Song of Wishrock Harbor (The Invisible Entente Book 2)

by Krista Walsh

  Gabe’s clients usually gave him more than twenty-four hours before they started pushing, but considering how much money Clare had forked out for his services, he supposed she believed herself entitled to a quick turnaround.

  He pushed the hood of his sweatshirt back, feeling underdressed in the face of the woman standing before him. Tonight, her red hair was pulled up into a bun and pinned with a gilt-edged butterfly comb. Her shoulders were draped with white fur and a floor-length red gown clung to her curves, the collar dipping between her breasts and the skirt slit open to reveal a long, tight thigh. He forced his gaze back to her face.

  “Big night?” he asked.

  She frowned and crossed her arms. “A benefit concert I couldn’t get out of. In my world, a dead husband is no excuse to stay at home and mope. Reputations need to be upheld and faces need to be seen. Especially when the dead husband is found under suspicious circumstances, possibly as a result of some untoward hobbies. Sam’s father is less than pleased that the…condition of Sam’s body was made public.”

  Her throat bobbed with a hard swallow, and Gabe wondered if she was bothered about her forced attendance at the party or about the way her father-in-law seemed more upset by how his son died than by his actual death.

  Clare cleared her throat. “Have you learned anything?”

  Gabe invited her to sit, but she hugged her arms tighter against her chest and didn’t move, waiting for him to speak.

  He stepped closer to the desk and grabbed the bottle of whiskey from the bottom drawer. Having a drink had been his plan in coming here, and he didn’t see that Clare’s presence should change anything. His skin was bubbled with goosebumps, and all he wanted was to warm up and wash the taste of river water and vomit out of his mouth.

  “I don’t have the entire case resolved yet, but I do have half the picture. I’ve discovered what killed your husband, and you were right. He was not killed by any regular mugger.” Gabe set the whiskey bottle on his desk and grabbed a glass.

  Clare’s tawny gaze dropped to the chair, then snapped back to Gabe’s sunglasses. A pang of sympathy squeezed his heart that both her public position and her fiery nature prevented her from showing the grief threatening to overwhelm her in that moment.

  “What was it?” she asked, as he turned away to pour himself a drink.

  “It’s a siren,” he said. “It looks like she’s coming up from the river and going after the men of New Haven. Her call is getting stronger, so Sam must have heard her on his way home from work or maybe from the bar. He didn’t go out of his way on his own power.” He looked up at her. “He didn’t betray you.” He thought about offering her a drink, but figured he’d already added enough fuel to the fire, so slid the bottle back in his bottom drawer.

  Tears glistened in Clare’s eyes, but only one managed to escape before she dashed it away. She pressed her red lips together, and her light eyes flashed like embers. Gabe’s heart jumped into his throat and his glass of whiskey vibrated in his hand as she slammed her palms down on top of the desk, her shoulders hunched and her fingers curled like talons.

  “That little harlot,” she screamed. Her fingers passed from white to orange before bursting into flame. The heat left scorch marks on the edge of the desk, and Gabe sent up a silent prayer of thanks that he’d put away his highly flammable alcohol. “I’ll kill her. I’ll go out there and tear her apart limb from limb. Who does the bitch think she is, taking what doesn’t belong to her?”

  For a flickering moment, Gabe was tempted to let her follow through on her threats. He’d done his part in finding the siren; he could let Clare take over without any deep feelings of guilt. But before he opened his mouth to say so, an image flashed through his head of the fire elemental razing the city to the ground in her impassioned rage. He pictured the five-foot snow drifts melting under her wrath, buildings on fire, the harbor destroyed. He’d seen that sort of anger in action and knew how impossible it would be to rein in after she started. One siren’s life was not worth the city’s fall.

  Keeping his distance from the sparks shooting off Clare’s arms, he set his glass on the chair and held up his hands to draw her attention. “Clare, stop. Your anger won’t bring Sam back. Remember why you hired me in the first place. I don’t think going out to the harbor and tearing her apart will be as simple as you think.”

  “Simple?” she asked, her volume rising another pitch. The fire in her hand flared into a large ball of dancing flames that faded into smoke as its tendrils crept toward the ceiling. “You think I care about simple? She stole half my life.”

  “And she’ll pay for her crimes,” he said.

  “How? Do you think you can stop a woman like that? She’ll turn you to her side before you get within three feet of her. You’ll end up just like Sam. Monsters like her shouldn’t be allowed to exist.”

  Gabe stared at her, watching as the flames licked up her arms in the sensual threat of her passion. He couldn’t help but note the irony of her words — calling the siren a monster when most people of the mundane world would likely see her the same way.

  “I’m working on a plan to stop her and make her answer for what she’s done. I need you to let me handle it. You’re in no position to take her on right now any more than I am. If you go out there, she’ll turn her song on you and you’ll be just as defenseless as Sam was. She’s more than a pretty voice. She’s dangerous. She nearly killed me tonight.”

  Clare clenched her fist and the fire around her hand grew brighter. “That just proves you’re not capable of this fight.”

  “Yet,” Gabe corrected, shoving down his anger when it threatened to rise. “Give me time to figure this out. There’s no point in you putting yourself at risk when someone else is willing to do it. You hired me because your father-in-law is worried about his reputation. He’s already upset about how Sam died. How will he feel if you get caught putting the city at risk to avenge his son? If you reveal to the world what you are?”

  Clare glared at him. The fire crackled against her skin, which flickered red and gold under the flames like molten rock. Beneath Gabe’s tense anticipation of her answer lurked a crazy wish that he could ask her to stay for a while, just until he warmed up. His chills were playing tag over his back as her heat chased them away.

  Too soon, Clare quenched the flames and dropped her hands to her sides.

  “Very well, Mr. Mulligan. You should proceed how you feel is best.” She reached into her purse and drew out another check in the same amount that had been written on the first one. Gabe opened his mouth to argue that she could cut it down by half, but she didn’t give him an opportunity. “But I suggest you move quickly. I can’t guarantee my temper will keep me from having my way with her before long.”

  She bowed her head in a nod, then swept out of his office.

  Alone in the room, which felt even colder than it had when he first entered it, Gabe found himself wondering what other trouble would come out of the harbor if he didn’t deal with this siren issue soon.

  With a groan, he grabbed his glass off the chair and dropped his body into the seat instead. He sipped the longed-for whiskey slowly, moaning around the drink as the warmth slid over his tongue and into his stomach. As it washed through his veins, his frayed nerves began to put themselves back together.

  Yes, he was an investigator and not a fighter, but he had taken the responsibility on his own shoulders. His conscience would hold him to it. He had to come up with a plan, and to do that, he had to find answers.

  Who was this siren?

  He downed his drink, took the glass and the bottle, and stepped back into his apartment.

  ***

  When Gabe filled Percy in an hour later on what had happened at the river, his friend wasn’t nearly as surprised as he should have been. Percy kept shifting in his chair, his attention focused on another screen.

  Gabe eyed him warily. “What did you do?”

  “I have no idea what you are talking about,” Percy replied. H
e disappeared from view and returned a few minutes later with a box of apple juice. He pierced the hole on top with the pointed tip of his straw and slurped.

  “What did you do while I wasn’t here to supervise you?” Gabe asked, spinning out the question.

  Percy sighed and set the juice box down. “I might have hacked into the security camera at the harbor and watched the fight. But it was from the safety of my own home and the video doesn’t have audio, so you can’t be too mad at me.”

  Gabe passed his hands over his eyes.

  “I couldn’t let you go out there without someone having your back,” Percy pushed. “At least this way I could have…called someone or something.”

  He returned the straw to his mouth.

  “Who would you have called?” Gabe asked, and then waved his hand in the air to dismiss the question. He had no doubt that Percy would have come up with something. “All right, so you saw what happened?”

  Percy frowned. “Not as much as I would have liked. The storm was cooperating. It let up enough for me to make out some of the details, at least. But you might have tried to stay in frame a bit better.”

  Gabe rolled his eyes. “Next time I’ll be sure to shift a little to the left.”

  “I’d appreciate it. But I saw her attack you. She must be crazy strong.”

  Gabe rubbed his neck. “She is. Much stronger than she looks. Allegra wasn’t kidding when she said she’s not an innocent little flower.”

  “She was also fast. There were times she disappeared from the camera because of how quickly she moved. Then she got all ugly.” When Gabe raised an eyebrow, Percy shrugged. “It might not be the priority here, but you can’t deny she did. I wouldn’t have seen it at all except that I zoomed in on the picture when I was looking at something else. I think I learned a few things about our mystery woman. Did you notice the style of her dress?”

  He brought a still from the security camera up on screen, and Gabe leaned in to get a better look at the blurry image.

  “I can’t say I did, no. I was too busy trying to keep the Haven out of my lungs.”

  “I have to admit, there were a few times where I thought you weren’t going to make it. I’m glad you proved me wrong. Now that you’re safe, sound, and dried off, take a closer look. You asked that succubus why our wintry friend would be living under the river when other sirens are living the high life, right?”

  “It does strike me as a little strange.”

  “Well, I did some research after you left her screaming on the ice — I think you really hurt her feelings — and based on the style of the neckline, the waist, all those ribbons, I’m pretty sure her outfit comes right out of the fashion palaces of the eighteen hundreds. The late end of the century, if you want to be precise.”

  Gabe’s stomach churned, still not completely settled, and the skin along his spine tingled. He squinted to smooth out some of the choppy pixels and spotted the details he had missed while he fought her. Percy was right. The gown that had appeared so ethereal out in the snow, wrapped in that blue glow and swirling around her body, was dated. The reason for the billowing was that it was too torn apart to stay in place. The tatters were stained, bedraggled, and hard to make out, but they were old. Authentically old. Not something she would have found browsing through a vintage shop.

  And then there were those manacles around her wrists and ankles, the snapped chains, her fury.

  “Holy hells,” he whispered.

  “Are you in the same place I am, buddy?” Percy asked. Gone was the smile that habitually pulled at the corners of his mouth to punctuate some wisecrack.

  Gabe cupped the back of his neck with his hand. “If we’re right, she’s been trapped under the water for over two hundred years.”

  10

  Gabe paced his small apartment from the front door to the window and sipped his whiskey. The bottle was almost empty, and he’d lost count of how many drinks he’d had since bringing the bottle home from the office. He wished the alcohol would hit him with more than a mild buzz. Even if it was just for a few minutes — enough time to give him a break from his circuitous thoughts. His mind was numb, stuffed to bursting with the theory he and Percy were considering.

  He wished he smoked. He needed something to keep his fingers busy while he worked out this latest puzzle and decided how to tackle it.

  The siren had been locked up for close to two hundred and fifty years.

  The fact sank in again, and Gabe shook his head. His fingers tapped against his knee as he paced the room.

  He wondered who had trapped her. The siren moved quickly and she was strong. Getting those shackles around her wouldn’t have been easy.

  And why chain her? If she was causing trouble way back when, why not just kill her? It would have been the merciful option. Even the most rational mind would turn feral after being alone that long in the cold, wet darkness.

  Gabe paused in front of his futon and considered sitting down, but his restlessness nipped at his ankles, so he kept pacing.

  Did her chains change anything? It might, if he knew why she had been imprisoned. Had she been luring men to their deaths two hundred and fifty years ago, just as she was doing now? If she had been on a rampage in New Haven and chaining her was the only way to make her stop, he could hardly blame the ones who had trapped her.

  The question of her past crimes ate at him, but unless the siren decided to surrender and explain everything to him, it was unlikely he’d ever find out how she’d ended up under the river.

  And remaining in the dark about the truth couldn’t stand in the way of doing what needed to be done. His priority was to safeguard his home. She was luring men to their deaths in his city and, as far as he could tell, would continue to do so if she weren’t stopped.

  He pushed his hand through his hair and drained his glass, then set it down on the kitchen table next to the bottle. His hand reached for the bottleneck of its own accord, and he drew it back. As much as he wanted to keep going, attempting to drink himself into a stupor wouldn’t make the picture any clearer. He needed his faculties intact to figure out his next steps.

  Gabe walked over to the window and stared out over the dark street, his vision blurring with exhaustion and tension. Gone were the lazy swirls of snow he’d walked through while out on the ice. The wind had picked up with a vengeance, and great whorls zipped through the air. The power had been restored down the street, and the lights from the hospital were doing their best to cut through the darkness. Envy wrapped around Gabe’s guts at the people who now had hot water at their easy disposal.

  He debated rifting over there and pretending to be injured so he could enjoy one night in a heated room with a shower, but he didn’t have time to think about comfort. Making plans to wrestle with a mad siren would have to be enough to satisfy him.

  Percy had gone to bed after he and Gabe had talked through every inch of their theory. Neither of them had come up with any useful new ideas, and Gabe had eventually been left alone with his thoughts.

  Thoughts that were starting to become dangerous.

  Under the swim of the alcohol, his battered mind inevitably turned toward the knife he’d lost to the water, and he clenched his jaw so tightly the pain shot into his head.

  That knife was filled with memories of growing up in the middle of nowhere just outside Boston’s city limits, of the old farmhouse filled with nooks and crannies where he and Rick would play hide and seek, of the fields where they played tag and cops and robbers.

  Rick had given him the knife when he had been twelve and Gabe ten. By then, Gabe had long given up on the idea of having friends. That wish had died after he’d lost his sunglasses when he was five and turned two kids into statues in the park. The families never knew what had happened to their children. How could his mother have explained it? Gabe’s parents had slipped out of town, claiming the city was too dangerous. Rick, although barely old enough to understand his brother’s rare affliction, had become his only friend and all
y. Together, they’d enjoyed their silly childish rebellions against their sweet, protective mother and their generous, laughing father.

  Gabe hadn’t wanted the weapon. At ten years old, he’d turned his mind against hurting anything. He’d been there, done that, and the guilt had nearly crippled him until his mother had driven it home that he hadn’t hurt them on purpose. She’d told him that his nature was not a crime, and that as long as he learned to control it, he could be proud of his heritage.

  Rick had insisted that Gabe take the knife anyway.

  “You can’t live out here in the country without a knife,” he’d said. “What if the coyotes come for you?”

  So Gabe had accepted it, and for years it had never left his side.

  Two years later, Rick had slipped on the rocks and ended up in the churning rapids of the river on the edge of their land. Gabe had been there, had tried to help. He’d jumped in after him and tried to pull him free, but his sunglasses had been swept away in the water, so he’d had to close his eyes and reach out blindly, terrified of getting caught in the current himself. His hands had been raw and bloody by the time he’d given up. The rush of the water had been too strong. He’d pulled himself out onto the bank and watched his brother get sucked into the rapids. They’d found his body two days later on the other side of town.

  The knife was all he’d kept of Rick’s, and now that was gone, too. To have lost both of them the same way felt like the Fates were laughing at him behind his back.

  Cold bitches.

  But then, they’d already proved to him enough times that he didn’t deserve any of their blessings.

  Gabe squeezed his eyes shut to prevent his sudden tears from falling and slammed his fists against his thighs with a growl. He rubbed the back of his bowed neck, and when the contact stung, he dropped his hand once more to his thigh to beat a steady percussion with his fingertips.

  Despite the whiskey, the taste of river water still gurgled in his throat. His palms turned clammy at the memory of water drizzling up his nose and down into his lungs. The darkness. The helplessness.