by Dannika Dark
“I’ve always preferred the main course myself.”
Glass had blond hair the color of straw, short with the top brushed messily forward. His ears were a little small, but I hardly noticed because of his piercing gaze. He rubbed his clean-shaven jaw and looked as if he was trying to decide something. Now that I was finally getting a good look at him, I couldn’t help but notice his dark eyebrows. They were oddly attractive against his otherwise light features and put emphasis on his eyes. He sure looked like a detective. Clean-cut, a little rough around the edges, always hiding a smirk, perceptive, and probably had an after-hours bar he frequented. Some quiet place with a friendly bartender who knew him by name.
Glass turned his attention to Niko, who was touching everything on his plate. “Are you blind?” he asked bluntly.
Niko lifted his burger. He seemed to tolerate the question, but his annoyance was obvious. “My vision is impaired, yes.”
“Pity.”
Questions like that weren’t necessarily considered rude among Breed. Most immortals were very forthright with their thoughts and opinions and didn’t tiptoe around someone’s feelings. It was something you grew accustomed to. And the joke was on him if he thought Niko was someone to feel sorry for.
“What are you doing in the human district?” I asked, slightly distracted by my delicious pie.
“I was following a lead. And you?”
“Returning a coffeepot.”
He steered his gaze out the window. “Have you come up with any more theories?”
“Well…”
Niko suddenly kicked me under the table, reminding me that we didn’t report to Detective Glass. I’d only been with the team a couple of weeks and didn’t know all the rules, but I was a quick study.
I blew the steam from a forkful of pie. “We’re still discussing the facts. You should probably talk to Viktor.”
He smiled warmly. “For someone with a lot of questions, you don’t have much to say.”
“You didn’t tell me the food was so good here,” Niko interrupted. “I haven’t tasted a cheeseburger this superior in decades.”
“They buy their meat fresh,” I said. “Not that prepackaged, frozen stuff. Next time you should order off the breakfast menu. Do you want to order anything, Detective Glass?”
“You can call me—”
“Mr. Glass,” I answered. “I shouldn’t get personal with people I’m working with.”
He leaned in. “Shame. Because I’d very much like to invite you to dinner, Miss Black.”
Niko rose from his seat. “I think I’ve changed my mind on the drink.” He turned away and left us alone.
I tried to ignore the fact that my cheeks were on fire. I hated awkward situations like this, and a man hadn’t asked me out on a date in a million years. Even worse was knowing that Glass was a Chitah and could probably smell my embarrassment.
I set down my fork. “I thought you were kidding around this morning.”
He smirked, accenting the lines on his cheeks. “I wasn’t sure if you were interested, so I thought I’d test the waters. Your scent changed when I made the suggestion.” He circled his finger on the table. “That intrigues me.”
“Cheater.”
He sat back and stretched his arm across the back of the seat. “I couldn’t ask you out in front of your boss. That would be inappropriate, and I could lose my position.”
“I’m not the dating kind.” I lowered my eyes to my pie and stabbed at the flakey crust. Little did he know that when left alone with a man, I was more likely to kill him than kiss him.
“Don’t be so quick to say no. It’s not easy for me to sit here and face rejection from a beautiful woman. We work similar jobs, and I can tell you take yours seriously. Not many people can relate to what we do, so I think we have a lot in common already. What do you have to lose?”
The sun skated behind a cloud. What did I have to lose? I’d never had good experiences with Chitahs, but this wasn’t some loser with a seedy past. He had a respectable job and a nice smile. Chitahs weren’t exactly high on my list of guys I’d date, but being around Claude had shown me that some of them actually respected women. Maybe I needed to come out of my shell and have some fun for a change.
I swallowed a large bite of my pie. “And you have no problem with my being a Mage? Is this going to be a secret date in the back of a restaurant where all the other interbreeders hide?”
Interbreeders being people who liked to fool around with other Breeds.
“Do you go out much?”
“As a matter of fact, I’m probably banned from returning to the last bar I went to.”
He leaned forward. “A little troublemaker, are you?”
Then I remembered I was talking to the law. “Oh, um. No. It was just a misunderstanding.”
Glass laughed warmly. “Don’t worry, Miss Black. I only plan on putting you in cuffs after our date, not before.”
“I’m not easy to catch,” I said playfully.
He rubbed his chin. “So is this guy your partner?” he asked, pointing to the empty space beside me.
“No. Christian’s my partner. We don’t go everywhere together, but that’s the arrangement.”
His head jerked back. “The Vampire? The temperamental jerk who stormed off this morning?”
“That would be him.”
He glanced at my black nail polish. “You shouldn’t trust Vampires.”
I set down my fork and picked up the last crumb. “Who said I did?” I noticed his clothes beneath his open coat. “Nice tie. I didn’t know detectives had a dress code.”
He touched the blue tie, his fingers tracing the diagonal pinstripes. “We don’t. My mother taught me that presentation is everything, and what you project on the outside will shape people’s opinions. When I question people, they’re more intimidated by a suit and tie. It looks official.”
I mentally snorted. His mother would probably disown him for seeing a girl like me. Especially when I thought about how I’d shown up at the crime scene, braless and wearing a trapper hat.
“How much do you really know about Christian Poe?” he asked.
Niko approached the table but didn’t sit down. “Raven, we need to leave. Viktor called.”
I smiled at the detective. “I guess you’ll be seeing me again.”
“Give me your number.”
“I don’t have one yet.” Viktor hadn’t given me a phone since there was a special process he had to go through to get free access. “Give me yours.”
Glass scribbled his number on a napkin and pushed it toward me. He looked at me for a few beats, and I thought he was going to say something. Instead, he slid out of the booth and buttoned up his coat. “I hope we see each other again under different circumstances, where a body isn’t involved, but something tells me that’s not going to happen. It was a pleasure seeing you again.”
When he left, I looked at Niko’s half-eaten plate. “Do you want a take-out bag? And since when do you have a phone?”
He drew his hood over his head. “I can’t operate the touch screens, so Viktor gave me one with buttons for when he needs to get in touch. He just called and asked me to check something out, so I need a ride. It’s not related to this case.”
“Where?”
“Pawn of the Dead. There’s been a murder.”
Chapter 10
Niko shivered when a sudden gust of wind beat against his face. He resisted the urge to tap into his Thermal abilities since they were on the job and he didn’t want to run down his core energy. Viktor had sent Blue to meet him at Pawn of the Dead, so Niko was patiently waiting for her arrival. One benefit of having a partner was they could work on different cases simultaneously.
He heard the familiar sound of Blue’s boot heels as she approached from the right, and when he looked up, he recognized her energy moving toward him.
Darkness was once the only world he’d ever known, so after becoming a Mage and developing these newfound abiliti
es to perceive energy, he’d wanted to shut it off. It had frightened him, confused him, and stripped away everything that had once been familiar.
But in time, he learned to interpret what he could only refer to as shapes and colors. They were different, and so he gave them names. They most likely weren’t the same colors or textures everyone else saw in their world, but he used their language to identify what he saw and make a distinction. Everyone had a unique aura, and he realized he could sense changing emotions. Walking in the busy city was easier to navigate than isolated areas since he could follow the trails of energy.
He still wondered what clouds looked like during sunset, or the intricate patterns on a butterfly. There were so many things people took for granted, and while sight didn’t matter to him anymore, he was still curious about things he overheard in conversation.
Even though he moved through the world with ease, his blindness attracted attention. It made people question why a Creator would choose a blind man, and those were questions he didn’t want to answer. It also made him stand out and become more easily recognizable. So, like Blue, Niko had taken to wearing a hood. He had plenty of summer shirts with shorter sleeves that still offered him the ability to veil his face. Sometimes he relied on his long hair to do the trick.
“Why didn’t you wait for me inside?” Blue asked.
He turned in the direction of her voice. “I know how you drive. I thought you would only take a few minutes.”
Her aura briefly sparkled with humor, and her tone lightened. “Serves you right, amigo. So what did Viktor tell you?”
“He mentioned a murder, but that’s all.”
Keystone didn’t investigate every murder in the city, only ones with peculiar circumstances or linked to crimes they were already working on.
Blue lowered her voice. “It’s just a routine check. They couldn’t find the killer or a motive, so here we are.”
“Who was the victim?”
“A security guard.”
Niko furrowed his brow. Nothing about that seemed suspicious. Robberies happened all the time, especially in pawnshops.
“And before you ask,” she continued, “nothing was stolen. Viktor just wants us to check it out since it happened on the night of our visit.” She hooked her arm in his, and they turned. “Let’s get this over with.”
Warm air touched his face as they moved inside, and the first thing he noticed was a whirlwind of different smells. Even though he had an altered sense of sight, he was still blind and relied on his other senses to tell him things. An expensive perfume indicated the woman standing near them was either wealthy or spent a lot of time in here searching for used fragrances. Pawnshops were visited by all social classes. Many items were rarities, and in some cases people were searching for things they’d lost track of years ago.
He let go of Blue’s arm and placed his hand on her back, following her lead. He trusted her, and she always made sure that no obstacles were in his path. Her patience was why they worked so well together.
They neared a familiar light he remembered from their previous visit.
“Cosmo,” he said in greeting.
“Well, lookie who it is,” Cosmo said, his tone condescending. “Mr. Bruce Lee himself.”
Niko bent over and rested his forearms on the counter. He kept his head down as if he were examining the items inside the glass case. Some people eventually figured out his impairment, but he didn’t like to showcase it during introductions. It had a tendency to make people feel like they had the upper hand. “We heard you had some trouble.”
“Trouble is an understatement,” Cosmo said. “My best guard was murdered.”
Blue’s energy continued shifting. “Is there anyone you’ve had problems with lately? Either a customer or someone in your personal life?”
“Lady, I’ve got to deal with trouble on a daily basis from customers who argue about the prices, claim they’ve found something that’s theirs and they want it for free, want to return something for the exact price they paid—the list goes on and on.”
“What about your guard?”
“Big Dog? He’s the one who dealt with the trouble. And before you ask me about his personal life, I can’t tell you squat about that. He was a quiet guy who liked to spend his breaks in the back room watching reruns of Dennis the Menace.”
Niko noticed the waning colors and sensed that Cosmo was fond of his guard, which belied his apathetic tone. “It’s not right for a good man to be cut down for no reason. We want to help you find the person responsible. I’m sure the authorities are already working on the case, but we’re here to review the evidence and see if there’s anything they might have overlooked. What can you tell us?”
After a long sigh, Cosmo’s voice was more relaxed. “It happened after hours. I’ve got roll-down shutters for security, but someone broke the damn things. Unless they had a bulldozer, I’d say it was a Vampire. Follow me to the back; I don’t want customers to hear.”
Niko ran his fingers along the edge of the counter, following Cosmo’s energy trail. When he found the opening, he crossed behind the counter, and they went into a back storage room. Their voices echoed, indicating the ceilings were high and the room large.
“This is the inventory room,” Cosmo said. “It’s divided up. New items over there, large stuff I can’t fit in the store over there, and as you can see, I have a pile of shit over there that just won’t sell.”
Niko turned, pretending to notice.
Blue’s thick boot heels clicked against the concrete floor. “Was anything taken?”
“No. I thought it was just another robbery. Sometimes people have in mind what they want to steal, but I had one last year, and they cleaned me out. That’s why I bought the security shutters. I sat down with two of my guys and went through the inventory, and it’s all accounted for. Well, except for the damages.”
Niko strode forward and paused. “What damages?”
“See over there?” Cosmo said. “They smashed the shit out of some of that stuff. Knocked the shelf over and made a mess.”
Niko furrowed his brow. That sounded like an impulsive outburst a frustrated person would do. “Who did those items belong to?”
“Hell if I know. They bring it in by the truckload sometimes. I have my guys add everything to the record books and research the value before we decide what to do with it.”
“Why were you so reluctant to let us search your shop if you had nothing to hide?”
Cosmo chuckled. “I had a few early shipments I hadn’t gone through yet.”
Blue’s energy flared. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Cosmo cracked a few knuckles. “Sometimes my guys scout around and clear a scene before anyone gets there. Usually they seek out people with money, but no one important.”
“You mean while the bodies are still on the floor?” It sounded like her teeth were clenched. “How do you find out when someone’s dead?”
“Don’t ask those kinds of questions. It’s no more illegal than ambulance chasing. And before you ask, there was nothing illegal in the boxes. Go through it yourself if you want.”
Niko gripped the handle of his katana beneath his coat and turned away. Too much time had passed for there to be any residual energy still left. Big Dog’s body had already been taken, and there wasn’t anything stolen that would hint to a motive. It must have been a personal dispute. If Cosmo’s guard was the one who took care of all the trouble, he’d probably made a lot of enemies. Niko didn’t want to waste much time here. Viktor just wanted them to check out the scene and add it to their books. Sometimes it took a while before they saw a pattern between crimes. Perhaps one day they would figure this one out.
Blue’s heels scraped against the concrete. “You don’t have security cameras?”
“I might stick one back here, but Viktor would probably take it. You know that we’re not supposed to be filming Breed in public places. They don’t like us doing that kind of shit, and I could get
in trouble if it fell into the wrong hands. Big Dog was the only Shifter I could trust. If you ever find out who did this, I want to cut off his testicles before you turn him in.”
Blue lowered her voice to a whisper and drew close to Niko. “We don’t have enough evidence. This is a dead end.”
“This wasn’t a robbery; they were searching for something,” Niko murmured.
Blue sighed. “Even if something was missing, we don’t have a way to trace the owners. Not every case leads to an arrest.”
Blue was right. Part of their job was deciding what was worth pursuing and what to leave to the authorities to handle. Right now they had a serial killer on the loose.
“We’re sorry for your loss,” Niko said in earnest, addressing Cosmo. “Is there anything else you can tell us that might help us catch the person who did this? Any evidence left behind? Something moved? Did someone have a personal vendetta against your guard?”
“He didn’t leave a scent behind. I have another Shifter working for me, and his animal checked out the body before we called in the Regulators. I don’t know…”
“What?” Blue asked.
“We found a tuft of white hair by the shelf. Big Dog was a grizzly, and my other Shifter is a black panther, so it’s just weird. It might have come in with the inventory and blew off the shelf. Who knows.”
“Why’s that strange?” Blue asked. “Maybe the murderer was a Shifter.”
“Do you know anything about Shifters? If the killer changed into his animal, Big Dog would have done the same. There would have been blood everywhere and signs of a struggle. My guard was choked to death and had his head beat against the floor.”
“We’ll make a note of it,” Niko said. “If you remember anything else, notify your contact at the higher authority, and they’ll get in touch with us.”
“Yeah. Thanks for nothing,” he grumbled, escorting them out of the room.
Niko’s shoulder knocked into something before Blue gripped his arm and led him into the main store. Once there, Blue gave Viktor a quick call and told him there was nothing to report.
Outside, they headed across the parking lot at turtle speed.