Death of a Wandering Wolf

by Julia Buckley

  “He’s chasing me,” I managed. I pointed to my throat. Thyra walked forward with a water bottle, and I drank. Then I said, “Killer. Kodaly’s killer.”

  “Come and sit down,” Runa said. “I’ll call Erik.”

  She had her phone out; she poked it, and then it was at her ear. “Erik,” she said, and Brad Derrien burst through the door, shutting it behind him.

  He was out of breath, too, and sweating. He took out a gun, obscene and black, and pointed it at us.

  “Hello, ladies,” he said with a terrible smile.

  Chapter 19

  To the Wolves

  He pointed at Runa. “I’ll have to ask you to give me that phone.”

  She did so. Her hand wasn’t shaking, and her face was expressionless. “This is your man, Hana?”

  “Yes. He killed William Kodaly.”

  “Wrong,” said Brad Derrien. He motioned for Thyra’s phone and mine, and we gave them to him. “I did not kill him. I have an alibi.”

  “Then why are you here? Why did you come to my apartment?” The proximity of others had made me bold.

  His eyes widened. “You knew about that, huh? Like I said, I just want to talk to you.”

  “Then put the gun down,” Thyra said.

  Derrien shrugged. “Can’t do that. Where does that door there go?”

  “To the alley,” Thyra said. “Why don’t you head out there, and we won’t chase you?”

  He laughed. “Chase me? I’m the one with the gun, lady. If anyone’s going to run, it will be you.”

  “I thought you said you only wanted to talk,” I said. I was trembling, half with fear and half with anger. I was worried about the anger, and what it might make me do. I was on the verge of some terrible explosion.

  Runa took a step backward, her hands in the air. “Okay, so let’s talk. What do you want to talk about?” she said. Her blue eyes were cold and trained on him.

  He pointed. “We should go in the alley. I don’t want anyone to hear us.”

  Thyra did not like this; I could tell she was thinking through her options. “The alley is not contained. All sorts of people go up and down. You’ll want to stay here until you’ve said your piece.”

  Derrien scowled. He obviously wanted us to act more afraid than we were acting. The funny thing was that I could feel the fear in the room, almost taste it, and it came from all four of us. But Runa and Thyra looked as calm as statues.

  Derrien pointed at me. “Here’s what you need to know. I didn’t kill Kodaly. Someone else did that.”

  My mouth hung open. “Why in the world do you want me to know that?”

  “Because I know you suspect me!”

  “How would you know that? You don’t know me. You’ve never met me. Maybe you chatted with Cassandra Stone and heard about my family? Heard the rumor that we have abilities? And then you decided to shoot at me while I was at the autumn ball? That you weren’t out of town at all, the way you told Amber?”

  His face darkened. “I didn’t do that.” He was lying though; his eyes told me that.

  “The only reason you would have found me threatening is that you feared I would know the truth. Know it, through some other means than the police have, and this possibility made you nervous. Is that pretty close? Because otherwise I can’t explain why you and I are standing here now.” My hands were on my hips; I leaned forward with aggression born of adrenaline. Runa caught my eye and shook her head. She wanted me to tone it down.

  I took a step back and let my hands fall to my sides.

  Derrien said, “How about if you just shut up for a minute?”

  We all stared at him, a trio of coldness that was lowering the temperature in the room.

  He wiped his forehead with the hand that wasn’t holding the gun. “Let me think.”

  Runa and Thyra exchanged a glance; I didn’t know what it meant, but I felt a certain power in them. It thrilled me—but this, too, might have been born of adrenaline.

  “I know why you killed him,” I said. “Because you loved Sofia, and she told you that she was going to go back to him. That she loved him. And he suspected you; he put your face on the man in his Dark Intentions painting. A painting I’m guessing you stole because you feared people would recognize you.”

  Derrien’s brows rose, and then he got defensive. “Sofia was not in love with him. She loves me,” he said.

  “Then why kill him?” I asked.

  “Because—I didn’t kill him!” Derrien shouted.

  Someone knocked at the door. “Ms. Wolf, is everything all right back there?”

  Derrien lifted his gun and pointed it directly at me.

  Runa said, “Everything’s fine, thanks,” in a voice both calm and dismissive. The person outside said, “Okay, let me know if you need anything.”

  “Thanks, Finola,” Runa said, her eyes on Derrien’s gun.

  I had the sense that the distractions were helping. Derrien was confused, afraid, wondering about his next move. The dialogue was keeping him from working it out.

  “Why did you put the tracker on the wolf? And why did you tell Will Kodaly that Sofia gave it to him?”

  His eyes widened, but he tried to lie. “What makes you think there was a—?”

  “The police found the tracker on the very first day. They know that someone used it to find Kodaly’s house and kill him. And now it’s clear that if you wanted Sofia to take you back, you’d have to produce an alibi. She would hate you if she knew you killed her lover. So you hired someone to do your dirty work, right?”

  Panic flitted through his eyes. “Is that just your theory?” he asked.

  “No. The police know all this. They also know that I came to Imperius today. I arrived with a police escort because you made so many clumsy attempts to kill me.”

  “This is ridiculous,” he said. His sweat was visible now. “We need to clear all this up. I didn’t kill Kodaly, but I think I know who did.”

  “I do, too. The man you gave the tracker to. The man you told to drive out to Kodaly’s house and kill him. What I can’t imagine is who would possibly—” A horrible image appeared in my brain. “Oh no,” I said. “You didn’t.”

  Derrien winced slightly as my eyes locked on his.

  “You used that poor man in front of Imperius. The paranoid man who fears that some unknown predator is coming. You fed his fears and told him to kill Kodaly.”

  Runa and Thyra looked indignant. “Chester? The man at the light pole?”

  I nodded, watching Derrien’s face. “You had the means and the opportunity. All the police have to do is find out where you bought the surveillance equipment and the other things will fall into place. And of course they’ll know that you showed up here with a gun and threatened three women.”

  Derrien’s eyes were dangerous now—the eyes of a cornered animal. “I’m tired of listening to all of you. You think you’re better than me?”

  “Yes,” Thyra said. “And smarter, too.”

  Derrien aimed his gun at her. “How smart do you feel now?” he asked. With a mighty lunge, Runa heaved the clothing rack at Derrien; it hit him in his midsection just as the gun fired. I dove to the ground.

  Someone screamed: was it him? Was it one of the twins? Had it been me? My heartbeat thudded in my ears and drowned out most of what was happening. I couldn’t see anyone on my side of the clothing rack. I heard a punch, another scream, more punches.

  “No!” wailed Runa’s voice.

  Horrified, I struggled to get up. What had I done? I had led him here. I had put their lives in danger—Thyra’s and Runa’s and Runa’s baby! With a sob I inched forward, moving through clothing that lay on the floor. Someone was pounding on the door outside. “Ms. Wolf? Ms. Wolf? What’s happening?”

  “The police will be here soon!” Runa cried. As if in answer, sirens
sounded distantly.

  I peered around the corner and saw Brad Derrien curled into a fetal position on the floor; Thyra stood above him, her face bloody and the skin around her eye growing red. She held his gun in her hand.

  Runa stood beside her, looking perfectly fine. I pointed at her with a shaking finger. “You cried out! You said, ‘No!’”

  Runa smoothed her blonde hair. This time her hands were shaking. “Because he tore my blouse. It’s real silk.”

  My sigh of relief seemed to last for a long time.

  I said, “Thank you. Both of you.”

  They smiled at me.

  By the time the Chicago police arrived, the twins had already tied Derrien’s hands with some packing tape, and when Erik Wolf and Greg Benson burst in ten minutes later, my blonde saviors were already holding different outfits against me, deciding what I should wear for the photo shoot. “You thought you got out of it, Hana, but you didn’t,” Thyra said, grinning like a Viking after battle, her gory eye turning redder by the minute.

  “It’s the least I can do,” I said. “I’ll pose in the nude if you want me to.”

  Runa considered this. “It might be good—maybe riding that fake reindeer we used last year. Maybe a tastefully placed Ulveflokk sign.”

  Erik had finished talking to the other police officers by then and had moved to my side, holding me against him. My trembling had almost ceased. He said, “Maybe not, Runa.”

  Her eyes were defiant. “It’s Hana’s decision! If she wants to be nude for a photo shoot, she can.”

  “I don’t want to,” I said. “I was using hyperbole.”

  Erik was studying his sisters. “Are you guys okay?”

  “Yes,” Thyra said, laughing a bit too much.

  “No,” Runa said, winding a Nordic-patterned scarf around my neck, and she began to cry.

  * * *

  Derrien was led away moments later. I hugged both of the women who had saved me, clinging to them more than they probably wanted. Then Andy appeared, his face pale. “What the heck is going on?” he asked.

  Erik said, “Everyone’s fine. But you should take Runa home.”

  He did. To my surprise, someone named Rolf also appeared, a big shaggy-looking man with long blond hair and an unshaven look. He examined Thyra’s eye and her cheekbone; Erik murmured that he was her boyfriend, and a doctor. My mouth hung open in surprise, and Thyra winked at me, then said, “Ow.”

  Rolf hustled her out of the room, murmuring about X-rays.

  Then somehow, I was there alone with Erik Wolf, amid a jumble of clothes and a stack of Ulveflokk packing boxes, on which four wolves howled at a lonely moon.

  “You scared me,” he said. “All of you. Katie called, and then Runa called, and I heard a man yelling in the background. I cannot tell you, Hana—”

  “I know just how afraid you were. I felt the same when I was flying down the stairs of Imperius, terrified that any minute he would catch me. Then I was playing hide-and-seek in the parking garage.”

  “Oh God. Oh, Hana!” He squeezed me against him. “We were looking at Derrien already; Talman didn’t pan out. I had just talked to Sofia, asking her if she’d mentioned to anyone that she planned to go back to Kodaly. There was just a short list of people, and that’s when Greg and I knew. A minute later we got Katie’s call.”

  “It was scary. But I knew to come here, that it was my best bet. Your sisters were amazing. They never looked scared, even though I knew they were.”

  “They’ve always been brave. I’m proud of them, and I’m proud of you, Hana.”

  “For what? Running?”

  “No. For figuring this all out. And facing down a madman.”

  I shook my head, trying to clear the cobwebs. “How am I going to tell my family about this? How am I going to tell my grandma that a man held a gun in my face?”

  Erik looked down at me with the hint of a smile. “And how are you going to tell her that when you were in danger you ran to the wolves?”

  “Oh boy,” I said.

  “Maybe don’t tell her that part,” Erik said.

  Chapter 20

  The Wolves to Come

  The story came out over the next several days. I got information from Erik, from television news; from Sofia, who called me in tears; from my grandmother, who was on the Hungarian grapevine; and from stories printed in the Riverwood press. Derrien was in jail; Chester, the man he had manipulated into committing murder, had been declared unfit for trial and was being cared for in a psychiatric facility. Wolf and Benton had found evidence of Brad’s purchase of the surveillance equipment, along with e-mails he had written to Sofia, begging her to take him back. They had matched the footprint outside the window at the Riverwood Pavilion to Brad Derrien’s shoe in Derrien’s basement, and they had found the gun used to kill Kodaly and the one used in an attempt to kill me.

  Dark Intentions, Sofia told me, had been painted by Kodaly after they had an argument about her ex-lovers. He said that she had terrible taste in men, and that Derrien in particular was disturbing. She dismissed him, saying that jealousy was not flattering. “He told me in just those words: ‘The man has dark intentions.’ But I wouldn’t listen to him,” she said, wiping at tears. “He tried to warn me again, with the painting. But Brad was back with Amber, and I assured William that everything was fine.”

  “But, Sofia,” I said, “how did Will know that Brad had this dark side?”

  Sofia sniffled in my ear. “He told me that he had psychic ability. That it informed his art, lifted it to a higher level. I’m afraid I sniffed at that, too. I called him silly and vain. Now of course I know it’s true.”

  * * *

  “He thought he was psychic,” I said to Erik that night as we ate in my apartment. “And that explains so much! When I met him, he shook my hand, and there was this burst of light—just for a second—and he looked at me like he knew me. He said my family fascinated him.”

  “Wow,” Erik said.

  “And when we were talking about my grandmother, he asked if I had anything in common with her besides my brown eyes. He wanted to know if I was psychic, too. He wanted to find—his own kind, I guess.”

  “And he did,” Erik assured me.

  “Yeah. I mean, the fact that he had my family investigated . . . he really wanted to know something, but what? If he really had a psychic ability? Or how his life would turn out if he did?”

  “Didn’t you say he asked Sipos if Natalia was happy?”

  “Yes. Wow. Did he just want to know whether his gift was a positive in his life? Did it torment him in some way?”

  “It was probably a two-sided coin.” He reached out to touch my hand. “Isn’t it?”

  I nodded. “It is. But look at what it did for his art! Falken told me that since the press has made a big deal of Kodaly’s paintings, the demand for them has gone up. One of them just earned five hundred thousand at auction, and the prices will go up from there.”

  Erik’s green eyes were solemn. “Would you sell either of your Kodaly paintings to make half a million dollars?”

  I shook my head. “No. It would be like selling a holy relic. I can feel his power, his life, on those canvases. And they’re beautiful. You know how I feel about beautiful things.”

  “I do. I notice you put your wolf on display.”

  I had done so, the night before. My bedroom held an amazing shelf, made by my father and my grandparents. It held my favorite books and my growing collection of porcelain. Erik had removed the tracker from Kodaly’s ill-fated wolf, but I chose to see the porcelain figure for what it was—a thing of beauty, a work of art, and a gift that Kodaly had given me because he saw that it made me happy. In this way, I could look at it and not feel sad or ashamed. It had lost its terrible stigma.

  “Yeah. It looks good by that gold teacup.”

  He smi
led into his coffee cup. “I’ll never have to worry about what to buy you on special occasions. I have you figured out.”

  “Not entirely, Detective Wolf. You’ll still need some skills to solve my mysteries.”

  His gaze moved upward and met mine. “Then I’d better start investigating.”

  * * *

  Right before Thanksgiving, my mother and grandmother hosted a tea event called Friends of Kodaly, along with many of Kodaly’s old friends and old flames. Sofia came alone, her eyes more sad than ever. Amber Derrien came, too, accompanied by the man she had met at the dance. His obvious devotion seemed to be helping her deal with the horror of knowing that her husband had killed Kodaly.

  Falken had allowed us to temporarily display some of Kodaly’s art in the tea house, and people milled around looking at canvas after canvas, invigorated by the man’s talent.

  I rushed between tables, filling cups with tea and replenishing sandwiches and cakes. François had outdone himself. I snuck into the back room to tell him so, and I found him standing irresolute, his face flushed.

  “François? Are you all right?”

  He looked at me, his eyes blurry with feeling. “I have looked at these paintings, all of them. This man was a genius. This man’s gift—I cannot explain it. It is sublime. I want to own one of those paintings, Hana. The man on the mountain, did you see it?”

  I had—it was one that had been in Kodaly’s basement and offered at twenty-five dollars. “Yes. It’s beautiful.” The painting was deceptively simple: a man stood at the top of a mountain and lifted his face to view the open sky. Kodaly’s gift for creating light, however, made it a subtly layered piece, the light graduating from dark shadows up to almost blinding sun and pure white clouds. It was a painting of triumphant freedom.

  “I want to look at it every day,” he whispered. “It speaks to me. It shouts to me!” His eyes were miserable now. “But this man’s art sells now for hundreds of thousands. That’s what they tell me.”