“Yes.”
“That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. You don’t get to co-opt our choices simply because you’re possessed. Who died and made you mayor of the Land of Bad Decisions? You don’t get to make calls for us, Golden.”
“Sure I do,” Denny chuffed. “Being connected to me or my family is dangerous. If I have tuberculosis, I would do everything I could to separate myself from those I care about. This is no different…just as dangerous.”
“Love is dangerous, Denny Silver. With or without a demon involved. Jesus, you’re thick-headed. Look, they came at you because you were a newbie hunter—fresh meat, as it were. They saw an opportunity to get rid of a Hanta Raya. They failed miserably. You really think they’ll come back once you get experience under your belt? You kicked their asses.”
“I’m not waiting around to find out. I have a plan in place. I go out every night to cull the herd, Brianna...to let them know, loud and clear, that my ball is in play. What I am doing is easier to do than sitting around waiting.”
“But Denny, you just started your training with Ames. At least...at least go back and—”
“No way. He disapproves and I don’t need his permission to go after the demon who set Quick up.” Denny paused, and then turned. “How did you know I haven’t been back to see Ames? Did he send you here?”
“Oh for Christ’s sake, no one sent me here. I am here because I care. I care, god damn it. Is it that hard for you to understand?”
“Then do yourself a favor and stop caring.”
“So that’s it, then? You just walk away from everyone and everything in your life in an effort to save your brother and protect the rest of us mere mortals from the demonic world?”
The wind rustled the leaves and Denny paused to listen for footsteps she knew she’d heard. “That life is over for me, Bri. I’m not the same person I was a month ago. You saw it. Saw me. I’m possessed, plain and simple, and I have a war to wage with those responsible for going after my family.”
Brianna reached out and held Denny’s hand tightly in hers. “I get that you’re angry, Golden. I truly do. But nothing says you have to do it alone or throw your whole life away because of it.”
Denny looked at their clasped hands before gently pulling away. “That’s where you’re wrong. I say I have to do it alone. So I have to ask you to please, please stop coming by the house. You need to move on without me and know it’s for the best for both of us.” Denny rose. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got rounds to do. The night is still young and there’s plenty to get done.”
Helping Brianna off the mausoleum, Denny smiled softly at her. “Thank you for caring. In another place and another time, I think—”
“Don’t say it. Don’t you dare say it. You’re wrong, Denny. The whole way you’re going about this is all wrong, but I read you loud and clear. Just know—if you need anything, anything at all, I’ll be here for you. Always.”
Brianna hugged Denny before walking away. Had she turned back, she would have seen Denny melt into the darkness, a mere shadow of her former self.
****
The next morning, Denny was dressed in her nicest clothes and was sitting across from Quick making introductions.
“Quick, this is Reese. She’s a—”
Quick didn’t even cast a glance at Reese, but instead, stared at his sister. “Denny, what the fuck? You look like a Mac truck hit you and then backed up over you. What the hell is going on?”
Denny shrugged. “I’ve lost a little weight. No biggie. Now listen, there’s not a lot of—”
Quick held his hands up. “Whoa. That’s more than a little weight, Denny. You look like death on cracker. What’s happened? And why the hell are you wasting money on the slim chance of another trial?”
Denny looked to Reese to answer.
“Because your sister believes you’re innocent and from what I’ve seen, she could very well be onto something. I’ve investigated a lot of crimes and criminals, Quick, and there’s a whole lot about your case that doesn’t make sense.”
He stared at Reese a long time. “What do you hope to find that nobody else could?”
Reese leaned forward, her hands folded on the table. “For starters, how about the truth?”
Quick chuckled. “Oh, that. That got lost eighteen months ago, once the attorneys got involved.”
Reese pulled her file out and opened it. “This is what was said. I want to hear it from you. What happened that night?”
Quick looked to Denny. “You’re not gonna give this up, are you?”
She shook her head. “This isn’t even just about you, Q. It’s about our family. The legacy. It’s about making sure everyone knows not to fuck with us. If I let them get away with this, what will they do to Sterling or Pure?”
Quick leaned back. “Goldy…”
“I’m not a little girl anymore, Quick. I’ve...seen things and done things I’m not proud of, but failing to take care of our family isn’t one of them. You have to trust that I know what I’m doing. You can trust Reese as well. I do.”
Quick put his elbows on the table. “I wasn’t lying when I said I didn’t do it, but my attorney—”
“Was a piece of shit who never should have taken the case. He did next to nothing, Quick. He may as well have just driven you straight to the prison himself. And that, right there, is why we’re here. He did such a piss poor job that there are holes everywhere. The DA merely found a way of plugging those holes. So why don’t you just tell us what happened that night, and maybe, just maybe, we can find a way to get you out of here.”
Inhaling a deep breath, Quick started his tale. “There’s not a whole lot to tell you, really. Lisa and I had been dating two years, off and on, and—”
“Why off and on? You a player?”
“A player? Me?” Quick chuckled. “I wish. No, she didn’t like commitment.”
Reese took notes but kept her eyes on Quick. “Go on.”
“That night, I came over and she was saying goodbye to some guy. Some guy I’d never seen before.”
“Right. The mystery man no one could find.”
Quick nodded. “Yeah, how lame does that sound?”
“Very, but that’s beside the point. Go on.”
“She seemed agitated, but wouldn’t tell me why he was there or who he was, but I could tell she was disconcerted. She suggested we go to her room which was detached from her parents’ house, so we went out there.”
“How long were you out there?”
“Five, maybe ten minutes. We’d just been talking and hanging out when we heard the screams. We both took off for the house, Lisa ahead of me.”
“Why was she ahead of you?”
Quick blushed. “I...uh...was zipping up my pants.”
A slight smile from Reese. “Go on.”
Quick rubbed his hand over his face. “Lisa ran though the door and right into his knife. Slit her throat so deep, he nearly cut her head off.” Quick shuddered. “She was on the floor, probably already dead, when I ran in.”
“Wait. What you mean probably? How could you not know if she was alive or not?”
“Her eyes were open, blood was everywhere. I didn’t have time to check her. I saw him going towards the front door so I started after him.”
“Okay, I’ve read the reports. This is where it gets dicey. You say you saw him and started after him.”
Quick nodded. “But there was so much blood, so when I stepped over Lisa, my foot hit the blood and down I went.”
“Landing in the blood.” Reese said, consulting her notes.
Quick nodded, his face pale. Beads of sweat dotted his upper lip. “I got up to go after him and that was when I heard him...Austin, Lisa’s father.”
“And this is where your story goes to hell. You say you heard him moan, so you started CPR. Why CPR?”
Slowly shaking his head, Quick said, “Ma’am, I’d just seen my girlfriend’s throat get slashed and her two parents chopped
up like a sushi roll. I panicked. I had no idea what to do, so I just did the first thing that came to mind. CPR.”
Reese nodded, but reserved judgment.
“At some point, I knew it was useless so I called nine-one-one.”
“And what did you do while you waited?”
“I...I sat holding Lisa’s hand. She was dead by then, but I didn’t want her to be alone.”
“And the knife? Where did it go?
“That’s just it. I never saw it until after I—” Quick shook his head.
“After you what?”
“After I blacked out.”
Reese looked down at her notes. “You said he came from behind you and put a choke hold on you. Is that correct?”
Quick shrugged. “I don’t know if it was him. I don’t know if he came back into the house or if there was someone else in there with him. All I know is someone put a choke hold on me and I was out.”
“A choke hold. Like the kind cops use?”
Quick nodded. “Exactly.”
“So he knocked you out for how long?”
“Twenty, thirty seconds, I guess. I know those choke holds are for short amounts of time, but with everything that was going on, it could have been longer.”
“So you’re not sure.”
“No.”
Denny moved her chair and the scraping sound made them both turn to her.
“Sorry.”
Reese looked back at Quick. “And when you came to?”
“I was holding the knife.”
“What did you do then?”
Quick looked down at his handcuffed hands. “I did what any normal person would do. I tried wiping my prints off.”
“But you didn’t, did you?”
“I did...from that knife...not from the other murder weapon.”
“So, what the evidence showed was one knife with the prints wiped clean and another with your prints on it.”
He nodded. “Slam dunk.”
“There’s no such thing, my friend. Plenty of slam dunk cases have walked. That Casey Anthony woman a few years ago is just one of many examples of cases that appeared to be over before they began, yet ended far differently than most expected.” Reese closed her file and leaned back. “When you called nine-one-one, you said you thought there might still be someone else in the house with you, yet forensics could neither confirm nor deny this. Do you still believe there were two people in there with you?”
Quick nodded. “There was no way he made it all the way around the house to the back door to put the choke hold on me. None. There had to have been someone upstairs who came down and nailed me, set the knife in my hand, and then took off out the back.”
“Without leaving one bloody footprint anywhere?”
Quick looked at Denny. “It’s possible he leapt over us all.”
Reese leaned forward, her elbows on her knees. “Leapt. What? Six? Seven feet from a standing position? I’ve seen the photographs, Quick. He would have had to take a running start in order to leap over Mrs. Austin, Lisa, you, and the blood.”
Quick nodded. “I know. It would have taken someone with a buttload of strength to do that.”
“And the cops canvassed the neighborhood and no one saw a guy leaving the Austins’.”
Shaking his head, Quick swallowed loudly. “No one saw a thing.”
Reese stood suddenly. “Thank you, Quick. That’s good for now.”
“What are you going to do?”
“The investigative work on this case was shoddy at best. I’m going to backtrack over the evidence and shake a few trees.”
“So...you believe me?”
Reese grinned as she packed up. “Don’t sound so surprised.”
“Well, nobody else did.”
“Because nobody else asked the single most important question. Why didn’t they kill you, too? If this happened as you said it did, they should have just killed you as well, but they didn’t. Instead, they wanted you set up.”
Quick stood, his manacles clanking together. “In a way, I’ve been dead since the moment that knife was put in my hand, so maybe they did.”
“You hang in there, Quick. If your story is the truth, I’ll get to the bottom of this.” Reese turned to signal to the guard. She stopped and slowly turned to Quick. Tossing her pen at him, he caught it with his right hand.
Reese grinned.
“What did you do that for?”
Taking the pen before the guards could reach him, Reese was still grinning. “The killer was left-handed. You are not.”
“How do you kn—”
“It was in the evidence, Quick. Evidence your attorney never brought up. I’m thinking that was a very significant piece and yet, he let it go. Why?”
“Because he was lame?”
“Oh, he was something, alright, and I’m going to find out just what that was.”
****
Denny couldn’t stop thinking about the information Reese had culled from the reports and files. How did Quick’s attorney miss all of that? How had so many eyes skipped over something as vital as handedness? As the length of the leap? She could make that jump easily, but a human? No way.
So much did not make sense.
Sterling had wanted to pull a second mortgage on the house to pay for Quick’s legal fees, but he had said, “No way.” He’d refused, and as a result, had to settle for this apparently really terrible public defender. It bothered Denny how inefficient he’d been and how no one seemed to notice.
Reese Oakmont noticed.
For some reason, she had a lot of faith in Reese Oakmont.
Reese was confident, calm, and focused, and Denny had done a complete background check to make sure she had more than just street cred…that she was the real deal.
She was, and if anyone could dig up the truth Denny needed, it was her.
Pulling up to the house, Denny checked her messages while sitting in her car. Two from Lauren, one from Cassandra, one from Pat Patterson. She erased them all. Two days into her self-appointed exile Denny realized the pain incurred by listening to messages imploring her to call back. It was easier if she just didn’t.
As she got out of the Prius, she stared at a young girl sitting at the base of the stairs at her house.
“Who the hell are you?” Denny practically growled, stopping directly in from of the young girl.
The girl rose. She was all of five feet two inches with short, short, platinum blonde spikey hair. Her eyes, if they were a color, were grey. Not blue, not bluish grey, but grey, and this odd color was accentuated by the grey stone nose-piercing she sported. She looked all of twelve, but Denny figured her to be closer to seventeen or eighteen.
“Iris. Iris Carter.” She held out her many-braceleted arm to shake Denny’s hand. Denny ignored it and started up the steps.
“Whatever you’re selling, I gave at the office.”
“Wait. Please. I...I’ve heard you might be able to help me.” Even her voice sounded so young.
Denny stopped at the door and turned around. “I don’t really help people, Ms. Carter. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m a very busy person not helping people.”
“I’m sure you are, and I wouldn’t be bothering you, but I heard you have a...unique way of...dealing with bad things.”
Denny paused with her hand on the door. “Look. Zits are bad things. Taxes are bad things. Housewife shows are bad things. I don’t deal with any of those. I don’t know what you’ve heard about me, but I…well…let’s just say I am one of life’s bad things. Now if you’ll excuse me.” Opening the door, Denny quickly closed it and leaned against it.
She didn’t know how this girl had found her or why she thought Denny could help, but she was quite mistaken.
Denny had her own problems.
Looking around the room at the empty food containers and piles of unanswered mail, Denny could only shake her head before heading up to the lair.
And nothing else mattered.
****
I had to go back for more seeds and salt. Truth be told, I just wanted to talk to Tirobia again. She seems so knowledgeable and wise. I felt so much calmer after I left there— a rare feeling since coming to Savannah.
Rushalyn watched me with careful, almost wary eyes as I lit the incense, poured the salt, and buried the seeds. I wanted to ease her spirit so I actually spoke out loud, telling her these were not for her.
She surprised me by replying, “I know. I’m not evil.” Before vanishing.
It’s one thing to deal with demons, but a whole other ballgame talking to ghosts. I am not at all sure how I feel about it. I know Golden can see her, but I’m unsure about the others. Does this mean what I think it means?
I’ve asked Ames about it and he says children are simply more open to ghosts than adults. He’s right. I’m so glad I met Ames Walker. What an amazing young man he is. He’s given me quite a decent background on Savannah’s demon lore, not to mention how he’s shown me to better utilize Fouet and Epee. That man might very well save my life.
I’ve struggled with whether or not to introduce Robert to him. Ames is quite handsome and charming. I wouldn’t want Robert to get the wrong idea or to get even more jealous of a man who has so much to teach me. He’s already slightly bothered by the time we spend together.
I think I just answered my own question.
Speaking of questions, I had a woman come to me this morning asking for my help. At first, I was a bit taken aback, wondering how she knew what I was. She merely laughed this bell-like giggle and said, “This is Savannah. All the spirits gossip here.”
I liked Petra right off the bat and decided I would help her with her demon issue...only if he was, in fact, a demon. She was certain he was, and I finished the conversation wondering if there wasn’t more to Petra than meets the eye.
Only time will tell, I suppose.
****
Denny finished reading and pushed the book aside. Her mother had a bigger heart than she did, that’s for certain. To just agree to help some stranger who had somehow managed to find out she hunted demons was risky business.
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