“Wow,” I said, thinking that one over. “Chopping someone up just to dump their body in an alley—”
“Where it would almost certainly be discovered, keep in mind,” Webster said. He twisted his lips as he read the screen, and tapped one finger idly on his clean desk. “They didn’t even make an effort to dispose of it, and with it—him—in that many pieces, it would have been easy to at least try.”
“A public display of some sort,” I said, thinking it through. “But who would do something this messy…this brutal…?”
“I’m not exactly a profiler,” Webster said, sliding back in his chair, which squeaked as he did so. He regarded me in a posture that looked lazy, but his eyes were intent. “This mess, though, I mean… it could be personal, someone with a grudge, or it could be a serial killer…”
“Or neither,” I added. “Or both. Did your examiner find any DNA at the scene?”
“Not a bit other than the victim’s.” Webster shook his head. “The scene was short on blood compared to what you’d find in a human body, so the victim was definitely killed somewhere else and brought here.”
My head spun with the possibilities, but I kept myself upright in the chair. Personal score? Random killing? Disappearances of metas? I stared straight ahead as I considered it, then turned my head to meet Detective Inspector Matthew Webster’s brown, soulful eyes with my own. I could see he had some questions. I just had one, really.
What the hell was happening here in London?
Chapter 3
The old man screamed when he got cut, and that didn’t bother Philip Delsim at all. He took a leisurely path away from where the bastard hung upside down from his chained ankles and picked up his bone-white china teacup and saucer from the table they rested upon. He saw the red from his thumb smudge a bit on the saucer, and that drew a frown. He should have known better than to take a sip before washing his hands. This was a messy endeavor, after all.
The screams were a delicious sound; they caused him to prickle with anticipation all across his skin. They were a symphony of a sort, high and primal, primitive music that harkened back to the days of instinct. Philip had discovered early on that he liked the sound of this particular kind of music, though he’d rarely had a chance to listen to it in the last few years.
The world had changed, after all. Gone were the days of setting a leisurely pace of life. The digital age, they called it. Life moved frenetically, everyone feverishly scrambling to speed up. Philip took another sip of the tea, which hadn’t gone cold, fortunately. Not yet, anyway. He preferred to do things at a slower pace, take his time. Do the thing right.
Make them suffer.
The last one had suffered greatly, and for a long time, too. Why, he had barely remembered his name at the end of it. It was all wet croaks from a voice so strained it might as well have been broken. Philip took a sniff of the Earl Grey in his cup and found it quite the joy in contrast to the scent of blood and fear that suffused the room in which he stood.
“You know,” Philip said, placing the cup and saucer back on the table and turning, slowly, to face the old man hanging by his ankles from the ceiling, “I’m rather enjoying seeing you bleed.” He adjusted his glasses, wire-framed spectacles that he loved because they looked at least fifty years out of date. “Seeing you suffer. I could enjoy watching this for years to come.”
“You… would,” the old man croaked. It caused Philip to raise an eyebrow. Not many people could lose as much blood or skin as this fellow had and still remain cheeky.
Philip tried to recapture his sense of joy, though the subtle hint the old man had thrown at him nettled more than a little. “But I’m afraid I just don’t see a very long future for you.” He made a vague gesture with his hand, and the old man screamed again, this time from the pain. Philip had made him scream from terror at least a few times, and those were choice screams indeed, especially from a tough old bastard like this. “It’ll be memorable until the end, though. At least for me.”
Philip took a step closer and ran a hand down the old man’s chest. Knife work had exposed tissue to the air that was not supposed to be out and breathing. It was messy, really, but there wasn’t much to be done for it. He reached further up, came to the hip and thigh, where the damage done by yesterday’s handiwork had started to heal. “I can’t imagine you’ll enjoy it, but I can assure you that I’ll find the whole process immensely satisfying.” Philip smiled.
And then he jabbed a finger into the newly knitted flesh and started peeling it off in a long strip.
The screams followed, and that was all to the good. Philip found himself humming along with them, trying to match the pitch as best he could while he worked, tirelessly, on the old man, burying himself in his efforts and barely noticing the mess he continued to make.
Chapter 4
“So you have no knowledge of who might be behind this?” Webster asked me. I was getting a little chilly sitting in New Scotland Yard, but the faint hope in his eyes as he asked the question helped keep my disappointment at bay.
“Not a clue,” I said, giving him a short shake of the head.
“Is it possible—” he started, and I cut him off.
“Anything is possible,” I finished for him. “Absolutely anything at this point. Which is the problem, really. You could have a random act of violence. You could have a planned act of violence. A mugging and abduction gone horribly wrong, a revenge killing that—”
“Hang on a minute,” Webster held up a hand to stop me. “What if we operated from the assumption that this killing is connected to your friends’ disappearances?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “So what if we did? I guess at least then you’d have something to work on.”
“That’s the spirit,” Webster said and flashed me a smile. He turned back to his computer and pecked at the keys with one finger on each hand. I watched him coolly, pursing my lips. He glanced up at me and made a faint noise, an embarrassed guffaw. “Never have learned how to use a keyboard.”
“Me either,” I said, taking my eyes off of him and letting them roam around the bullpen. I caught a hint of interest as he cocked his head at me, waiting for further explanation. “They didn’t offer typing classes where I did my schooling.”
He returned his attention to his half-assed typing. With a sigh, I leaned over. “I think I’ve kind of reached the limit for how much help I’m going to be able to give you on this.”
His eyes flicked to me in surprise. “What about your friends?”
I felt my stomach rumble just a little. “I don’t know if you could call either of them friends. Acquaintances, co-workers maybe—”
“War buddies?”
“Maybe,” I said. “Whatever the case, you’ve got an investigation started and… frankly, I’m a little out of my depth here. I don’t think there’s going to be much I can do for you on this, and I’ve got a world of trouble waiting for me on my desk back in Minneapolis.” That was entirely true. I was presently inundated, working about eighty hours a week for less pay than I’d ever worked in my life. I mean, I was head of an underfunded agency that was in charge of policing metahumans across the United States, and while we were a small part of the population—about five hundred or so—we were not a quiet part.
Plus, a lot of the crap that flowed my way had nothing to do with metahumans, but I had to investigate to rule it out anyway. That was fun. I’d been called down to Ohio one time because of reports of some sort of fish-type meta living in a local pond. It was actually some weirdo who liked to take naked swims with a shark fin attached to his back. That image was forever seared into my mind; they didn’t make a mental bleach I could wash it out with, unfortunately.
Like I said: crap flowed my way. And that was one of the milder examples.
“I’ve got a list,” he said, and I heard a printer nearby spin to life, working on something. “Last known addresses for these people you dealt with—”
“Refugees,” I corrected. “We grant
ed them sanctuary, after all, so really they were refugees.”
“Right, these people,” Webster said, and he scooted back in his chair just around the corner of the cubicle and returned a second later with a piece of paper clenched between his thumb and forefinger, “they’re out there.” He glanced at the paper. “They could be in danger.”
“I’m sure you’ll warn them,” I said warily. Wearily, too. Those two always came together for me somehow.
“I’ve got to talk to them all,” Webster said, making the paper dance as he held it out in front of me. I couldn’t decide whether he thought the way he was doing it was enticing or if he was just trying to hypnotize me.
“Yeah, we call that ‘canvassing,’” I said. “I’ve done it. It’s not the fun part of police work.”
“I could use some help,” Webster said.
I sighed. “Not to be an ass, but so could I. I’m one of two—count them, two—responders to metahuman threats for the entire United States.” I had really felt the “entire” part of it over the last two years. “I have a stack of investigations on my own desk about six inches thick that I’m supposed to be working on, and just about the time I get it down to halfway, the U.S. State Department sees fit to loan me out to some other nation whose metas were nearly exterminated so I can deal with whatever threat they’re facing. Which is fine, except that when I get back, my little pile of folders will have increased back to a full six inches or more.” I joked with my brother—the only other responder to meta threats at our agency—that our caseload was more prolific at breeding than rabbits.
And on the rare occasions when our folders turned out to be filled with something serious, it was usually hairier than rabbits, too.
Webster studied me with a practiced eye. His finger traced that rugged jawline as he seemed to consider what I said. “So working this one case with me would be like a holiday of sorts.” He smiled. His smile was boyish and damnable and arrghhhhhh—
I rubbed the bridge of my nose and shut my eyes. I had a perpetual headache these days. My brother kept insisting that I go to the doctor for it, but I hated my doctor and knew what she’d say anyway—it was stress. Or the product of my abilities. Or an impending brain hemorrhage.
Part of me was rooting for the last one.
I pulled my hand back slightly and looked out at Detective Inspector Matthew Webster with one eye only. He gave me that smile and cocked his head invitingly. “Arghhhh,” I said, aloud this time. “Fine. I’ll canvas with you.” I saw his smile widen in victory. “But if we find nothing, I’m out of here so fast it’ll shatter your windows from the sonic boom. Deal?”
“Absolutely,” Webster said and stood, tugging his long tan coat free of the chair and then sliding it back under his desk. “Shall we, then?”
“We shall,” I said and followed him out. And I wondered why the hell I was doing this.
Then I saw him walk in front of me with the coat folded over his arm instead of blocking the view of his backside, and I knew exactly why I was doing it.
Chapter 5
Webster broke the silence as we rolled along the London streets. “You know, I saw you on the news.” I glanced to the side and he blushed, briefly, before expounding. “When it happened, you know.”
“You and everybody else in the world,” I said. This was all old hat to me by now.
“The whole world, eh?” Webster smiled. It was disarming.
I looked away in order to keep composed. “I went to China for a diplomatic mission last year, trying to foster cooperation because they lost pretty much all their metas at the opening of the war. This guy on the street recognized me and asked me if I could turn into a flaming dragon for him.” Technically, I could do that. I’d done it on footage that had millions of hits on YouTube. Of course, I hadn’t known I was being filmed at the time, and I hadn’t done it since.
Webster paused before answering. “I suppose it’s a rather impressive party trick.”
I just blinked, looking straight ahead out the rain-dappled windshield. “I think that’s the sort of trick that would send most people with any sense running from the party.”
“I suppose I’ve never been all that sensible,” Webster said, turning his attention back to the road. I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye. He was smiling faintly.
“Know your limits,” I said, keeping an eye on him.
“A wise practice in general,” he replied. “Do you follow your own advice?”
“I have no limits,” I said quietly, looking back at the road as he accelerated through a green light.
“You say it like it’s a bad thing.”
I paused before answering, giving it some thought. “It’s not an easy thing, that’s for sure. Finding out you’ve got power—real power, the kind that has a real purpose behind it—and knowing you have to use it responsibly? It’s not quite as glamorous or glorious as you might imagine.”
“If you’ll forgive me saying so,” Webster said, nudging the car gently into a turn, “you sound like you’re a bit… worn out.”
“Probably.”
“Maybe you should seriously take that holiday. An actual one.”
“Can’t,” I said. “Every time I leave for a few days my life gets measurably worse. There’s only so much of me to go around, you know.”
“So you do have a limit,” he said, and I caught him smirking faintly.
“My patience is certainly limited.” I kept it relatively gentle, and by his expression I could tell he took it as banter. Which was good. Seriousness was my biggest drawback, and frankly, he was right. I did have limits. Except in the area of metahuman power. No one could match me there, at least no one I’d met in the last few years.
In that one area, I was limitless.
“So you’re… super strong, right?” Webster was eyeing me again. I was familiar with this sort of curiosity. I’d been on the receiving end of it more times than I could count when I went out in the field and had to cooperate with local law enforcement, other federal agencies, or even just people on the street.
“Yes.”
“And then there’s the whole dragon bit,” he said. “The flames are a nice touch, by the way.”
“Thanks,” I said. “But the fire is an independent thing. I just combined them when I had to kill Sovereign, that’s all.”
“You shot some sort of light at him, as well,” Webster said. “Some kind of web or something.”
“It’s a net,” I said. “Made of light. It’s pretty strong, tough to break out of.” I’d used it a lot lately. For the last couple years, actually. It was my non-lethal option for confining and restraining.
“And you can fly?”
“It’s how I got here so fast,” I said.
“You flew over without a plane?” Webster looked slightly astonished. “I mean, I knew they picked you up outside the city. When you said you’d flown into an empty field, I assumed—”
“It’s a nine-hour flight from Minneapolis,” I said. “Only leaves during normal airport operating hours. I wouldn’t have been here until tomorrow if I’d gone commercial.” I ran a hand back through my long, dark hair, which still felt a little frizzed even though I’d tried to contain it in a ponytail while I rode into London in the Foreign Office car.
“That means you must be able to fly at ridiculous speeds,” he said, not taking his eyes off of me. I gestured toward the road. He looked back with a hint of contrition but kept stealing glances at me.
“Supersonic, yeah,” I said. “At least until I hit the coast of Ireland, then I had to turn it down a little bit.”
“My God,” Webster said, shaking his head. “Why not just fly right into the middle of the city?”
“Your government,” I said with a slight tug of a smile at the corner of my mouth. “They didn’t want me flying where I can be seen. Apparently they want to sleep with me, they just don’t want to be seen with me the next morning.”
“Ah, yes, well,” he said, clearing hi
s throat—out of embarrassment, I suspected. I thought his next question was going to be some variation of “What else can you do?” but he kept it in check. After a moment’s silence, he followed up with a question I did not expect. “So, with all that power at your fingertips, why did you decide to run yourself ragged working for your government?”
I opened my mouth and it hung like that for a moment. That was not a question I was used to getting. I had an answer anyway. “Because if I didn’t,” I said, “who would?”
He looked over, met my eyes, and nodded once. I would have sworn I saw a hint of sadness or something within them, but I wrote it off as me not knowing him very well. We lapsed into a comfortable silence, lulled by the quiet tapping of the rain at the windshield and the gentle thrum of the car’s engine as we drove onward.
Chapter 6
Philip had to take a good long scrub after finishing with the old man. He wasn’t dead, the crotchety old bastard, but Philip suspected he wanted to be. No one could lose that much skin and be sanguine about it. Except in the other sense of the word sanguine, of course—the bloody one.
“This is it?” he asked, taking a good long look out the window of the car. It was raining of course, as the London sky was prone to do, grey clouds hanging in a low ceiling over the scene. But he could still see the small house across the street. He had to look across the driver to see it, a worn-down brick house far on the outskirts. They’d been driving for a while to get here.
“This is it,” Liliana Negrescu said to him, her low, harsh voice tinged with a Romanian accent. She’d been living in London for years, he knew, but showed little sign of ever fully adapting. She was a sharp-faced girl—and she still looked like a girl, except in the darkness, where she looked like a scary, hard-edged witch he wouldn’t care to trifle with. Her dark hair was pulled back tight, and her black eyes flitted to look at the house.
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