I dashed a hand self-consciously through the unruly tangle. “Nah. Just lazy.” Then I glanced around. “What did you need me to take a look at?”
“Pretty nasty case.” Shadows like scudding clouds darkened his buoyant expression. “But first, let’s make you official.” He held out a visitor tag.
I took it, frowning at my biker jacket. There was no good place to clip it and I didn’t want to hurt the leather. I settled on clipping it to the end of one of the upper zippers. The laminated tag dangled precariously, but it held.
“I thought this was off the books?” I said warily.
Vigorously, Bobby nodded. “Just making sure nobody gives you grief. I’ll try to keep things quick.” He started walking, short legs pumping as he led me past the front desk. “I really appreciate you doing this for me, Zack. I didn’t want to bug you—I really didn’t—but this case, it’s got so many things that make no sense.”
I followed mutely behind, wondering whether or not the most puzzling aspects of the case might connect it back to Whisper Man, and how much I’d be able to explain to Bobby if they did. My sprightly police escort chattered as we threaded back through drop-ceiling halls, fluorescents buzzing overhead.
“I mean, people kill people all the time, but not like this,” he said. “There’s things you can’t unsee, you know?” I nodded to show my sympathy, although with him rushing along ahead of me, he probably didn’t notice.
“It’s so much worse because of the kids,” he continued. “Poor Garrett. He hasn’t been right since the investigation began—his little girl is the youngest daughter’s age. He even started smoking again.” This time he did glance back, boyish features eloquent with concern. “You know how hard it was for him to quit.”
“Actually, I don’t,” I reminded him gently. I even managed not to look bitter about it, but Bobby halted so suddenly that I almost tumbled over him. He gushed apologies, repeating “sorry” with such fevered rapidity, it sounded like he was going for some kind of record.
I held up a hand.
“It’s fine,” I assured him. “Shit happens.”
“Yeah, but of all people, I should really know better,” he said. “I worked the case. I know what those people did to you. I am so sorry, Zack.”
“Seriously, let it go, Bobby,” I insisted. I fought to keep the irritation from my face. I wasn’t angry at Bobby—just worn out. Sorry couldn’t fix my troubles. “Let’s get back to this thing, OK? Your partner started smoking. How long’ve you guys been working this without a break?”
Bobby did that nervous fidget, rubbing his palm across the back of his head.
“Sorry,” he faltered, then laughed miserably at himself. “I mean—sorry I keep saying sorry—”
“The case, Bobby. How long?”
“Right. Three weeks?” he ventured. He unclipped the work phone from his belt, tapped in his passcode, then scrolled through his notes to double check. “Uh, four this Tuesday. I know that’s not a lot in the grand scheme of things, but it’s a long time to live with some of these images. The little girls in that house, Zack—”
The next few words got stuck in his throat and I slammed down hard on my shields in a pre-emptive defense. I wanted to hear Park’s opinions on the murder, not share the emotional toll it was so obviously taking on him. Maybe that was cold, but I had enough of my own trauma to wrestle with.
Bobby never managed to complete the sentence. With effort, he drove the haunted look from his eyes.
“We still haven’t found the father.”
“The language you called me about—was it carved into the bodies?” I asked carefully.
After a hitching swallow, Bobby resumed walking. I wondered briefly what had driven him to become an officer—especially in homicide. He was so bright and shiny—that level of idealistic dedication rarely survived the brutal attrition of the job. Not to knock Bobby, but he didn’t seem like he had the grit.
“Some of it,” he answered, “but there was a lot more on the walls.” He led me down a narrow hall lined with cramped little offices, most of them closed up tight. “I won’t make you look at the autopsy photos, unless you think you need to. I’m hoping the pics from the walls will be enough.” He hesitated as he took a turn at the end of the hall, then adopted a more muted tone. “There’s a delicate aspect to the case. It’s why pinning down the language is so important.”
I listened.
“The father did work for Doctors Without Borders. Based on where he just came back from, we need to know if there’s a terrorism angle.” He sighed, fussing with his tie. “I mean, the symbols don’t look like Arabic at all, but you know how jumpy folks are these days. The higher-ups see bad shit and even the slimmest connection to the Middle East, and they make all kinds of assumptions—whether they’re fair or not.”
“Where was the father last?” I asked.
Bobby stopped outside the entryway to a large, open room filled with a regiment of desks. Several of them were occupied. The low and constant rhythm of typing, combined with intermittent phone chatter, drifted into the hall.
“Syria,” Bobby replied.
I indulged in a little mental geography, guesstimating how close modern-day Syria was to the old Hittite stomping grounds across the Anatolian highlands. Pretty damned close—to the point that they shared borders. One more thing that might link this case to Whisper Man, if Lil was right about the Luwian tie-in.
“For the record, I don’t think it’s terrorists,” Bobby scoffed. “The brass thinks that’s the answer to everything these days.” He stood in the hall, shifting from foot to foot, as if his tightly wound dynamism required that he keep some body part in motion at all times.
“I sense a ‘but’,” I prompted.
“Yeah,” he sighed. “The thing we can’t figure, aside from the symbols, is the Special Forces guy, Lawrence Booker. Last anyone knew, he was in Afghanistan—nearly three years ago. They’d listed him MIA. Now he turns up dead at our crime scene. Whatever he was into before he disappeared, the Feds aren’t sharing.” He fixed earnest black eyes on me and whispered, “I really wish I could get you to the location, Zack. We could use your special insight on this one.”
Special insight.
Maybe he was talking about academic expertise.
Suuure. Because my life was all about the simple answers.
“You mean reading the glyphs in person?” I ventured.
Bobby gave me a “don’t joke around” look. I stared at him blankly, wondering if I had a good poker face.
Apparently, I did.
“I’m sorry,” he sputtered. “You don’t remember.”
“I don’t remember a lot of things.”
His brows stitched. “I didn’t think that was something you could lose. I mean, I knew the lake thing was bad but—oh, hell. I feel like an asshole for even bringing it up.”
“Bringing what up?” I said. “Be specific.”
“You used to be able to read a room like—well, like no one else I’ve ever met. You said you were psychic.”
“Psychic,” I repeated.
He misread my relief.
“There isn’t a better word for it, right?” With a short, nervous laugh, he added, “This probably sounds hokey, especially if you don’t remember.”
“Maybe we can talk the psychic angle later,” I offered. “Pictures for now, OK?”
He nodded fervently. “Yeah. OK, come on,” he said, heading into the bullpen. “Let me re-introduce you to my partner, Garrett.”
17
Bobby threaded his way among the desks, making his way to a bald man sitting with his wide shoulders hunched over the keyboard. Despite the temperature outside, the guy was down to his shirtsleeves, cuffs rolled up to reveal forearms layered with corded muscle and fading tattoos.
Most of the tats were tribal, though one looked like the lines of a prayer. The dark hair that forested his tanned and weathered skin made it difficult make out the words.
Tapp
ing furiously with the fingers of one hand, he kept the other poised above his mouse in an oddly anticipatory gesture that made it look as if he intended to smack the device in some bizarre game of whack-a-mole. His attention was focused on the monitor, where multiple windows of text and images filled the screen, information flowing at an impressive speed.
“Garrett?” Bobby padded up to him on the thin carpet.
The burly officer didn’t respond. Then I noticed the earbuds trailing down to an iPod clipped to his belt. I could just hear the faint buzz of music over the chatter from the handful of other workers scattered throughout the room. Whatever he was listening to, it was loud.
Bobby turned to me. “He’s been so fixated on this case.” Then with a cautious, companionable pathos, he reached out and touched his partner lightly on the shoulder.
The big man twitched violently, nearly sending mouse, keyboard, and monitor onto the floor with the spastic sweep of one arm. In a swift series of motions, he yanked the earbuds away, closed the windows on the computer, then whirled to face us in the swivel chair. He was on his feet almost too fast for me to follow—and I was used to tracking things at vampire-speed.
Bobby staggered back, understandably startled. Garrett regarded him with a wild look, hands half-fisted at his sides. Veins corded on his neck and the earbuds bounced against his thigh, spilling forth—no shit—Flight of the Valkyries. With the bald head, muscles, and tribal tattoos, he reminded me of a paunchy Drax the Destroyer.
“Oh, it’s you,” the big man said in a curiously flat tone—which didn’t exactly help with the Drax comparison. He relaxed only slightly.
“Garrett, you remember Zack Westland.” Bobby flashed his partner an easy smile. “He agreed to take a look at those symbols.”
Garrett turned wary brown eyes on me, the corners of his mouth dragging with disapproval. I felt his attention—felt it like electricity dancing across my skin. All the hairs on the back of my neck tried climbing to higher ground. Out of reflex, I clung to my cowl.
“This man?” Garrett demanded of Bobby in an uninflected monotone. “Your ‘expert’ is this man?”
Bobby glanced between his partner and me, a look of confusion flickering across his features. His hand strayed to the back of his head and he squirmed nervously. The room had fallen so silent, I could hear the subtle whisking of hair against the skin of his palm.
The other officers working in the bullpen stared openly. Garrett never took his suffocating eyes off me. Wagner continued to pump out with tinny fidelity.
“I will not work with this one,” Garrett said gruffly. Without further comment, he sat down, turned his back to us, and popped in the blaring earbuds.
Bobby boggled at the back of his bald head for a moment, then shot me a look of awkward apology. “This case is wrecking him,” he said in whispered tones. “He’s been like this for weeks.”
The man’s inattention felt like a literal wall. It rose like the battlements of some brooding fortress, adding a strained quality to the silence. Everything felt smaller by comparison. I debated the wisdom of dropping my cowl just so I could get a good look at Garrett from a different perspective. Something felt… off about the man. Even without calling on my preternatural senses, I realized that he was hardly as big as he’d initially appeared.
Not to say he was scrawny by any means, but his shoulders weren’t much wider than my own. While he had muscle, it was softened by a layer of comfortable padding, no doubt added by his years behind a desk. He was a warrior, but one who’d passed his prime. When he’d stood and faced us, the presence he’d projected was that of a much bigger, much deadlier man.
What was that all about?
“You are still here,” Garrett said flatly. He didn’t turn around.
A duo of uniformed officers wandered into the room. They slouched near the copy machine as if they had something to do, watching us with expressions of guarded curiosity. We were becoming a regular attraction.
“Are you sure you want to blow Zack off like this?” Bobby ventured. He sounded peeved and made little effort to hide it from his face. “We haven’t had any luck on our own.”
No response.
“Come on, Garrett. I know it’s been a while,” he continued, “but Zack’s a stand-up guy. You’ve worked with him before.”
“No.”
The word reverberated with quiet thunder. Bobby rocked like it was a slap. Everyone who’d been gawking at our exchange strove suddenly to find something else to do. The quiet chatter of keyboards and the shuffle of paperwork once more swelled throughout the room.
“We’ll talk about this later,” Bobby promised. A spark of fury smoldered in his dark eyes. Motioning to me, he said, “Come on. I’ll walk you back out. Sorry for wasting your time.”
I turned mutely and followed the newly minted detective. Bobby moved swiftly, aggravation distilled in every gesture. A watchful tension spread in our wake as we exited the room. In the resulting hush, I could hear the rasp and whisper of Park’s fashionable, wide-legged pants.
As I stepped from the bullpen into the hall, I felt eyes needling me in the back. I knew pretty much everyone in that room was staring, but this felt different, weightier. I hazarded one final look in Garrett’s direction. The bald officer sat rigidly in his swivel chair, lucent eyes fixed on me with stifling intensity. There was no mistaking the warning in his gaze.
When the hell did I piss in his coffee?
Bobby was already halfway down the hall. I met Garrett’s naked glare for a moment, then ducked after my friend.
18
“I am so sorry about that,” Bobby said. He retraced our path through the winding back halls.
“Your partner always that friendly?” I asked. “No,” Bobby insisted. With a frustrated noise, he said, “I wish you remembered. Garrett’s a big goofball, always joking.”
“Could’ve fooled me,” I muttered.
“Zack, it’s not funny,” Bobby objected.
I tried to put my inner smartass in a choke hold, reminding myself that silence was golden—or at least less likely to get me punched in the mouth.
“If you saw half the photos from this case, you’d understand,” Bobby explained. He took a sharp right at one of the intersections, and I haltingly followed. If we were heading back to the front lobby, I was certain we should’ve gone the other direction.
We continued our trek in silence. The overhead lights lent a sallow cast to the beige walls, and a scent like sweat and nachos hung thickly on the air. A heavy brown fire door loomed at the end of the hall. Bobby used a swipe card and motioned me through. We emerged on the ass-end of the building with absolutely no one around.
The drop ceiling back here was full of warped and stained tiles, as if all the clean ones had been scavenged and switched out over the years. One bank of fluorescents was burned out while another flickered spastically at random intervals. Even when it wasn’t flickering, it filled the tiny hall with an angry, insect drone.
An exit sign hung helpfully above another heavy door set into the outside wall. Painted the same ugly brown, it had a small rectangle of wired glass revealing concrete steps leading down to the back lot. The black polyp of a security camera distended from the ceiling within easy sight of the back door. Bobby angled us away from its leering eye. He unclipped the police-issue phone at his belt, swiftly tapped his passcode, then opened an album of photos and held it out to me.
“I don’t have everything,” he said. “I can’t text any of them to you. But you can look at the pictures I took when we showed up. Make it quick.”
Suddenly the trek into the lonely back hallway made sense. Wordlessly, I took the device. The protective case around the phone made it thick and clunky. It weighed a ton. There was some kind of film across the screen to reduce glare—and all it succeeded in doing back here was pick up reflections of the seizure-inducing fluorescents. I shielded it with one hand so I could see.
The first image was a mailbox with a house n
umber on the side, mostly in focus. It was 5693. I scrolled past that. The next image was a house—a beautiful Tudor with ivy trailing up the sides, evergreen hedges, all of it dusted with snow. It looked like the opening shot of some sentimental holiday special.
I slid my finger over the touchscreen, advancing to the next photo. A close-up on a tactical blade. Blood beaded around it on the hardwood.
“Is that a Ka-Bar?” I asked.
“Not the only weapon present on the scene,” Bobby murmured.
I scrolled to the next image—an interior wall, painted a color that had probably been marketed under some frou-frou title like Crème Brulée. My eyes were drawn to an asymmetrical knick-knack shelf hung near the far side of the photo. Carved from a single piece of dense, dark wood, it looked expensive and handmade, and didn’t hold the standard suburban kitsch. I spotted a small clay cup that could have belonged to half a dozen ancient cultures. Next to that was a woven fiber doll with a white bone mask. It looked East African. Another statue of what appeared to be an authentic Egyptian ushabti was cut off by the edge of the photo.
“What’s all this?” I asked, indicating the shelf and its contents.
“Souvenirs,” Bobby replied. “Dr. Kramer collected things from all the countries where he volunteered—Iraq, Somalia, Sudan. We’re not sure all of them are legal.”
“I think you’re right about that.” I squinted at the crackled sky-blue faience of the ushabti figure. “These are the kind of things that cross my desk at the museum.”
Bobby nodded, shifting impatiently while he waited for me to examine the real focus of the photo. The shelf and its curious contents were a secondary issue—the camera hadn’t even been aimed at them. I directed my attention to the central portion of the wall where a series of brown and rust-colored smears arced across its dark yellow surface.
Blood. I was certain of it.
I enlarged the image, focusing on whatever had been painted onto the wall. I could make out perhaps two lines of what might have been script. All the shapes streaked unevenly.
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