Spinning around, she came face to face with the gray-haired coroner she’d seen at more than one crime scene.
“I need to speak with you, necro.”
Her heart sank even as her chin tilted. She’d known this was coming. Duncan’s friends weren’t going to be any more pleased with their relationship, no matter how brief it might be, than Fane and her friends.
Still, she’d hoped it could be avoided until after they’d captured the mysterious Lord Zakhar.
As unlikely as it might seem, there was the possibility that they would need the humans.
Resisting the urge to tell him to go to hell, she instead calmly met his dark scowl. She would try not to be a total bitch, but then again, she wasn’t going to be a damned wimp.
“I have a name,” she pointed out in deliberately cool tones.
“Brown, right?”
“Callie.”
“Callie.” He shrugged, clearly not interested in becoming BFFs. “I’m Frank. I’m a friend of O’Conner.”
“I know who you are.”
“I think we need to have a little talk.”
She nodded, her expression bland. “So talk.”
The cop frowned, almost as if caught off guard by her calm reaction. Maybe he assumed all freaks were raised by wolves and incapable of common manners?
“Do you want to sit?”
“No.” She had no sympathy for his sudden unease. “Say what you have to say.”
He hesitated before he squared his shoulders. “Did you know O’Conner’s ex-wife just got remarried?”
Ah. So that was the direction this was going to take.
“He told me,” she said.
“He was gutted when his marriage ended,” Frank informed her, the sincerity in his tone revealing he truly believed what he was saying. “It was even worse when he found out she was going to become another man’s wife. Susan was his soul mate.”
Callie might have been devastated by the stark claim if she didn’t know the truth. Now she merely shrugged. “Why are you telling me this?”
His mouth thinned at her refusal to react as he expected. “A man does crazy things when he’s been hurt,” he pressed. “Things he later regrets.”
“By crazy, I assume you mean spending time with me?”
“I’m sorry, but if he was in his right mind, he would never be with a—”
“Freak?” she helpfully supplied.
Heat crawled beneath his skin, his gaze shifting to the rows of chairs that faced the podium at the far end of the room.
“I’m not a fanatic. I don’t hate high-bloods,” he said in gruff tones. “I just know that you sort of people aren’t meant to mix with humans.”
She made a sound of disgust. How many people over the centuries had been made to feel isolated by those precise words?
“Separate but equal?” she said in a cold voice.
He hunched his shoulder. “Something like that.”
Her lips twisted. Okay. Maybe not so equal.
Jerk.
“I appreciate your concern for your friend, but Duncan is a big boy,” she said, hiding her disgust behind a mask of indifference. This man was Duncan’s friend and colleague. If their relationship continued then she would have to at least pretend she didn’t find him a total tool. “Don’t you think he should be allowed to make his own decisions?”
Frank’s expression hardened. Like most cops, he was used to people falling in line when he gave an order.
“Around here we take care of each other; it’s the only way to survive,” he growled. “If you truly care for O’Conner, you’ll walk away and let him find a woman who fits into his life.”
“His life or yours?”
“Think about it,” he warned before turning to leave the conference room, slamming the door behind him.
Callie rolled her eyes, wryly wondering why she hadn’t returned to Valhalla where she so obviously belonged.
“Welcome to the real world, Callie Brown,” she muttered.
Duncan returned to the interrogation room in a mood that was on the wrong side of shitty.
Studying the smug little bastard, he wanted nothing more than to shove his foot up his ass. Or maybe he would shove a few of his too-white teeth down his throat . . .
Unable to do either, he folded his arms over his chest and met the dark gaze that was studying him with blatant suspicion.
“What the fuck are you staring at?” he snapped.
The dark eyes narrowed, his nose flaring as if he was sniffing the air. Or could he be sensing that Duncan wasn’t entirely human?
“Are you—”
“You have until the count of five to tell me what you know about the coin before I throw your ass in jail for obstruction of justice,” he abruptly interrupted.
As much as he wanted to beat the fool to a bloody pulp and leave him for the trash, he needed whatever information he might have about the coin. And he wasn’t going to get anything out of the man if he feared Duncan was a high-blood.
Hektor bristled, but thankfully accepted that Duncan was human.
“I came here for your assistance, not to be threatened,” he said stiffly.
“I don’t give a shit. Tell me about the coin”
The man licked his thin lips. “It has a long history.”
“Sumerian?”
Hektor hesitated, clearly not willing to give away more than he had to.
“It doesn’t matter. The coin was created by the Brotherhood in the earliest days of civilization.”
Necromancers. Mysterious coins. Secret brotherhoods. It sounded like a cheesy plot from Indiana Jones.
Unfortunately, Duncan couldn’t laugh off the possibility that the man was speaking the truth.
“What does the coin do?”
Hektor grimaced. “It shields the chalice.”
“Chalice?” Duncan rolled his eyes. “What chalice?”
“The one that opens a pathway to the underworld.”
Duncan scowled. He hated mystic mumbo jumbo. “Does underworld mean hell?”
“Call it whatever you want.”
“And this chalice . . . What?” He gave a wave of his hand. “It’s a key to hell?”
Hektor nodded. “It allows the dead to walk.”
The simple words made Duncan shudder with horror. Christ. Even having seen Leah walking around . . . Wait. He took a step forward, leaning down to place his palms flat on the table in front of Hektor.
“What game are you playing? The necromancer was raising the dead before he got his hands on the coin.”
The stranger shook his head. “They were bokors.”
“Meaning?”
“They’re merely animated corpses that are able to be controlled for a short period of time by a necromancer.”
Duncan grimaced. When did his life become filled with words like “animated corpses” and “pathways to the underworld”?
“So what do you mean when you say that the coin allows them to raise the dead?” he demanded. “Will they actually be alive?”
The narrow face hardened. “Not the coin. It was created to close the mouth of the underworld. It’s the chalice that poses the true danger.”
Duncan made a sound of impatience. “Will they be alive or not?”
“In a manner of speaking. The chalice allows the necromancer to fill the corpses with an evil that will give them the ability to walk among us as if they live.” He leaned forward, clenching his hands on the table as his eyes filled with a hectic light. “They could infiltrate our society for days or weeks without us knowing. Or more likely—”
“What?”
“The necromancer will raise an army to destroy us all.”
Duncan muttered a savage curse. Holy hell. This just got better and better.
“How do we find this . . . chalice before the necromancer can get his hands on it?”
“No one can enter the inner temple without the coin,” he grudgingly confessed.
Duncan abru
ptly straightened. Of course the bastard would be filled with dire predictions with no genuine plan to avoid the looming disaster.
Pacing across the narrow room, he struggled to think clearly.
He was a cop.
And this was a case.
Okay, it was filled with creepy necromancers and a weirdo brotherhood, but preventing a potential crime was what he did.
And for that, he needed to be able to locate the coin or the necromancer before he could unleash hell.
Literally.
“Was Calso a part of your Brotherhood?” he abruptly demanded.
“Certainly not.”
He turned to study Hektor’s outraged expression. “Then why did he have the coin?”
“For centuries we kept the coin protected, then we began to realize it was being hunted.”
“By who?”
The man shrugged. “The name is easily changed, but there was no doubt it was a necromancer. One who was dangerously powerful.”
It would be easy to leap to the conclusion that it was Lord Zakhar. But he preferred to have real proof before he dismissed any other possibility.
“How could you be so certain it was a necromancer and not some crazy person who thought the coin was worth money?”
“Our brothers and sisters—”
“You allow females into your Brotherhood?” Duncan asked in surprise. Usually fanatics liked to keep their bizarre cults exclusive.
“If they’re worthy,” Hektor explained in a lofty voice. “Many are called, but few are chosen.”
Duncan rolled his eyes. Yeesh. He’d walked right into that one.
“Yeah, whatever,” he muttered. “Go on.”
Hektor stiffened, as if insulted by Duncan’s lack of respect at his grand achievement in being chosen for the Brotherhood.
Arrogant ass.
“Our brothers and sisters were being slaughtered and then returned from the grave,” he at last explained.
“They had the coin?”
Hektor shook his head. “No, but they each knew the location of the coin. They were killed and their corpses used to try and slip past our defenses.”
“Just like Leah,” Duncan growled, shuddering at the memory of the young female being jerked around Kansas City as if she was a gruesome marionette.
“Who?”
Duncan ignored the question. He wasn’t about to discuss poor Leah or how she’d been abused.
“How did you manage to recognize that they were . . . what’s the word . . . bokors?”
The man shrugged, trying too hard to look casual. “We are trained to spot the walking dead.”
Yeah, right.
“You want to know what I’m trained to do?” Duncan leaned forward, his eyes narrowed. “Smell bullshit a mile away.”
Hektor muttered something beneath his breath, but he wasn’t stupid enough to insult an armed cop to his face.
“All right. We received word from an anonymous source that the coin holder had been identified so we were able to move the coin before it could be stolen.”
Duncan snorted. He’d worked with anonymous sources for years. Ninety-nine percent of the info he got from them was worth jack-squat, the other one percent was usually little better than a random guess that accidentally turned out to be right.
He wouldn’t depend on an anonymous source to tell him the time of day, let alone to entrust the protection of the very reason for his existence.
“How did you know you could trust this source?” he demanded.
“They’d always been right before. Unfortunately—”
Hektor bit off his words, a flush of embarrassment crawling beneath his skin.
“Unfortunately?” Duncan prompted.
“When we were warned that Calso’s name had been discovered it was decided it was too risky to move the coin until we’d found some place that couldn’t be traced.” The man’s lips thinned with anger. “We put out word that the coin had been transferred to a new host, hoping the necromancer would be fooled long enough for us to find a more permanent solution.”
A risky decision.
One that might destroy them all.
“How did Calso get the coin in the first place?”
“It was decided that the necromancer hunting the coin had found a way to recognize members of the Brotherhood.” Hektor absently lifted his hand to trace a small tattoo that looked like a stylized arrow on the side of his neck. “It was imperative we find someone who had no formal connection to our group to hide the coin”
It made sense, but Duncan couldn’t imagine how a group of self-righteous nut-bars had chosen a financial whiz who had a weakness for pretty strippers to harbor their most precious treasure.
“Why him?”
Hektor thinned his lips, as if he hadn’t been entirely pleased with the choice.
“Calso was a trusted friend of our leader and since he was already a collector of art, it wouldn’t be suspicious for him to invest in high-tech security measures.”
Duncan resumed his pacing, making mental notes to check the various ways someone could have discovered Calso had the coin.
It could be done.
He didn’t doubt that for a minute.
But tracking down leads took time.
Sometimes days, sometimes weeks.
Time he didn’t have.
There had to be a faster way to find Lord Zakhar, or whoever the hell was using a dead woman as their personal puppet.
“Can you—” He gave a vague wave of his hand.
“Can I what?”
“Sense the coin?” he asked.
The man scowled. “I’m a human, not a high-blood. I have no unholy magics running through my veins.”
Duncan narrowed his eyes. “And yet you seemed to know that Callie was a high-blood from the minute she entered the room.”
“The ability to sniff out the enemy is a gift from my god,” Hektor said with a sneer.
Duncan curled his lips. Hypocrite. Any powers he and his so-called Brotherhood had came from the same place as high-bloods, not from some mysterious god.
Now, however, wasn’t the time for a philosophical debate.
Actually, as far as he was concerned, there was never a good time for a philosophical debate.
Instead he concentrated on the only thing that mattered.
“Fine. Can you use that god-given gift to track down the necromancer?”
The dark eyes flashed at the edge of mockery that Duncan didn’t try to hide.
“If we had that power then we would have eliminated him years ago.”
“Really?” Duncan asked dryly. He would bet good money the Brotherhood was very good at hiding in the shadows and very bad at actually getting off their asses and taking care of business. “Do you often eliminate people?”
The man hastily glanced toward the camera in the ceiling. “Certainly not.”
Duncan was abruptly done.
He’d hoped the man could offer a way to capture the necromancer.
Instead he’d gotten fairy tales and vague threats.
“So you don’t know where the coin is or how we can find the necro who stole it,” he snapped. “Why the hell are you here?”
“To warn you of the danger if the coin isn’t immediately returned to our protection.”
“Worthless,” he muttered, heading toward the door. “Feel free to show yourself out.”
Anxious to track down Callie and make sure she wasn’t being hassled by his supposed friends, he hissed in frustration when Hektor was demanding his attention.
“Sergeant?”
He glared over his shoulder. “What?”
The man rose to his feet, his expression hard with warning.
“High-bloods once tried to make themselves into gods,” he said in fierce tones. “Don’t for a minute doubt that they won’t try again.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Zak opened his eyes, briefly confused by the realization he was lying face first on a stone flo
or with blood dripping down his neck.
Since being burned at the stake by his rabid serfs, he’d learned to take excessive precautions not to put himself in a position where he might wake up in strange places with oozing wounds.
It wasn’t just paranoia.
Not when he knew he was surrounded by enemies.
Both those who openly worked against him, and those who hid in the shadows ...
Ignoring the pain that pounded through his skull, Zak turned his head, a grim satisfaction replacing his momentary confusion.
Even in the shadows he could make out the unmistakable glint of gold.
The chalice.
Grasping his trophy, Zak awkwardly forced himself to his feet.
It hadn’t been a dream. Or a trap.
He’d spoken to the ghosts of his ancestors. And he’d been found worthy.
More than worthy, he silently gloated, forcing his heavy feet to carry him out of the temple.
Unlike the previous necromancer, he had no intention of jeopardizing his life to acquire the power necessary to raise an army. The martyr routine had never appealed to him. Not when he’d been clever enough to prepare a proper sacrifice.
What was the point of power if you couldn’t use it to rule the world?
Making his way down the long staircase, he paused at the bottom, gathering his strength before he walked the short distance to the waiting witch.
His head might be throbbing and his knees threatening to collapse, but he would never show weakness.
He was too close to his ultimate success to risk a knife in the back.
Halting in front of Anya, who was still on her knees, her head bent in weariness, he reached down to grasp her arm. Yanking her to her feet, he slipped the chalice into the deep pocket of his robe.
“Is the pathway still open?” he growled.
Anya blinked, her eyes unfocused as if she’d been asleep. “Yes, but—”
“Let’s go.”
“What happened?” she demanded, glancing around the barren desert. “Did the coin work?”
He offered a tight-lipped smile. “I have what I need.”
She studied him in the fading moonlight, her brows drawn together. “Are you bleeding?”
“How very astute of you, Anya,” he drawled, refusing to speak of what had happened in the temple. “Do you intend to continue this inquest? Or perhaps we can finish it when we aren’t standing knee deep in sand?”
Born in Blood (The Sentinels) Page 23