“Yeah. Did.”
Joe took that moment to return. He smiled—much more pleasantly—and handed me a smoldering lump of rubber and canvas. “I’m not bored anymore.”
I took the shoe by its laces and held it out to Murdock. “This is the kid’s. It had some elf blood on it, but it’s gone now obviously.”
Murdock leaned in his car window to retrieve an evidence bag. Murdock held the bag open, and I dropped in the shoe. He zipped the bag closed and held it up, waiting for the smoldering to die off for lack of air.
“Elf blood,” he said. He looked at me with a knowing smirk. “Why do I not like the implications of that?”
“Because you know I think it was Kruge’s, even though I couldn’t definitively sense it, and now I can’t prove it. And because you don’t like coincidences any more than I do, we’re going to have to figure out how the cases are connected without missing other evidence in case they’re not.”
He pursed his lips, nodding. “Yep.”
That’s why I like working with Murdock. No bickering without a good reason. Oh, sure, we disagree, sometimes a lot. We debate, though, not argue, and usually end up at a place we’re both comfortable with. Just like he knew where my thinking was heading, I knew he wasn’t going to discourage me until he thought the trail was dead cold.
“This is the first time I touched it,” Joe blurted.
Murdock looked at Joe, then me. “Oh?”
I shook my head in amused exasperation. “He sat in it.” I told Murdock what happened. No surprise, he shrugged.
“Doesn’t matter now. The bigger question is when you were spotted.”
Two cop cars appeared on either end of the block. Another fire truck pulled up, followed by an ambulance van. “Um, Murdock, shouldn’t you be doing something?”
He craned his neck over the roof of his car. “Yeah. Get in. If we don’t leave now, they’ll box us in.”
“Leave? Don’t you have to police something?”
He walked around his car and got in. “Homicide, Connor. Is there anyone in the building?”
I looked at Joe. “Nope,” said Joe.
“Then get in before my clothes start smelling like smoke.”
“I’m going to watch the fire,” said Joe.
“Suit yourself. Let me know about your gang contact,” I said. I don’t think he heard me, though. He was already drifting higher up for a better view. I tossed some juice bottles off the passenger seat and got in. Murdock backed all the way up the street to the corner and bounced the car around. He coasted over to Summer Street and made his way back toward downtown.
“What took you so long?” I asked.
“Doctor’s appointment. New healer.”
“What did he say?”
“He says what they all say. He can’t find anything wrong with me except my essence is suped-up. I told him I’m fine, it’s only the fey who seem to think I’m not.”
I nodded. “It’s not that there’s anything wrong with you, Murdock. Remember that kid, Shay? How I kept telling you he had an oddly strong essence for a human? He still felt like a human normal to me. You feel like a fey human, if there’s such a thing. You feel like what I bet a human from Faerie would feel like. It’s never been seen post-Convergence, and they don’t understand it.”
As he stopped for a red light, he gave me a sideways glance and smiled. “Sounds familiar.”
“Touché,” I said. At Avalon Memorial, they didn’t understand my condition either. “Who’s the doctor?”
He accelerated with the light change. “I don’t think he’s a doctor, actually. He said he was a medic. Do the fey have army medics?”
I laughed. “That’s his title. Midach. He must be old school. You should ask Gillen Yor his name. He’ll know.”
“Why so interested?”
“Beyond the obvious that I hope you’re okay, if he can figure out what’s going on with you, maybe he can figure out what’s going on with me. We sort of have opposite problems. The source might be the same.”
“I knew this would end up being about you,” he said.
I felt anger rise. “I said I hoped you’re okay, didn’t I? Don’t you think I feel enough guilt about it?”
As usual, Murdock put me right in my place. He laughed. “I’m joking, ya fool. I knew it would irritate you. It’s not your fault I have some freaky essence now, just like if you got shot on another case, it wouldn’t be my fault. Unless, of course, I shot you. By accident, I mean. Let it go, Connor. I’m fine.”
“Jerk,” I said. I slouched deeper in my seat. He was right, of course. But I had put a lot of people in danger on that case, especially him. I had involved him—a human normal—in a situation where ability was being manipulated on an enormous scale. It could have killed him. It almost did. I’m still not sure if it was ego or error. Either way, I didn’t like doubting myself. I’m not used to it. I didn’t say anything more. I know what it feels like to have something wrong that no one knows how to fix.
“Anyway, we ID’d the kid,” Murdock said. “Dennis Farnsworth. Sixteen years old. Some petty shoplifting charges. All dropped. No big trouble.”
I knew it. Sixteen. “Until now.”
“Until now,” Murdock repeated.
“Any family?”
He nodded. “Mother. Two sisters. They live on D Street.” He turned onto D Street.
My stomach gave a slight clench. I knew what was coming. “Have they been notified?”
“Yeah. We get the easy part. All we have to do is question her while she’s in shock.”
I hate talking to parents about their dead kids. You knock on a door. It opens. They take one look at you with your solemn face, and they know. They always know. You don’t even have to be wearing a uniform. They can smell cop a mile a way. Doesn’t matter what rung of the social ladder they’re on. They know a cop who has that look isn’t stopping by for the Auxiliary Association’s annual donation drive. The last thing they want to talk about is how maybe their kid was not hanging with the right crowd.
Sunset was coming on, the sky turning a deep purple. The streetlights hadn’t kicked on yet, but already house lights burned more visibly, the taillights of cars standing out a little more. You travel far enough down D Street, you get out of the Weird and into South Boston. If you don’t travel that far, you end up in the twilight zone between the two neighborhoods. Not dangerous with a capital “D,” but barely safe with a small “s.”
It was easy to spot where the Farnsworths lived. The triple-decker wooden townhouse shone with light. One lone news van from the local cable station had parked not too far away. I could lay odds I knew where the network stations were. Murdock parked by a fire hydrant.
We walked up the sidewalk to the house, nodded to the beat officer who was keeping an eye on things, and mounted the porch steps. Several kids stared at us, an unusual mix of fey and human, street kids, with hard stares and harder lives. No gang colors that I could see.
We went through the open door into the house, the heat of many people wafting over us. To the right, a staircase led to the upper apartments. The Farnsworth place was on the first floor, another open door that met the entryway on the landing.
Murdock stepped in first, pausing to take in the scene. Over his shoulder I could see people clustered in a modest living room. On the couch a red-eyed woman sat, stout, thin, dyed blond hair clipped to one side with a child’s red barrette. She had her arm wrapped around a small girl, who half lay in her lap, maybe seven years old, with solemn eyes roaming the room. Another young girl, a few years older, sat on her other side, her face pressed against her mother’s shoulders, eyes as red as the woman’s.
“Mrs. Farnsworth?” Murdock spoke softly.
The woman lifted her head in our direction without speaking.
“Mrs. Farnsworth, I’m Detective Leonard Murdock. I’m very sorry for your loss today.”
She didn’t so much nod as rock back and forth slightly. “Thank you.”
“Is there somewhere we can talk?”
Another woman crossed the room, sat on the couch, and with gentle hands took the younger child into her own lap. Mrs. Farnsworth squeezed her other daughter’s hand and stood. Without speaking, she led us through a crowded hallway lined with more people. Their conversations fell away as we passed, their faces tracking with questions.
We entered a back bedroom, obviously her room, crowded with a bedroom set too large for the space. Everything was neat and orderly, the faint odor of dime-store rose water in the air. She sat on the bed.
“Mrs. Farnsworth, when was the last time you spoke to Dennis?”
“Last night before I went to work. He was supposed to be watching his sisters. Molly said he went out about eleven o’clock and made her swear not to tell. He said he’d be back in an hour.”
“Did he seem different? Preoccupied? Worried?”
She shook her head. “He seemed fine. Happy. It was just a regular day.”
“Do you know if he was in any kind of trouble?” Murdock asked.
She shook her head again. “Not that I knew. He’s that age when it isn’t cool to confide in his mother.”
“What about his father?”
Her voice and face went flat. “Gone. Ten years.”
“What about friends? A lot of kids on the porch.”
She shrugged. “I don’t know his friends anymore. I work two jobs. Denny was quiet. He was trying to stay out of trouble.”
“Was it working?” I asked. Murdock shot me a look, but I ignored him.
“I don’t know,” she said in a tiny voice.
I crouched down so that she could look down at me. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Farnsworth, I didn’t introduce myself. I’m Connor Grey. I’m helping to investigate any unique aspects to this…situation. Do you know why Dennis was on Summer Street?”
She shrugged. “He hung around up the Weird. Found some group that he liked.”
“A gang?”
Finally, she stirred out of her lethargy. “He is not in a gang! Denny hated gangs. That’s how he got in trouble—some gang trying to recruit him. His high school counselor got him involved in a community group.”
I liked and didn’t like where this was going. “Unity?”
She nodded. “That’s it. He seemed to like it there. His grades went up.”
“Did Dennis know Alvud Kruge?”
Her eyes searched the carpet. “He talked about Mr. K. all the time. He liked him.”
“Do you know what happened to Alvud Kruge today?”
She closed her eyes. “Yes. My son couldn’t have done something like that.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to imply that.”
“Mrs. Farnsworth, did Dennis confide in anyone?” Murdock asked.
Her face hardened a bit as she looked at him. “He had a girlfriend. Crystal. Crystal Finch.”
“Do you have an address or phone number?”
“No. Somewhere on E Street. He ended the relationship.”
“Why’s that?” Murdock asked.
“Because I asked him to. That girl was bad news. Bad family. Trouble.”
“Is there anyone you can think of that might have wanted to cause Dennis harm?”
She exhaled sharply through her nose. “Look where we live. I work two jobs, and this is the best I can do. No one needs a reason to harm you around here. And I can’t think of a single reason why someone would…why someone would…” She teared up. “No, I don’t know.” The tears began to spill.
“Mrs. Farnsworth…” Murdock began.
She bunched a tissue under her nose. “I want my girls. Please, get my girls. I don’t want to talk anymore.”
Murdock pulled a business card out of his pocket. “Okay. Here, please call me if you think of anything. I’ll call on you tomorrow to see if you need anything.”
She took the card wordlessly, not looking at it. I stood and backed out of the room with Murdock. He turned back a moment. “If I may ask one more question, Mrs. Farnsworth, did Denny have a pair of orange Nikes?”
She shook her head. “No. He had white sneakers. I don’t know what kind.”
“Thank you,” Murdock said. We made our way back through the apartment. Murdock paused by the couch and squatted in front of the older girl. “Are you Molly?” She nodded.
“Did Denny say where he was going last night?”
She stared at Murdock with wide, solemn eyes. “No. He said he had something important to do.”
“Did he say what?”
Molly glanced at the woman cradling her sister. She leaned close to Murdock. “No, but he went with Crystal,” she whispered. “I saw her up the street. Don’t tell Mum or she’ll be mad.”
Murdock smiled to reassure her. “I won’t. Your mum’s asking for you and your sister.”
We left the apartment. The porch was decidedly emptier than when we had arrived. The fey kids were gone. Of the ones left, Murdock started asking about their relationship to Dennis. I stepped down to the sidewalk. He was just covering the bases. I was willing to bet that the kids who really knew Denny Farnsworth had left when they saw us. Tough kids don’t talk to cops if they can avoid it.
I wandered back to Murdock’s car. As I leaned against the fender, I noticed a woman a couple of houses down. If the height of her skirt were any indication, she had not taken into account the coming night chill. And if the flash of her sequin top was any indication, she had wandered into the wrong end of the neighborhood. She wasn’t watching the street, though. She watched the Farnsworth house, craning her neck every time a girl stepped onto the porch. Just the girls. A gut-level intuition kicked in.
I strolled over. As I got closer, I could see the heavy makeup, the overdyed hair. She had that look that said early thirties, trying to cover up enough wear and tear for someone in her forties desperately hoping she looked in her twenties. It probably worked later in the evening.
Without looking at me, she said, “Not now, hon. I got business.”
“Mrs. Finch?” I said.
Her head whipped around fast on that. She eyed me up and down, then turned back to watch the house. “Not hardly.”
“Looking for Crystal?”
She bit her lower lip and looked at me sideways. “You know where she’s at?”
“That answers my next question. She’s not here, Mrs. Finch. I got the feeling inside she wouldn’t be welcome.”
She flipped her hair and stared directly at me know. Cool, hard eyes, not the type I would find comforting if I were looking for a little short-term company. “Ain’t no Mrs. Finch. That was Crystal’s daddy’s name. You a cop?”
“Not really. But I’d still like to talk to Crystal.”
“Oh, you’d ‘like to talk to Crystal,’” she mimicked. “Get in line, buddy. I haven’t seen her in three days. When I heard about Denny, I thought I might get her here.”
I glanced up at the house. Murdock had made his way onto the steps and was talking to the last couple of kids remaining. “You don’t seem very upset.”
She shrugged. “Not my kid. Shit happens.”
“What can you tell me about Crystal?”
She narrowed her eyes. “Crystal? How about she’s an ungrateful little bitch who owes me seventy-five bucks, and if she don’t turn up real soon, she can just stay wherever she’s landed. How’s that?”
“Very maternal,” I said.
She curled her upper lip. “Go to hell, Mr. Not-really-a-cop. You see Crystal, you tell her I want my cash.” She walked away, her high heels boring holes into the sidewalk. I watched her go and thought you don’t have to be fey to land on the wrong side of the street around here.
I went back to Murdock’s car to wait for him. Night descended on the city, a darker night than usual. Death may be the great equalizer, but the Weird is a close second. That two people died there, one so prominent, the other so not, demonstrates it. The fact that they had a connection to each other shows how the high and low can both find the same
knock on the door.
Chapter 5
A high-pitched ringing jolted me out of sleep. I knew that sound and dreaded it every time I heard it. One of my protection wards had gone off. I slid out of bed into my jeans in one smooth motion. In less than two seconds, I was across the room and standing to the side of the door with a classic Louisville slugger in my hand. The bat had two functions: it was charged with a deflector spell that would activate if someone threw essence at me, and it hurt like hell if I whomped someone with it. In either case, the idea was to give me some breathing space to call for help if I needed it.
Several wards protect my apartment. Some of them are passive—they act like barriers against charged essence. Some are reactive—like those that test for an individual’s essence to determine whether that person is someone I trust. That’s how people like Murdock and Joe can come and go without freaking out the wards. And some are active, doing a regular scan for any unusual activity. None of them will completely protect me. That’s where the signal wards come in. They’re scattered around the building and keyed to my essence. I touch one, and an emergency signal shoots to the Guild. Only I know where they all are. They are my fail-safe, presuming I live long enough for help to arrive.
My apartment is on a dead-end hallway, so anyone making the turn at the top of the stairs has only my place to go to. The alarm that had gone off was a simple proximity alert at the end of the outside hall. It’s a silent alarm—only I can hear it in my head. I felt another alarm go off, the one within five feet of the door, followed immediately by a banging.
“UBS,” a voice called out.
I relaxed, but only a little. It wouldn’t be the first time someone pretended to be a delivery service before they turned all assassin on you.
“Got any ID?” I called back. I did not move to look through the peephole. That would be expected. Whoever was on the other side of the door would know where I was standing at that moment and could take it as an opportunity to, oh, blow a hole in my head.
“Hello?” the voice said with an edge of annoyance.
I gave a quick look through the peep. He looked like a brownie—tawny skin, curly hair, button nose. The essence trickling through the door verified it as well. And he had the standard brown UBS uniform with the yellow shield sewn into the pocket, though that could have been filched.
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