by Jim Butcher
Murphy put her hand on my neck and pressed me back down on the pillow beneath my head, which was, apparently, her jacket, because she wasn't wearing it. "Stay down," she growled. "How did you get here? Not in that heap of a car, I hope."
"The Beetle is doing its phoenix impression," I told her. "I've got a loaner. Look, I'll be fine. Just let me out of here, and I'll go home and get some sleep."
"You aren't in any shape to drive," Murphy said. "You're a menace. I'd have to arrest myself if I let you behind a wheel in your condition."
"Murph," I said, annoyed, "unless you can pay up what you owe me already, right now, I can't exactly afford a cab."
"Dream on, Harry," Murphy said. "And save your breath. I'll give you a ride home."
"I don't need a—" I began, but she got up from her knees and stalked out of her office.
Foolishness, I thought. Stupidity. I was perfectly capable of moving myself around. So I sat up and heaved myself to my feet.
Or tried to. I actually managed to half sit up. And then I just heaved.
Murphy came back in to find me curled on my side, her office stinking from where I'd thrown up. She didn't, for a change, say anything. She just knelt by me again, cleaned off my mouth, and put another cool cloth over the back of my neck.
I remember her helping me out to her car. I remember little pieces of the drive back to my apartment. I remember giving her the keys to the loaner, and mumbling something about Mike and the tow-truck driver.
But mostly I remember the way her hand felt on mine—cold with a little bit of nervousness to the soft fingers, small beneath my great gawking digits, and strong. She scolded and threatened me the entire way back to the apartment, I think. But I remember the way she made sure she held my hand, as though to assure herself that I was still there. Or to assure me that she was, that she wasn't going anywhere.
There's a reason I'll go out on a limb to help Murphy. She's good people. One of the best.
We got back to my apartment sometime before noon. Murphy helped me down the stairs and unlocked the door for me. Mister came running up and hurled himself against her legs in greeting. Maybe being short gives her better leverage or something, since she didn't really wobble when Mister rammed her, like I do. Or maybe it's the aikido.
"Christ, Harry," she muttered. "This place is dark." She tried the light switch, but the bulbs had burnt out last week, and I hadn't had the cash to replace them. So she sat me down on the couch and lit some candles off of the glowing coals in the fireplace. "All right," she said. "I'm putting you in bed."
"Well. If you insist."
The phone rang. It was in arm's reach so I picked it up. "Dresden," I mumbled.
"Mister Dresden, this is Linda. Linda Randall. Do you remember me?"
Heh. Do men remember the scene in the movie with Marilyn standing over the subway grating? I found myself remembering Linda Randall's eyes and wondering things a gentleman shouldn't.
"Are you naked?" I said. It took me a minute to register what I'd said. Whoops.
Murphy gave me an arch look. She stood up and walked into my bedroom, and busied herself straightening the covers and giving me a modicum of privacy. I felt cheered. My slip had thrown Murphy off better than any lie I could have managed. Maybe a woozy Harry was not necessarily a bad Harry.
Linda purred laughter into the phone. "I'm in the car right now, honey. Maybe later. Look, I've come up with a few things that might help you. Can you meet me tonight?"
I rubbed at my eyes. It was Saturday. Tonight was Saturday night. Wasn't there something I was supposed to do tonight?
To hell with it, I thought. It couldn't have been all that important if I couldn't even remember it. "Sure," I told her. "Fine."
She mmmmed into the phone. "You're such a gentleman. I like that, once in a while. I get off at seven. All right? Do you want to meet me? Say at eight?"
"My car exploded," I said. My tongue felt fuzzy. "I can meet you at the 7-Eleven down the street from my apartment."
She poured that rich, creamy laughter into my ear again. "Tell you what. Give me an extra hour or so to go home, get a nice hot bath, make myself all pretty, and then I'll be there in your arms. Sound good to you?"
"Well. Okay."
She laughed again, and didn't say good-bye before disconnecting.
Murphy appeared again as soon as I hung up the phone. "Tell me you didn't just make a date, Dresden."
"You're just jealous."
Murphy snorted. "Please. I need more of a man than you to keep me happy." She started to get an arm beneath me to help me up. "You'd break like a dry stick, Dresden. You'd better get to bed before you get any more delusions."
I put a hand against her shoulder to push her back. I didn't have that kind of strength, but she backed off, frowning. "What?"
"Something," I said. I rubbed at my eyes. Something was bothering me. I was forgetting something, I was sure of it. Something I said I would do on Saturday. I struggled to push thoughts of drug wars and people driven mad by the Third Sight visions given them by the ThreeEye drug, and tried to concentrate.
It didn't take long to click. Monica. I had told her I would get in contact with her. I patted at my duster pockets until I found my notepad, and took it out. Fumbled it open, and waved at Murphy.
"Candle. Need to read something."
"Christ, Dresden. I swear you're at least as bad as my first husband. He was stubborn enough to kill himself, too." She sighed, and brought a candle over. The light hurt my eyes for a moment. I made out Monica's number and I dialed her up.
"Hello?" a male child's voice asked.
"Hi," I said. "I need to speak to Monica, please."
"Who's this?"
I remembered I was working for her on the sly and answered, "Her fourth cousin, Harry, from Vermont."
" 'Kay," the kid said. "Hold on." Then he screamed, without lowering the mouthpiece of the phone from his lips, "MOM! YOUR COUSIN HARRY FROM VERMONT IS ON THE PHONE LONG-DISTANCE!"
Kids. You gotta love them. I adore children. A little salt, a squeeze of lemon—perfect.
I waited for the pounding in my head to resolve into mere agony as the kid dropped the phone and ran off, feet thumping on a hardwood floor.
A moment later, there was the rattle of the phone being picked up, and Monica's quiet, somewhat nervous voice said, "Um. Hello?"
"It's Harry Dresden," I told her. "I just wanted to call to let you know what I'd been able to find out for y—"
"I'm sorry," she interrupted me. "I don't, um … need any of those."
I blinked. "Uh, Monica Sells?" I read her the phone number.
"Yes, yes," she said, her voice hurried, impatient. "We don't need any help, thank you."
"Is this a bad time?"
"No. No, it's not that. I just wanted to cancel my order. Discontinue the service. Don't worry about me." There was an odd quality to her voice, as though she were forcing a housewife's good cheer into it.
"Cancel? You don't want me looking for your husband anymore? But ma'am, the money—" The phone began to buzz and static made the line fuzzy. I thought I heard a voice in the background, somewhere, and then the sound went dead except for the static. For a moment, I thought I'd lost the connection entirely. Blasted unreliable phones. Usually, they messed up on my end, not on the receiving end. You can't even trust them to foul up dependably.
"Hello? Hello?" I said, cross and grumpy.
Monica's voice returned. "Don't worry about that. Thank you so much for all of your help. Good day, bye-bye, thank you." Then she hung up on me.
I took the phone away from my ear and stared at it. "Bizarre," I said.
"Come on, Harry," Murphy said. She took the phone from my hand and planted it firmly in its cradle.
"Aww, mom. It's not even dark yet." I made the lame joke to try to think about something besides how terribly my head was going to hurt when Murphy helped me up. She did. It did. We hobbled into the bedroom and when I stretched out on the cool she
ets I was reasonably certain I was going to set down roots.
Murphy took my temperature and felt my scalp with her fingers, careful around the goose egg on the back of my skull. She shined a penlight into my eyes, which I did not like. She also got me a drink of water, which I did like, and had me swallow a couple of aspirin or Tylenol or something.
I only remember two more things about that morning. One was Murphy stripping me out of my shirt, boots, and socks, and leaning down to kiss my forehead and ruffle my hair. Then she covered me up with blankets and put out the lights. Mister crawled up and lay down across my legs, purring like a small diesel engine, comforting.
The second thing I remember was the phone ringing again. Murphy was just about to leave, her car keys rattling in her hand. I heard her turn back to pick up the phone, and say, "Harry Dresden's residence."
There was a silence.
"Hello?" Murphy said.
After another pause Murphy appeared in the doorway, a small shadow, looking down at me. "Wrong number. Get some rest, Harry."
"Thanks, Karrin." I smiled at her, or tried to. It must have looked ghastly. She smiled back, and I'm sure hers was nicer than mine.
She left then. The apartment got dark and quiet. Mister continued to rumble soothingly in the dark.
It kept nagging at me, even as I fell asleep. What had I forgotten? And another, less sensible question—who had been on the line who hadn't wanted to speak to Murphy? Had Monica Sells tried to call me back? Why would she call me off the case and tell me to keep the money?
I pondered that, and baseball bats and other matters until Mister's purring put me to sleep.
Chapter Thirteen
I woke up when thunder rattled the old house above me.
True dark had fallen. I had no idea of what time it was. I lay in bed for a moment, confused and a little dizzy. There was a warm spot on my legs, where Mister must have been until a few moments before, but the big grey cat was nowhere to be seen. He was a chicken about thunderstorms.
Rain was coming down in sheets. I could hear it, on the concrete outside and on the old building above me. It creaked and swayed in the spring thunderstorm and the wind, timbers gently flexing, wise enough with age to give a little, rather than put up stubborn resistance until they broke. I could probably stand to learn something from that.
My stomach was growling. I got out of bed, wobbled a little, and rooted about for my robe. I couldn't find it in the dark, but came across my duster where Murphy had left it on a chair, neatly folded. Laying on top of it was a scattering of cash, along with a napkin bearing the words "You will pay me back.—Murphy." I scowled at the money and tried to ignore the flash of gratitude I felt. I picked up my duster and tugged it on over my bare chest. Then I padded on naked feet out into the living room.
Thunder rumbled again, growling outside. I could feel the storm, in a way that a lot of people can't, and that most of those who can put down to nerves. It was raw energy up there, naked and pulsing through the clouds. I could feel the water in the rain and clouds, the moving air blowing the droplets in gusts against the walls of the house above. I could sense, waiting, the fire of the deadly lightning, leaping from cloud to cloud above and seeking a path of least resistance to the patient, timeless earth that bore the brunt of the storm's attack. All four elements, interacting, moving, energy flashing from place to place in each of its forms. There was a lot of potential in storms, that a sorcerer could tap into if he was desperate or stupid enough. A lot of energy to be used, up there, where the forces of ancient nature brawled and tumbled.
I frowned, thinking about that. It hadn't occurred to me before. Had there been a storm on Wednesday night? Yes, there had. I remember thunder waking me for a few moments in the hours before dawn. Could our killer have tapped into it to fuel his spells? Possibly. It bore looking into. Such tapped magic was often too unstable or volatile to use in such a carefully directed fashion.
Lightning flashed again, and I counted three or four seconds before the rumble reached me. If the killer was using the storms, it would make sense that if he or she were to strike again, it would happen tonight. I shivered.
My stomach growled, and more mundane matters took my attention. My head was feeling somewhat better. I wasn't dizzy anymore. My stomach was furious with me—like a lot of tall, skinny men, I eat endlessly, but it never stays on. I have no idea why. I shambled into the kitchen and started building up the grill.
"Mister?" I called. "You hungry, bud? I'm gonna fry up some burgers, mmm, mmm, mmm."
Lightning flashed again, closer this time, the thunder following right on its heels. The flash was bright enough to sear through my half-sunken windows and make me wince against it. But, in the flash of light, I caught sight of Mister.
The cat was up on the top of my bookshelf, in the far corner of the apartment—as far as it was possible to get away from my front door. He was watching it, his eyes luminous in the half dark, and though he had the cat-lazy look of any lounging feline, his ears were tilted forward, and his gaze focused unwaveringly upon the door. If he'd had a tail, it would have been twitching.
There came a knocking, a rapping, at my chamber door.
Maybe it was the storm making me nervous, but I quested out with my senses, feeling for any threat that might have been there. The storm made a mess of things, and all of that noise, both physical and spiritual, kept me from being able to tell anything more than that there was someone outside my door.
I felt in the pocket of my duster for the gun—but I remembered that I had set it aside in the lab last night and not taken it with me down to the police station. Police don't take kindly to anyone but police toting firearms inside the station, don't ask me why. In any case, it was out of easy reach now.
And then I remembered that Linda Randall was supposed to be showing up. I berated myself for getting spooked so easily, and then again for sleeping so long, and then again for looking and smelling like I hadn't showered in a couple of days or combed my hair or shaved or anything else that might have made me marginally less unappealing. Ah, well. I got the impression that with Linda, that sort of thing didn't seem to matter too much. Maybe she was into eau des hommes.
I walked over to the door and opened it, smoothing back my hair with one hand and trying to keep a sheepish grin off of my face.
Susan Rodriguez waited outside in the rain, her black umbrella held above her. She wore a khaki trench coat and an expensive black dress beneath it, with heels. Pearls shone at her throat and ears. She blinked at me when I appeared in the door. "Harry?" I stared at her. Oh my gosh. I had forgotten my date with Susan. How in the world could I have forgotten that? I mean, the White Council, the police, vampires, concussions, junkies, mob bosses, and baseball-bat-swinging thugs notwithstanding—
Well, no. There probably weren't any women incredible enough to make me keep my mind on them through all of that. But all the same, it seemed a little rude of me.
"Hi, Susan," I said, lamely. I peered past her. When had Susan said she was going to show up? Nine? And when had Linda said? Eight—no, wait. She'd said eight o'clock at first, and then said she'd be by in another hour after that. At nine. Hooboy. This was not going to be pretty.
Susan read me like a book and glanced back behind her in the rain, before looking back up at me. "Expecting someone, Harry?"
"Not exactly," I told her. "Uh, well. Maybe. Look, come on in. You're getting drenched." Which wasn't exactly true. I was getting drenched, my bare feet soaked, standing there in the open door, the wind blowing rain down the stairway at me.
Susan's mouth quirked in a malicious, predatory little smile, and she came in, folding down her umbrella and brushing past me. "This is your apartment?"
"Nah," I told her. "This is my summer home in Zurich." She eyed me as I closed the door, took her coat, and hung it up on a tall old wooden hat stand near the doorway.
Susan turned away from me as I hung up her coat. Her dress showed her back, the long curve of her
spine, all the way down to her waist. It had a fairly tame hemline, and long, tight sleeves. I liked it. A lot. She let me see her back for a while as she walked away from me, toward the fireplace, then slowly turned to face me, smirking, leaning one smooth hip on the couch. Her midnight hair was bound up on top of her head, displaying a long and slender neck, her skin an advertisement for something smooth and wonderful. Her lips quirked up at the corners, and she narrowed her dark, flashing eyes at me. "The police having you put in overtime, Harry?" she drawled. "The killings must be sensational. Major crime figure, murdered with magic. Care to make a statement?"
I winced. She was still hunting for an angle for the Arcane. "Sure," I told her. Her eyes widened in surprise. "I need a shower," I said. "I'll be right back. Mister, keep an eye on the lady, eh?"
Susan gave me a little roll of her eyes, then glanced up and studied Mister on his perch on the bookcase. Mister, for his part, flicked an ear and continued staring at the door.
More thunder rumbled overhead.
I lit a few candles for her, then took one with me into the bathroom. Think, Harry. Get awake, and get your head clear. What to do?
Get clean, I told myself. You smell like a horse. Get some cool water over your head and work this out. Linda Randall is going to be here in a minute, and you need to figure out how to keep Susan from prying her nose into the murders.
So advised, I agreed with myself and hurriedly got undressed and into the shower. I don't use a water heater, and consequently I am more than used to cold showers. Actually, given how often I, and wizards in general, get to date actual real women, maybe that's just as well.
I was just lathering up with shampoo when the lightning got a lot worse, the thunder a lot louder, the rain a lot harder. The height of the storm had hit the old house and hit it hard. It was almost possible to see clearly in the violent electrical discharge. Almost impossible to hear over the thunder. But I caught a flicker of motion out of the corner of my eye, a shadow that moved across the sunken window (covered by modest curtains) in the bathroom. Someone was moving toward the stairs down to my apartment.