Ice Cold Death

by Razevich, Alexes

  I didn’t say anything.

  “Look, Oona,” he said, “The last few days have sucked. Brad. Eric. The guy in Redondo. Beasts from the Brume. Only a fool thinks mixing sex up with fear and sorrow is an okay idea.”

  My voice stayed cold. “And yet, here you are.”

  He ran his hands through his hair. “You don’t make things easy, do you? Men get sad, too, you know. Men get lonesome. Our hearts can ache. All I want is a warm body to curl next to and a good night’s sleep. That’s all I came for. It’s all I ask.”

  That was all I felt from him, too—the simple desire for companionship. The healing power of human contact.

  I’d sold him short, not given him credit for being just as human as anyone else, for having the same natural emotions. It was pretty crappy of me.

  But what did I want? The question had a simple answer: the same thing he’d asked for.

  I twisted, lifting myself up on one elbow. “You sing off-key.”

  He tilted his head in acknowledgement. “So I’ve been told.”

  “Stay,” I said.

  13

  In the morning, I put on the electric kettle as soon as I heard Diego coming down the stairs.

  “Breakfast tea with zoom-loads of caffeine?” I said when he padded barefoot into the kitchen, his longish hair uncombed. “Or something calmer—chamomile maybe?”

  “Tea?” he said, sitting at the oak table. “Nothing more substantial?”

  The kettle clicked off and I poured boiling water over a bag of Morning Thunder for me. “Maybe later. Right now, all I can think about is taking the drawing to Maurice, getting this bastard demon-beast named, and figuring out how to stop it.”

  He ran his hands through his unruly hair. “I’ll take caffeinated, thanks.”

  I put a fresh bag of Morning Thunder in a mug, poured hot water over it, and passed him the mug. My new supply of magic thrummed in my blood, urging me onward. I wanted him to hurry and drink his tea so we could get moving.

  “I’ve been thinking,” he said. “It might be better if you stayed home and I brought Maurice to you. You’re safe here, behind the wards.”

  I blinked, annoyed. “Don’t get all overly protective on me just because you spent the night in my bed.”

  Diego lifted his arms in a stretch. “Quiet mutual comfort is hardly the same as having passionately fucked our brains out. Even then, I’m hardly likely to suddenly become Mr. Chivalry. I am concerned for your safety though.”

  I stared at him, stunned. “I can’t believe you said that.”

  “Just being honest,” he said. “Do you not like your friends to be honest with you?”

  “I’ll tell you what, Dee—”

  His eyebrows shot up. “Dee?”

  I shrugged. “I woke up this morning and the name in my head for you was Dee. Just the front half, not the whole Diego. Too many syllables.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Preferable to the back half, I guess.”

  I scoffed. “Eggo? Yeah, much better than that.”

  “We’re getting off topic,” he said.

  “On purpose,” I said. “To spare you making useless arguments.”

  I dropped my voice back into friendlier tones. “It’s true I hide out at my house a lot, but I have my reasons and it’s by my choice. It was my choice to agree to help you find Brad’s killer. I’m not going to stay here while you hunt this whatever and bring it to heel. It’d be better if you taught me more magic to protect myself.”

  He closed his eyes a moment and sighed. “It would be best if you didn’t go running headlong into trouble. And fucking great if I didn’t have to worry about fighting off some demon-beast from the Brume out on the street.”

  I saw his point—sort of. I saw, too, that he didn’t know me.

  I stirred honey into my tea. “It’s my nature to fight my way to the goal.”

  He muttered something I didn’t quite catch. I didn’t need to hear the words. His body language and vibe were loud enough.

  “This isn’t a game,” he said. “The demon-beasts in the Brume have no conscience, the way we understand it. No regard for others. No remorse over killing.”

  That sobered me.

  “Thanks,” I said quietly. “It’s a good reminder, but I’m not going to stay home. I’m going wherever this hunt takes us.” I licked my lips. “You put up a good front, Diego, but the truth is you want me beside you in this fight.”

  He stared at me a moment and then laughed softly under his breath. “Never work with a psychic.”

  “Too late,” I said. “Now you’re stuck.”

  He turned his hands palms up. “I talked Juliana and Tyron into hiring you, so I guess I hung myself.”

  Diego had led me to believe the first day he came to my house that Tyron wanted to hire me. My first day in the office, Juliana had called me Diego’s new hire. I guessed I knew which it was now.

  “Why did you do that? Your bosses seem to give you a lot of free rein, but not enough to hire someone purely on your say-so.”

  “You’d had a vision of the murder. I thought you’d be able to help find the killer quickly; bring Mr. Keel some kind of closure. His wife died two years ago. Cancer. Then he lost his son, their only child. I figured, why not bring you on board and see if you could help bring him some peace.”

  The weight of that responsibility settled hard on my shoulders. What if we failed? What if we never could bring any peace to Mr. Keel? What if we couldn’t stop the killer from hurting more people?

  There was only one answer: we wouldn’t fail.

  Dee drained his mug and set it down. “We’ll take the drawing and your car and go see Maurice,” he said. “Do you have anything sweet around? Cookies?”

  I remembered he’d said that an offering was expected in return for Maurice’s expertise.

  “I have some chocolates.”

  “That’s perfect,” he said.

  I took several of the dark chocolates with caramel filling out of the plain brown box and dropped them into a plastic sandwich bag. I was glad Dee had abandoned the idea of me staying in my house under some sort of protective house arrest. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that I hadn’t won as much as I thought. That he’d walked me right where he wanted me to be and I’d hardly noticed.

  * * *

  The same parking spot at the back of the lot behind the Civic Center was open and I took it. It was Monday but except for two other cars the lot was empty. Maybe the people who worked here disliked driving in town as much as I did. Whatever the reason for the mostly empty lot, picking the same spot seemed right somehow.

  I turned off the engine, picked up my drawing, and Dee and I exited our respective doors. Maurice already sat on the asphalt just outside the green strip he evidently called home.

  “What did you bring me?” the rat asked, his pink nose twitching.

  I thought for a moment he meant the rolled up drawing I carried, but realized he meant the treat.

  I sat down on the asphalt next to him and took the chocolates out of the bag.

  “A friend of mine makes these,” I said. “I only share them with those I consider special and worthy.” Still a little miffed at Dee, I leaned close and whispered, “I didn’t offer any to Diego.”

  Maurice chuckled his rat laugh, then eagerly took a small nibble from the candy I’d set in front of him. A shiver of pleasure shimmied the length of his body.

  “This is delicious,” he said. “My compliments to your friend.”

  “I’ll tell him,” I said, and imagined the conversation: Good news, Jeff. Maurice the rat thinks your chocolates are grand.

  We waited while Maurice nibbled away half of a chocolate, then heaved his little shoulders and sighed. He sat up and gave a shrill whistle. Three rats ran from the greenery and eagerly hauled the rest of the chocolates back with them.

  “Okay,” Maurice said. “Let’s see what you brought to show me.”

  Dee had remained standing. He sank down on his h
aunches next to Maurice. “Oona did a drawing of what we think is probably the thing that killed Brad.”

  I unrolled the drawing and spread it out flat for him to see.

  Maurice blinked. “Bring me a brick or something. I need to get up higher to see it properly.”

  I went back to the car and grabbed my large, carpetbag-like purse. I carry a huge purse since I like to be able to drop anything I might buy or pick up into it—regular women’s pants being decidedly skimpy on pockets. I brought it over and set it on the ground for Maurice. The rat scampered up, stood on his hind legs and looked down at the drawing.”

  “You’re pretty good,” he said to me.

  “Thanks,” I said. “Do you know what it is?”

  “Sure,” he said, and looked at Dee. “You know what it is, too.”

  Dee nodded. “But I wanted to be sure.”

  The rat nodded. “A Klimertin. From the Brume. A nasty piece of work.”

  “Tell us what you know about it,” Dee said.

  “The klim,” Maurice said, turning his back to the drawing to face us, “feeds on emotions, especially fear. The Brume is full of emotion, creatures full of rage, of hate, and their own desperate hungers. I’m surprised this klim would leave a place of plenty—from its point of view—and venture out here, where it seems to have found a need to manufacture the strong emotions it hungers for.”

  “I think it might be stalking Oona,” Diego said. “Any guesses on why?”

  The rat sat back and considered me, his nose twitching. I felt him poking around inside my mind a bit—odd to feel in myself what I’ve done so often to others. Dee was right; it feels like a tickle on the inside of your skull—but I felt the rat reaching out more to the klim, poking around inside it. Searching. Searching.

  “Got it,” Maurice said. “The klim is focused on Oona because she’s full of conflicted emotions, which the klim finds a delicacy. She hides away from the world for self-preservation and yet hates the need, which she views as a weakness. She loves and doesn’t love her psychic abilities.”

  He shifted his gaze to Dee. “But what the klim really likes is her conflicted feelings for you, Diego.” The rat turned his gaze back to me. “It would be better for everyone if you’d make up your mind.” His whiskers twitched, and he heaved a small rat sigh.

  I felt my cheeks warm and glanced at Dee, but his face was calm, as if he were interested in what Maurice was saying but it had nothing to do with him. I wanted to take a look at Dee with my inner eyes, see how neutral he really was, but held off. I’d promised him privacy and meant to keep my word.

  The rat looked up at the sky, as if finding more answers in the clouds, then back at us. “Both of you are providing plenty of lust—honestly you two reek of it—which the klim likes, but it can find lust anywhere. What the klim smacks its lips over is Ooona’s conflicted and confused state. The klim loves those ‘don’t know what the hell you want’ emotions roiling around inside. Umm. Yummy.

  “Diego here is more forthcoming. Some good old lust and some growing affection. Boring—as far as the klim is concerned. But you—” he pointed a paw at me, “all that desperate need for privacy to protect yourself from the onslaught of the world, that ‘don’t want to need anyone, don’t even want to want anyone’ stuff, but seriously wanting to jump Diego’s bones and have your way with him, and maybe love him a little—the klim eats that up.”

  He paused a moment. “The klim is after you, Missy, because it’s more than a little worried you might find and hurt it, and because you feed it so deliciously. Conflict is its bread and butter.”

  The rat reached a paw behind his ear and scratched. “For gods’ sake, Lady. Just bang the boy. You’ll both feel better and the klim won’t find you quite so alluring.”

  My cheeks flamed. I stared at the ground. I was hardly the only emotionally conflicted person in the world. I wasn’t even the only person putting off a would-be lover that she maybe didn’t want to put off forever but wasn’t ready for now. So why me?

  “Did someone or something bring the klim here, or did it slip into our world on its own?” Dee asked.

  The rat shrugged his shoulders. “Ask the psychic. Isn’t that why you brought her on in the first place?” Then he laughed, that high-pitched rat laugh.

  “I can’t read you, Maurice,” I said. “I don’t know if it’s your ratness or your magic that keeps me out, but when I try to know your thoughts I get nothing. I can’t read the klim either. I can feel its presence, follow its trail, but I can’t catch thoughts or feeling from it. I certainly can’t read if someone brought it or it came on its own.”

  I thought about the implications. “We need to know that answer, don’t we? Need to know if we’re chasing only the klim or chasing the klim and whoever engineered its move into our world.”

  Maurice turned his gaze to Diego. “She’s pretty smart. Do you listen to her? You should.”

  Dee gave the rat a closed-mouth smile. “She’s plenty smart. I pay attention.”

  “Good,” Maurice said. “The next step is up to you, wizard. Use that big magic you’re so famous for and find the answer to that question.”

  Maurice sniffed and trotted on back into the shrubbery. Evidently, he’d said all he had to say.

  Dee stood and reached out his hand to help me up.

  “Look,” he said when I was standing, “I’d already figured out most of what Maurice said about you. Well, except the part about you wanting to move to the next level. You did a good job making me think we were firmly in the friend zone and that wasn’t going to change.”

  I eased my hand free from his. “Maurice may be a magic rat, but that doesn’t make him right in everything he says.”

  Dee gave me a close-mouthed smile. “He’s right about that, though. But I won’t rush you.”

  I sent him side-eye. “My high school boyfriend was the first and last man to rush me into anything.”

  “I believe that.”

  He shook his head and I felt memories sliding through him. “The teen years aren’t easy on anyone.”

  He had that right. “At least they’re behind us now.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Thank God for that.”

  As we eased out of the parking lot and back onto Pier Avenue I said, “Are you really famous for your magic?”

  “No,” he said. “Known, maybe. In small circles.”

  Pride has a distinct color, a rather nice purplish blue. I watched his aura flare with the shade.

  False modesty is pretty stupid when I can see how you really feel, I wanted to say.

  This was exactly why I didn’t want to be involved with any man, much less a full-of-himself wizard who evidently was as perceptive—about some things at least—as he was magical. My whole life was a case of too much information.

  And yet, there was something about Diego Adair. Something that, if I didn’t explore the possibilities, could leave me wondering What if?

  Not to mention that the klim was out there inciting people to kill their friends, and oh, by the way, stalking me because my internal conflicts tasted most delicious.

  14

  Dee had been quiet on the short drive back to my house, but his busy mind had pricked at me—bits of thought poking into my awareness—like listening to someone mumble under their breath, catching a word here and there, enough to know the general direction of his thoughts but not the particulars.

  We pulled into the garage, stopped the car, and went in the back door.

  “Would it help to say what you’re thinking out loud?” I said, taking a seat at the kitchen table. “You feel pretty jumbled. What’s going on in your wizard brain?”

  Dee sat and fiddled with his empty mug from this morning, still on the table. “How would you feel about staying at my place for a while?”

  “Why?”

  “The klim is a nasty beast. The wards here,” he glanced around to indicate my house, “are strong, but my place is pretty much a fortress.”

 
You can’t be the sort of person who voluntarily puts himself in front of a bunch of big strong guys shooting heavy pucks at your face and body at fifty miles an hour and up and doubt your ability to stop whatever someone throws at you. If Dee thought I’d be safer at his house, who was I to argue?

  “For how long?” I said, realizing I trusted him now, when I hadn’t before. Maybe it was feeling the truth of his promise not to rush me. Funny what a difference a few days can make.

  He shrugged. “Until the klim is back where it belongs and you’re out of danger.”

  A day? A week? A month?

  “Okay,” I said. “You pack up your stuff and I’ll pack up mine.”

  * * *

  I have something of a fetish about checking out people’s homes. The best way to know someone is to read their mind. The second-best way is to see how they choose to live.

  Dee’s home wasn’t what I expected. He’d said he lived alone, and the two-story, red-tile roofed Spanish-style houses that stretched nearly property line to property line with just a bit of land around its perimeter struck me as too large for one person. The teensy bits of land around the house were carefully planted and manicured. I’d bet good money it was kept perfect by a paid gardening team—or by magic.

  It was a wizard’s house though. The front door lacked a doorknob, keypad, or any other way to open it that I could see. I smiled, a little proud of myself for noticing that just before he muttered a spell and the door swung open. As we stepped inside, I saw that the door was covered in runes, visible now but not when we’d stood in front of it.

  He led me to the living room and motioned toward a light-colored linen sofa. I settled myself on it, surprised how comfortable it was for having very modern, sharp lines.

  “Can I get you anything?” he said. “I have cold water, orange juice, and I think there’s some beer.”

  “Water would be lovely,” I said.

  The rest of the room’s furniture was new and eclectic—a big flat-screen TV mounted on the opposite wall from the couch above a low Japanese wooden chest with a frosted glass front that held components.