“What happened after that?”
“She didn’t come home. She was fine with them. She got a job at a renaissance festival, juggling fire of all things, but when the summer was over, she disappeared. It was the day before we were supposed to come to pick her up. She went out for ice cream with a friend and didn’t come home.”
“Is there any chance the friend was Chris Wilson?”
“Yes. We warned my parents about him, but they didn’t listen. They never listened to anything when it came to her. They were too desperate to spoil their only granddaughter. I’m sure they let her call him, and if he drove there, I’m sure they let him see her.”
“And you think she left with him.”
“I know she did. That boy was evil. It always comes back to him. The day she met him was the last day all of us we happy. I’m still sorry we ever went to that Yule festival.”
“Yule festival?” I asked.
“It’s a Christmas thing; they hold it outside. Kelly went off with some hot cocoa, and we found her next to the bonfire with him,” she added extra hate to the word him, “looking guilty. She was never the same after that.”
“Did Kelly have any favorite places, places she might go if something happened between her and Chris?”
“You mean before or after she met him? Before she met him, her favorite place was the library, after it was whatever hole he was in.”
“Which library?”
“The big one downtown, she liked the way it was wedged in between all the sky scrapers.” Her eyes lightened a little at the thought. “I always hoped it meant she’d end up down there, working in finance or a lawyer, wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase. I was so excited to see her grow up, and then she turned seventeen, and it all came crashing down.
“I know it’s hard to believe, Detective, but I love my daughter. I want her to go back to being the girl I knew a year ago. She was so happy. She loved us. I had the perfect daughter a year ago. If I can’t have her back the way she was, I still want her back but”—she took a deep breath—“I’ll always miss the girl she was.”
I got a few more details, thanked Mrs. McRae for her time, and promised I would tell her if I found anything out about Kelly. I realized I’d made the same promise to Anna’s Aunt Jo on Monday. Two mothers with lost children, and I didn’t think I was going to be able to help either of them. The drive back to the station was lonely.
Chris was the obvious suspect. He was tied to all three locations, he drank at the bar (probably, I was still waiting on the picture from Mark), he went to the school (definitely), and he got a health card at the clinic (definitely). I had one probably, and two definitelys. I had Chris’ record in school of fights and bullying. I had his past drug use. Uh, actually those two didn’t show anything. I crossed them off my mental list.
I started again. Chris had a past history of violence and a known bad temper. He’d recently become a vampire, which meant… Ah hell, it meant he probably wasn’t a fire witch anymore even if he had been one. Damn it, my gut instinct was telling me Chris was the key to this puzzle, but I could barely convince myself. There was no way I was going to get Danny to go along with it, let alone someday convince a judge.
“You don’t look happy,” Danny said sitting down across from me.
“She feels even worse, frustration, self-doubt, and bitterness. That’s the perfect combination for our birthday girl,” Simon said as he walked back to his own desk. The only one of the three who was quiet was Lucas.
“What’s up?” Danny asked.
“Why don’t you tell me about yours, and I’ll tell you about mine?” I said. Lucas was silent, but Simon was willing to talk.
“Not much to tell, siren convinced a shifter to go for a swim where he shouldn’t. What’s your problem?”
I told the three of them everything. Everything I knew and everything that contradicted what I knew. I even told them about Mark’s idea that we had a pair of fire witches.
“Wow, that’s one hot mess,” Lucas declared when I was done.
“Yeah, but your idea that it’s Chris, feels right,” Danny agreed with me. I was elated with joy.
“Chris or Chris and Kelly. Couples do things people wouldn’t do on their own,” Simon pointed out. “He could be showing off for her or trying to scare her into staying with him.”
“Great, so what do I do?” I asked the three of them. It was nice they agreed with me, but I was really hoping for some magic that would solve my case.
“Damned if I know,” Simon said.
“Go have lunch,” Lucas declared. “When you’re done, start hunting him down.”
I looked at Danny waiting for the third member of the Greek chorus to chime in. He surprised me by standing up.
“You heard the man. We go to lunch.”
****
Danny let me pick a restaurant for a lunch out. I was going to force him into sushi at Haroku but at the last minute gave him a reprieve. We picked up sandwiches and soup at Sunshine’s. It was too cold and rainy for sushi anyway. Somehow my birthday always seemed to fall on a gray, wet day—another reason why it wasn’t worth making a big deal about it. We took a table inside, away from the bleak scene presented by the windows and spent lunch talking about the insane birthday parties his girls attended. The conversation carried over as we dodged rain drops to get back into the car. In the middle of the description of one astounding fete involving manicures and pedicures for all of the eight-year-old attendees, I noticed what direction we were headed.
“Indigo’s?” I asked.
“I’m hoping he can pull off a birthday cupcake,” Danny said with a smile. Indigo could and did. He contributed his own tales of birthday party madness, including was Alex’s extravagant Quinceañera, a celebration that cost more than my first car. By the time we pulled back into the station, I was willing to admit I’d downplayed my birthday a little.
“I wish we had more on Chris,” I admitted. It would be nice if wishes made on your birthday always came true.
“We can make a case against him; it’s not much, but if the lieutenant likes it and we’re lucky, we can have a warrant to bring Chris in for questioning by sunset.”
****
The lieutenant bought it. While he agreed the idea of a vampire who was also a fire witch was a reach, he thought we had enough to question Chris. One of the district attorneys agreed. The photo that had been messengered to me of Chris at the bar while Meat went up in flames helped more than a little bit. I made a mental note to thank Mark the next time I saw him.
“Hey,” I started as Danny pointed the car toward Vianne’s. Our warrant was very clear, we were there for Chris, not her and none of the other boys, but it was still a warrant and I was a little nervous about it. “Remember that charm you gave me?”
“I remember.” When I’d first started seeing Jakob, Danny had been concerned about the balance of power in our relationship. He’d given me a charm that stopped vampire magic from working, in case Jakob had been magicing me into anything. He hadn’t. Jakob wasn’t that kind of guy, but Vianne didn’t share his scruples.
“You want to wear it to keep your head clear? We could stop by my place on the way.”
“Sure you don’t want it?”
“I’m not her type, remember? I didn’t like the way you were the last time we talked to her.”
“I didn’t either,” Danny agreed. “The charm’s a good idea.”
Our stop was quick, and we arrived at Vianne’s house before four. Thankfully the gray gloom meant there wouldn’t be any problem getting Chris back to the squad room.
The molten chocolate center of my birthday cupcake provided enough calories for me to check out the house and then some. Actually, if Chris resisted arrest, I would probably have enough strength to control him. We would have to keep our fingers crossed the rest of the vampires in the house, especially Vianne didn’t help him.
I took a deep breath and lost myself in the magic. The house was the sa
me, nothing had changed as far as death was concerned. There was still a collection of short lived insects and rodents, a woman who wasn’t near death and a handful of vampires. It wasn’t what was added that struck me, but what was missing. The thing in the basement that reached back to me was gone. I flexed supernatural muscle, pulling from the core of my being and poured it over the house. Nothing reached back. There was something else missing. Today instead of five vampires, one strong and four weak, there were only four, one strong and three weak.
“We’re screwed,” I said without thinking.
“Why?” Danny looked scared, and I felt immediately guilty.
“One of them is out, and I’ll bet it’s Chris.”
“That’s it? He knew we were coming, and he bolted?”
“I’m betting. Oh and the thing I usually feel isn’t there.”
“The thing that looks back at you?”
“That one.” I nodded.
“Can’t say I’m too upset about that. All right, let’s give this a try anyway. Hey, maybe you’ll get off early for your birthday.”
The maid let us in, but Vianne was waiting on the stairs above us, nearly at the top in a silky nightgown that pooled around her feet with a deep v neckline. She looked like the scene from an old movie, the one before the hero carried the heroine off to her bed to ravish her. Even from the distance her smile for Danny suggested she wouldn’t mind a little ravishing.
“We have a warrant to search the house for Chris Wilson,” Danny said blandly.
“If you want to get upstairs, Detective, all you had to do was ask…” Her voice was the same languid drawl it always was, but this time Danny didn’t turn stupid listening to it.
“Actually we’d prefer you call him here. If not, we’ll start in the basement.”
Her eyes narrowed at his indifference. She tried again, and this time I felt the power brush by me as she spoke. “Why call anyone else here, when I’m all you’ll need?” The magic in her words made my stomach flutter, but Danny didn’t move.
“We have a warrant for Chris in regards to four arsons, if you could get him that would be great.” Danny’s voice was full of false bravery. I didn’t think Vianne could tell.
“He’s not here,” she spat the words at Danny coming down the stairs in a rage. When she got close to us, I could see why she’d set the scene with her so far above us. Vianne looked tired and old. Her skin was drawn tightly around her face. I could see every bone beneath it. Her skull seemed too prominent beneath her brittle hair. “I cast him from the house until he does what needs to be done.”
“And what’s that?” I asked, drawing her away from Danny. Her bad looks emboldened me, something had drained Vianne of enough power that she looked like hell. That probably meant she was weak enough for me to take her if anything happened.
“Get rid of his little bitch.” Her eyes bleed away to red with her anger. “I should never have let him keep her. It was a mistake.”
“You mean Kelly?” I asked.
“Who else? Ignorant flit of a girl, living in my house, causing trouble. I wanted her out the minute she came in, but Chris convinced me otherwise. Last night was the end of it, I threw them both out.”
“What happened last night?” Danny asked. “Why do you look so bad?”
She laughed loudly sounding crazy. Douglas and a boy we hadn’t seen before stumbled on to the stairs. The new vampire was older, sixty, maybe seventy-five even though he looked fifteen. His white blond hair was pulled into a ponytail, and his green eyes sparkled. Whatever had happened last night, it hadn’t hurt his looks one bit. He was clearly in charge, issuing orders I couldn’t hear. Douglas picked Vianne up and carried her away. I doubted ravishment was in her future.
“Vianne isn’t herself. Perhaps I could better help you?”
“All we need is Chris,” Danny said.
“He’s a fairly sensitive subject. We should go into the parlor.”
We followed him into the room, and he offered us a drink. He was businesslike, and the feeling of the room changed to reflect it.
“Chris was Vianne’s first mistake in a very long time. I’m afraid it’s affected her rather badly.”
“What made him a mistake?” I asked.
“Oh so many things, his drug addiction, his temper, his love for Kelly, the list goes on. What matters for you is he really isn’t here. When she found out he’d bound himself to Kelly, Vianne couldn’t delude herself any longer. Either he comes back alone, or he doesn’t come back.”
“You’re hoping he doesn’t come back,” Danny said.
The man nodded. “I am. Vianne spent too much energy and magic trying to break the bond between him and Kelly. The rest of us spent too much trying to handle his outbursts. I’d rather be shed of him.”
“You’re not going to burn his hands first?” I asked keeping my voice light. He looked up at me in shock.
“You’re what I felt earlier, aren’t you? What was searching the house? Did you know about the burns or guess?” I started to say something but he stopped me. “It doesn’t matter. Either way, you’re entirely too fascinating for my good.”
“Because of what Vianne will do to you?”
“Lord no, I can handle Vianne. You belong to Jakob, and I’m a thousand times more scared of him than I ever was of her.” His smile struck me as melancholy. He looked too young to be so sad. I started to wonder about the things he’d endured with Vianne, the things he missed.
“So you have no idea where Chris went, and you don’t plan on looking for him?” Danny steered the interview back on course a moment too late for my peace of mind.
“No idea. He was using one of our cell phones, if it’s turned on you can track it, but you’re probably better off checking the drug dens he frequented before she turned him. You don’t lose your cravings once you change, you just can’t satisfy them anymore.”
“You sound like you’re speaking from experience,” I said, trying to follow up.
“I’m afraid there’s nothing any of us can do to help with Chris. If he comes back, I give you my word I’ll hand him over to you. Have a good evening, detectives.”
He handed us a note with the cell phone number and left. In the car, I waited for Danny to correct my poor interview form. When he didn’t I felt guilty enough to ask.
“Aren’t you going to yell at me for ending things too soon?”
“Nope. The guy didn’t have anything to say, not really.” He took a minute before adding, “Besides I promised myself I wouldn’t yell at you on your birthday.”
“Gee thanks, you have to admit the men in that household are more than a little creepy.”
“Not nearly as creepy as the way he started coming on to you. Does he have a good reason to be scared of Jakob?”
I thought it over, what I should tell Danny and what I should keep to myself. “Let’s put it this way, if there’s something you really wanted to know from any of them, Vianne included, I’d suggest you ask before tomorrow night.”
“Going to be fairly interesting for her boyfriends then.”
“Why’s that?” I knew how interesting it would be, none of them would be left alive. The man whose sad smile captured me wouldn’t live to see the weekend.
“Chris is a really young vampire right?”
“Vianne made him a month ago, so yeah…” I wasn’t sure what Danny was getting at.
“So everything he knows he learned from her. If he bound himself to Kelly, that’s because Vianne taught him what that means.”
“What does it mean?” I’d never heard the word before today.
“Should I be romantic or blunt?” Danny asked.
“Blunt, there’s nothing romantic about anything that goes on in that house.”
“It’s a magical way of sealing two creatures together. I don’t know the details, but you swap blood and maybe some other stuff. It doesn’t matter, what does is the outcome, couples that are bound can never be parted.”
�
�Never? Not even when they die?”
“They usually die together. I’m betting all of Vianne’s little playmates are bound to her, and when she dies…”
“The rest of them will die too,” I finished. “But why would Vianne try to break the bond between Chris and Kelly? Why would she risk killing him?”
“When people are bound, they can influence each other, maybe even control each other. I’m betting Vianne didn’t want Kelly telling Chris to leave her.”
“Because if she did, Chris would have no other option, he’d have to leave? What if she told him to kill himself, would he have a choice then?” I asked.
“Nope.”
Chapter Fifteen
The phone tracking site wasn’t the most wonderful website in the world, but it gave us an address outside of town. A quick cross check showed it was a not-so-nice bar a little outside of town. It was possible the bar had a basement, and if there was a basement Chris might still be there.
“So let’s go.” I stood up.
“Call first.” Danny pointed to the phone.
“What? Why?”
“Because we don’t know if anyone is there. We know the phone is, but that doesn’t mean anything. We only have a warrant for Chris at Vianne’s. We don’t have a warrant for this place. Call and make sure there’s someone willing to open the door.”
I sighed, hating the way he was right, then dialed the phone. The voice that picked up the phone was so rough, I couldn’t tell if it was male or female.
“Corner Pocket. We’re closed,” it barked. I shot Danny a confused look, but he motioned for me to go on.
“This is Detective Mallory Mors, I’m following up on an arson investigation. Would it be possible for me to come by and talk to someone?”
“No way. We’re closed.”
“I understand, but our suspect may have visited your bar or even be there now.”
Fire in Her Blood Page 24