Close Enemies

by Marc Daniel

  Michael hadn’t shared the information with anyone beside Olivia, Ez and the skinwalkers, and he doubted the vamps or the Fida’I had a mole amongst his friends. Could his phone be bugged again? It had happened once in the past, but that phone had been a gift and had come to him already bugged. Aside from Sheila, nobody had ever been left alone with his current cell phone. And somehow, he didn’t picture the journalist bugging his phone.

  As he reached the West Thumb geyser basin, he spotted Helen’s car parked on an otherwise deserted parking lot. What was she doing there by herself?

  He parked his truck next to her vehicle, but she was nowhere to be found. What now? He didn’t think Helen and he were close enough for her to become a target, but Lucy hadn’t been a close friend of his either.

  He got out of his truck and headed for the boardwalk meandering a foot above the geyser basin. He found Helen a half mile down the walk, kneeling by one of the most colorful hot springs in Yellowstone.

  “Hi, Michael. What are you doing here?” she said, hurrying to slip her burnt forearm back into the opera glove she always wore in public.

  She had apparently not heard him coming and looked surprised to see him.

  “I was just checking on you. I spotted your car on the parking lot and wanted to make sure everything was fine.”

  “Always the gentleman,” she said, smiling. But the smile looked contrived and didn’t erase the tear streaks visible on her pretty face.

  “Are you alright? You seem… distraught.” Michael knew this was the type of thing someone would ask given the circumstances, but it was something he had to force himself to do. It didn’t come naturally. He felt even more awkward when Helen resumed her crying in front of him, quiet tears rolling down her cheeks. He couldn’t act as if he didn’t see them, could he?

  “I’ve had a rough year… I was just feeling sorry for myself. Nothing you need to worry about, Michael. Thank you for your concern, but don’t worry, I’ll be fine.”

  Michael stood there an instant, not sure what to do. “I’m sorry about your husband,” he said finally. “I know it can’t be easy. It’s only been a few months since…”

  “Since the accident,” she finished for him. “I miss my husband. But I miss my daughter more. She was in the back seat of the car.”

  Michael hadn’t known about her daughter. He now admired the woman for keeping things together so well, given the magnitude of the tragedy that had befallen her. He could relate only too well to the pain of losing a child and a spouse. He and Helen had more in common than he’d first realized.

  “I had not heard about your daughter. I am terribly sorry for your loss.”

  She closed her eyes and nodded slowly before taking a deep breath. “I could use some company right now, to be perfectly honest. Would you care for a cup of tea maybe? I also have fresh scones at home,” she said hopefully.

  Michael didn’t really feel like keeping Helen company. He needed to check on Olivia and hadn’t had a chance to call Detective Lewis to enquire about Katia Olveda, another prime suspect on his list. But Helen needed a friend at the moment, and he needed to work on his social skills. At least that’s what Sheila kept telling him.

  Sheila… she’d been in a coma for over a week, much longer than the doctors and Gweven had first predicted. His initial anger at the bastards that had put her there was starting to turn into fear that she might not wake up.

  He suddenly became aware that Helen was staring at him expectantly, still waiting for an answer. “I could use a cup of tea.”

  Helen’s face lit up at the announcement, and they started heading back towards the parking lot.

  “What was your daughter’s name?”

  She seemed to choke at the question. That was typical of him. The one time he tried to be sociable, he managed to ask the worst possible question. “I’m sorry. We should probably talk about someone else.”

  “Her name was Lilian,” she replied, bringing up a picture on her cell phone of her holding a cute little blonde. The caption read Lilian and Mummy. “She’d just turned three. A week before the accident.”

  She kept talking about her daughter all the way to her car. She had tears in her eyes but seemed happy to be sharing with him.

  “I’ll follow you to your house,” he said, climbing into his truck.

  “Sounds good. See you there.”

  *****

  Although far from sufficient to tame the pangs of hunger that had been slowly growing all afternoon, the scones were delicious. The tea was excellent, too, with just the right amount of honey, something Sheila still had a hard time accomplishing.

  They’d been talking for over an hour, sitting on opposite ends of the couch facing the small fireplace in the middle of Helen’s leaving room. Helen seemed better. She hadn’t cried once since they’d made it to her house, and Michael carefully avoided any subject that could bring back memories of a better time.

  Helen got up in the middle of a sentence and walked to her room, still talking. From the open door, Michael peeked at the bedroom that appeared almost as spartanly furnished as his own. She hadn’t had much time to bring her own touch to the dwelling provided by the Park Services.

  She came back a moment later holding a familiar jar.

  She peeled off her glove and started applying the ointment to her burnt forearm and hand. “How are your legs doing?”

  “They’re doing much better.”

  “May I see?” she asked, looking at Michael’s pants.

  But he didn’t really feel comfortable showing his legs to the woman. They were still badly burnt, but unlike her arm, his legs had healed some.

  “Come on. Don’t make me feel awkward. I’ve shown you my arm, you can show me your legs.”

  Michael reluctantly unzipped the bottom half of his convertible pants, letting them drop to the floor. He didn’t particularly mind sitting in his shorts, but the way she inspected his legs made him feel a bit uncomfortable.

  “Have you been applying the ointment I gave you?” She had a puzzled look on her face.

  “Not much recently,” he admitted.

  “I can tell,” she said, kneeling in front of him, jar in hand. Before he had a chance to understand what was happening, Helen was massaging his left calf and thigh with ointment.

  At a loss for words, Michael simply sat there, stupefied.

  By the time she moved on to his right leg, he was starting to enjoy the contact of her hands on his skin.

  As she replaced the lid on the jar, Michael hurried to zip his pants’ legs back together. Mumbling some excuse, he took his leave, utterly confused by the whole thing.

  Chapter 51

  As Olivia watched Lucy’s casket roll into the crematorium, her resolve to end her own life came back with a fury. This had been the last thing on her To Do list. Now that Lucy’s body was taken care of, nothing held her back in this world. She simply needed to come up with a quick and efficient method to chop her own head off.

  The service had been short and as depressing as one would expect the funeral of someone in their twenties to be. None of Lucy’s classmates from Bozeman had shown up at the crematorium, but a couple of her friends from Houston had said a few words. Olivia had felt neither the need nor the strength to emulate them. Nobody other than Lucy needed to hear what she thought of her.

  Daka’s packmates accounted for the majority of the fifteen or so mourners. But it was Ezekiel’s presence that truly surprised Olivia. The old wizard stood opposite her and Daka on the other side of the quickly disappearing coffin, with Michael to his left and Leka to his right.

  As the oven’s door closed, Olivia left the room. She was terrified at the idea that her werewolf nose might let her smell the burning flesh of her sister through the sealed door. This wasn’t an odor she had any desire to remember.

  She exited the funeral home and went to sit on a bench located in a small garden behind the building. The place had clearly been designed to be soothing and help griever
s relax after the funeral, but it wasn’t nearly soothing enough for Olivia.

  Daka came to join her and the two of them sat in silence.

  “What do you want to do with her ashes?” asked Daka after a while.

  “I don’t know. Maybe spread them over the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. It was Lucy’s favorite part of the park. It’s as good a place as any.” Olivia was no longer crying. She just felt numb. “I want to leave, Daka. I need to get out of here.”

  “I’ll go tell Michael to collect the urn. I’ll be right back.”

  *****

  A half mile away, on a hill overlooking the funeral home, a vampire was watching the two of them from a distance.

  The skinwalker was a problem, he was dangerous. How dangerous, the vampire wasn’t sure, but his kind was particularly well-equipped to dispose of undead like her. She’d seen him at work, had seen her kin fall under his fangs and had no desire to get too close.

  She needed to be patient. Bide her time. Sooner or later he would have to leave the woman’s side and that’s when she’d make her move.

  The vampire watched the two of them get into the man’s car and drive off. She debated whether to follow them but decided against it. She knew where to find the woman, and she had more urgent matters to attend to. She was famished.

  The sun felt warm on her skin, but she was used to that feeling. She’d always had sensitive skin, even when she’d been a human. At least she didn’t need to wear one of those silly day-suits. There were precious few downsides to being a daywalker.

  Chapter 52

  I-Naur-Tal, the elvish Fire City, was covered with a dusting of fine snow that had fallen overnight and had yet to melt away when Michael passed through its main portal to find Leka waiting on the other side.

  The elf was holding the reins of two horses and handed one set of them to Michael. “We’ll ride to the castle. Unless you’d rather take your time and walk?”

  Michael wasn’t in a mood to delay. Only one day after Lucy’s funeral he’d received the best news he’d had in a long time: Sheila had finally come out of her coma.

  The two of them rode through the elvish city at a gentle gallop. Although Michael had been here several times before, the majesty of the place never ceased to awe him into utter admiration.

  The mixture of stone and wood expertly blended together into buildings of unique architecture, the cobblestone roads crossed great open fields, and the quaint arched stone bridges went over small streams of crystal-clear water; everything incarnated peace and beauty. But the most mesmerizing thing about the city was its location. Hidden behind a magical force field, it sat in the middle of the Gallatin National Forest. Michael had walked around it dozens of times over the years without ever suspecting its presence.

  They finally arrived at the castle and made straight for the infirmary where they found Sheila sitting by a window near her bed. Seeing Michael, the journalist jumped to her feet.

  They hugged for a long time. She eventually went for his lips, which meant getting on her tiptoes and stretching for the sky, but Michael wasn’t too comfortable with Leka as a witness.

  Picking up on the atmosphere, the elf excused himself, leaving the two of them alone in the infirmary wing.

  Freed from the awkwardness he associated with public displays of affection, Michael kissed Sheila wholeheartedly, sweeping her off her feet and holding her at his level. The moan that came out of the woman as she returned his kiss told him she didn’t mind.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Like I’ve been sleeping for a week,” she replied, smirking.

  “More like eleven days by now… Any pain?” he asked, putting her down.

  “No, not really. I feel a bit tired and hungry, but Gweven says it’s all normal and will go away soon. He’s quite a charming character by the way.”

  “Yes, he’s a nice guy,” replied Michael, oblivious to her teasing. “A lot has happened since St. Lucia.”

  “So I’ve heard. Leka and Gweven have been filling me in on a few things. How’s Olivia taking the death of her sister?”

  “I’m not sure. She’s distraught, that much is certain, but I don’t know how badly. I asked Daka to keep an eye on her while I’m away.”

  “That’s probably a good idea. I didn’t know Lucy, but I feel for Olivia… and for you. You don’t look great, Michael. Are you OK?”

  Of course, he wasn’t OK. How could he be with everything that had happened over the past few weeks? But what he dreaded the most at this instant was what he had to tell Sheila next. The thing he knew nobody else had dared to tell her.

  “I have some bad news, Sheila.”

  “You mean worse news than Lucy dying?” She looked suddenly worried.

  “You didn’t know Lucy very wel—”

  “What happened, Michael? Who else has died?” she interrupted in a panic.

  “Your sister. Stephanie is dead.”

  Sheila looked bewildered, as if she didn’t understand what he was saying. “Who?”

  “Stephanie. I am so sorry, Sheila,” he said, taking her in his arms.

  “But that’s not possible. How would you know? You’ve never met her. Who would tell you?” she asked, pushing away from him.

  These were the types of situations where Michael felt about as useful as a bag of rocks. He knew that denial was the first step in the grieving process, but he sure had no idea how to respond to it.

  “I went to Houston to tell Stephanie about your accident. That’s how I found out.”

  He explained the series of events that had led him to learn about Stephanie’s fate, answering every one of Sheila’s questions in great detail. This seemed to be what she needed, and he wanted to do everything in his power to ease her pain.

  Sheila’s voice quivered at times, but she did not shed a single tear. This surprised Michael and worried him a little. People grieved in different ways but bottling things up was rarely a good idea. He hoped that wasn’t what Sheila was doing.

  “You said Stephanie died the day we were attacked in St. Lucia?”

  “Yes. That’s what the coroner said.”

  “But she’d been missing for over a week prior to that?”

  “At least nobody had seen her in over a week.”

  Sheila sat on her bed, a very focused look in her eyes. “The whole China vacation story is bogus. Stephanie has never mentioned any desire to go to China. And she would have told me if she’d suddenly felt the need to reconnect with her roots.”

  Michael nodded in agreement.

  “She also never would have taken off work for three weeks. That’s just impossible. My sister is a workaholic. The woman actually dislikes weekends!”

  Sheila’s use of the present tense didn’t go unnoticed by Michael. Another sign of denial…

  “According to the detective in charge of the case, she told her boss in person that she was taking off,” he replied cautiously.

  “And you said you detected a mountain lion scent at her house.”

  “I did.”

  “As in the same mountain lion that attacked me?”

  “I’m almost positive.”

  “So, the mountain lion that attacked me in St. Lucia was at Stephanie’s house, Stephanie was the one inviting us to St. Lucia, and she took a three-week vacation out of the blue to supposedly go to China without mentioning a word of it to me.” Her voice was a mixture of skepticism and anger.

  “It looks that way.”

  “Are you suggesting Stephanie had anything to do with the attack? Are you suggesting that my own sister willingly sent me to St. Lucia so I could be killed? And why did she end up dead if she was in on it all along?” Sheila was more yelling than talking at this point.

  Michael was about to suggest that the killers might have used Stephanie and killed her afterwards to cover their tracks, when a much more likely explanation suddenly hit him. “Maybe your sister never sent us to St. Lucia in the first place?”

  “What?
I spent twenty minutes with her on the phone. She bought our plane tickets. What are you talking about?”

  “One of the assassins is a chameleon.”

  Sheila just stared at him questioningly.

  “It’s a type of fae,” explained Michael. “A chameleon can impersonate anyone and be virtually undetectable. One would have to know someone extremely well and have extended exchanges with them in order to be able to tell the difference between a chameleon and the real person.”

  “So, you think a chameleon impersonated my sister and invited us to St. Lucia?”

  “That would fit the evidence and make a lot more sense than any other explanation.”

  “Walk me through it, Michael.”

  “Your sister disappeared seven days before you were attacked. That means she was already missing the day you had her on the phone. She didn’t mention anything about her being on vacation, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “That’s because it wasn’t her on the phone. It was the chameleon. The mountain lion kidnapped her and probably took her phone. The phone was then handed to the chameleon who used it to call you. That also explains how the Fida’I knew we’d be in St. Lucia. They were the ones who sent us there in the first place.”

  Sheila didn’t disagree but wasn’t convinced either. She seemed doubtful a chameleon could have fooled her.

  “Ezekiel ran a test to try and unveil a chameleon among the Yellowstone staff, but couldn’t find any. I’ve been wondering about this fae ever since. If he impersonated your sister, it would explain why they needed a chameleon on the team in the first place.”

  Sheila stared at Michael for a moment before saying, “Let’s go and catch my sister’s killer.”

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to leave I-Naur-Tal quite yet, Sheila.”