front room early the next morning, still bleary but feeling much more himself than the previous night, Jason was already up. He sat at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee, looking out into Lopez’s small, neat backyard with a fair imitation of Stone’s thousand-yard stare.
He looked up as Stone came in. “Hey, Al. Didn’t think you’d be up yet.”
“I could say the same thing. Are you all right?” He dropped into a chair across the table.
Jason rose, poured another cup of coffee, and set it in front of Stone. “Surprisingly, yeah. I was hungry as hell once I woke up last night. Stan wasn’t kidding about me eating a whole pizza. But it was a weird feeling—not like I hadn’t eaten for several days, but more like it just—switched back on after being turned off.” He sipped his coffee, then looked at Stone with an odd expression, sober and thoughtful. “I didn’t say thanks last night, Al,” he said. “Thanks for coming for me, for getting me out of that. If you hadn’t—”
Stone waved him off. “Think nothing of it. Rescuing people from magical threats is apparently becoming what I do.”
“Still, I owe you big.”
“We’re not out of this yet,” Stone pointed out. He looked down into his cup. “We—well, I anyway; you’re not obligated—still need to track down He of Many Faces and f
igure out how to deal with him.”
“We,” Jason said firmly. “I’m in this till the end. I’ve got a score to settle with this thing anyway.” He glanced up. “So you told Stan, huh? That was a surprise. I thought you wanted to keep the whole magic thing a secret. Did you tell him about me and Verity, by the way?”
“No. That’s for you two to reveal if you wish.” He shrugged. “As for why I told him—I didn’t fancy getting arrested again, so I figured that having a law-enforcement officer on my side couldn’t do me any harm. And you’ve told me you trust him. So far, it’s proven to be one of my better decisions. He’s been a valuable ally.” He quirked an eyebrow at Jason. “And he tends to accept things much more easily than you do. It was quite refreshing not to have to deal with ‘what the hell?’ and ‘holy crap’ every five minutes.”
“Hey, what can I say? I’m just skeptical like that.” He paused, looking out the window again. “So, what’s our next step? Do you think that thing will try to grab me again?”
Stone shook his head. “Probably not. I’m sure it knows that, now I know what I’m looking for, I could find you again much more easily. No, I think it’s mostly focused on killing us now, along with whatever other plans it’s pursuing.”
“That’s why I like you, Al: you’re so comforting.”
The phone rang before Stone could reply. After a single ring it stopped, as if it had been picked up in the other room. Five minutes after that, Lopez came down the hall in plaid boxers and undershirt. He looked grim. “Bad news, guys. That was Casner calling. We got more murders.”
“Murders plural?” Stone asked.
“Yeah. Three. Looks like a whole family this time. And Pete’s pretty sure these are related to the others.”
“I don’t like it,” Stone said, “but I think we’re going to have to try to get Casner to cooperate with us.”
The three of them had reconvened at Lopez’s kitchen table twenty minutes later, after showers and fresh clothes (fortunately, Jason was close enough in size to Lopez that he could borrow a shirt, though the Budweiser logo looked out of place on him). “You thinking of telling him about the magic thing?” Lopez asked, surprised.
“No. But I’ve already established myself as an expert on the occult. If these murders include the same odd circles that the others have, would we have any chance of convincing him that there might be occult involvement, at least enough to use me as a consultant? It would be easier if I could get access to the scene, especially when it’s relatively fresh.”
Lopez considered. “It’ll be tough,” he said at last. “Like I said, Casner’s smart and he’s a good cop, but he’s not the kind to believe in ghoulies and ghosties and things that go bump in the night.”
“Remember,” Stone pointed out, “‘Occult’ doesn’t necessarily mean real magic. The majority of occult-related crimes and people out there have nothing to do with the real thing. Satanists and whatnot, for example: sure, a few of them can be trouble if they have actual talent and genuinely believe, but ninety-nine percent of them are just fools in eyeliner.”
Lopez nodded. “True. Even if the murderers were just cranks pretending to be spooks, I might be able to convince him that you could help.”
“Does he know Jason is back yet?”
“Not yet. Apparently the people in the motel didn’t call it in. Nobody did, which is weird considering how loud we were yelling.”
“Probably just thought you were drunk or having an argument or something,” Jason said. “Even around here, people don’t always get involved.” He looked at Lopez. “You have a lot of cred in the department, Stan. Can you make this Casner guy believe I didn’t kill anybody and that Al could help with things?”
“I think I have to try. It’s gonna come out pretty soon that you’re back. It has to, since we can’t let them keep devoting resources to finding you. I’ll give him a call. I sure hope this doesn’t blow up in our faces, though.”
“Make this fast, Stan,” Peter Casner said, without looking up from a form he was filling out. “I need to get out to the crime scene. This one’s going to take hours to process, even with help from Ventura.” He tossed his pen down and glanced up—
—and stared.
Stone had to admit a bit of sympathy for the man. He thought he’d be talking to his old friend from another precinct, and instead he got the friend, the crackpot who’d been hauled in twice on suspicion of murder, and—
“Hey—aren’t you the guy who’s supposed to be missing?” Casner demanded, starting to rise from his chair. “Stan, what the hell—”
“Sit down, Pete, please,” Lopez said, making a placating motion. “This is Jason Thayer, yeah.”
“Come on, Stan, this is bullshit,” Casner said, his brows furrowing in anger. “What hell’s going on?” He did sit down, though.
“It’s not bullshit,” Lopez said. His tone was even, calm, steady. “Just hear us out, okay? Or are you so on top of seven murders now that you can afford to turn down help?”
Casner’s gaze darted between the three of them. “Where’d you find him?” he asked, pointing at Jason. “You know he’s wanted, right?”
“Now that is bullshit,” Lopez growled. “You know as well as I do that this guy didn’t do a damn thing but get smashed off his ass at a party in an unfamiliar area, wander off, and get himself lost.”
Stone and Jason exchanged glances, but neither contradicted Lopez’s words.
“For three days?” Casner demanded.
“Jason didn’t kill anybody, Pete,” Lopez said, shaking his head. “That’s all that matters. You know it and I know it. Don’t waste your time chasing useless leads. You don’t have that kind of time or manpower right now.”
Casner looked like he was going to protest, then let his breath out and subsided again. “Yeah,” he said. “I know.” He both looked and sounded very tired. “Right now I don’t give a damn where he was, as long as he turned up safe and I can take him off my to-do list.” He glared at Stone, who was leaning against the frame of the open office door. “What’s he doing here?”
“He wants to help, Pete,” Lopez said. “And I think maybe you oughta listen to him.”
Casner rolled his eyes. “Come on. Get serious. You just said it: I’m dealing with seven murders here. And you want me to listen to some nutcase ghostbuster who can’t even keep himself off the suspect list?” He started to rise again. “Thanks for coming by, Stan, but I’ve got to get out to the crime scene.”
Stone stepped forward. When he spoke, his soft voice was every bit as chilled and intense as his gaze. “Lieutenant, Sergeant Lopez has been kind enough to bring me here, and as he’s said, it would be best if you listen to what I have to say. You don’t have the luxury of disbelief any longer. Whether you believe in genuine occult powers or not is irrelevant. Whoever has committed these murders does believe, and that’s what matters. I can help you, if you’re willing to put aside your literal-minded view of the world for a moment and let me.”
Casner stared at him, and Stone could almost see the quick procession of thoughts running through the man’s head. Sometimes you didn’t need to be a mind reader to be able to follow the obvious. So far, the only sides of him the cop had seen were “concerned friend” and “grief-stricken suspect.” Now, though, Stone had deliberately brought to bear a side of his personality that he didn’t normally show, augmenting it with the full potent force of his magic. He’d never actually seen what he looked like when he let loose, but more formidable things than a harried, small-town police lieutenant had backed down when confronted with it. He didn’t have time to waste in verbal sparring or posturing right now. Every hour they waited, more people would die.
Casner managed to hold the mage’s unblinking gaze for another second or two, then looked back at Lopez again. “I got nothing, Stan,” he said with an exhausted sigh. “I haven’t got a fucking clue wha
t’s going on here. Seven people dead, no motive, no suspects.”
He looked back at Stone warily. “I guess it couldn’t hurt to see what you’ve got to say.” His gaze hardened. “But on my terms, got it? I still don’t trust you, Stone. I still think you know more about this situation than you’re telling. But if Stan vouches for you, and you’re willing to play it my way, I’ll take a chance. For now.”
Stone inclined his head. “Thank you, Lieutenant. What I’d like, if possible, is to see this latest crime scene while it’s still fresh.”
Casner looked suspicious. “Why?”
“Because if there are any impressions to be gathered, it will be easier than if we wait until later.”
“Impressions? You mean like psychic readings or something?”
Stone made a small shrug. “Call it what you like. I’d also like to see if this scene includes the same crude circle I believe I mentioned to you before.”
Casner rubbed the bridge of his nose. He sighed again, louder this time. “Fine, whatever. If you give me your word you’ll follow my orders to the letter, you can come along. I don’t want you getting in the way of the crime-scene guys or compromising the evidence.”
“Of course, Lieutenant. You have my word.”
The cop hooked a thumb at Jason. “What about him?”
“He’s my assistant,” Stone said.
“Don’t worry about Jason, Pete,” Lopez said. “He didn’t get his fool ass expelled from the Academy until after the unit on how not to fuck up crime scenes.”
Jason gave him a sour look, but didn’t contradict him.
Casner stood. “This is turning into a fucking circus,” he said. “Call me when the rest of the clowns get here. Come on. Let’s go.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The house that was the scene of the triple murder looked relentlessly suburban: a rambling, single story, peach-colored ranch with a shake roof, white shutters, and a large manicured lawn kept proudly green despite the late summer heat. The wooden sign hanging over the closed garage door read: The Ayalas. It looked like every other suburban ranch-style house in the neighborhood.