by Kim Harrison
The angry, smaller man punched a button, and we started to descend. “It was deemed better to have a small lie that the public could touch, sit in, and connect with on a physical level than a harsh truth behind glass that would divorce them from experiencing anything,” Mr. Calaway said, the rims of his ears red. “You’ll see.”
Glenn shifted from foot to foot and faced the front. “It can’t be that bad.”
Something was crawling up my back, and I turned to see that it was Nina’s attention.
“You are such a delight to watch,” she murmured, but everyone in the elevator could hear the seduction the dead vampire was putting into Nina’s voice. “Every thought you have passes over your face.”
“Y-yeah . . .” I drawled, trying to remember who had told me that before.
“Do you always fight crime in dirty shoes?” she asked, and Glenn, in the back of the elevator, cleared his throat.
“Give me a break,” I said, trying to hide the wrinkles in my shirt. “I was having coffee with my bodyguard. I didn’t expect to be hunting bad guys until later. Leather before sundown is tacky.”
“Besides,” Mr. Calaway muttered, “if we had the pen upstairs, it would fall apart in twenty years. We have it in the biggest temperature-controlled room in an eight-hundred-mile area,” he said proudly. “That’s why the museum was set here in the first place. It was originally university property.”
My eyebrows went high. Do tell?
Oblivious to my sudden interest, Mr. Calaway said, “Some of their machines are still down here, and we let university people in occasionally to use them. The room has its own heating and cooling system, and battery backup in case the electricity goes down.”
Machines? I thought, forcing myself to be still, but inside I was fidgeting. “Mr. Calaway? Just what kind of machines do you have here?”
The man’s enthusiasm vanished, and he winced. “Uh, they tell me they’re used to identify genetic markers,” he said, and Glenn grunted. “It’s all perfectly legal,” Mr. Calaway said as the doors opened to show a hallway almost identical to the one above, with the exception of a huge double door facing us from across a wide hallway. “Nothing unsavory,” the curator insisted. “We use it occasionally to find out who used an artifact, owner or slave. It’s old technology, and they need the cooler room to run it in.”
Airtight room. Black magic. Genetic, borderline technology. I wasn’t liking what this was adding up to, and I followed Glenn to the locked door. My amulet was a bright green. Clearly this was it, and the tension grew.
“There, huh?” Mr. Calaway said, disappointed as he glanced at the amulet and then his massive key ring. The first key he tried didn’t work, and Glenn became impatient. The second one didn’t, either, and when he tried the first one again, Glenn just about lost it.
“Open the door,” he demanded. “Or I’ll call in for a warrant and sit here until it arrives. Rachel, go stand over there.”
“I’m trying!” the curator insisted as I obediently moved to where Glenn wanted me, knowing it was going to be an empty room but wanting to prove that I could be a team player as well as the next person. “My key isn’t working,” he said, bringing the key right up to his nose and squinting at it. “Either the key has been changed or the lock has.”
Glenn squatted before it, breathing gently on the lock with his hands unmoving before him as he looked it over. “It’s the lock,” he said softly as he stood. “You can see the new scratches in the paint. We need to get a team down here for fingerprints.”
“They can’t do that!” Mr. Calaway exclaimed, affronted. “I’m the curator!”
“I don’t have time for this,” Nina said impatiently. “Excuse me.”
She moved vampire fast, and both Glenn and Mr. Calaway backed up when she grasped the knob and simply yanked the mechanism out of the door. It gave way with a terrible shriek of twisted metal and, looking satisfied, Nina threw it into the open elevator.
“Shall we?” she said as she tugged down the hint of lace at the hem of her sleeves.
Glenn was outraged, sputtering at the loss of fingerprints. Mr. Calaway looked at the waiting vampire, then the broken lock in the elevator, and finally the door. “Sure,” he said weakly. I think he’d only just realized she was a vampire.
My skin prickled as Glenn pushed the door open, tense and straining for sound as he slipped into the darkness past the threshold. Nina was next, straight and upright as she casually strolled in and turned on the lights. Thinking about the mutated, twisted body in Washington Park, I hesitated where I was with Mr. Calaway. “We’re good,” Glenn’s voice echoed out, and I lurched to get in before Mr. Calaway.
The room was at least two stories high, lit with fluorescent lights still flickering and ringed with banks of cupboards and counter space. At the center of the room was the holding pen in a huge snow-globe-like affair, all blackened timbers and broken chimney. The windows were mere slits, and the walls had fallen apart in places. It was ugly, awful, and I was glad it was behind glass. Maybe Mr. Calaway was right to hide this. The emotion coming from it was almost too much to bear.
Shivering, I went in farther. Mr. Calaway was staring, aghast, at the twin empty spaces against the opposite wall. I could see why. There were scrape marks, and in one place, the wall had been busted and a thick cable had been pulled out. The end was raw and looked like it had been connected to something, hardwired in, and just cut out.
There were no bodies, no blood, and it looked barren. Perhaps too barren, I thought as Mr. Calaway began a high-pitched cry, his hands over his mouth.
“They’re gone!” he shouted, pointing at the broken wall with a trembling finger, and Glenn turned from where he’d been staring at the holding pen.
“Who?” the FIB detective asked, his voice suddenly aggressive.
“The machines!” Mr. Calaway said, pointing again. “Someone took the machines! They’re gone!”
Ten
The come-and-go chatter of the FIB guys was pleasant, much like the audible equivalent of the hot chocolate I was sipping: warm, comfortable, and soothing. I watched the FIB officers with half my attention as they finished up, having vacuumed, photographed, measured, and taken samples within an inch of being ridiculous. They hadn’t strung up their yellow tape except for the door, and after I had promised that I’d stay sitting on the counter, they’d left me alone. I was being a good girl, and I think they’d forgotten I was here. It had been almost four hours.
My eyes strayed to a square of concrete that was lighter than the rest, and I couldn’t help but wonder why no one had commented on it. Even Ivy and Jenks—who had been allowed to help gather information—ignored it.
Setting my paper cup of powdered fat, sugar, and cocoa down, I pulled my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around my legs. I couldn’t help my sigh. Ivy took to data collection like a duckling to water, and Jenks, with his ability to see the smallest thing and wedge into the narrowest place without leaving anything but dust, was equally as welcome. Even the two I.S. personnel, standing on the outskirts and watching, were more accepted than I was. Somehow, between the investigation at Trent’s stables a few summers ago and the house where a banshee and her psychotic husband killed a young couple and stole their identities, I’d gained the reputation of being a disruptive force at a crime scene.
“But they can’t be replaced!” Mr. Calaway exclaimed as an FIB officer tried to lead him back out into the hallway. Smiling, I rested my cheek on my knees. The guy was having a very bad day, and his tidy state had slowly decayed. His small temper tantrum of frustration at Glenn’s estimation of his chances of recovering his property had been entertaining. I thought it odd that Mr. Calaway was more upset that his machines had been stolen than the fact that there had been six people living down here for almost a week without his knowledge, but I agreed with his assessment that even though the machines had been insured,
replacing them would be impossible. They didn’t make equipment and software that revolved around identification of the genetic markers anymore.
Trent probably had one, I thought. I’d ask him if he was missing any sensitive machinery when I talked to him about the memory-charm blocker.
A soft prickling of the skin on my neck brought my head up, and I looked across the wide room to see Nina making a slow beeline for me. Her expression was one of surprise that I’d felt her attention, and I shifted my legs to a more professional position, dangling them over the sides of the counter and a good foot off the floor.
“May I join you?” she asked formally, and I nodded, feeling uncomfortable. She’d been here as long as I had, going upstairs once to make a call before returning to sit on the outskirts and watch. I didn’t think she was waiting her turn like I was, but rather learning firsthand how extensive FIB data gathering was.
She sighed heavily as she leaned a hip against the counter, sounding so alive that I stared at her. “Not mad at me anymore?” I said, and she chuckled.
“Mildly annoyed,” she drawled, her hands holding her biceps. “Losing jurisdiction was a small concession for the chance to see you work.” Looking sideways at me, she all but smirked. “If the FIB fails to apprehend the people responsible and to keep HAPA out of the headlines, you will still take the blame.”
It was what I figured, and peeved, I thumped my heels into the cupboard I was sitting on. “Getting settled?” I said sourly, meaning him into Nina, and her expression flashed, dark.
But then she smiled to show her little living-vampire teeth. “Nina is most appreciative,” she said, her voice lower than one would expect. “She was destined to be no one, and now she will walk away from this with myriad coping techniques and little wisdoms that other vampires will recognize and acknowledge. I’ve furthered her evolution tremendously, and her chances of living past the crucial forty-year ceiling after death have increased as well.”
I was talking directly to the undead vampire, and it gave me the creeps. “Okay, so why don’t you do this all the time? There’s got to be a downside.”
Nina shifted her body away. “How right you are, Ms. Morgan.”
I waited for more, but he/she wasn’t telling, instead watching the FIB personnel examining the bags of dust they’d sucked up in the vacuum. “Tell me yours, and I’ll tell you mine,” I mocked.
Nina stiffened. She slowly turned back, still leaning casually against the counter but with a new wariness tightening her features. “Why should I?”
I was dealing with the devil, and my heart hammered. “Rynn Cormel believes that I can save her soul after death.” I glanced at Ivy, who was studying a printout with Jenks. “He believes I’ll find a way to keep her soul intact after she dies, and with that, she won’t need the blood anymore. The information might help me figure out how.” I licked my lips. It was the first time I’d openly admitted to anyone not my friend why the city-wide master vampire and former U.S. president had put me and my roommate off-limits to everyone.
Apparently my “show” was enough for a “tell,” and Nina turned her attention to Ivy, saying, “Borrowing Nina this long isn’t healthy. I’m feeling a great lack in myself, a longing. I’ve had to almost double my blood consumption to combat it. Feeling her emotion, even filtered through my thoughts, has taxed my ability to maintain my balance.”
It went with what Ivy had said earlier, and I shivered when Nina’s eyes suddenly became a hungry-vampire black and her reclining posture became a threat.
“I am quite hungry,” she said casually. “But it’s not for blood. I want to feel the sun on my face, not feel it through Nina. It grows harder to not give up and simply . . . rise into the sunlight. It might be worth ending it all for that exquisite moment of joy.” Her eyes fixed on mine. “What do you think?”
I put my palms on the counter, wanting to inch away from her. “I think you need to stay where you are, in the dark.”
The undead vampire thought about that for a moment, then nodded, all the rising tension washing out in a soft sigh. “Perhaps you’re correct,” Nina said, and I breathed easier when she looked across the room to Glenn, peering up at Jenks, who was standing in a heating duct. “This Detective Glenn. My information says he’s been working with you for some time. Do you find him . . . trustworthy? Unbiased?”
I appreciated the change of topic, and I eased when she shifted her position so we were more side to side than facing each other. Unbiased. What he/she meant was unprejudiced. It was an understandable question. “I’ve worked with him off and on for a couple of years,” I said, remembering Jenks pixing the man for all but kidnapping me that first day. I chuckled, then explained, “He wasn’t afraid of me when we met. He still isn’t, but he learned respect quickly.”
Nina made a small sound of agreement. “Respect can’t always save you. He’s been with a skilled vampire,” she said, her eyes on Glenn in a way that made me feel decidedly protective. “A dead one, by the look of it.”
Concerned, I brought my knees back up to my chin. It was cold down here. “Glenn? No. He’s dating Ivy. He knows better than to get involved with a dead vampire.”
“Her?”
I frowned at the disbelief in Nina’s voice, and brought my attention from where Ivy and Glenn were discussing something with Jenks. Jenks wasn’t happy, and red dust was pooling under him. “Yes, her,” I said. Ivy’s old master had made Ivy into something just this side of the undead, while still living, to satisfy his own depraved longings. “And you will leave her alone,” I added, “or I’ll track you down, Mr. Ohem-whatever-your-name-is, and I and my little pixy friend will do something permanent.”
Nina smiled ingratiatingly, and my face burned. I fingered the charmed silver on my wrist, feeling my tension rise. Would I take it off to save Ivy? Probably, though it would mess up my life. Nina suddenly sobered. “You are serious,” she said, her brown eyes wide. “Then I apologize. I will leave her alone.”
“Good,” I said tightly, unkinking my fingers from around my shins. Why is he being so chummy? It was almost as if yesterday hadn’t happened.
Ivy, too, had smelled my anger, and she swung her hair from her face and looked at me, her gaze flicking questioningly to Nina. I gave her a sour bunny-eared kiss-kiss to tell her we were okay, and she said something to Jenks, who then laughed like wind chimes.
“She knows you’re talking about her,” Nina said, sounding almost wistful.
“Yup.” I didn’t want to think about how close a tie we had for her to be able to do that. Ignorance was bliss.
Jenks darted up and down like a yo-yo, and I tossed my nasty, snarled hair off my shoulder as he approached, but it was my knee he landed on. His wings looked gray with cold, and they were rattling. They’d been getting progressively louder the longer he stayed down here.
“You okay?” I said as he landed, huffing a little. “Want them to turn up the heat?”
“Nah, I’m okay,” he said, but he sat down to take advantage of the heat coming up off my knee. “The people who strung up that witch in the park were here, all right. The air ducts are closed, but you can tell they were opened recently and the filters changed. Hardly a day’s worth of dust on them. The ductwork has been cleaned, too. Only a pixy could tell.” He glanced at Nina, listening intently. “Or one of those optic lines, maybe.
“And the computers?” the pixy added, his wings shivering to up his core temperature. “I got into the history files of the ones they didn’t take. All of them say they haven’t been used recently, but the trash was wiped last Thursday, so it’s my guess that that’s when they left.”
Nina tapped her fingers and pushed herself away from the counter. “The day before they dumped the man in the park.”
Jenks nodded. He looked about as cold as I felt, and I promised myself I’d make cookies tonight to get the kitchen warm and cozy for him. “I don
’t even know why they used them,” Jenks said. “They’re so old that a laptop would have more power.”
“Not the same programs, though,” I said, wondering if he’d accept the unused tissue I had jammed in my shoulder bag as a blanket.
“Right,” Jenks said. Arms wrapped around himself, he looked up at me, an odd look of both revulsion and attraction on his face. “The curator said the computers down here were for doing genetic stuff.”
I nodded. “Helpful when you’re making witches capable of invoking demon magic,” I said. God! What were they doing? This was crazy. Who would want to be like me? My life sucked.
“Like you,” Jenks said, his voice thick with warning.
“Yes, like me,” I said, then sighed. “I’ll be fine, Jenks.” I glanced at Nina, who had heard my theory in the coffeehouse about what these wackos were doing. “They know better than to go after me, or they would’ve done it by now.”
“Maybe they would have except for Wayde,” he said. “He’s a lot better at this than you give him credit for. You need to get off his case.”
“I know. I apologized,” I said, and he made a satisfied noise.
“You need to stay away from Ivy, too, Mr. Walkie-Talkie Man,” Jenks said suddenly.
My head came up to see Jenks standing, still on my knee, with his hands on his hips and staring at Nina. “Ah, Jenks?”
Nina slowly slouched until she was reclining against the counter again, her attention on the FIB as they began packing up their gear. On a man, her posture would have looked casual and attractive, but on Nina, it was untidy and at odds with her expensive pantsuit. “I know. I apologized,” she said, mimicking me to sound mocking.
“I know your type,” Jenks said, unconvinced. “You see something, and you want to know if you can eat it. You’re worse than my youngest daughter. Stay away from Ivy or I’ll find where you sleep and send my gargoyle in to carve out your heart.”
“I’m staying away from Ivy,” she said flatly, and Jenks hummed his wings.