Twist of Fae (Vegas Fae Stories Book 3)

by Tom Keller

  This time it was different. Faster. Images speeding by. People, dressed in clothing from bygone eras. Then it slowed. A little girl walking with, who? Someone familiar. Maybe her father. Then it sped up again as she grew and changed. Suddenly it was the present. Images rushed by, but some would stop, if only for a moment. She was with a man. I'd seen this one's picture before. Then a different one. Images of guns and feelings of violence. Then she was back in this house, straddling a man in a bed. Then she was shooting. I'm not sure how long it lasted. Time had lost all meaning while I watched it fly by. Then someone was shaking me.

  "Agent! Hey, Agent," I heard a voice calling. "You okay there? You looked like you were zoned out for a minute."

  "Just thinking. Sorry," I replied, not knowing what else to say. "This is his sister."

  "Whose sister?" the officer asked, a hint of concern in his voice.

  "Holt's," I said, simply, without a clue as to where I'd gone or how I knew. "Her name's Rebecca Holt. She's my subject's sister."

  What the hell was happening to me?

  Chapter 2

  NIKKI

  My cell phone rang just as I was closing the trunk. It had been my fourth call of the day and when I saw it was my supervisor calling, I just knew it was going to be bad news.

  "What's up Al?" I asked as I pushed the connect button on my Bluetooth headset.

  "Hate to bother you, Nik," he said. "How's your day going?"

  "I've got a van full of evidence and a shitload of reports that need finishing. Same as every other day. What do you need?"

  "Retta's knee deep in it and needs a little help," he replied. "She's got the shooting on 18th street from this morning and she's buried. Can you give her a hand? You know I wouldn't ask if I had anyone else to send."

  "No problem," I said. Yeah, right! I thought to myself. "But you're gonna have to up the overtime if you want all this shit processed before Christmas."

  "You're killing me," he said with a laugh. "But I'll see what I can do. I'll have dispatch send you the call."

  "Can't wait," I replied as I disconnected. Shit! Our caseloads were getting bigger and bigger and the Department still hadn't started the next CSI academy. At the rate we were going, it'd be years before we ever got any more people. Not that it mattered. Everyone knew we were shorthanded, so they'd just have to deal with it like we did.

  I sighed as I opened the car door and got in, just in time to hear the MDT (Mobile Data Terminal) beep as Retta's call came onto the screen. I punched the enroute button after reading the details of the call, and pulled out to drive in that direction. I'd heard it on the radio when it first came out, but I'd been lifting prints from a burglary and hadn't gotten all the details.

  It was a gang shooting. A drive-by, actually. But it hadn't gone the way the car's occupants had planned. As soon as they pulled up, they'd been ambushed instead, by one of the occupants of the house. Forty or fifty rounds had been fired and at least three people were dead. The fourth was in critical condition at the hospital. Patrol had canvassed the neighborhood, but hadn't found anyone else, so now our job began.

  Documenting the scene with photos, gathering evidence, all of which included finding every bullet. Then analyzing the trajectories so Homicide can reconstruct the scene for their investigation, and later, introduce it into court. Unlike the glamorous image of a CSI on television, there were times that I felt that I was nothing more than a glorified garbage collector. Picking up bloody clothes, rummaging through shattered glass from busted doors and windows. But I knew my job was important. I was creating a snapshot in time with my work that would, coupled with the detective's investigation, forever memorialize what had happened.

  An officer pulled aside the crime scene tape that blocked the road. I pulled in and parked a few houses down. Retta was in the street picking up one of the numerous small orange cones that had been placed over what I knew were shell casings. She stood as she saw me walk up.

  "What you got and what do you need, girlfriend?" I asked as I approached. Retta and I were on the same squad, and had gone to the same CSI academy, and often worked cases together.

  "Most of it's done, actually," she replied, stretching her back. "I've been here most of the day and Homicide has already cleared. Just a couple of patrol guys still around to keep an eye on us until we're finished. I've already packaged up most of the evidence in the house and done photos. I've just got the shells and a few other things to tidy up out here."

  "Sounds like fun," I said, knowing that it was anything but. "How can I help?"

  "Like I said, I got most of it," she replied, looking around the street at the other still placed cones. "We recovered three guns, two 9 mm's and a .40. I've got forty four shell casings between here and the house. I've been able to account for most of the rounds. Sixteen 40's in the car over there and twenty two 9mm's at the house. I found two 40's in the house across the street and another two in the wall. Neither of those went far, but I'm still missing two more of the .40's.

  "Since the guy in the house was shooting from an upstairs window, the damn things could be anywhere. I haven't made it that far, but patrol checked the alley and knocked on doors the street over, but didn’t find anything. If you would do a careful sweep, just to make sure they didn’t miss anything and then help me clean up we'll be good. I don’t know what else to do if we can't account for those last two strays."

  "You got it," I replied as I walked back to my car. Opening the door, I grabbed my kit, bags, gloves, and tape, and then headed directly across the street to see what I was dealing with.

  Unlike the newer homes, this was an old Vegas street that still had an alley running behind the houses. Some of the yards were fenced, either in block, wood, or chain-link, but the one I was standing in front of was fenceless, which wasn't that unusual in this neighborhood. Cutting through the side yard, I stopped when I reached the alley, to assess my plan of attack.

  I looked back at the house the shooter had been in and saw that from the window, he could have fired a round damn near anywhere. Since he'd been shooting at the car, I at least had some idea where to start. Assuming he hadn’t deliberately shot at something else, the chance of a stray round that was aimed at the car going much more than two houses in either direction was slim. Of course, that was a big assumption, since bullets can travel quite a distance, but I had to start somewhere.

  I started by doing a simple search of the walls and garbage cans along the alley. Most of the walls were wood or chain-link, but I spent extra time on the block ones. As I expected, there were enough dings and gouges to make it all but impossible to tell what had caused them, but no bullet holes were obvious. There were several holes, but most appeared to be old damage. I was just looking at the second house across the alley, when something caught my eye. It was a mockingbird.

  It was dive bombing something just below the eve of the house next door. My curiosity got the best of me, so I walked over to see what the hell it was doing. There was an electrical box to the rear, so I climbed on top to get a better look. As I stood up, I heard it cawing, and I'll be damned if it didn't sound like it was trying to say, "here, here." By now the bird was perched on the roof and as there was nothing more to see I turned to get off the box and resume my search.

  Before I could step down, the damn thing had flown across the yard and was now buzzing my head, cawing the "here, here" sound. I damn near jumped out of my skin! I wasn't a fan of birds on any day, but this was the first time I'd been attacked by one. I swatted the bird away and it flew back to the eve, still cawing as it did so. Suddenly, the hair stood up on the back of my neck when I finally saw what it was diving at. There was small hole about two feet below the eve that looked like it could have been caused by a bullet!

  "C28, C26, I may have something here. Can you meet me in the alley?" I said, keying my lapel mic, goosebumps forming at the thought of a bird showing me the spot. C28 was Retta's call sign and mine was C26.

  "How the hell did you spot t
hat?" Retta asked a few minutes later, as she stood next to me on the box. "That's one of the houses where the patrol guys spoke to someone at. Maybe they're still home."

  "Pure luck," I answered, as I jumped down from the box. I didn’t think the part about the talking bird was relevant, and it was too crazy to mention anyway. "Let's grab your van and we can take the ladder over there."

  A little while later, I was climbing up the ladder to see what we had. Retta was already inside, accessing the attic from a hallway, courtesy of the occupant. She was an older lady who hadn’t heard anything at all this morning. Sure as shit, the hole looked like it could have been caused by a bullet; the one found lodged in a stud by Retta a few minutes later. I climbed down to get my camera, and then moved the ladder over a bit to get some good pics. That's when I heard the bird again.

  Looking up, the damn thing was, once again, perched on the eve, cawing at me. This time it didn’t sound like anything but bird noise, and since it wasn't dive bombing me, I just ignored it. I guess it got tired of watching, because a few seconds later it flew away. I finished up my work and was beginning to climb down when a shadow passed across the wall in front of me. Looking up, I damn near lost my footing, as I stared into the eyes of a big black bird the size of a small dog. I grasped the ladder tighter as the world around me swirled. I was still on the ladder but things looked different. It was like I was looking through coke bottle glasses. I moved my head and tried to focus, but all I could see was that damn big bird.

  "That human requires your aid," I heard a voice say.

  WTF? I looked around, but I was on top of a ladder, and it wasn't Retta who had spoken. There was no one else up here except for the bird. Maybe I had fallen and hit my head and this was all a dream. Was I in the hospital with a concussion? Surely I wasn't really going to have a conversation with a bird.

  "Excuse me," I heard another voice say, before realizing it was mine.

  "Over there, across the road. The nice human that feeds us. He requires your aid," the voice said. This time it had definitely come from the bird.

  I swiveled my head, and after a bout of vertigo, I could see a garden in the back of a house across the alley. My eyes seemed to zoom in, and that's when I saw him. He had fallen behind the sunflowers and wasn't moving. Because of the angle, they'd never have seen him by looking over the wall. Then I saw his leg twitch, and suddenly the world returned. I was back on the ladder again, seeing things normally.

  I shook my head and looked back across the alley. Barely visible this time, I saw the blue jeans the fallen man was wearing. Trying not to think about what had just happened, I scrambled down the ladder and raced across the yard, exiting into the alley. Jumping the fence, I knocked down several sunflowers and found the man still lying there. Blood had stained his shirt, but some of it still looked like it might be fresh. The bird now forgotten as I looked him over. He had taken a round to the stomach. I was already wearing gloves, so I pulled the shirt aside and put some slight pressure on the wound, hoping it wasn't already too late, before grabbing my mic and requesting an ambulance. Retta and one of the patrol officers joined me a few minutes later. We all hoped that we'd found him in time.

  "It's pretty bad, but at least he's stable," the paramedic said as he closed the back door of the ambulance. "He must have been out there for hours. I doubt he'd have had a chance at all if you guys hadn't come along when you did."

  "Yeah," I replied.

  "Looks like you guys saved his life," the paramedic added with a thumbs up, before getting into the cab of the ambulance.

  I didn’t say another word as I watched them drive off down the alley. As I turned to finish up, I saw the big black bird perched on a shed next to the garden. It just sat there, watching me. I half expected to hear the damn thing talk again, but it just stared at me for a minute. Then its head bobbed up and down and it flew away.

  I asked Al to have someone from swing shift meet them at the hospital and then, almost in a daze from my experience, I helped Retta finish up what needed to be done here. We still had to figure out how he'd been hit, and Homicide was on their way back out, now that another wounded victim had been found. Later, as I was putting my gear away, one of the Homicide guys that had come back out walked up to me.

  "Nice work, Nik," he said as he approached. "That brother of yours, the one that works for Homeland Security, isn't his name Jay?"

  "Yeah, why?" I asked.

  "I got a call from one of the San Berdoo guys about a case right before I came out, and we got to talking," he replied. "You remember that Victorville SWAT guy, Jesse? He was in town during the Baker to Vegas run."

  "The one that kept hitting on me," I said with a smile. "How could I forget? Why?"

  "Turns out you aren't the only Hoskins to save someone's life today."

  "What do you mean by that?" I asked as I closed the trunk.

  "Well, get this. They're out hitting a house and miss a suspect in the attic. Jesse goes out to his car thinking the scene is secure, when out of nowhere this Federal agent by the name of Jay Hoskins leaps up over his car and tackles him to the ground, just as the suspect cranks out a load of full auto right where he'd been standing."

  "No shit?" I exclaimed.

  "Yeah," he continued. "The report said he'd seen a flash off the barrel right before she fired. Kinda coincidental when you think about it."

  "What's coincidental about that?"

  "I don't know. Bullets in the attic I guess," he replied, shaking his head. "He sees the flash in one attic, you see a bullet hole in another, then you both end up saving someone's life. Hey, that'd almost make a good movie." Then he patted me on the back, and with a chuckle, turned to walk to his car.

  Suddenly the goosebumps came back, and I suppressed a shudder. I pulled out my cell phone to call Jay's number. What the hell was going on?

  Chapter 3

  ROBERT

  "Still, it was a bit impulsive, wouldn’t you say?" Ray O'Malley asked, sipping his coffee. Ray was the lieutenant of Homicide at Las Vegas Metro PD. He was a good looking Irishman with a full head of silver hair, tall and well built. He was also a whiskey drinking, cigar smoking old school cop. He had been my friend and mentor for the last 30 years, and if that wasn't enough, it turns out he was also Fae. Some descendant of Irish Faeries, wouldn’t you know. He was the liaison to the Fae at the local PD.

  That was something that had come as one hell of a surprise to me when I'd found out just a few days ago. I'd known the Fae had a contact at the PD, but I'd never realized it was him. Now that I think about it, I should have guessed based on some past conversations, but it's not like I haven't been preoccupied with other things. I tried to ask him more, but all he would say was that he'd promised my grandmother he'd watch over me and been sworn to secrecy. If my powers hadn't surfaced I'd probably never have found out. Having been born a male in a world dominated by females, rules and history, my grandmother had gone to a lot of trouble to hide what I was from the rest of the Fae of her kind. It still amazed me the number of conspirators that were involved.

  "Impulsive?" I replied. "Maybe a little. But even you have to admit that everything that's happened has been pointing me in that direction anyway. Although I will confess to hating the very idea of such a spell ever being crafted."

  We had just finished breakfast and were, of course, discussing my recent actions in releasing the Lilin from an ancient curse. The Lilin are what you might call Vampires. Although instead of fangs, they have a needle-like appendage that's located in the base of their tongue they use to take blood. They had lost a battle with the Fae eons ago and as a condition of their surrender, had been placed under a spell that rendered them, to say the least, second class beings.

  As a descendant of the Greek Goddess, Demeter, I had been the only one with the power to release them from that spell. Something I had done without hesitation and, to be honest, without thinking the whole thing through before doing so. An act that many were not too happy about. Whi
le I had been directed onto that path by a certain Dwarf named Bernd, it had still been my decision. The spell's results had been nothing short of slavery and I just couldn’t live with that on my hands, no matter who I pissed off.

  "Well, what's done is done," he said, putting his cup down and looking over at me. "For what it's worth, I agree with your decision, if not the speed that it was made. But not everyone does, so I expect we'll see the backlash soon enough."

  "Oh, I already have," I observed. "Half the Fae on the Strip are screaming their heads off and blaming me for the loss of such compliant employees." I stressed the word compliant. Fae are no different than humans in many ways and there were more than a few of the local Fae leaders that had taken advantage of the Lilin because of that spell. Now it appears that the Lilin had all but disappeared since the spell had been lifted. I knew that they had a new leader, but I wasn't sure yet what she was up to.

  "I hope you told them to pound sand," he continued. "But at least you've still got the Milagres on your side, as well as the Elves. But I'm a little concerned about the Feds. You know they like to know about that kinda thing before it happens. Have you heard anything from them yet?"

  "Nothing, although I'm sure that's coming as well."

  "Oh, it is. It is," he affirmed.

  Ray had never exactly been a fan of the Feds and had always preached to me to never let them think they had the upper hand. I had a sudden flash of a memory from my rookie police officer days. Ray had been the scene commander on a major bank robbery where hostages were being held by several rifle toting bad guys. We had just secured the area and Ray was about to contact the robbers when the local FBI arrived. The agent in charge, some new guy from back East, had walked in like he owned the place and told Ray in no uncertain terms that he was taking over. Ray just nodded and smiled before telling me to get on the radio and order all our units to pack up and leave. The agent in charge almost had a coronary, seeing that we had upwards of twenty units on the scene and he had a total of four, including himself. Had we left he would have been in a serious predicament. Not that Ray really would have done that, or at least I don’t think he would have. But, either way, the Feds had backed down and we had handled the scene without further incident. Of course that's neither here nor there, since that wasn't the kind of Feds he was talking about.