by C. E. Murphy
“Maybe you’ll get lucky,” Margrit offered hollowly. “I’m sorry,” she repeated. “I know I said thanks for coming here, but thank you again. I didn’t know there’d been another murder. I’m surprised you could come.”
Tony pulled a thin smile. “It lets me put off going back to the station and getting busted for letting the city go to hell in the past week. Let’s go upstairs. I’ll see if there’s anything left that might be helpful.”
“Thanks,” Margrit repeated quietly, and took the lead. Guilt was assuaged by anger as she pushed the door open, the room’s emptiness echoing back at her. “She’s gone.”
Tony sighed, looking around. “So’s everything she owned. It doesn’t look like a kidnapping to me, Grit. It looks like she packed up and moved away.”
“Inside a few hours, without telling me?”
“Margrit.” Tony reached for her hands, then stopped, unsure of his welcome. The distance between them she thought suddenly seemed uncrossable, with too many sharp words lying there, waiting to cut again.
Too many secrets. Only a handful of days ago they’d stood on the edge of trying to build a life together. More had changed in that time than Margrit could wholly fathom. She had changed more in that span of days than she could explain.
She put her hand out abruptly, bridging the space Tony had hesitated to breach. He took it carefully, his grip warm and strong, and stepped a little closer, ducking his head toward hers. “Maybe she’s just found a better place and hasn’t had time to tell you yet.”
“In two hours?”
Hope slid out of the detective’s eyes. “Grit, I know you’re upset, but yelling isn’t going to help.”
She sighed and manifested a brief smile. “I thought you boys from big Italian families solved everything by yelling.”
“Well, you know,” Tony said with a deadpan shrug. “It’s all that NYPD sensitivity training.”
Surprise caught Margrit out and she laughed. “That must be it.” The laughter faded away as she glanced around the apartment again. “Tony, I’m worried about her. I’m afraid the neighbors who tore up her apartment came back to finish the job. If I’m going to pursue this injunction, I’m going to need her as the plaintiff, and to be there looking fragile and pathetic. Her and Deirdre. Dammit. Dammit!”
Margrit pulled away and stalked to the window, frustration and anger reasserting themselves as she spoke. “Russell may not even agree to go forward with this if we don’t have her. Cara’s a great victim.” Hypocrite, she told herself. Even hating to have her own physical aspects played on, she would still use Cara’s for every advantage they could provide. “Things are totally out of control.”
“It can’t be that bad.” Tony followed her, stopping just far enough away to not be intrusive. “Look. I’ll put out an APB on her, okay?”
“Yeah. Shit.” Margrit turned to slide down the wall, lacing her fingers behind her lowered head. Her fingers protested and she flexed them cautiously, trying to work some of the ache out. “This just feels like a last straw. You wouldn’t believe some of this shit, Tony.”
The detective slid down beside her. “Try me.”
“I would if I could.” She lifted her head enough to stare at her own feet. “Janx tipped you off about Alban being at my place the other night, didn’t he? That’s why you asked me about him.”
Tony didn’t answer. Margrit glanced at him, discovering his expression was tight. She lifted an eyebrow and he wet his lips, evading answering with a question of his own: “Why’d you go to him?”
“A friend of Alban’s said he might know something about the murders.” Margrit huffed a laugh at her fast and loose version of the truth, but shrugged it off. “It was the first time I’d heard of him, except when you’d asked me who he was. Your turn.”
“It was him.” Tony sighed. “We’ve always got somebody on him. He made a pay-phone call the same time the tip came in. Besides, I’ve listened in on enough of his conversations to know that voice. Sounds like a used-car salesman. Oily.”
Alarm clustered in Margrit’s stomach, making hairs stand up on her arms despite her sweater. “You’ve got him bugged?”
“No. We try, but the bugs never last for more than a couple hours. Something always fritzes ’em out, even in public places. It’s like he’s got some kind of antibug aura.”
Malik, Margrit thought, though aloud she said, “Great. Just what you need. An unbuggable bad guy. Is that how you found the room beneath Trinity Church? A helpful tip from the friendly neighborhood crime lord?”
Tony slid another glance at her, then looked away. “I lost you outside Huo’s on Saturday night.”
“Dammit! I knew it! You were following me!”
“You were my only lead, Grit,” he said without apology. “When we lost you I…” He exhaled a deep sigh. “I went to see Janx myself.”
“You what? Jesus, Tony, you don’t know what you’re dealing with there.” Margrit clenched her teeth, torn between wanting to protect her erstwhile lover and being unable to betray Alban and the Old Races’ secrets. Worry bubbled in her stomach and she wrapped her arms around herself. “You’ve got to be careful.”
He gave her another sideways look, a smile playing at his mouth. “You’re saying this to me? Janx and I go back a ways, Grit. I’ve been on him for years and he knows it. Cat and mouse game.” He shrugged. “Maybe he figures giving me a heads-up on a guy who might be killing women all over the city will commute some of his sentence when I finally make the arrest. So did he know anything?”
Margrit pulled her head down until her upper spine cracked. She sighed, feeling tension release with the popping nitrogen. “I wish.”
“You telling me the truth?”
Margrit smiled. “I thought you believed people were basically honest, Tony.”
“I do. I also know you’ve been keeping things from me all along with this goddamn investigation.” There was no heat in the detective’s voice, just weariness.
“You haven’t been exactly forthcoming yourself,” Margrit said, but nodded against her knees.
“I want this thing over with. I want our lives back, Grit. Just you and me and our breakups. Like it used to be, without your new friend in the picture.”
“Alban’s not…” She had no words for what Alban was or wasn’t. Not human whispered through her mind again, and she sighed. “It shouldn’t matter.”
“It does matter, Grit. I don’t know who the guy is and I don’t like that you’ve been covering for him. If there’s something going on, don’t I deserve to know?”
Margrit released her head, turning to look at the dark-haired man by her side. “Nothing’s going on.” It was as much an untruth as anything Janx or Daisani had said to her. “Nothing like you’re thinking.” Warmth crept up her body and she lowered her head again, hiding any telltale blush that might color her cheeks. “We’ll see what happens. Right now I’m going to see if I can find anything out about where Cara might have gone. I’ll talk to Daisani if I have to.”
“You think Eliseo Daisani disappeared your client?”
“Under the circumstances, I think it’s not beyond the realm of possibility, although I wouldn’t say it in a court of law just yet. If you’ll put out that APB…”
“Yeah.” Tony got to his feet and offered her a hand. “I will. It might take awhile. There’s a lot of shit to clean up after this murder. I’ll do my best, Grit, okay?”
“Thank you.” Margrit hesitated, then let him pull her to her feet. “I owe you one, Tony.”
“Yeah.” He crooked a faint, uncertain smile, still holding her hand. “We better?”
“Better than what, Tony? We’re not together. I mean, you can’t think we are. Not with…” She trailed off, unwilling to discuss recriminations and recognizing too clearly their same old pattern in her reluctance. “This still isn’t the time to talk about it. I’ve got to find Cara, and you…”
Tony whitened his lips, then nodded, expression unreadable. �
�I have to go explain to my boss why there’s another dead woman in the park.” He let her go without trying for a kiss, his face still drawn and serious. “Be careful, Margrit.”
“Yeah. You, too.” Margrit turned back to face the empty apartment so she didn’t have to watch him go.
TWENTY-SIX
AFTER A LIFETIME of not knowing gargoyles hid in the city’s shadows, Margrit’s irritation at being unable to find the one she sought was blown out of proportion. Having Janx’s Cruiser made both her irritation and her inability greater: convenient as a car was, she couldn’t watch the sky while she drove. Fingers tapping against the wheel, Margrit guided the vehicle toward downtown, wondering if she might find somewhere to park it at or near the Legal Aid building on Water Street.
Work. A wince tweaked her. The weekend was gone and she hadn’t been near the office, much less spent the hours putting together supporting documents for the injunction that she’d promised she would. She thought of the Russell will kill you file folder and let a deep breath turn into a sigh. He’d have to kill her. There was no way to turn back the weekend and be in two places at once.
Besides, with Cara missing, there might be no case for the injunction anyway. Margrit swore under her breath and pushed away thought in favor of concentrating on driving. Minutes later she pulled into a downtown parking garage and took the ticket, trying not to think of how much the fee would be for overnight parking. Maybe she could deliver the stub to Janx and let him pick the car up himself.
The idea brought a grin to her face and she left the garage cheerfully, stretching her legs into a jog. Huo’s on First was close, and if anyone had a sense of where Alban might have hidden in the moments before sunrise, Chelsea seemed a likely candidate. Margrit came up the steps to the bookstore two at a time, cheeks pink from exertion. Chelsea appeared from the stacks with a look of amusement. “There you are. Who’s after you?”
“Nobody, I hope.” Margrit folded her arms over her chest. “I can’t find Alban. He suggested meeting here before, so I hoped…have you seen him?”
Chelsea tilted her head toward the beaded curtain at the back of her store, smile warming. “He’s waiting for you.”
Margrit jolted, a few quick steps sending her through the rattling curtain. Alban stood in time to catch her as she flung her arms around his neck. Even in human form, his scent was cold stone, the clean smell of earth after rain. Margrit inhaled deeply, tightening her arms around him and trying not to let herself think beyond the warmth and safety she found in his embrace. “Where the hell have you been? I’ve been trying to find you all night. I thought maybe something’d gone wrong this morning, at sunrise.”
He closed his arms around her carefully, as if she might be fragile. “I landed a few blocks from your building just before dawn. Perhaps I should have just gone to the top of yours, but I thought if anyone knew where you lived…I was careless,” he admitted. “I haven’t been that incautious in centuries. I won’t do it again.” He shifted his weight back so he could look down at her. “After I checked your home and saw you weren’t there, I came here. I hoped you’d think to. I’d have called your cell phone if I’d known the number.”
“It doesn’t work anymore. Malik phased it into oblivion.”
“Malik?” Alban’s voice rose with alarm. “You’ve seen Janx?”
“I’ve been busy since I saw you.” The words seemed so inadequate she laughed and cast a helpless glance upward. “I haven’t done my laundry, though. It’s Sunday, right?”
“It is,” Alban said, bemused. “Laundry?”
“That was my big plan for Sunday. Laundry and cleaning the bathroom. Maybe watch the Superbowl. I wonder who won.” She breathed a laugh and ducked her head. “How did I end up chasing down murderers and gargoyles instead?” She held up a hand to stop his reply, wincing at her purpling fingers. “Rhetorical question. Lawyers like those. Janx set us up, Alban. He sent us after Grace O’Malley so he’d have time to hire a copycat killer. Vanessa Gray was murdered last night.”
Alban’s eyes widened, palpable shock rolling off him. “Daisani’s assistant? That Vanessa Gray?”
“That one.”
Alban whistled, a long high sound of wind howling through stone, and Margrit looked at him in surprise. “You can whistle?”
His eyebrows wrinkled. “Can’t you?”
“Of course, but it’s so frivolous. You’re sort of stolid. I wouldn’t have thought whistling was in a gargoyle’s nature.”
Alban chuckled. “I don’t do it often.” Laughter faded into concern. “Do you understand what Gray’s death means, Margrit?”
“That Daisani’s schedule will be messed up for a week?” Margrit lifted her hand again, dismissing her own flippancy. “I know that Daisani hauled me in this afternoon to tell me I was personally responsible for apprehending the killer. He knows Janx is behind it, but he won’t go after him.”
“Personally responsible.” Alban’s voice became quiet. “Had he said that to me, Margrit, my inclination would be to run.”
“I did,” Margrit admitted in a mumble. “After I threw up.” She stepped out of the gargoyle’s embrace, shrugging. “But not far, because can you imagine any place on earth that he couldn’t find me, if I ran? I can’t, and I’m pretty damn sure if there was somewhere, it wouldn’t be an island paradise in the Bahamas.”
“Mmm. It may be worth considering, regardless.”
“I’m not going to run, Alban. Besides, I might’ve gotten a lead. I had to borrow Janx’s cell phone after Malik zotted mine, and I found an overseas number. Maybe it’s a place to start. I called Tony with it.”
“Tony. Your detective.” The words were half a question, and Margrit felt her shoulders go stiff and uncomfortable.
“Not exactly mine. It’s complicated.” She lifted both hands, index fingers pointed upward, and ducked her head toward them, bringing her thoughts under control. “Not the point. Gray’s death was the point. I thought I knew what it meant. Is it more than a thorn in Daisani’s side?”
“Far more.” Alban’s voice dropped and he turned to lean on the table. It creaked beneath his weight, and Margrit winced, taking an inadvertent step backward. “Gray had been with Daisani since the eighteen eighties.”
Margrit tilted her head, scrubbing a finger against her ear. “I’m sorry, what did you say? The early eighties? She must’ve started working for him when she was about fourteen, then.”
Alban looked down at her. “The eighteen eighties.”
Incredulous laughter broke from Margrit’s throat. “The woman was only forty years old.”
“Vanessa Gray has been Eliseo Daisani’s assistant—among other things—since eighteen eighty-three. Some of the stories about vampires are true.”
A cold wave ran through Margrit, numbing her fingers. “What, he made her a vampire?”
Alban shook his head. “No more than I could be made human. But a taste of a vampire’s blood can bring long life, Margrit. Very long life. I’m sure the records claim a line of descent, family working for family for generations, but it’s the same woman. She was well over a hundred years old.”
“People don’t live that long,” Margrit whispered. The memory of a photograph, an austere bob-haired Vanessa Gray standing beside Dominic Daisani, flashed through her mind. “Jesus. That picture at Daisani’s office. It’s them, isn’t it? Not their grandparents.”
Alban inclined his head marginally. “Eliseo Daisani’s blood could turn New York into the City of Youth for three generations. Vanessa Gray might have been expected to live centuries, if she’d been allowed to—age naturally, for lack of a better phrase. The blood of vampires is potent stuff.”
“So Janx really won this round,” Margrit whispered. “Does this kind of thing happen a lot?”
“No. It precipitates a kind of war, Margrit. Brief and violent and destructive. Perhaps a battle more than a war,” he said with a quick wave of his hand. “We can’t afford wars.”
“There
aren’t enough of you,” Margrit murmured.
“And wars tend to be noticed. Especially when fought in the streets of human urban centers.”
Margrit nodded, only half listening. “Who’s Janx’s second? Malik? Does that mean his life is on the line now?”
“That…is a difficult question. Yes,” Alban said abruptly. “Very probably. The difficulty is in how. We do not kill our own.”
“Malik’s not one of Daisani’s own.”
“We all are, in a way. We Old Races.”
“You have to hang together, or you’ll most surely hang separately?”
“As your founding fathers aptly said, yes.”
“Is that why Janx and Daisani haven’t killed each other?”
“I’m not certain they would anyway. They’re in the habit of one another, as well. They’ve been playing this game for a long time.” Alban lifted broad shoulders and let them fall again. “But Eliseo may make an example of Malik, despite convention.”
“Good,” Margrit said viciously, and lifted her chin in defiance as Alban’s eyebrows rose. “I don’t like him. He scares me.”
“Malik scares you.”
Margrit’s chin rose higher. “Yeah.”
“You bargain with Eliseo Daisani, Janx has gained three favors from you and Malik frightens you?” Humor colored Alban’s voice.
Margrit wrapped her arms around herself defensively. “Janx has his own kind of honor, and Daisani…I don’t think I’m even worth killing. Unless that number doesn’t pan out and the guy who killed Vanessa disappears for good. Then I’ll probably get to be a six-o’clock-news object lesson. But Malik would hurt me just because he could. What happens if Daisani takes Malik out?”
“In my youth he would have been exiled for such an action,” Alban said slowly. “But he held less power in the human world then. Exile from the Old Races would mean comparatively little to him, and those of us who have to deal with him would find ourselves doing so regardless of his status. I don’t know, Margrit. Perhaps something like war, after all.”
Exile. The word echoed in Margrit’s thoughts as she looked up at the gargoyle. “Exile. You mean he’d be an outcast?” She remembered clearly the curl of Cara’s lip, the sneer in her voice as she labeled Alban that outcast. The arrogance seemed all the more out of place knowing the selkies were considered mongrels among the Old Races, but the dichotomy hadn’t bothered the thin-boned young woman at all.