Walters would be needing to recoup. He’d need to redeem himself in the public eye. Though my guards and I knew that he’d had no chance to prevent what had happened, the humans wouldn’t accept it. The major had been in charge. He’d take the fall. It was simply how they thought.
Christine, my aunt’s secretary, was petite, well-endowed, and more plump than was the fashion. In her day she’d been perfect. Her blond hair curled over her shoulders, and her youthful face was eternally beautiful. One of our noblemen had lured her away centuries ago, but he’d grown tired of her. To stay in faerie she needed to be useful, so she learned shorthand and computer skills. She was probably one of the most technologically savvy people in either court.
She suggested that we call the Bureau of Human and Fey Affairs. Logical, I suppose, but they were more useful for social difficulties or diplomatic problems. If you want something done, don’t call a politician or a bureaucrat. Call a cop.
I took a deep breath, said a little prayer to the Goddess, and dialed the number the secretary had given me.
He answered on the second ring. “Your Highness,” he said.
He must have had caller I.D. “Not exactly,” I said. “Princess Meredith, actually.”
His first words had been professional, his next held the hint of suspicion. “Princess, to what do I owe this honor.” In fact, he sounded positively hostile.
“You sound angry at me, Major Walters.”
“The newspapers say you don’t trust my men to keep you safe. That human cops aren’t good enough for your guard detail.”
I hadn’t expected him to be so blunt. He was more cop than politician. “I can only say that I never even hinted to the media that I doubted your men.”
“Then why were we barred from the second press conference?”
Hmm, that was a sticky wicket. “You and I both know that it was a spell that made your officer shoot at me, correct?”
“Yeah, our unit psychic found the magical remnants on him.”
“I’m safer here in the sithen, but your officers won’t be. Someone did a spell in a building of metal girders and beams, with technology all over the place. Put that same spell caster inside the sithen, inside faerie, with no damper of metal and technology on them, and your officers would be in even greater danger of being bespelled.”
“What about the human reporters; aren’t they in danger of being bespelled?”
“They aren’t armed,” I said. “They can’t do that much damage.”
“So we just aren’t up to your standards, is that it?” He was angry, and I wasn’t sure why.
The queen’s secretary must have caught enough of the conversation to give me a hint. She flashed the headline of the St. Louis Post Dispatch: POLICE FAIL TO PROTECT THE PRINCESS. Oh.
“Major Walters, I’ve just been shown a newspaper. My apologies for not understanding the effect this situation was having on your life. I was a little too preoccupied with my own being in danger.”
“I don’t need your apologies, Princess. I need my men to be good enough to protect you at public events.”
“How much crap are you getting about what happened? Are they trying to scapegoat you?”
“That’s not your business,” he said, which was almost as good as a yes.
“I think we can help each other, Major.”
“How?”
“You sitting down?”
“Yeah,” and that one word was not happy.
I told him the briefest version I knew about the reporter and Beatrice, and that the queen had given it to me to clean up.
There was utter silence on the other end of the phone for so long that I finally said, “Major, you still there?”
“I’m here,” he said, in a hoarse voice.
“I’m sorry that being on faerie duty has just gotten so horribly complicated. I’m sorry that it is screwing with your plans.”
“What do you know about my plans?”
“I know you want to be chief of security at a certain place of business when you retire early next year. I know you took the job as liaison to us for your résumé. I know that letting me get shot at probably didn’t win you any points at your soon-to-be new job.”
“You know a damn lot for a princess.”
I let that go, not sure if it was compliment or insult. “But what if I show, plainly, that I have utter confidence in you, Major Walters?”
“What do you want from me?” The suspicion was thick enough to walk on.
“I want a Crime Scene Unit down here. I’ve got the crime scene itself isolated, but I need science, not magic, on this one.”
“Didn’t you just lecture me about my men being in danger from enchantments if we came into your place?”
“Yes, that’s why I want only you, the CSU, and maybe one or two others, tops. My guards can protect you individually from magic if you are a small enough group.”
“The entire department is being crucified in the press, especially the St. Louis press.”
“I know that now. Let’s show them that Princess Meredith and her guards don’t believe all that bad press. I do have confidence in you, Major Walters. You and a good forensic unit. How about it, Major? Do you want to play, or do I leave you out of this? I can pretend I didn’t call, and just start with the chief of police.”
“Why didn’t you start with him?” Walters asked.
“Because you’re my police liaison. I respect that title. You’re who I’m supposed to call. Besides, you’re almost more motivated than I am to solve this case.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Don’t be naïve, Major Walters. The department is taking heat. They’ll hang someone for it, and it will most likely be you. Let me show the department that you still have my trust and they’ll back off. They’ll be desperate to solve this second violent episode and have someone to punish. They’ll fall all over themselves to give you anything I ask for.”
“You seem to know how it works.”
“Politics is politics, Major, and I was raised in the thick of it.” I sat on the edge of the desk and tried to get my shoulder to loosen up. The injured muscles had tightened sometime during the interview with the queen. Funny that, but now my arm ached, and that wasn’t funny, at all. Of all the things I missed with being part human, not healing instantly was one of the biggest envies I had. “I need a cop, Major Walters, not a politician. I need someone who understands that my crime scene is aging even as we speak. That valuable evidence may be getting contaminated right this minute. I need someone who will worry more about solving this mess than the political ramifications of it. I think you’re that man, and now that your political star runs beside mine, you are doubly motivated.”
“What makes you so sure of that? What makes you think I won’t cut my losses and run for the hills?”
I thought about that, and said, “The look in your eyes yesterday at the airport when you were angry with having to share leadership with Barinthus. The fact that you showed anger to me now on the phone rather than trying to toadie to me. I wasn’t sure with a rank as high as major, but you’re more cop than politician, Walters. And if you knew how little I like politics, you’d know what a compliment that is.”
“You seem pretty good at politicking for someone who doesn’t like the game.”
“I’m good at a lot of things that I don’t enjoy, Major Walters. As I’m sure you are.”
Silence again. “If we don’t solve this, my ass is grass, and no amount of confidence shown in me, by you or anyone else, will save it.”
“And if we solve it . . .” I said.
He laughed, a deep chuckle. “Then I’ll be the department’s shining star, and the executives will be climbing over themselves to give me an even bigger salary. Yeah.”
“Are you my man, or do I pretend that I didn’t make this call?”
“I’m your man.”
I smiled. “Good. You start making calls, and get me some CSU out here as soon as possible.�
�
“What do I tell the Chief about why you’re letting us into your precious faerie land?” he asked. Oh, yeah, he was definitely a better cop than politician.
“Explain that whoever did this has diplomatic immunity, but we are allowing this investigation to happen out of our mutual desire for cooperation and justice.”
“You want the bastard who did it, don’t you?”
“Yes,” I said.
“You probably don’t remember me—I was just another uniform keeping the crowd back—but I saw you the day your father died. They gave you his sword.”
If I’d had any doubts that I’d called the right person, that one sentence took them away. Out loud I said, “Yes, yes, they did.”
“Catching this bad guy won’t catch your father’s killer.”
“That is a very insightful remark for a man I’ve only met twice.”
“Well, I’ve been the uniform on faerie duty off and on.”
“My mistake, but it was still insightful, uncomfortably so.”
“Sorry. Sometime after we’ve caught this guy, and if faerie princesses have drinks with lowly police majors, I’ll tell you why I became a cop.”
It was my turn to be insightful. “You lost someone, and they didn’t catch the bastard who did it.”
“You knew that already.” He sounded accusatory.
“No, I swear I didn’t.”
“Then that was a hell of a guess.”
“Let’s just say that those of us who bear a particular wound recognize it in others.”
He made a humph sound, then sort of growled, “Yeah, I guess we do. What will you be doing while I make phone calls and get everyone out there?”
“I’ll be questioning witnesses.”
“You know, it’d be nice if I were there for the questioning.”
“Most of the fey who may have witnessed anything are ones who almost never travel outside of faerie. They’re a little shy around humans, especially humans in uniforms. They all remember the last great human-fey war.”
“That was almost four hundred years ago,” he said.
“I’m aware of that.”
“I’ll never get used to it.”
“What?”
“How you guys look so young, but you remember this country before my great–great–great-grandfather took a boat here.”
“Not me, Major. I’m just a poor mortal girl.”
“Poor my ass,” he said.
“I’ll let you know if we learn anything that’s useful from the witnesses.”
“I’d like to decide what’s useful and what’s not.”
“Then hurry up, Major, but I do not promise that any fey will talk to you. I can’t even promise that you’ll be in the room when I question everyone. Some of them will simply not talk to the human police.”
“Then why am I coming?”
“So that when the press follow us around we can stand shoulder to shoulder and show that you are helping solve this case. And bring the officer who shot at me with you.”
“Why in the name of God?”
“Because his career is ruined unless he gets a chance at this, too.”
“Won’t he be a danger to you?”
“We’ll give him a charm to help bolster his psychic shields. If I think he’s too fragile for the duty, I’ll let you know and we’ll escort him out.”
“Why do you care what happens to one young uniformed cop?”
“Because he could have gone his whole career and not ever had anything like this happen to him, if he’d only stayed away from the faeries. The least we can try and do is minimize the damage.”
“I’ll make calls now, but you puzzle me, Princess Meredith. You’re almost too nice to be true.” He hung up.
I put the phone back in its cradle. Too nice to be true. My father had taught me to be nice first, because you can always be mean later, but once you’ve been mean to someone, they won’t believe the nice anymore. So be nice, be nice, until it’s time to stop being nice, then destroy them. I wondered if he’d taken his own advice that summer’s day, or if he’d hesitated because someone facing him had been his friend. I would have given a great deal to find the person in question, and ask him.
CHAPTER 6
THERE WAS ANOTHER PHONE CALL I WANTED TO MAKE. I LOOKED at Christine’s smiling, pleasant face, and said, “Can you wait outside for a moment, Christine?”
She blinked big blue eyes at me, but took a deep breath, stood up, rustled out her full skirts, and left without a word. I couldn’t tell if I’d offended her, but then she was always hard to read. That she could smile and smile through everything the queen did in front of her always made me wonder about her. Did she enjoy the queen’s little shows, or did she not know what else to do?
With Christine gone I was left with Doyle, Barinthus, and Usna. Frost, Galen, Hawthorne, and Adair were at the door to make sure we weren’t interrupted. Besides, the office just wasn’t large enough for all of us. Not comfortably anyway. I trusted everyone but Usna. I didn’t know him well enough to trust him.
“Usna, wait out in the hall,” I said.
He gave me a little smile, but he didn’t argue. He just hesitated by the door. “Do you want me to send someone else to take my place?”
I thought about it, and said, “Galen.”
He gave a little bow, then opened the door and told Galen to come in. Galen looked a question at me as he closed the door behind him.
“I’m going to call Gillett.”
Galen was shaking his head. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
“Who is Gillett?” Barinthus asked.
“He was one of the federal agents who investigated Prince Essus’s murder,” Doyle said.
“I don’t know why I’m surprised that you remember that, but I am,” I said.
Doyle looked at me, and his face was unreadable, dark and closed to me. “Gillett was the most persistent of all the human investigators.”
I nodded. “Yes, he was.”
“You’ve been in touch with him?” Doyle asked.
“More like he kept in touch with me, Doyle. I was seventeen, and he seemed to be the only one who wanted to solve my father’s murder more than he wanted to obey the queen or his superiors.”
Doyle took in a lot of air, and let it out slow. “And Galen knew of this?”
“Yes,” Galen said.
“And it never occurred to you to tell your captain that the princess was keeping in touch with a federal officer?”
“It made Merry feel better, and just after Essus died, I’d have done anything to help her feel better.”
“And after that?” Doyle asked.
“They exchanged cards twice a year, that was all.”
Doyle turned his dark gaze to me. I shrugged, then wished I hadn’t because it hurt. “He sent me a card every year around the anniversary of my father’s death. I sent him a Yule card.”
“How did no one notice this?” Doyle asked.
“The queen didn’t care enough about me to pay attention, and you paid attention where the queen told you to. You all did.”
He rubbed his eyes with thumb and forefinger. “How badly does your arm hurt?”
“It aches.”
He took in air again, then let it out slow. “You need to rest, Princess.”
“You’re not mad at me or Galen,” I said. “You’re angry with yourself for not knowing this.”
“Yes,” he said with the tiniest edge of anger.
“When my father died, what other guard could I have trusted but Galen?”
“Did you not trust me?” Barinthus said.
I looked at him, my father’s closest friend. “You were almost as distraught over his death as I was, Barinthus. I needed someone who was touched by grief but not consumed by it. Galen was that person for me.” I reached out to Galen, and he took my hand, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
“If you could marry where your heart lies,” Doyle said, “I
fear what it would do to the court.”
I looked at him, trying to see behind his careful face. I squeezed Galen’s hand and drew him in against me. Once, Doyle would have been correct. Once it was Galen in my heart and no other, but that was before I grew up enough to understand what it would mean to be at my side. It was a dangerous place to be, a treacherous place to be.
I hugged him not because he was the only name written across my heart now, but because he no longer was. A part of me was saddened by that, and another part of me was almost relieved. I understood what my father had known decades ago: for Galen the title of king would be a death sentence. I needed someone hard and dangerous by my side, not gentle and placating.
I looked into Doyle’s face as I held Galen to me. Did Doyle not know that my heart’s list had grown larger, and that his name was on that list? The way he was acting, he seemed jealous, or envious, or angry. He was hiding his emotions so well that I couldn’t decide what emotion he was hiding, just that it was something strong that he didn’t want to share. Even being able to see that much meant the Darkness’s legendary control was slipping.
“I’m going to call Gillett.” I turned back to the phone, and since I had only one good hand, I had to let go of Galen. He kept himself touching the back of my body, his body insinuated against me. He fit against me as he always had, as if he’d been born to be there. If all I’d ever wanted in my bed was gentle lovemaking, then Galen would have been wonderful, but we’d had months in bed to discover that his idea of passion and mine did not match. He did not understand my desire for roughness, or pain, or just simply being a little more forceful. Galen gave me pale, uncomprehending eyes when I asked certain things.
[Merry Gentry 04] - A Stroke of Midnight Page 7