Honah looked up. “I accept full responsibility,” he said in a clear voice.
He hadn’t screwed up, not at all. If anything, I should’ve said something about being outnumbered, but I’d been afraid to act like a sissy. Now, the chief, who’d done more to help me than anyone, was getting his butt chewed. That didn’t sit well with me.
“Listen,” I said, “I really should’ve handled that situation better myself. Should’ve spoken—”
Melton held up his hand to stop me. “You’re still learning our ways, and your sentiments do you honor. Your teammates, all highly experienced by comparison, have disappointed me. I will not tolerate factions within our ranks or the slightest lack of goodwill for one another. Have I made my expectations sufficiently clear?”
“Yes!” they all shouted back.
With that final word, Milton vanished.
I hurried over the Honah. “This has gotten way out of hand. I should’ve warned you soon as I knew I was in trouble.”
He shook his head. “There is plenty of blame to spread around, but you were the least qualified to recognize the danger. Milton is perfectly correct in his beliefs. We lost Toller precisely because we were all so consumed by our own work that we failed to protect the one among us least capable of protecting himself.”
I didn’t want to be treated like a child, but I could see that my effort to point out my own mistakes wasn’t helping. I wasn’t sure that Milton’s comments would change how the other angels in the office perceived me, but at least I knew how I should be looking out for their best interests.
Cleo came up to me and put an arm around my shoulders. “We’ll do better, Gabe. Every century or so, Milton needs to remind us that fighting demons is a team sport. If we don’t look out for each other, we’re no better than they are.”
I gave her an appreciative hug. “I also need to take responsibility for protecting myself.”
She shook her head. “There’s so much you still have to learn. Because we went through your experience so long ago, we’ve forgotten that it takes centuries to truly become an angel.”
Time to change the subject. “I’m going to check in with Rosie on whether she managed to crack the casino vampire’s phone. She gave me an encrypted email program so I can message her safely.”
While I was typing, Inga came up and gave me a hug. “We’d like to keep you around for a while, if that’s okay with you? I’ll do better, too”
I hugged her back. “We both know you’re not the problem. On a personal level, I’d like to see you again as soon as we get through this latest crisis.”
“Sounds like fun.” She smiled and wandered away.
I emailed Rosie and asked about her progress.
A few minutes later, she said. I left the phone in the top drawer of the desk you were last using. I managed to break into it, but I can’t read the code they use. The security has been turned off so you can see for yourself.
I found the phone and checked its email program first. All the messages contained seemingly random letters and numbers arranged in blocks of text ten characters long. It wasn’t a foreign language anymore, but a sophisticated code. I started comparing the email addresses on the second phone to the list I’d created earlier. Most addresses from years ago were still being used frequently. Caligula had to be one of those.
Then I checked my watch and realized I had to get to one of the bank branches soon or everyone would be gone for the day. The closest branch was a few blocks from our headquarters. Honah insisted I take Kiko with me, which I did.
She didn’t try to apologize for her part in the earlier screw up, and I was sick of the subject myself. All I expected from her was protection from attacks.
At the bank, I merged into her mind. She asked for the branch’s manager to set up a new account for a greeting card business. Although the idea seemed ridiculous, the bank manager was as excited about the idea as the lawyer had been for my moneymaking idea.
I popped into the manager’s mind. Kiko remained sitting, but I took control of the manager’s thoughts. Using his credentials, he looked up the bank accounts I couldn’t access before. A different customer, Darrell Johnson, controlled five new accounts, which had two hundred and eighty thousand dollars.
Even better, Johnson was shifting funds back and forth among fourteen other accounts, including three credit cards. The bank manager pulled up the recent transactions for each card, but none of them had been used recently.
Instead, I checked the transactions in the largest checking account. The one thing that stood out was Johnson had written a nine-thousand-dollar check to a different bank, First National Merchant Bank. The memo line had said C’s card.
That seemed promising, assuming C could be Caligula. I checked the clock on the wall, though, and it was too late to visit that bank. I’d have to do it the next afternoon.
Lastly, I took the manager’s memories of his time with Kiko and me. She stood, and I transferred back into her head. He remained in a daze while she left and walked back to the headquarters. There, we parted ways.
“Thanks for your help,” I said.
She waved in reply.
We’d probably never be friends, but she’d held up her end each time we’d worked together. That was enough.
Jack approached me. “Hey, I’m so sorry I didn’t—”
This time, I put up my hand to stop him. “Nobody’s perfect, and I think we’ve beaten that issue to death.”
He looked at me askance. “You could’ve been destroyed, like for forever and ever.”
“We’ll all do better. That’s the best that Milton can expect. In the meantime, I’m sorry you got stuck with Torino. He’s a real dim bulb.”
“Tell me about it.” Jack sighed. “He still thinks you started those forest fires in Colorado, and he suspects you’ll set a few out here, too, in your spare time.”
I laughed at how ridiculous that idea was. “Have you been to the scene of the latest murder?” I asked.
“Yeah, not much to see. The crappy driver took the bullet right above his left ear. Death had to be instantaneous. He has no obvious connection with Caligula or anybody in San Francisco that we’ve found so far. I think the driver was a target of opportunity for a demon who loves to kill.”
It didn’t sound like there was any good reason for me to go to the crime scene. “Our best bet is probably to keep following the money. I’ve found connections to a different bank. It’s too late to visit today.”
Jack rubbed the back of his neck. “Then, it’ll probably be faster to gain access the old-fashioned way. We can get search warrants for the banks accounts connected to the one you know about. Given the hue and cry caused by Avenger, I’m sure any legitimate bank president will cooperate.”
I gave him the account number I’d found at First National Merchant Bank, and he called one of his buddies at the bureau.
Within an hour, we had a list of three other bank accounts at different institutions. The US Attorney’s office was preparing civil forfeiture complaints to freeze every account linked to Caligula or his businesses.
The walls were narrowing in on the sorcerer, but not quickly enough to satisfy me. The Bay Area had a population over seven million people. The head demon could be hiding with any one of them, assuming he hadn’t left the area.
I pondered how we were going to find him. It’d taken several years for a dozen national security agencies to find Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein, and they’d devoted thousands of people to the task. We didn’t have those kinds of resources or that kind of time. Caligula killed every day or two. Damn, this is tough duty.
-o-o-o-
CLEO AND I huddled with Jack to plan strategy. She suggested we try to cut off Caligula from his network of infernal supporters. So, we asked Honah for a meeting.
He showed up right away. That told me nothing on his to do list was more important than this case. The four of us sat in a conversatio
n area in soft leather chairs, but I didn’t feel the least bit relaxed.
I started off by saying, “Now that we’re not trying to hide our pursuit anymore, I think our best bet is to run down every dangerous demon we can find who might be inclined to help the sorcerer. The angels here have to know, at least generally, the majority of demons who’re part of the infernal community here.”
“There are thousands of dark immortals within thirty miles of here,” Jack said. “It’ll take days or weeks for a hundred angels to contact so many demons. And as soon as the damned hear we are after them, they’ll all run for cover.”
“But most of them don’t want anything to do with Caligula,” Cleo fired back. “The guy scares them more than we do. I know several demons high up in the local organization, and I’m happy to check their memories. Somebody has to be helping Caligula hide. We’ve already checked every property on the list Gabriel found to make sure their boss isn’t there.”
“Sometimes, there’s no substitute for the drudgery of looking everywhere,” I said. “Caligula needs a hidey hole big enough for himself and his entourage. There are at least six of them left.”
Honah sighed. “I’ll shift resources here from other offices. You three need to contact every angel in this office and get a list of known demons so we can determine who should be contacted first.” He paused before adding, “Is there anything else we should be doing?”
One idea had been bouncing around in the back of my mind. “We could put more pressure on him by offering a large reward,” I said. “Then he’ll have to worry about being betrayed by the other demons. They could take his job and get well-paid for shafting him. My dad the preacher loves to say greed never goes out of style.”
I looked at Honah, and he remained passive for a moment. Then he chuckled. “I love the idea of using these demons’ inherent greed to isolate Caligula from them.” He turned to Cleo and Jack. “Our angels should approach every infernal contact they can find. Tell the dark immortals about a five hundred-thousand-dollar reward that is only available to the fallen. I know many of them will vanish before we can speak to them, but find every one you can.”
I hadn’t expected him to offer such a big reward. “With five hundred grand, somebody could live large for quite a while.”
Honah arranged for three hundred guardian angels from the other offices in North America to descend on San Francisco. Jack and Cleo shared the responsibility of creating teams of three, with one local angel accompanied by two others on each raid.
At two a.m., the teams fanned out and searched for those demons known to be close to Caligula. Jack, Cleo, and I caught a dozen of the sorcerer’s lieutenants flat-footed, but the rest quickly disappeared. None of the twelve knew where Caligula or his entourage were hiding, but their eyes gleamed when they heard about the reward. Caligula had built a personal fortune by screwing everyone he could. They didn’t tell us, but I could see that the demons I checked resented him for having cut them off from the gravy train. Hopefully, that would be his undoing.
-o-o-o-
Saturday, August 19th
FOR TWO FULL days, four hundred angels scoured the Bay Area looking for demons who might’ve hidden the sorcerer, but we didn’t find him. Many of the guardians even got over their squeamishness about reading dark immortal minds. It helped us to confirm his way of doing business, but it wasn’t enough.
I went on many raids, but we soon lost the element of surprise. So, I turned to researching the property records for the places Caligula owned through dozens of corporate entities. Most were businesses, and all had shut down when we’d arrived to check on them.
Jack and I also worked to identify various bank accounts Caligula controlled either directly or through his network, and we found forty-six bank accounts and thirty-seven credit cards in nine different financial institutions. All those assets were frozen through civil forfeiture actions.
One thing that surprised me was that nobody was attempting to use those credit cards before we locked them. I had to wonder whether Caligula had switched to using only cash or did he have still other layers of financial schemes we hadn’t found?
All in all, this was the most frustrating investigation—by far—that I’d ever conducted. Despite four hundred angels working around the clock for days, we’d struck out repeatedly. No doubt, lots of the guardians were muttering among themselves about how much time I was wasting by sending them on dead end tasks. The worst part was, I couldn’t disagree with that viewpoint. We were working our butts off but making no progress.
-o-o-o-
AT THREE-THIRTY A.M., I was sitting at the desk within the headquarters I’d claimed as my own. My cellphone rang. At first, I wasn’t sure whether I should pick it up. I rarely used it for calls, and I didn’t recognize the number it displayed.
I decided that if it’d been one of those robo-calls, they wouldn’t dial me in the wee hours of the morning. With a cautious hello, I answered.
“Gabriel, is that you?” I didn’t recognize the voice.
“Yeah, who’s asking?”
“Bianca from the New York contingent. That other baby angel. Listen, I might have some helpful news.”
She was a relatively new member of the legion, only a century old, who’d been born in Havana, Cuba. In her human form, she was tall and gangly, with ebony skin. Because she was the least-senior angel I’d met in terms of seniority, we’d chatted briefly a few times about newbie surprises. A sweet gal.
“Hey, great to hear from you, and I’d love some good news. I’m getting so tired of spinning my wheels.”
“I probably shouldn’t say anything over the phone. Why don’t you come here?” She gave me an address in a Hispanic neighborhood a few miles from the legion’s headquarters.
“On my way, as soon as I can find an escort.”
Kiko happened to be nearby, huddling with several other guardians as they planned their next raid. She agreed to go with me instead. We flew from the rooftop patio toward a spot my phone’s map program had pinpointed.
When we arrived, I was glad that I hadn’t been tempted to fly alone. This was one of the worst neighborhoods I’d ever visited in the city.
Stay close, Kiko told me.
She was preaching to the converted. We landed on a sidewalk in front of a townhouse with broken windows. The paint was peeling on the clapboard siding, and the small front yard was littered with trash. As we walked up the front steps, they sagged under our feet. Stepping gingerly over broken boards, we made it to the open front door.
Kiko paused before entering. Our sword handles appeared at the back of our necks at the same time. Demons had to be close. Both of us extracted our blades and crept forward. The living room was filled with the stink of rotting garbage. People had apparently broken in and lived in squalor. The only light came from our swords.
“I sense both light and dark immortals upstairs,” Kiko whispered.
We eased toward the stairs when a light glowed above us. Bianca was standing on the landing with her own sword out. “There you are. We’ve secured the area. Don’t get your hopes too high, muchachos, but we might have stumbled across a lead.”
Hope fluttered in my heart, despite her warning. We’d worked so hard and found almost nothing. “What’s the deal?”
“A vampire claims he knows where Caligula was last night. He thinks the sorcerer might still be there.”
Something was immediately wrong. “Didn’t you check his mind to confirm his claim?”
Bianca shook her head. “Couldn’t. Come on up. You’ll see why.”
Chapter 16
KIKO AND I climbed the stairs and followed her down the hallway to the last room. A pale vampire sat on a mattress resting on the floor. He was holding an infernal dagger—pointed at his own chest. That was a first, a demon holding himself hostage. He reminded me of Cleavon Little’s crazy stunt in Blazing Saddles where he put a gun to his own head.
Two other ang
els stood over him with their swords drawn, so I put mine away. This room didn’t contain the trash I’d seen below, but the floor was covered with mold, and a window pane was broken. This vampire had to be squatting in this building.
Before speaking, I took a closer look at him. His skin was chalk-white, like he was on the edge of death. Vampires were long-lived, but didn’t truly live forever. His face was gaunt, and his bones protruded beneath the skin.
“This gentleman,” Bianca said sarcastically, “would like to claim the five-hundred-thousand-dollar reward.”
The vampire spoke with a raspy voice. “I can tell you where Caligula is.”
I suppressed a snort. At least fifteen demons so far had said the same thing but couldn’t deliver the goods. “Call me skeptical. We’re happy to pay for the sorcerer’s head, but I have to check you for sincerity.”
The vampire coughed. “I don’t trust you. What if you look but don’t pay?”
“We’re not like you,” I said. “We keep our commitments.”
He looked at me askance. “Plus, I got health issues. Need a new body.”
A needle lay on a decrepit nightstand near the bed. This dirt bag was a junkie. They were relatively easy to deal with because they constantly wanted another fix. The way this guy was shivering told me he was desperate.
“I’m pretty busy,” I said. “So far I haven’t heard any details that makes it worth my while to stick around and chat with such a charming guy.”
I turned and walked toward the bedroom’s door.
Before I reached it, he said, “Wait! I can prove what I say. I got a picture you can see before you bring the money.”
I looked up at the ceiling in false piety. “Lord, give me strength.” Then I turned back to the vampire. “Let’s get on with it.”
The guy motioned for me to come closer, but he reeked of body odor. Thank God, I didn’t need to breathe. He fumbled with his phone for a moment. His fingers shook so much, he couldn’t tap the right spot on the screen while holding the dagger in his other hand. After more than ten attempts, he finally pulled up a photograph.
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