City of Crows Books 1-3 Box Set

by Clara Coulson

  “Oh, dear god. Are you okay?” Ella steps up to the edge of the blood pond and offers me a hand. “Here. I’ll help you up. Take it slow.”

  I reach out with a shaking hand, trying really hard to ignore the sensation of blood soaking through my clothes—don’t get me started on the smell—and attempt to grasp Ella’s hand. But I’m about half a foot too far away from her to grab hold, and so, groaning in disgust, I roll over onto my knees, picking up even more blood, and try again. Only for the hand I have braced against the floor to slip out from under me. My forehead smacks the floor, flinging blood everywhere, and Ella yelps, jumping back to avoid the spray.

  “Oh, jeez,” Desmond mutters. “Let me get him, Ella.”

  I snort out a glob of half-coagulated blood, whimper, and then pray to whatever gods are out there that the third time really is the charm. Then I open my eyes, blinking away a haze of red, and press my blood-covered hands against the floor, preparing to prop myself up. But a split second before I rise to take Desmond’s hand and get pulled to safety—I notice something.

  My eyes are, on the off chance, directed at the gap underneath one of the sugar racks that the headless man is situated between. The lights illuminating the scene don’t quite reach all the way to the wall, blocked by the bottom shelf, but the dusty space is lit enough for me to see the strange, deep gouges in the stone wall. They trail about six inches across the wall, at a downward angle, tracking back toward the headless man’s badly broken arm. They look like…claw marks?

  “Uh, Cal?” Desmond calls out behind me. “You all right?”

  “Wait a minute,” I respond. “Something here is…off.”

  “Huh?”

  I abruptly sit up, ignoring the blood altogether (or at least pretending to), and crawl closer to the headless man’s body. His injuries don’t appear to have been inflicted by claws. The cuts are single strokes, maybe from the blade of a large knife. But if he wasn’t attacked by claws, then where did the marks on the wall come from? Unless…

  I stare at his disheveled clothing, eying each tear, the way his pants and shirt are twisted, almost as if he was nude at some point and someone did a poor job of redressing him after his death. Or maybe, maybe—maybe he wasn’t nude at all. Maybe he came into the basement wearing the clothes, wearing a human shape, only to change into a different shape in an attempt to escape or fight back during the attack that killed him.

  Passing over the decapitated head in his lap, I search his pants for the clue I need to prove my hunch.

  And there they are: holes in the fabric punched outward, not inward, as if something with claws burst out of the denim.

  I peer over my shoulder at my teammates, who are gawking at me in absolute disgust. Because I’m nonchalantly sitting in a pool of blood, poking at a headless corpse. And that’s pretty disturbing behavior, even for me, to be quite honest. But I’m on a roll here, and it’s helping me somewhat ignore how super fucking gross I feel right now, so…

  I point at the decapitated head and say, “Guys, this dude was a werewolf.”

  Chapter Six

  The task room is abuzz when I amble in with fresh clothes and damp hair. But the chatter dies in an instant when the closing door alerts everyone to my presence.

  Desmond looks everywhere except my face, still wearing the same apologetic expression he’d slipped on as we left the bar and grill, after saying he was sorry, seventeen times, for “forgetting” I’m sixty pounds lighter than him and punching me a tad too hard. Amy, similarly, ignores my existence altogether, because the first thing that came out of her mouth when I trudged sopping wet up the basement stairs at Jameson’s was a shocked, “Shit, I thought there were only three victims.” And I swear to god, I will not forgive her for that comment for at least two weeks.

  Delarosa, whose team has been called in to assist us in the investigation, sits directly across from Amy at the table, sporting a look somewhere between amused and disturbed.

  As I take my seat next to Ella, she checks me over with subtle glances. Like she’s searching for any smears of red I might have missed in the shower. She doesn’t find any—I know this because I checked myself, after scrubbing my skin raw for twenty minutes straight. So she clears her throat and gestures to the papers strewn across the tabletop in front of her.

  “All right. Let’s get started. Nick’s on the phone with Mayor Burbank and the commissioner right now, discussing security around the crime scene and related areas, so we’re going to move on to initial assignments without him.” She grabs the keyboard and mouse in the middle of the table, nodding to the projection screen on the wall, where a case summary someone wrote up is displayed. “Currently, we’ve identified two out of three victims: Ben Halliburton, a local ICM wizard, and Arthur Slate, the former Aurora mayor.”

  Delarosa reels back like Ella punched him. “No way. Ex-Mayor Slate is dead?”

  “So it seems,” Ella replies. “He was found with the other two bodies at Jameson’s early this morning. There appears to have been a quick, violent attack, likely by a supernatural being, or multiple beings. The storeroom was left remarkably intact despite the level of violence, which suggests to me the killer was very fast. Either that, or they were unseen. Maybe wearing a veil or some other kind of illusion magic.”

  “Uh, actually…” I say.

  “Yeah?” Ella looks at me.

  “Sorry, I should have mentioned this earlier, but I was kind of, you know, Carrie by Steven King.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Just tell us, Cal.”

  “I didn’t sense any magic in the storeroom.” I rap my knuckles on the table. “Except a faint trace. Weeks old. So, not only did the killer not use any magic, but the high-level wizard didn’t either. Whatever hit him happened so fast he didn’t even have time to throw up a protective shield, or counterattack, or do anything—other than curl up on the floor and die.”

  No one speaks for a moment.

  Then Liam Calvary, the youngest member of Delarosa’s team, whispers, “That’s freaky.”

  “You’re telling me,” Delarosa says. “I know of several supernatural speedsters. But something that can one-up a trained wizard like that? That’s one nasty motherfucker.”

  “Indeed.” Ella pulls up a folder of crime scene images. “Brace yourself. This one’s bad.”

  The first shot is a wide view of the storeroom, showcasing the entire scene, blood pool included.

  Delarosa pales. “Jesus, Kinsey. You fell into that?”

  “Don’t even start, man,” I reply. “It’s over and done with. Moving on.”

  Desmond, a few seats away from me, faintly whispers, “So sorry.”

  Ella flips through the full slideshow of pictures, reviewing all the gruesome injuries along the way. The second-to-last picture in the bunch is of the claw marks I found on the wall under the sugar rack, lit up with the flash of the camera. Ella zooms in on the image and points at the screen. “Before the ME arrived to pick up the bodies, Cal spotted these on the wall.” She flips to the last picture, a close-up shot of the claw holes in the dead man’s jeans. “Looking closer, Cal figured out our third victim was a werewolf.”

  “Wolf?” Delarosa leans back in his chair and crosses his arms. “What the hell kind of business could a wizard, a Wolf, and ex-Mayor Slate have in common?”

  Ella shrugs. “That’s what we need to find out. Amy?”

  Amy gathers the papers in front of her, the notes from the Jameson interview, and quickly scans for the highlights. She sits ramrod straight in the chair, a habit she must have picked up during her years in the US Army. (According to the water cooler gossip, she retired after an incident in Iraq involving an angry djinni who blew up a convoy of Humvees. Another perfect fit for this office full of weirdos with tragic pasts. Myself included.) Tugging at a loose lock of dark hair, she starts running through her notes out loud:

  “Mark Jameson’s nephew arrived at the bar and grill early this morning, about five AM, to start restocking all the
kitchens for the morning breakfast rush. He went down to the storeroom at approximately quarter after, where he found our three victims. The maintenance man who closed the restaurant at twelve AM the night before claims that he checked the entire building before he left for the night. There was no clandestine meeting taking place in the storeroom when he locked up.”

  “So,” Delarosa says, “that means the victims broke into the bar, met in the basement, and were then murdered between the hours of midnight and five AM.”

  “We can narrow it down a little further,” Desmond throws in. “A lot of the blood spatter was already dry when the nephew arrived. So a better guess would be between midnight and three AM. The ME will confirm a more precise time of death when she gets through the autopsies. But I think a three-hour range is good enough to work with for now.”

  “I agree.” Ella clicks out of the crime scene photos and pulls up a map. “As you pointed out, Juan, we need to figure out why the three of them were holding a secret meeting at Jameson’s. Because more than likely, whatever they were discussing, or whatever transaction they were making, is what put a target on their backs. Since the killer didn’t leave any obvious clues to their identity, we’ll have to walk the slow and steady.”

  “Ah,” Delarosa says. “So we’re checking out the homes?”

  “Right. We’ve got two locations to investigate. Prelim teams are already securing the perimeters.” She types in an address, and the house pops up on the map. “Ex-Mayor Slate lived on Cranston Street, in one of those remodeled townhouses. I’ll take Cal, Amy, and your boy Liam there with me, and we’ll pry the place apart for clues to what our beloved ex-mayor might have gotten himself mixed up in. Meanwhile…”

  She types in a second address, but it’s not anyone’s house. It’s some kind of public community center. “I want the rest of your team and Desmond to go meet with the local Wolf rep. You guys have handled several werewolf cases in the past—except for Liam, being a rookie—so I want you all to use that experience to tread carefully. Got it?”

  Delarosa holds up his hands. “You know me, Ella. Cool and collected.”

  “Except for the time Ramirez sprayed your lunch with that super-hot pepper extract,” Amy quips.

  “Hey, now.” He frowns. “You better not still have that video.”

  “Oh? And if I do?” She grins in a way that suggests she’ll post it on YouTube in a heartbeat if he dares to tick her off. Ever.

  For some reason, he changes the subject. “So, what about the ICM guy? We’re not sending anyone to his place?”

  Ella huffs. “The prelim team we sent to Halliburton’s house reported that they couldn’t get in. It’s warded against intruders. We had one of our R&D practitioners take a look at it, but it’s high-level stuff. Which means we need a wizard or witch to open it. Which means we need to appeal to the ICM through official channels. And that’s no deal right now because…”

  “Marcus threw a fit when you booted him from the crime scene earlier,” Delarosa says. “Regret that?”

  “No,” Ella snaps. “Not at all. After that stunt they pulled with Wizard Vickers, they don’t deserve our trust. Not in this kind of investigative capacity. If Halliburton was involved in some supernatural criminal enterprise, then they will do everything they can to keep it quiet, up to and including destruction of evidence. Because publicly announcing that the ICM has the occasional bad apple, like every other group in the world, is apparently devastating to their reputation in the global supernatural community.” She says devastating with a nasally accent that must be a mockery of someone. That Ambrose guy, maybe.

  “So,” she finishes, “if I have to choose between blowing off the front of Halliburton’s house with a wrecking ball, or begging the ICM for help, I will drive the freaking crane myself.”

  Amy claps. “Bravo, sister.”

  Delarosa chuckles. “You do that.” He takes out his phone and copies the address into his Google Maps. “I know the werewolf drill. Speak softly and carry a big stick. Or is it speak loudly and carry a small stick? Regardless…” He rolls his chair away from the table and rises. “Let’s get our gear and head out, team—and Desmond. And…not Liam.”

  Liam pouts but doesn’t complain about being left behind. And I wouldn’t either.

  Werewolves aren’t exactly known for being the friendliest supernatural creatures.

  Chapter Seven

  As my team is heading down to the lockers to gear up for our trip to Slate’s house, I excuse myself for a pit stop. Ella warns me not to be late again—the threat of that lecture still hangs over my head—and I promise I’ll just be a moment. Then I duck inside the nearest restroom, waiting until the door is closed before I tug the vibrating phone from my back pocket. It’s been bothering me on and off for the past five minutes. An indication I’ve received several text messages back to back. And when I unlock the screen with my four-number combo, I’m entirely unsurprised to see who the texts belong to.

  Erica.

  Drafted onto the Jameson case by Marcus. Am told Riker’s team is on it.

  Careful with this one. Marcus thinks you’ll smear Halliburton’s name without cause. ICM will be on the offensive.

  Ambrose already in route, though Riker and co probably guessed as much. I’ll keep you updated on his movements.

  If Halliburton was rogue, push the issue as hard as you can. This isn’t like Vickers. He had relatives up high. His bad name damaged theirs, so they tried hard to protect him.

  Halliburton was popular but had no real connections. You can nail him if he’s guilty. Ambrose will back off to avoid embarrassing the High Court. Marcus will have to follow.

  Rumor has it there’s a Wolf connection?

  Rumor has it this rumor came from DSI.

  Watch your back. Someone’s passing secrets.

  My eyes scan the messages top to bottom four times in a row, and the last time, it strikes me that Erica may have been writing these during an ICM meeting, since each one adds new information less than a minute apart. A picture of her texting under the table surrounded by keen-eyed witches and wizards pops into my head, and I snort at the thought she somehow snuck all this obvious spy work past them. But then, I don’t know many ICM practitioners. Maybe they aren’t all as whip smart as Erica Milburn. Or maybe they’re too disconnected from the world of normals to care about someone’s apparent smartphone addiction.

  Whatever the case, Erica’s messages are troubling, especially the last three.

  Erica’s been secretly passing information to DSI for several years to help us navigate around the ICM’s incessant attempts to block our access to the supernatural underground, especially where magic practitioners are concerned. They don’t think we have a place in their world of strange powers and even stranger creatures. And while on some level, they’re right, the ICM’s inability to stop their world from affecting ours in all sorts of awful ways necessitates the existence of DSI. If it weren’t for all the supernatural crime the ICM fails to prevent, DSI wouldn’t be around to bug them in the first place.

  So it’s a huge insult that they refuse to share—considering we put our lives on the line all the time to protect the practitioners that fall under their purview.

  And that’s where Erica has picked up the slack. She gets it. What we do and why we do it. So she shares intel with us that Marcus would never let us have.

  Riker used to be her go-to guy, but now that I’m, ahem, seeing her on a regular basis, my captain has quietly and without (too much) complaint let me take over his old role.

  It’s a dangerous game to play, I know. If the ICM at large finds out, I could get my ass handed to me. And I don’t even want to think about what would happen to Erica. (She mentioned offhandedly once that the ICM is liable to bind a witch’s powers if she dares to step out of line. And I sincerely doubt that’s their worst punishment.)

  Of course, DSI wouldn’t be too lenient either concerning a spy in our ranks.

  And according to Erica,
we have one.

  I think back to all the DSI agents I saw at Jameson’s. Beyond my own team—and I know they’re trustworthy—there were a dozen crime scene techs on contract work, and a few other people from lower-level investigation teams securing various parts of the building. Most of those people were unknown to me, and most of them wouldn’t have been close enough to hear me shout about the dead werewolf. That basement level was pretty far from the main bar and seating area.

  But if someone working that main room had shimmied two-thirds of the way down the storeroom stairs, then…yeah, they could have heard the tidbit about the Wolf and passed it on to the ICM.

  I guess there’s also the possibility that somebody from Delarosa’s team is a plant, but besides Liam Calvary, all the detectives on that team have worked for DSI for nearly a decade. If one of them had been a spy all this time, Erica would have picked up on it sooner. Even if she wasn’t able to discern the identity of the spy, she’d have passed the information about their existence onto Riker. And Riker would definitely have smoked out the rat.

  Could the spy be Liam then? The new guy?

  I don’t want to think that—he seems like a decent dude (if not a little dim) from the few times we’ve talked—but the timestamp on Erica’s text about the mole…She sent me that message two minutes and sixteen seconds after Ella ended the task room meeting. And Liam, I recall, was the first person to leave the room. He zipped off down the hall and was already at the elevator by the time the rest of us had exited. He could have easily shot off a message to Marcus in the time it took the rest of the group to catch up.

  Christ, I don’t want to think about internal strife.

  I open up the reminder app in my phone and jot down Check into Liam’s history.

  I’ll bring the issue up with Riker when we have a minute to talk in private.