“Not necessarily,” Liam said. I could tell by the tone of his voice he was thinking the same thing I was. “If the video on that SD card would have showed the same thing the witnesses claim they saw, then there’d be no reason to take it.”
“Which means, whoever took it was afraid it would prove the witnesses were wrong. Or lying.” I couldn’t help looking back at Something Fishy, toward where Siobhan still stood on her shiny boat, thinking she’d won. I smiled. “It’s not over yet.”
Chapter 7
The morning after Andy’s arrest I woke up late for me, at nine a.m. I’d been sleeping later ever since the psychic attack on my third eye. Healing that kind of injury takes a toll, and even though I could stick to my usual schedule—up with the sun—forcing my body to rise before it was ready would only make my third eye heal slower. The only problem with sleeping late is that I started my day feeling hours behind schedule.
I sensed Peasblossom frowning at me as I pulled on a clean pair of leggings and long-sleeved back knit shirt. “I still think we should have tracked down that SD card last night,” she groused. “It’s all we need to prove Andy’s innocence.”
“And like I told you last night, there was nothing we could do.” I snagged my waist pouch off the bedside table and strapped it on. “We had to let Vincent and Kylie examine the camera and search us, otherwise Siobhan could have claimed we stole the SD card because it proved Andy was guilty. And Liam tried to track who might have retrieved it, but the ammonia they used to wipe down the camera hid whatever scent trail there might have been.”
“It was funny watching him try to follow the scent trail of ammonia.” Peasblossom snickered.
“Don’t laugh, ammonia is a terrible smell for anyone. I can’t imagine what it was like for Liam.” I headed out of the bedroom for the kitchen. “Whoever took that SD card left in a car. The trail didn’t leave the parking lot.”
“So how are we going to find it?”
“We might not. If whatever’s on that card would clear Andy, then whoever took it probably destroyed it. But even if we don’t find it, the fact that it’s missing means there’s something someone doesn’t want us to know. And hopefully, after we talk to Kylie and Vincent, we’ll know what that something is.”
I could feel Peasblossom staring at me as I passed the fridge.
“I don’t want a hard boiled egg.”
I set up the Keurig for my first cup of coffee, putting my Batman mug under the drip even though I’d just be dumping it into a travel mug anyway. “You don’t have to eat it. But you should have some milk with your honey. You need protein.”
“Honey has protein.”
“No, it doesn’t.”
“It has vitamins.”
“No.”
“It has—”
“Sugar, Peasblossom. Honey has sugar. And antioxidants.”
“Well, there you have it. What more do I need?”
I let my forehead fall against the refrigerator door, enjoying the cool surface against my skin before taking a deep breath and heaving it open to retrieve the milk. “You’re having milk with your honey. We need to be better about eating, especially when we’re on a case. Once we pick Andy up, we’re going to be really busy, so we might not have time to eat for awhile. I don’t want you hyped up on sugar and then crashing when it counts.”
“I do not crash,” Peasblossom said sullenly. “My wings are fine now.”
That wasn’t what I’d meant, but for the life of me, I couldn’t be sure if Peasblossom knew that. I shook my head and retrieved two hard-boiled eggs from the bowl I kept on the top shelf. Liam was right, I did tend to neglect my dietary needs when I was busy, and that wasn’t good for anyone. Having hard boiled eggs on hand was a quick way to make sure I didn’t cheat with magic food.
Though Peasblossom was clearly already sick of them.
“All right, so Kylie told Liam they should have results for us this morning,” I said, cracking one of the eggs. “Liam’s picking us up, then we’ll swing by for Andy, and we’re off to Kylie’s for the autopsy results.”
“It would have been easier if Andy had just stayed here,” the pixie pointed out, wrinkling her nose as I took a bite of my egg. “Then we wouldn’t have to make the trip to his house. Kylie’s house is far enough.”
“Peasblossom, have a heart. The man is under enough stress right now, he deserves to sleep in his own bed.”
At the sound of a knock at the door I shoved the rest of my hardboiled egg into my mouth. I snagged the other egg to eat on the way, then dumped my coffee into a travel mug and hurried to let Liam in.
He smiled when he noticed my breakfast on the go. “You remembered to eat.”
I chased the last bite of egg with a swallow of coffee, relieved that the amount of milk I’d dumped into it had cooled it enough to drink quickly. “Did you?” I teased.
He grinned as he reached around me to grab my red trench coat. “Two pounds of bacon, six eggs, and four pieces of toast.”
I let him help me into my coat. “Show off.”
Liam chuckled and we made our way out of my apartment building to his truck. The sun was bright this morning, and I squinted as the beams stabbed me in the eye through the glass of the front doors.
“Is Scath coming with us today?” Liam asked.
“Yes. She took Majesty outside to…” I stopped, unsure how to put it.
“To set him off so he doesn’t sneeze magic later,” Peasblossom supplied.
The flare in Liam’s aura told me he was remembering the last time Majesty had flexed his magic. A rather unfortunate experience that had involved slowing Liam in time—right after he’d been shot. It occurred to me now that he might not want Majesty along this time. And if that were the case, we’d need to have the awkward conversation about how part of the kitten’s magic seemed to be showing up when I least expected him.
Fortunately, Scath chose that moment to trot up to us wearing her service dog disguise. Without the glamour, Scath was an enormous beast with the body of a panther, and the ears of a lynx. Her body wasn’t so much black fur as shadow, or maybe just a moving hole in the universe.
I didn’t stare too hard at her without the glamour. That way madness lies. Typical of the Unseelie Court.
Majesty peeked out of the pouch slung around Scath’s body, and I caught a glimpse of blue eyes in a white-dusted face on what was otherwise a grey cat with black stripes. On his good days, I could almost appreciate him for the adorable kitten he was, all but forgetting about his chaos magic and the turmoil it caused me.
I’d already caught Scath up on what was going on last night after I got back to the apartment. She didn’t like to take human form very often, and she really didn’t like to talk if it wasn’t absolutely necessary, but she’d resumed human form long enough to share her thoughts on kelpies. Apparently, there was a sort of don’t-ask-don’t-tell policy among the Otherworld when it came to creatures that ate humans.
According to Scath, there were those among the Otherworld who looked at creatures that preyed on humans—such as kelpies—much the way humans looked at deer hunters who kept the herd numbers down.
I hadn’t asked Scath if she had ever eaten a kelpie. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.
“Do you think Oksana was right about why the kelpies really hate Andy?” I asked Liam.
“You mean that they hate him because he’s not going to look the other way when they eat humans?”
“As opposed to wanting revenge for Bradan’s death, yes.”
“It makes sense to me. I don’t know a lot about kelpies, but based on my limited experience, they aren’t really herd animals.”
“Which is why you call a group of waterhorses a ‘team’ not a ‘herd,’” Peasblossom added.
“Right,” Liam agreed. “They’re loners that only get together as often as they do now because some of them have decided they want a presence on land. The days of lurking around the lakes for fun and food are done, and some of them want the power
that only comes from participating in society outside the water.” He tilted his head. “I’ve only had two cases involving a waterhorse, and both of them were in the past two years.” He glanced at me. “Why do you ask?”
I leaned back in my seat. “Having to explain justice in the Otherworld to Andy has made me think about the ins and outs more. I mean, I knew that too many Otherworlders were getting away with preying on humans. That’s why I became a private investigator, to take the cases that were too small or obscure for the Vanguard to bother with.”
“And isn’t Andy helping you with that? Isn’t that why the two of you teamed up, so you could help him identify cases that had an Otherworld component?”
“Yes. But now I’m wondering if it was a mistake to involve him in a justice system that…” I trailed off, unsure how to finish.
Liam raised his eyebrows. “I see. You mean, a justice system that generally ends with the criminal facing punishment within their own closed community, or with—”
“Being killed,” Peasblossom finished.
“And it’s the second part that’s the problem. For humans, punishment for a crime usually means jail. But the Otherworld just doesn’t do that, not often. When a werewolf commits a crime, you rehabilitate them within the pack. For the sidhe, they get sanctioned—or executed—at court. For those who don’t have a strong community justice system, the criminal is more often than not killed by the victim or the victim’s family.”
“And you think Andy is being seduced by that idea,” Liam said slowly.
“I think Andy is a smart man who does his research. You heard the people at the bar. Andy’s been watching the kelpies. He’s meticulous, and he’s smart. If he started looking—really looking—how long do you think it would take him to compile a list of missing persons last seen near water?”
“As a police officer, I’ve had to watch some bad people walk away because I couldn’t get the proof to convince a court of law,” Liam said quietly. “I won’t deny that the thought of meting out justice vigilante-style is tempting. But crossing that line… It doesn’t lead anywhere good.”
“The question is,” I said half to myself, “how close has Andy come to crossing it?”
Liam tapped one finger against the steering wheel. “I ran the serial number for the gun. It’s unregistered.”
“So it could be Andy’s or it could be someone else’s,” I murmured. “Not good news, not bad news.”
No one said much the rest of the way to Andy’s. I wasn’t sure how interested Scath was in the conversation, but she obviously wasn’t interested enough to take her human form and weigh in. Finally, we arrived at his house, and I got out to fetch him.
There was no answer when I knocked on the door. I frowned and knocked again. Still no answer. I tried the knob, but it was locked.
“No answer?” Liam asked, getting out of the truck.
I rose on tiptoe to look through one of three diamond-shaped windows in the door. I didn’t see anyone, but there were no signs of a struggle either, no overturned furniture or broken windows. “I don’t see him.”
I held a hand out toward the doorknob. Normally, using a lockpicking spell on the door to a personal home was risky. A threshold held a type of magic all its own, and its response to an invasion could be unpredictable. But I’d been here before, used this spell here before. I was reasonably certain the threshold wouldn’t attack me.
Reasonably.
“Recludo,” I whispered.
To my relief, the lock clicked. I turned the knob, and the door opened easily, so I stepped inside, Liam following behind me.
Liam’s nostrils flared. “No one else has been here recently. But neither has Andy. His scent is faint, as if he hasn’t been here for a long time.”
“You mean not since last night?”
Liam shook his head. “I could be more accurate in wolf form, but even now, I can tell it’s been weeks. I can almost smell the wood of the furniture and the dust more than him.”
“But we dropped him off here last night.”
“But we didn’t watch him go inside. Based on what I’m smelling, it seems like he must have left right after we did.”
“Check upstairs,” Peasblossom urged.
I was already headed for the stairs. “Wait here,” I said over my shoulder to Liam.
I found the door to Andy’s parents’ room locked, but it didn’t take me more than a second to open it. I pushed the door open and stepped inside. “Mr. and Mrs. Bradford?”
Two ghosts appeared to my left, tickling my peripheral vision as they materialized. I recognized the woman with the short white hair and the cotton blouse with blue flowers on it. I also recognized the concern in her eyes as she rushed toward me.
“Shade,” Andy’s mother said. “Oh, thank goodness you’re here! Where is Andrew?”
“I was going to ask you the same question. Did he come home last night?”
“No.” She wrung her hands in front of her, her features pinched tight with worry. “I heard him at the door, and I heard a car pull away. But he didn’t come inside. And when I went downstairs to look, he was standing at the end of the driveway. A taxi picked him up eventually.”
A knot of dread hardened in the pit of my stomach. “When was the last time you saw him? Inside, I mean?”
The second ghost stepped forward, a man wearing a grey suit and starched white shirt. Andy’s father. “Not since August.” His lips pressed into a thin line. “Is Andrew all right?”
Blood and bone. I stared at them, and I knew my attempt to hide my concern failed when his mother reached for her husband, one hand pressing against his chest until he took her hand in his and squeezed it.
“What’s wrong with Andrew? What’s happened?” Her expression grew pained. “It’s us, isn’t it? He’s not comfortable with us being here like this.” She gestured at their ghostly forms.
I shook my head. “It’s not you. I don’t think it’s you.” I backed toward the door. I hated to leave them like this, to leave without giving them any answers. But I didn’t have any answers to give. And I had nothing to say that would be of any comfort. “I’m going to go find him right now. I’ll come back, and I’ll bring him with me.”
Mrs. Bradford let her husband gather her to his chest. He nodded at me, and there was more emotion in that one gesture than I think he’d wanted to show.
I retreated down the stairs and gestured for Liam to follow me out before I locked the door behind me. “Andy’s parents said he hasn’t been home since August.”
It was hard to get the words out past the lump in my throat.
Liam froze. “His parents? Aren’t they—”
“Ghosts. Long story.” I hurried back to the truck and climbed inside, already groping for my cell phone in the side pocket of my pouch. I dialed Andy’s number with shaking hands. It went straight to voicemail. Four more attempts got the same result. “He’s not answering. His phone is off.”
Liam started the truck and backed out of the driveway. “We’ll check his office. If he’s not sleeping here, he has to be sleeping somewhere.”
I dialed Bryan’s number. Bryan Foundling worked security at the FBI building where Andy worked. He’d been the one to introduce us, and I trusted him enough to ask him questions that might arouse suspicion in his other coworkers. Maybe Andy had gone in to work?
“Mother Renard,” Bryan said in lieu of hello. “It’s good to hear from you. How’ve you been?”
“Keeping busy,” I said honestly. “Bryan, have you see Andy around lately? Did he come in today?”
Uncomfortable silence filled the air. Then Bryan cleared his throat. “He didn’t mention his…vacation?”
“I thought he used up all his vacation days this spring?”
Bryan cleared his throat again. I heard him murmur under his breath to someone, as if excusing himself. After a minute, he came back. “Mother Renard, Andy was ‘encouraged’ to take a vacation a month ago. If you know what I mean?”
“You mean he was unofficially suspended.” I took a slow, deep breath. “Why?”
“He struck a suspect in custody,” Bryan said quietly. “Lost his temper and just… Well, he hit the guy pretty hard. Another agent was watching the interrogation, and he broke it up quick, but…” He sighed. “If he didn’t have the clean record he does, it would have been a lot worse.”
I looked at Liam. He didn’t take his eyes off the road, but I could tell by the set of his jaw that he’d heard everything.
“Thanks for telling me, Bryan,” I said, keeping my voice as light as I could manage. “I’ll talk to him.”
“Please do.” Bryan let out a deep breath. “Shade, Andy’s been under a lot of stress, and I get that. But if he doesn’t get a handle on it soon, I’m not sure he’s going to be able to come back.”
“I’ll talk to him,” I said again. “I’ll call you back later, Bryan.”
I hung up before he could say anything else.
“You don’t think he ran, do you?” Peasblossom asked carefully. “Because if he did—”
“I don’t think he ran,” I said quickly. “But I do think he’s in trouble. I think he’s been in trouble for a while, and for some reason, he hasn’t told me about it.”
“He didn’t know the terms of his bail,” Peasblossom pointed out. “He would never have run if he knew what it meant for you. But he didn’t know, so maybe…”
Scath’s head shot up at the mention of ‘terms.’ Suddenly there was a giant feline head between the two front seats, her service dog glamour abandoned, and her murky green eyes bored into mine.
“I didn’t mention it because it’s not a big deal,” I said calmly. “I made a deal with Siobhan that if Andy doesn’t show up to take his punishment when the case is over…I’ll take his place.”
A sound crawled out of Scath’s throat, one of those blood-curdling sounds all cats seemed capable of. I rubbed my arms to get rid of the goosebumps and scowled. “He’s not running. He wouldn’t run.”
Scath snarled and retreated to the backseat, but she didn’t lie down again. Tension rolled off of her in waves, and she stared out the window as if she might spot Andy running away.
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