“Monique said your Fey affinity with Earth improved after you started working with the Dark.”
“Yeah. It calls to me, and I’ve always tried to shut the sound of it out. But one day I was just so frustrated and tired of it all. I wasn’t getting anywhere with what Monique was trying to teach me and I felt like I’d never get my life back. I just couldn’t do it anymore. So I locked myself in my room and started drawing the way I did when I was a kid. The dresses I drew were dark and weird. I liked them. I drew well into the night and then I went to apologize to Monique for being such a pain in the ass. She jumped out of her skin when I stepped out of Shadow. I hadn’t realized I’d pulled it around me. That was the first time.”
“I couldn’t see you at all when you demonstrated yesterday. I’ve never witnessed an ability like that before.”
Tasha turned from the railing and went to sit on one of the swings, starting a gentle arc. “I’ve been playing with something else, too, but it scares me.”
Kellan joined her on the other swing. “Tell me.” He needed to know what kind of risks she’d taken.
“Traveling through Shadow. I don’t just wrap it around me. I go all the way in. It’s kind of like not being in the real world. I walked through a wall once.”
“That would scare anyone.”
“That wasn’t what frightened me. There are creatures that live in the Dark. Some of them try to talk to me, but I’m too afraid to listen. I never stay long, but I also feel a tug to go back.” Tasha stood and held out her hand. “Let’s go back to the hotel.”
Kellan stopped the motion of his swing and clasped her fingers. “Please be careful. I don’t know anything about this.”
She nodded, but Kellan doubted she understood enough about the Shadow Plane to know the risks.
They entered the lobby and Bea called to him from behind the desk. “Did you enjoy your dinner?”
He didn’t think Tasha had eaten more than three bites. He’d cleaned his plate but he hadn’t tasted much of his own meal. “Delicious. Thank you for the recommendation.”
Bea beamed. “Wonderful! Oh, did you want to email that picture of your friend to me so I can send it to the other hotels?”
What he wanted was to go upstairs and touch Tasha.
“Sure.” Just as he reached into his pocket for his phone it began ringing.
It was Jasper.
He didn’t bother with a greeting. “Where the hell are you?” he demanded.
An unfamiliar voice replied. “This is Detective Saavedra of the Cochise County Sheriff’s Department. Is this Kellan Matthews?”
Dread filled his belly. “Yes.”
“You were listed as an emergency contact in Jasper Sorensen’s phone. May I ask what your relationship to Mr. Sorensen is?”
“We’re friends and business partners.”
“What kind of business?”
“We’re private investigators. What’s happened? Why are you calling me on Jasper’s cell?” But he already suspected the truth.
“I’m sorry to tell you this, but Mr. Sorensen is dead.”
Chapter Nine
“Dead?” The word didn’t terrify Kellan. Over thousands of years, his various partners had transitioned to new bodies a hundred times, leaving their old bodies for new ones, but it had usually been planned and witnessed. Transition was a vulnerable time, and it helped to have another U’dahmi present to assist with the spell. Only under extreme circumstances would one of them transition on the fly.
Beside him, Tasha came to alert.
“Yes. I’m afraid it appears Mr. Sorensen was the victim of a homicide.”
Homicide. Even that might have left Jasper time to find a new home. Somehow he managed to make his voice work. “What happened?”
“I’d rather not discuss this over the phone. I notice your cell has a Phoenix area code. Is that where you are?”
“No. I’m in Bisbee.”
“What brought you to Bisbee?”
“I came here looking for Jasper.”
There was a pause, and then the detective spoke again. “That’s good you’re so close. I’d like to talk with you. Where are you staying? I can be there in half an hour.”
Kellan gave their location and ended the call.
Worry furrowed Tasha’s brow. “What’s happened?”
He glanced over at Bea who wasn’t even trying to pretend disinterest. “You won’t need to send Jasper’s picture to your friends. He’s been murdered.”
“Murdered!” Bea’s eyes widened as she pressed a hand to her chest. “Dear Lord! Here in Bisbee? How?”
“I don’t know anything more than that. A Detective Saavedra is coming to talk to me. I hope to find out more then.”
“Oh my goodness! We don’t have murders around here. Well, not more than one a year. Sometimes none. We’re not like Phoenix, or even Tucson.”
Kellan looked at Tasha, tilting his head to suggest they go upstairs to their room. Her eyes were wide in apparent alarm, but she nodded and led the way, leaving Bea to enjoy her fluster alone.
Before Tasha could open the door to their room Kellan pulled her aside, putting her back to the wall. He should have left her downstairs with Bea. What was the matter with him? Just being up here might be putting her at risk. **Let me go in first. I really don’t know anything. Worse, I don’t have a clue what the people who killed Jasper know or why they killed him. It’s possible they know about us and have found a way into our room.**
He half expected her to argue, but she nodded and stayed put.
Grateful for her compliance, Kellan unlocked the room and stepped inside. The room was empty. No sense of an intruder alarmed him. He checked the bathroom and closet for good measure, but all was as they’d left it. “It’s safe.”
Tasha came in and closed the door behind her. She reached for his hand, but he couldn’t do that now, couldn’t risk more than the brief contact for communication that he’d just had with her. He pulled back. “Not now.”
Hurt showed in her eyes before she turned away. “I get it. I just wanted to say I’m sorry.”
Damn. He’d muffed that, but he’d make it up to her later. He needed to keep his mind clear and focused so he could get the information he needed from the cop coming to interview them.
“I plan to tell Detective Saavedra that you’re my protégé. We met earlier this year and you decided to change career paths.”
Tasha lifted the corner of her mouth in a wry smile. “It has the advantage of being almost the truth.”
Kellan nodded. “If he’s any kind of detective he’ll check us out at least a little bit. He’ll need to eliminate us as suspects. Unfortunately, this will pull your sister and Gideon up on his radar, and that will bring Jared and Cassie to his attention, too.”
“So what? Ana’s a respiratory therapy tech at the university hospital, and Gideon works for Jared’s security firm. They all look very normal, don’t they?”
“That depends on how deep Saavedra digs. Police are trained to look below the surface. Ana reported you missing to Tucson Police last May, didn’t she?”
“They never followed up on it because I’d been missing less than a day at that point. As far as they’re concerned, I snuck off with my boyfriend without telling anyone. Neither my fingerprints nor my DNA are on file, so they have no way of knowing I was at the warehouse that got shot up.”
Kellan nodded. As a P.I. his fingerprints were on file, but there would have been a boatload of prints to run through the system. He’d never been questioned about the shoot-out, so maybe they hadn’t found his prints—the place had been huge after all. Or maybe the chronic backlog meant they were still processing them.
A few minutes later Saavedra announced his arrival with a double knock on their door. Tall, barrel-chested, and dark-haired, he looked to be about forty.
“Have a seat,” Kellan gestured at the small table by the window. The detective sat in one of the two chairs. It was sturdier than it looked, appa
rently, and didn’t even creak as he settled his weight onto it. Kellan took the other, while Tasha sat cross-legged on the bed nearby. He wished they had a third chair so she could sit beside him. Just so they could confer mind-to-mind if necessary.
“How did Jasper die?” Kellan asked as Saavedra pulled a small notebook out of his pocket just like every TV detective did.
“Do you mind if I ask you a few questions, first? I just need to clear up a couple of things.”
Kellan invited him to continue with a wave of his hand.
Saavedra covered the basics such as their occupations, family, where they lived, and why they were in Bisbee looking for Jasper. All stuff he undoubtedly already knew or could easily confirm. It was standard procedure to check if their stories changed, and if so, in what way. Then he moved on to ask, “Did Mr. Sorensen have any enemies? Former clients or subjects of investigations that might hold a grudge?”
“No. No one had threatened either of us.” He couldn’t tell the detective that no one would be coming after Jasper because he’d executed all of his “assignments.” Or nearly all. He’d let Melchior and Athena live.
Saavedra lifted a brow. “Most private investigators have pissed off someone, sometime. What kind of work do you do? Divorce cases? Custody battles? Bail jumpers?”
“We specialize in missing person cases. It’s not usually dangerous.”
“Not usually. But sometimes it is?”
“We’ve had a case or two of custodial interference. Parents who don’t agree with the Court’s decision. They often start out arguing with us, but we know how to talk them around. Maybe we’ve been lucky, but we’ve never had a case turn violent. I like to think it’s because we’re good at our jobs.” And it didn’t hurt that they could influence the minds of mortals to do what they already knew they should do—at least for a little while. He could suggest to Saavedra that they’d answered all his questions satisfactorily, but within a day he’d realize he hadn’t gotten any real answers and would come looking for them.
“What if the person you’re looking for doesn’t want to be found?”
“If the person we’re looking for has been abused or has some other good reason to keep their head down we just tell the person looking for them that they’re in good health, but we don’t reveal where they are. Sometimes the client isn’t happy and we don’t get the balance of our fee, but no one has threatened us or become violent.” Most of that was even true. He and Jasper had to support themselves like anyone else. Not all of their work was for the Council.
Kellan leaned forward. “Now it’s my turn. How was Jasper killed? When did he die?”
Saavedra held up a hand in a slow-down gesture. “Where were you two days ago, mid-day?”
“Both of us were at a friend’s condo in Coronado, California.”
Tasha nodded. “We got a late start back to Arizona and spent last night in Yuma.”
“What’s your friend’s name?”
Kellan gave him Monique’s contact info. He didn’t mention Ezra being there, too.
The detective wrote down what Kellan told him. “We’ll check on that.”
“Of course. When can I see him? I assume you’ll need me to ID the body?”
“That won’t be necessary. We have his fingerprints. And Mr. Sorensen’s body has been sent to the Medical Examiner in Tucson for a full autopsy.”
Tasha straightened. “Tucson?”
“Cochise County doesn’t have the tax base to support an M.E. We contract with Pima County when we have an unwitnessed death. Undocumented border crossers that die in the desert are taken there, too,” Saavedra said.
Kellan hid a wince, knowing Tasha was already thinking that she’d get to see her sister after all, even if the Golden Path was on her tail. “You still haven’t said how he died.”
The detective’s professional mask flickered as he glanced over at Tasha. Whatever he had to say disturbed even him, and he was clearly wondering if his next words were going to trigger a meltdown in her.
A cold stone settled in Kellan’s belly. “Tasha didn’t know Jasper.”
“One more question. Have either of you had any dealings with the drug cartels or local gangs?”
“No. Fortunately.” Not in this incarnation, at least.
Saavedra nodded. “Smart. You should keep it that way. But you said you hadn’t had much contact with Mr. Sorensen for six months. What was he working on again?”
“Nothing to do with the cartels,” Kellan dodged. “What about his phone? Has it given you any leads on his last contacts?”
“Not so far. We sent it to Tucson, too, since they have the tools and personnel to crack the password-protected files. Maybe you can help with that?”
Kellan nodded. “Sure. I’d be interested in that information, too. You still haven’t said—what happened to him?”
The detective blew out a deep breath and seemed to come to a decision. “His neck was broken. But before that, he was tortured.”
Dave shifted to sit beside Julie as she covered her face. Comforting women was uncharted territory for him, but he’d seen Jared put his arms around Cassie when she was upset, so he figured it was worth a try. He slung an arm around Julie’s shoulders and tucked her against him. “I’m sorry. You’ve had to deal with a lot on your own. I thought I could help more by sending you enough money to pay the bills, but maybe I was wrong about that.”
Julie didn’t pull away, so he kept going. “I was only a dumb kid myself when I left.”
His sister hiccupped and said in a tear thickened voice, “I looked up to you. You kept us safe. And then you were gone. Every time that creep downstairs came onto me I told him you’d beat the crap out of him if he touched me.”
Belated fear tightened his arm on her shoulders. “Wait. He was trying to recruit you to sell drugs and get in your pants? Jesus! How old were you?”
“No. No. It was two different guys. The first one wanted me to sell drugs to the kids in my elementary school. Then he got busted. It was a couple of years later when the perv moved in and tried to get me to sit on his lap. I was thirteen, then.”
Fuck. “Did you tell Mom?”
“She had enough to worry about. You know how she was.”
“Yeah.” She’d been fragile and had never really recovered from the years of abuse. Taking the blame for the accident that had killed her husband had been the single bravest thing she’d ever done and had used up what little she had. Dave was pretty sure she wished the lie had been the truth and that she’d been the one to end her abuser.
“After I threatened him with my Army Ranger brother, he mostly kept his hands to himself.”
Mostly. “What’s this guy’s name?” He didn’t even try to keep the growl out of his voice.
Julie hugged him and sat up, wiping the tears from her cheeks. “Thank you. But it’s past tense.”
“For you.”
“For him, too. He’s in prison.”
Dave rubbed a hand over his face. God, he wanted a drink. “I should have been here.”
“I thought so, too. For a long time, it seemed to me that you left us behind so you could go have adventures. Wherever you were, you didn’t have to look after us anymore. We were dead weight and you were free.”
Dave started to protest that it wasn’t like that, but she put a hand on his, stopping him.
“I was a child. And then I was a mother, and then Mom’s caregiver. I wasn’t thinking much past my hurt for a long time. I don’t know what you’ve been through, but I can see it hasn’t been a joyride.”
She’d never know, if he had any say in the matter. “I’m here now. I don’t want Chad or whoever he was talking to on the phone to hurt you or Alex. Please, let me help.” There. He hadn’t ordered or demanded. He’d given her a choice. His mentor would be so proud of him. Or he would be, if he got through this without a drink.
Julie squeezed his hand. “I don’t want to run away, but I’m too tired to think of an alternative right n
ow. Can we talk about this in the morning?”
He didn’t want to wait until the morning. Chad could come back at any time, and next time he might bring friends with him. But pushing Julie right now would be the act of a bully, and she’d had enough of those to last a lifetime. “Okay. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
He hoped he wasn’t making a deadly mistake.
Tasha watched Kellan as the door closed quietly behind the detective. He hadn’t reacted strongly when the detective had dropped his bombshell on them. Her U’dahmi bodyguard was one of the most self-contained people she’d ever met. Probably very little surprised him since he’d been alive for so long, but maybe he’d let down his guard now that Saavedra had gone. Or he might feel like he had to put on a stoic face for her. It wasn’t like they were close—despite what they’d shared when she’d fed him.
“I’m sorry you lost your partner. How long had you been working together?”
“About two hundred years, give or take. The Council put us together just before the French Revolution.”
“That’s a long time. Or maybe it’s not, for you.”
Kellan shook his head, but didn’t say anything.
“Would you like to be alone? I could go down and chat with Bea for a while, if you’d like.”
His eyes widened. “Hell no. I don’t want you out of my sight, especially now.”
“I won’t blab to Bea. We don’t need to feed the Bisbee hoteliers grapevine.”
Kellan frowned. “What? No. I’m not worried about that. I don’t know who killed Jasper. I don’t know why. Whoever killed him could have been trying to find us. They could come after me next, to get to you. Crap. I don’t know anything about what happened or why. Until I do, until I can find a safe place for you, I’m keeping you close.”
Keep her close—until he could dump her somewhere “safe.” He wanted to get rid of her. Again. That shouldn’t come as a surprise since he’d stashed her with Monique at the first chance, but it did. When they’d touched minds, she’d thought there’d been something between them—or the possibility of something. But maybe not. Probably not. Probably, he didn’t want there to be anything, regardless of what he felt.
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