Erin took a deep breath and let it out gradually. “I was married,” she said. Simple. Direct.
“I’m guessing you haven’t seen him for a while.”
“Five and a half years now.”
“What happened?”
“I don’t know. The state police found his car down in the Everglades. He didn’t tell anyone he was going there. Including me. No signs of foul play. The car was just sitting there. Keys in the ignition. There wasn’t a note of any kind. There was an empty bottle of cranberry juice and a half-eaten sandwich sitting on the passenger seat. Nothing else. No wallet. No clothes. No body.”
“I’m sorry.” I hope she could tell I meant it.
“I was worried an alligator got him. Then I was mad and I hoped an alligator got him. For the last couple of years, I’ve tried to be . . . indifferent. But he’s in my thoughts every day.”
“Of course he is. You loved him. You’ll always love him.”
Erin looked the floor and nodded a few times.
“What was his name?”
“Blake.”
“Did he have magic?”
Erin was still looking at the floor.
“None. He didn’t have any idea about magic. He was just a sweet guy I met at a hotel while I was at medical conference. We went out for a year. Had the big church wedding. He traveled a lot. Commercial pilot. When he was gone, I spent time in the Behindbeyond, and when he was home it was just blissfully, boringly mortal.”
“Sounds nice.”
“It was.” She looked up at me with her eyes all shot with green and dew.
“You want me to find him?” I asked. “I’m very good at that.”
She laughed but it was more of a bitter-sounding burst. “See?” she said. “You’re too sweet. And just plain dumb.” She looked at the tips of her fingers, which were twining themselves together. “I don’t want you to find him. It’s time to move on.”
She stepped in close and put her arms around me. I put my arms around her.
“I wanted to tell you before you found out from someone else. My marriage to Blake wouldn’t mean anything to the Alder King. A mortal marriage is not recognized in the other realm. The Alder King only cares about the Behindbeyond. But my marriage meant something to me. Before I can even consider a serious relationship, I need to close that chapter of my life. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“There will be a hearing. Ten days from now. I want you to come with me.”
“Okay.”
I could hear Erin’s breathing. It was quicker than it should have been. The pulse in her neck was almost audible. Her heart was pounding so hard I could feel it. My heart was pounding too.
“Why are we so old-fashioned?” she asked.
I thought about it for a second. “Because we’re fashioned old?”
Her giggle was soft. “I like that. I remember Queen Victoria ruling England. I was eleven when she died.”
“Ah, the formative years,” I said. “Lucky for you, I remember the Puritans.” I felt Erin’s fingers in my hair.
“No you don’t,” she said. Then, “I should go to bed,” she said.
“I should let you,” I said.
“Thanks for letting me stay.”
“Yeah. Anytime.”
We stood like that for maybe a minute. Our bodies calling to each other. I swallowed thickly. More pounding heartbeats. More breathing. Then she said, “I almost didn’t come back.”
I heard what she said but I didn’t know what she was talking about. “Didn’t come back? When?”
“In the forest. On your ten-thousandth dawn.”
“Oh.”
“When you were supposed to be picking a helpmeet. I almost didn’t come back.”
I didn’t interrupt. I liked to hear her talk. She’d tell me what she wanted to tell me if I just let her.
“I almost didn’t come back because I was afraid you wouldn’t pick me. I was afraid you’d pick one of the other girls. I didn’t have any right to expect you would want me. But it would have made me sad if you’d picked somebody else, and I wanted a chance.”
“I did pick you.”
“Yeah.”
We were kind of swaying together. Like kids at a sixth-grade dance. She laughed, that bitter burst again. “If you’d picked one of the other girls, you’d be sleeping with her by now.”
“Uh-huh.”
With that, she backed up. She patted me on the chest but she wouldn’t look me in the eyes. “Ten days. Then maybe I can think again.” She turned and didn’t say anything else as she let Sandretta take her off to the guest room to sleep.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Lair of the Wild MacPherson
“What’s your plan for the day?”
Erin and I got to eat breakfast together. Delightful. She looked well-rested, which I was happy to see. Somewhere she had gotten fresh clothes. Maybe Sandretta had procured an outfit for her. Or maybe she had somehow squeezed a complete blouse and skirt and different shoes into her purse. Or she had made a portal to the walk-in closet at her house. Didn’t matter, I decided. She was here with me and it was a beautiful morning and she looked spectacular.
“I’m going to check the rest of MacPherson’s properties,” I replied. “If they’re building a Jeweled Gate, we have to find it. Fast. I heard Amad say he’s been stealing diamonds and getting away with it. They have to be stockpiled somewhere. If I have time, I might go work out at the Iron Foundry. How about you?”
“I have to finish my reports for the autopsies yesterday and try to catch up on the lab requests. Graves is taking the primary spot today.”
That meant he would be the one examining Tiny the Tongan. My memories about him and the fight last night were still raw. I wondered with a flash of guilt if his family had been notified. If he even had a family. Erin was still speaking, and I pulled my attention back to what she was saying. “So, unless we get called out to a crime scene, I should be ready for our date tonight. About six o’clock?”
“Okay,” I said.
We finished breakfast and walked out to our cars together. I followed her to I-95 and smiled as she waved at me.
The next property on my list was only a mile away from my house. It was a nice two-story office building with accountants, lawyers, a photography studio, and other assorted office types. Definitely one of MacPherson’s profit makers. Definitely unlikely to have a gate to the Deamhan realm. The next two properties were farther inland. They were close to each other though, about four blocks apart.
The first one was a pile of dirt. Or multiple piles. It was an industrial parcel that hadn’t been developed. Dozens of tall mounds of dirt had been deposited there, each one over ten feet high. Maybe it was topsoil for amending the dirt in garden plots or citrus groves. Nothing here to indicate a gate. The next parcel was better developed. Construction was in progress but no workmen were around. There was a building, of sorts. I drove up to it and got out of the car. There were trucks standing idle, including a backhoe and a cement mixer. The structure itself wasn’t much more than a floor and four walls. No roof. Inside, there were some tall stacks of framing materials and a radial saw along with a few other tools. Everything except the aluminum was covered with sheets of plastic to protect it against the rain.
I went to three other locations before I ran into a warehouse in an industrial area that looked like it was used for raves. The warehouse was large, easily 25,000 square feet. I could see a bar and some overhead lighting through the roll-up doorway. There was a fence all around the property, and the gate was locked. I parked by the gate and got out to get a better look. If I didn’t find any other leads, I’d come back with Nat and then we’d see what we could see.
It took two more hours, but I made it through most of the list. None of MacPherson’s properties seemed likely places to
build a gate for transporting deamhans into the world. Most were occupied by people with the usual lack of horns and the usual number of eyes doing their usual jobs. Two of the properties were developed but not occupied. They were relatively small buildings, three and four stories tall, partitioned into small rooms for small business use, but they were waiting for carpets and paint and finishing work. With nobody around, it was a quick job to walk through and see that there was nothing suspect to find.
As I sat in my car, I thought about how there appeared to be a lot of projects that MacPherson was leaving unfinished. Maybe when you’re trying to put together a small apocalypse, you decide not to waste money on developing places that could just be destroyed or not needed. When humanity is decimated, it’s hard to find renters.
I drove to a better-populated section of town and found a café that made pressed Cuban sandwiches. The radio was playing a jazzy song and it sounded like the woman was singing “prisoner of love” in Spanish. Aren’t we all, señorita. The pork and ham were succulent, and the side of fried plantains went down nicely with a cold bottle of Malta.
The rest of the properties were nearer the coast. These were all well-developed commercial spaces full of tenants. One of the tenants was MacPherson’s development corporation. I decided to drop in and say, “Howdy.”
The middle-aged receptionist with the sensible perm in her hair tried to stop me. She really did.
“Heya,” I said. “Is ol’ Lonnie Mac this way?”
“I’m sorry sir, do you have an appointment?”
“I do. I’m Mr. MacPherson’s psychiatrist. I’m here because he missed our session this week. I’m very worried.”
“You . . . you’re . . . what is your name?”
“Do you know if he has a couch in his office? It’s very important for him to be relaxed. To keep the psychosis from taking over.”
The receptionist glanced to the right, which told me where MacPherson’s office was located. “Just a moment, sir.” She started pushing buttons on her phone.
“No, this really can’t wait,” I said. “Could be an emergency. Last time, he thought demons were coming after him. Classic schizophrenic delusions. Possibly terminal psoriasis of the cerebellum.”
I left the receptionist and walked up the hall. She was still mashing buttons on her phone when MacPherson’s door flew open. His face was beautifully apoplectic. Without breaking stride, I put my forearm across his chest and shoved him back into his office and shut the door.
Wow. Was he surprised to see me, with two good legs no less. He retreated behind his desk where he stood, mouth opening and closing like a beached carp. His eyes were stunned wide enough to smooth out the crow’s feet at the corners. Made him look ten years younger.
“Whassup, Lon?”
He finally remembered how to breathe. He leaned forward, putting his hands on his desk and almost made it look nonchalant. He looked down and took a few deep inhalations through his nose. I could hear the air struggling past his septum. It took a minute, but I heard the click in his throat as he tried to swallow, and then he said, “I heard there was a fire and they found a body. Would have been a real tragedy if it had been you.”
I was up for that conversation. “Yeah. The tragedy is that man didn’t have to die. You’re going to pay for that one day.”
MacPherson raised his head and looked at me with a feral gleam in his eyes. “It’s not going to matter.”
“Why? Because some idiot with a few magic tricks up his sleeve has convinced you he’s going to build a Jeweled Gate and bring a deamhan into the world?” MacPherson’s shocked expression told me volumes. “What? You don’t think there are powerful people who know what’s happening, Lon-nee? You don’t think there are bigger and badder mages out there who are going to stop this, Lonnneeee?”
“The other Fae don’t know or don’t care,” MacPherson said. “Unless it affects them directly, they can’t do anything.”
I noticed a silver ring in the floor of MacPherson’s office. MacPherson was Amad’s summoner. Or one of them. “Is that what Amad told you? Because I know a few Fae who are very interested in keeping this from happening.”
MacPherson was gradually regaining his composure. “I’m not talking to you anymore.” He sounded like a little kid again, caught pulling his sister’s hair.
“Amad said two days. Is that when the gate will be finished?”
MacPherson glared at me.
“Where is it?” I asked, more insistently. “Where’s the gate?”
“You’re going to have to be a lot scarier for me to be afraid of you.”
“Scary is for the weak,” I shot back. “Scary is for people who don’t have anything else to fall back on. It’s the little yappy dog who bares its teeth and snaps at you, trying to scare you away because, deep inside, it knows it’s small and weak and powerless and pointless and it doesn’t want to have its scrawny little neck snapped in two.”
MacPherson didn’t have a ready reply for that.
“You can do the right thing, Lonnie. You can be a real man and help me stop this.”
He thought about it. For half a second his eyes went to hopeful. He was a man trapped in a bad deal of his own making and a small part of him knew if there was a ray of light he should take it. Then the look went away.
“Get out of here,” he said.
I didn’t move. I just gave him a thousand-yard stare and made him repeat it.
“Get out of here!” He said it louder.
“Okay, Lonnie. I’ll be going now. But know this: there will come a time when you’ll remember this moment. When you had a chance to make it right.”
I left the door open. Let the cowardly little monster shut it himself if he wanted to hide.
As I walked past the receptionist, I shook my head in her general direction and said, “Wow. He really hates his mother.”
* * *
Mostly I was ticked.
The fruitless encounter in MacPherson’s office just brought back feelings of helplessness and woe over the death of the Tongan. The biggest share of blame was Amad’s, of course. MacPherson was to blame too, the weasel. The blame was theirs but all the guilt apparently belonged to me.
Rush hour hadn’t got underway yet, so I made it to the Iron Foundry with enough time to work out. In an act of defiance, I went to the weight room to shove something useful around. The iron in the metal made me feel itchy and annoyed, but I went through every one of the stations with a determination and drive I hadn’t felt in quite a while. When I finished, my muscles felt respectably torn up. I did a few laps in the pool and took a hot shower. The water sluiced over my skin and the heat soaked into me like a balm, soothing body and soul.
On my way out, I spoke to Nat.
“There’s a place that looks like it holds raves,” I said. I gave him the address. “I want to get in there and see what’s going on.”
“Legal? Or extra-curricular?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’ll check it out. How’s Erin?”
“Fine.”
Nat nodded. “And?”
Sheesh. What a gossip. He didn’t want to know if the raves were part of my case or anything official like that. He just wanted the juicy details about my love life.
“And . . . she’s fine.”
Nat just grunted.
“All right. We’re going out tonight. Somebody’s wedding thing.” At least that was pretty close to honest. It was our wedding thing.
Now Nat gave a half-smile. “Wedding thing?”
“Sorry, Dad. Can’t tell you more than that. Gotta be ready in thirty minutes. I’ll have her home before midnight. Promise.”
“You kids have fun.”
What a gossip.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Ail Bán Dearg
Erin looked completely
gorgeous. I’d gone through my whole closet trying to find something good to wear, and Erin probably spent three minutes getting ready and she turned out certifiably drop-dead. Tonight she was in a rust-colored dress with a texture of tessellated geometric shapes that was eye-catching but still subtle. It was slit up the side to show off about a mile of leg, and the bodice featured décolletage so perfectly framed that any man who saw her would instantly wish he were me.
Awesome.
Her heels matched her dress and her cute toes poked out the front. Her hair was voluminous with rolling waves that trailed down her shoulders in a shiny, dark cascade. Her makeup was dark but tasteful, highlighting her cheekbones and setting off her glistening eyes with smoldering lines.
“It’s okay if I stare at you, right?”
Max had led her into the great room where I was trying to decide between two pairs of shoes. They were the only dress shoes I had.
“You’d better stare at me,” she said. “If you know what’s good for you.”
“Oh. I know what’s good for me,” I replied.
Erin pointed at a pair of shoes. “Those.”
“Okay.” I started putting on the shoes she had indicated. “These go better with the pants?”
“No. But they’ll be better for dancing.”
It took a second for that to register. “What? Dancing? We don’t have to dance, do we?”
“Maybe. I don’t know what they have planned, but it’s traditional. You don’t have to be good at it. Just hold me and go in a circle.”
Dancing. Like I wasn’t dreading this whole thing already.
“C’mon. We don’t have to stay long,” Erin said. “Just meet your princely obligations and we’ll go.”
Erin was at my house because Max and Sandretta were invited to the party as well, and we all wanted to go into the Behindbeyond together. It would be easier to coordinate that way since time behaved differently in the Faerie realm.
Max had also surprised me earlier that day with a wedding gift. He had converted one of the unused rooms into a portal room like the one Erin had at her house. Now I had gates to the glade near the Alder King’s castle, Erin’s house, and Corrchnámhach at my disposal.
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