Shade Chaser (City of Crows 2)

by Clara Coulson

  I down the rest of my orange juice and tap the message.

  For a long, silent moment, I stare at the iPad’s dusty, fingerprint-marked screen. At first, I’m baffled. Because the body of the apparently super important email is blank. There’s not a single word in it that I can see, not even a greeting or a signature. And then, as the understanding dawns on me at a half-salted snail’s pace, and I realize what exactly is on the screen, indicated by what is not, my stare morphs from confusion into what I imagine someone would dub a “constipated bitch face.”

  Because the email’s not blank. It’s charmed.

  Allen Marcus, somehow, charms his official ICM emails to render them invisible to anyone, who, I don’t know, doesn’t have the magic password or something. Look, I don’t understand how magic like this works exactly—DSI education on magic is rudimentary at best, because the dickwads at the ICM don’t like to share—but it just so happens that I have the power to see it, regardless of strength, construction, or intention. If I stare hard enough and concentrate.

  Magic sensing. It’s an off-the-wall skill of mine.

  I’ve used it a couple times before on DSI cases, but I can’t say I’ve ever used it to expose a muted blue glow, shaped into foreign symbols and odd shapes, distorting the white background of an email before. Nope, this is a first. And yet another learning experience for me.

  Note to my posterity (if I have any): Wizards and witches can enchant Gmail. Fear their prowess. Fear their skill. For it is awesome and cannot be blocked by spam filters.

  Thwarted in my attempt to butt in where I don’t belong, I grumble my way over to the dishwasher, drop off my plate, fork, and cup, and then make one last trip to Erica’s bedroom to gather the rest of my belongings. As I’m stuffing yesterday’s dirty laundry into my duffle bag, a muffled buzzing noise catches my attention. I immediately glance at the closet, afraid the alarm clock has come back from hell to haunt me again. But the sound isn’t coming from there, I realize. It’s coming from under the bed.

  I sink to my knees and peer under the bed skirt. My cell phone peers back at me, the screen lit up with a text message notification. I cringe, knowing I would totally have forgotten the phone if someone hadn’t decided to send me a message at this exact time. Thinking back to last night, I wonder how the phone got under the bed in the first place—but I can’t think too awful hard about it, because boners do not work well with these tight DSI combat uniforms. So I shrug, reach under the bed, and recover the phone.

  By the time I retrieve it, the screen’s gone black again. I unlock it and tap my messaging app, expecting another birthday party invite sent out to the entire Criminal Investigations Division, or a text from Cooper Lee about going to the ice rink next weekend, or even a message from Ella Dean, who, like Erica, enjoys bugging me about getting to work on time. But the text, unfortunately, doesn’t turn out to be any of those innocuous things. And I don’t even have to click on the message to know it.

  The text is from my boss, Captain Nicholas Riker.

  And the first two words, visible in the preview, are EMERGENCY CALLOUT.

  My eyes drift away from the phone screen, back down the hall, and into the sliver of dining room I can see from my current position. The iPad sits in perfect view, mocking me. And as it does, the air in the normally warm, cozy bedroom seems to thicken into something almost tangible, clinging to every inch of exposed skin on my body. A light sweat forms on the back of my neck as my thumb closes in on the text message. I hesitate, the general outline of what I’m about to read already forming in the shadowed corners of my brain.

  It was inevitable, really. Four weeks my team has been fruitlessly working on that bizarre death in Wilcox’s (former) office building. With all the evidence burned away, and with no bites in the supernatural community—from Erica or anyone else—we’ve been at a standstill. No justice for the dead woman (assuming she was murdered). No criminals behind bars (assuming there was a murderer). Not even a suspect to arrest (assuming there was a murder).

  It was only a matter of time before Bollinger tossed a big new case our way. The commissioner is not a fan of fawning over cold cases for months on end.

  Maybe we’ll solve it one day. (A man can hope.) But until then…

  My thumb brushes over the text preview, and the message opens in full.

  EMERGENCY CALLOUT TO ELITE TEAM RIKER

  MYSTERIOUS DEATHS AT JAMESON CORNER BAR AND GRILL

  INTERSECTION OF OLD SAINT STREET AND ELMORE

  INITIAL REPORTS INDICATE TRIPLE HOMICIDE, MAGIC INVOLVED

  CONVENE IMMEDIATELY AT THE SCENE

  Oh, yeah.

  It’s definitely going to be an exciting day.

  Chapter Two

  My good friend déjà vu ambushes me on Marlborough Street.

  It begins innocently enough. I pack the rest of my stuff, zip up my duffle, toss the bag over my shoulder, and then power walk out of Erica’s cozy little house to the driveway. Don’t even bother to lock the front door. Don’t need to. The wards keep out anyone Erica hasn’t specifically allowed inside. As more than one would-be thief has learned over the years. (For some reason, burglars tend to flee in terror after they get thrown twenty feet across the yard by an invisible force.)

  After hopping into my rusty truck, I spend a few minutes working extra hard to get it started. Cold weather doesn’t do old vehicles any favors. When the engine finally catches, and I get the heat going, I reach over and switch on the radio. But instead of the crappy holiday songs I’m used to hearing this time of year, the local station is covering a special news report: “…and the police are refusing to let anyone within a block of Jameson’s, claiming…”

  I shut off the radio and dig my iPod out from the glove compartment.

  The last thing I need is my thoughts on these new murders contaminated by conflicting, biased reports from the local press. It’s bad enough I have to tiptoe around their presence during every DSI case, making sure they don’t learn things they aren’t supposed to know. I don’t want their hysteria and ridiculous exaggerations rubbing off on me too. That’s a recipe for disaster.

  After I get some rock music playing on low volume, I back out of Erica’s driveway. The looming towers of downtown Aurora’s big businesses greet my gaze in the distance, vague masses faintly visible through the thickening haze of an oncoming snowstorm. As I reach the last two-lane street in Erica’s neighborhood and sit at the turnoff onto the busy highway, the snowfall rolls over the entire city like a heavy, unraveling blanket. By the time I’m halfway to Jameson’s, just a few minutes later, I’m already navigating a virtual blizzard.

  But it’s not my first time driving through rough weather—that and 4-Wheel Drive works wonders. So I chug along down the snow-covered roads, the salt spread doing little to clear the asphalt. I pass a few cars whose drivers have given up, unwilling to brave the low visibility. I even spot a car spun out, sitting in the ditch. But the crash doesn’t look serious, maybe a few dents to the bumper, and the driver is out and about surveying the damage. I keep on going. Slow and steady wins the race.

  Until, that is, I see the man with yellow eyes.

  He’s standing in front of a high-end chocolate store along the stretch of Marlborough that houses the Lowland Shoppes, all the fancy-pants places that cater to Aurora’s “elite.” What makes the man stick out to me, even through the rippling veil of snow, isn’t that he’s just standing—there’s a bus stop a few feet from him, after all. Rather, it’s the fact that he’s wearing nothing but a T-shirt and ratty jeans. No coat. No scarf. No hat. Not even shoes. His bare feet are pressed against the snow-slicked sidewalk.

  Most people would be freezing in his situation. The temperature is in the single digits.

  And yet, he looks unaffected.

  He leans against a light pole, posture casual. Pedestrians pass by him all huddled in massive coats, hurrying along, and…don’t appear to notice him. He stands there like a statue, dark skin a stark contrast to
the background of hazy white. And also a contrast to his yellow eyes, glowing bright, too bright, in the muted daylight.

  This man, surreal, does nothing as he loiters near the bus stop—except stare.

  At me.

  The déjà vu hits me like a sack of bricks.

  I’ve never had the déjà vu while driving before, and it’s so unexpected that I instinctively yank my mind away from it. Then I double over in my seat, on the cusp of vomiting, as nausea sends my breakfast creeping back the way it came. There’s a voice in my head that screams, HOLY SHIT, YOU’RE DRIVING! STOP THE FUCKING TRUCK, CAL! But I can’t do it. I physically can’t. I’ve screwed up, breaking Navarro’s touted “balance point,” and now I’m in for it.

  What is it?

  Probably death.

  My eyes screw themselves shut and refuse to open. My teeth clack together in between each round of gagging. My ears pop, like I’m taking off in a plane. And my heart starts to palpitate in time with my ragged breathing.

  For a moment, I’m pulled out of time and space. I float in a void between the here and now and the sharp edge of my own future. And I have the urge to reach out and touch it, to grasp at events I haven’t experienced, learn details human beings shouldn’t be able to gather ahead of time. It’s a terrible urge, as if my brain is overcorrecting for pulling too hard away from the déjà vu—and I have to ignore it. Because if I try to glimpse the future, I’ll pass out. And if I pass out, I’ll crash into a building going thirty-seven miles per hour and probably get impaled by something with a pointy end.

  I struggle to resist the all-encompassing compulsion. For three seconds. Five?

  And then the déjà vu surrenders and retreats to the nasty corner of my brain where the untouchable memories of my future sit and wait for time to pass.

  I spring up in my seat and regain control of the truck. Just in time to prevent a bumper-to-bumper collision with a large, white plumbing company van in front of me. I grip the wheel and pump the brakes, narrowly avoiding clipping the van as it turns right onto Ackerson Road. The van’s driver spots my faux pas and beeps the horn at me a couple times, probably yelling about stupid kids on their phones. But by then, I’m not even paying attention to him anymore.

  My eyes dart up to the rearview mirror, searching for anything I might have run over when I lost control. But my truck kept rolling forward, thank god, and didn’t threaten anyone on the sidewalks. And there don’t appear to have been any jaywalkers in my vicinity either. I don’t see any damaged public property. I don’t see any scared or angry people waving fists at me. I don’t…

  I don’t see the man with yellow eyes.

  He’s gone.

  Rattled, I pull the truck into the nearest stop-off, the empty parking lot of an Arby’s. Foot firmly on the brake, I finally release my death grip on the wheel. I lean my head back against the seat and observe my shaking hands, fingers twitching like I’ve been shocked by a taser. My heartbeat still runs too fast in my chest, the organ pumping hard underneath my ribcage. I can hear the sound drumming in my ears, so loud it drowns out the growling chorus of rush hour.

  I’m not sure exactly how long I sit there, trying to regain my composure—but I do know it’s too long. Because, as I’m about to pull out of the parking lot again, my phone buzzes at me from where I dropped it in the passenger seat.

  When I pick it up with my somewhat steadier hand, I find that Ella Dean has texted me, asking where the heck I am. The rest of Elite Team Riker has already gathered at Jameson’s, apparently. I’m the odd man out. The new guy, Cal Kinsey, smart and skilled and driven, assigned to an elite team right out of the academy…and late for a very important case.

  Always a good impression to make.

  I respond to Ella’s text, promising to be there soon. I don’t give a reason for my lateness. I mean, what reason could I give that wouldn’t make me look like an idiot? When this déjà vu crap started, Riker didn’t put me on desk duty because I swore up and down I would thoroughly monitor my performance and remove myself from the field if the effects of my “ability” became too much to handle at any time. On top of that, I agreed to voluntarily step down from any planned combat scenarios until a) I gain full control over the déjà vu, b) Navarro figures out a way to prevent the physical side effects, or c) the “power” goes away on its own.

  With those assurances in mind, the fact that I let the déjà vu surprise me to the point where I nearly crashed my truck during rush hour?

  Bad.

  Very bad.

  If Riker and Ella find out about that, I’ll be off the Jameson case. Period.

  And that’s…not acceptable.

  I spent far too much time sitting on a bench after Mac’s death.

  I don’t care if I have to perform brain surgery on myself, in my bathroom, with an icepick, or fuck myself up with a witch’s potion made from a bunch of poisonous junk in Erica’s shop. I will not allow déjà vu, of all things, to put me out of commission, especially not when three people in this city have just been murdered by magic. Too many innocents have died at my feet for me to sit back and do nothing while this city suffers in the grip of the things that go bump in the night.

  No, sir. Cal Kinsey will find a way to persevere.

  Sitting at the exit to the Arby’s parking lot, waiting for traffic to clear, I idly glance back the way I came. A huge mistake. Because in the thickening snow coating the asphalt, I now notice the tracks where my truck had started to drift to the left, into oncoming traffic, a moment before I snapped out of the episode and righted myself.

  I grip the steering wheel so hard my knuckles turn white and press my tongue against the roof of my mouth. Hot tears prickle at the corners of my eyes. But I don’t let them fall. I don’t deserve to cry. Not here.

  My gaze ticks up to the rearview mirror again, and I cuss out the weary moron staring back. Last month, I had the gall to make fun of Wilcox for being so pathetically proud—and now look at the dumb Crow in his beat-up pickup truck, sitting in the parking lot of an Arby’s with fat tears in his eyes. I’m no better than that mousy little bastard. In fact, I’m worse.

  Wilcox isn’t a threat to Aurora.

  But here I am, at risk of becoming a danger to the people I’ve sworn to protect.

  I’d rather be in prison than let that happen.

  I’d rather be dead.

  With the taste of copper on my tongue, I make myself a brand new vow:

  If I ever let the déjà vu distract me at a crucial time again, even if it’s only for a fraction of a second, I will remove myself from DSI field duty until such time as the issue is resolved for good. Even it takes months. Even if it takes years.

  Come hell or high water, I won’t risk innocent people in my quest to protect innocent people. And if that means I have to give up my career and sit on the bench forever, while everyone but me saves the day—I take a deep breath—then so be it.

  And if that’s not the motivation I need to beat the déjà vu into submission, nothing is.

  Chapter Three

  The Jameson Corner Bar and Grill sits at the intersection of Old Saint and Elmore, nestled among two rows of buildings that might be called “historical.” Built at the turn of the century, the bar and grill was originally just a bar, then a hotel, then an abandoned husk after World War II that was eventually bought by the Jameson family in the sixties. From there, it was transformed into one of Aurora’s most well-regarded establishments. Between the great food, the live entertainment, the private lounges, the sports bar, and the billiard room, there likely isn’t a single person in the city who hasn’t been drawn through the dark-washed double doors for at least one night.

  I used to frequent Jameson’s before I went off to Stanford. Since I returned, joined the police department, quit the police department, and then joined DSI, I really haven’t felt inclined to head to my old haunts again on any kind of regular basis. Especially because the last time I was at Jameson’s was the day after I graduated fro
m the police academy, and also the day I first met Mac. The man who would be my senior partner. And the man who would die in Gloston Square a few short months later while I did nothing but cower in the shadow of a psychotic vampire.

  As I turn onto Old Saint, the sour taste of the déjà vu episode still fresh in my mind—not to mention the freaky yellow-eyed guy who knew my face—I realize that finding a parking spot near Jameson’s will be even more of a task than usual. There are two blocks cordoned off in each direction, police tape securing the perimeter. Media vans are parked crooked in every available street-side spot for another block farther. The front of the building is completely obstructed, double doors half hidden by an array of police vehicles with flashing lights and the occasional DSI SUV tucked discreetly in between them. There isn’t a single clear patch of road in the vicinity for me to stow my truck.

  Groaning, I make a left onto Streisand Road, turning away from the massive crowd at Jameson’s. I drive for another hundred feet or so before I finally reach a line of empty spaces next to a hair salon that went out of business last year. My truck growls to a stop as I pull into the nearest space and judders hard when I cut the engine. I sit there for a second in the silence, watching the snowflakes flutter across the windshield, and smack my cheeks a couple times, repeating, Composure, Cal, composure, until the lingering tremors from my episode subside.

  Then I pop the door and step out into the blizzard.

  The wind whips at my cheeks, peeling the heat off my skin. As soon as I force the door closed behind me and lock the vehicle, I shuffle quickly over to the sidewalk. Hugging the brick exteriors of the shops to ward off the harsh air, I trudge back up Streisand until I reach the intersection onto Old Saint. Tentatively, I peek around the edge of a closed antique store.

  Somehow, even more people have arrived on scene in the few minutes it took me to park. Reporters decked out in huge puffy coats, mics held close to their faces, are speaking excitedly into the cameras, blathering about whatever rumors have emerged from the doorway of the bar and grill. They’re all crowded up tightly around the perimeter tape, some of them challenging the uniformed cops by nudging the tape a few inches backward, enough to let their cameramen get a slightly closer shot than their competitors.