by Gina LaManna
Nash frowned. “What do you mean?”
“The corner booth has less turnover. The mayor sat in the middle with his head tilted back.” She gestured with her hand, revealing a display invisible to everyone else. “His Spell Splash is all over the wall.” At their confusion, she explained. “Residuals have a quality that’s a little like dust. If left alone to settle, they might linger in a corner for some time. Even longer than the average twenty-four hours. But if left to their own devices in the middle of the room, they’ll drift through the air, swirl around people as they move, cling to the clothes of passersby.”
Willa frowned. “Then they disappear? I wish the dust in my apartment disappeared after twenty-four hours.”
“The contract?” Matthew asked. “Can you tell the type?”
“Of course,” she said. “It’s nothing telling, though, or even that interesting. It’s a simple Silencing Spell—a legal bind that’ll prevent the persons at that table from sharing anything that was discussed.”
“That could be one of the reasons nobody’s speaking up,” Nash mused. “Maybe they can’t. They could be physically and magically bound to silence.”
“Maybe,” Dani said. “More likely, whoever was with the mayor was discussing something incriminating. That would also keep them silent.”
“Well, I think we can rule out a romantic evening,” Nash said. “On the basis there were three of them. That wouldn’t need a contract.”
“We rule nothing out,” Matthew said, gently chiding, “until it’s proven.”
“Exactly,” Willa said with a firm nod. “I can think of ten romantic reasons there might be three people and a Silencing Spell for their romantic evening. And that’s just off the top of my head.”
All three law enforcement officers shifted their gaze to Willa. Nobody wanted to admit they were curious.
“What?” Willa shrugged. “I have an active imagination, and I like romance novels.”
Dani burst out laughing. Some shared female bond between them, Matthew thought. He let it go on for a moment, enjoying the sight of a true smile on Dani’s face as he wondered if this burgeoning, odd new friendship might be good for her.
“Barring romance,” Nash said, “I think we need to consider other reasons they might’ve been together.”
“Or,” Willa said, raising her hand to flag down a waiter. “We just ask.”
“No, Willa—” Dani tried to stop her, but the server had already seen the call and approached the table.
“What can I get for you?” The server was male, a possible member of the shifter family, though not an active werewolf. The assumption was based solely on the amount of hair that covered his neck and arms. “Another Appletini? Drinks for anyone else?”
“Actually, can I get a Hex on the Beach?” Willa purred, resting her hand gently on the waiter’s arm. “My friends here, they’re still looking at the menu. I had to bring them by to try the flavors—they’re ah-mazing.”
The waiter seemed stunned into silence by Willa’s touch on his arm. He nodded.
“In fact, I was here last night,” she mused, pulling her fingers slowly back so they brushed across his skin. “We had a server who told us to say hi—the one who worked that booth. Do you know who it might be?”
Willa pointed toward the booth in the corner, and Matthew watched as Dani’s eyes lit up with pride. Somehow, the lone wolf had found a friend. In a manner of speaking.
“Oh, right. That’ll be Dillon,” he said. “Want me to send him on over?”
“That’d be lovely. Just want to thank him for bringing us back here. But I’d still love that drink from you...?”
“Wallace,” he filled in. “Wallace Prinkle.”
“Thank you, Wallace.” Willa waited until the very hairy server disappeared from view before turning to the group with a grin. “And that’s how it’s done! Sometimes when you want something, you just gotta ask.”
“If this works, Willa,” Dani said, “I’m hiring you on as my assistant.”
“You mean that?!”
Dani’s face colored. “I mean, I don’t have an assistant, but if I did...”
Willa tossed her a playful elbow. “I’m joking. Though I’m not kidding about taking that job at the pizzeria if you’re offering.”
Dani didn’t get the chance to confirm or deny the offer because at that moment, a smaller, hunched man who couldn’t have been more than thirty approached the table. His eyes were dark and hooded, and purplish bruises underneath signaled a severe lack of sleep. His hands folded before his body twitching nervously, and when he addressed the group, he stared at the ground.
“Someone ordered a drink?” he said, hardly able to draw his head upward—from nerves or exhaustion, Matthew couldn’t tell. “I have a Hex on The Beach.”
“That’d be me,” Willa said. “Sorry, don’t go anywhere just yet, though.”
Dillon looked up, his eyes latching first on the vampire, then the other two officers, before landing on Willa. “Aw, man! You guys are cops. I didn’t do anything—I swear.”
“It’s him,” Dani said, so softly nobody heard save for Matthew. “Residuals are a match. Ready?”
Matthew understood her at once. He gave a quick nod, watching as she stood, biding her time.
“Now,” she said, and Matthew moved.
Together, they worked seamlessly: Dani brought the man down hard against the table, startling Willa into spilling her new drink straight down her blouse.
While Dani handled the physical force, Matthew snapped a pair of handcuffs to the man’s wrists with startling speed and finesse. This entire process took under ten seconds and was near silent, save for the yelp from Willa as her shirt turned colorful.
“You’re not going to say anything,” Matthew warned Dillon softly, “because you don’t want to draw attention to yourself. I’ll take the cuffs off for a civil conversation if you promise you’re not going to attempt a getaway.”
Dillon looked dryly around the table. “Doesn’t seem like I have a choice.”
“Not much of one,” Dani agreed. “In fact, let’s head over to the booth in the corner.”
At the mention of the booth, the man shifted uncomfortably against the table. “What do you want from me? You didn’t see nothing because I didn’t do a thing wrong. I’m just here working, attacked by the cops, and—”
“Dude,” Nash said, giving a calm shake of his head. “She’s a Reserve. He’s a vampire. You really want to argue that you’re innocent?”
Dillon hissed at the word vampire, but it was Dani to whom he looked first. “I knew something was weird about you. Staring at the wall like a lunatic.”
“Unfortunately for you,” Dani said, “I’m a lunatic who can see a Silencing Spell all over you. Fortunately for you, the man who made it is dead—which leaves you free to talk to us all about it.”
“D-dead?”
“The mayor,” Dani said. “You’ve obviously heard the news by now.”
“But the mayor didn’t slap a Shusher on me,” he said, using the slang term for a Silencing Spell. “It was the chick.”
“The chick?” Dani glanced toward Matthew. “I think we need to sit. Come on, you get the seat of honor. Scoot into the middle, buddy.”
Chapter 19
I shoved myself on one side of the server while Matthew situated himself on the other. Dillon’s slim figure was dwarfed by that of Matthew, though he seemed more frightened of me than of him.
Nash rounded out my side of the table while Willa disappeared to the bathroom to clean up her shirt and, I believed, to give us some privacy. She was already better at her job than she knew.
“He’s going to remove the cuffs,” I said. “And you’re not going to budge, got it?”
Dillon gave a shrug.
“Thanks for your cooperation,” I said dryly. I quickly introduced the rest of the table to Dillon before getting started. “We’re investigating the murders of Mayor Lapel and the Goblin Girl with who
m he was found dead.”
“No name for her yet?” Dillon said with a smile. “She called herself Crystal. Obviously, a fake name.”
“Crystal,” I said, as Nash pulled out a notepad and began jotting notes down. “Last name?”
“Lady, does the Hollow Haven look like a place where last names are given freely?” He shook his head, the shadows under his eyes giving him a haunted look. “Nah. I didn’t even recognize the mayor until I sat down and started talking to them. I don’t think he used a Cloaker, but he’d altered the way he looked a bit. You know, a human-style disguise. A hat and all that junk.”
“Start from the beginning,” I said. “Did you know you were meeting them here?”
“I didn’t know in advance because the chick roped me into it. I thought we had ourselves a little something romantic going because she’d been in here last week. I was her server, and we got to talking. She asked when I worked again, and I told her.”
“What was she asking around about?” I continued. “This is important. Please try to remember everything.”
“She was just shooting the breeze at first,” he said, thinking back. “In fact, she kind of reminded me of the other chick with you.”
“The other one?”
“The chick with the see-through shirt.” He nodded toward the bathroom. “You know the type. Young, hopeful, all bubbly and innocent and shit. The Goblin Girl was a bit like that—she was just barely green.”
I remembered the light shade of the woman’s skin. “So, you two hit it off. What specifically did you talk about?”
“She asked what I liked to do for fun, you know, small talk. I told her about this new—” He stopped abruptly. “I don’t think I can talk about it.”
“Yes, you can—the contract is null and void. Crystal is dead, Dillon. We think whatever happened at this table helped to get her that way.”
“No, I don’t think so. I can’t tell you.” Dillon shook his head, his lips tightening. “You guys are cops. You wouldn’t understand.”
“Believe me, I’ll understand more than you give me credit for. In fact, I’m so understanding,” I said with a drawl, “that I bet I can get the vampire to go easy on you for whatever hole you’ve dug for yourself. You aren’t getting out without a shovel, buddy, and we happen to have one we might let you use. Talk, or we’ll work to get you put away for accessory to murder.”
“I didn’t do nothing! I’d never kill anyone! I wouldn’t—couldn’t, come on, lady,” he said. “Don’t play me like that.”
I sighed. “Matthew—”
He moved so quickly even Nash jumped in surprise. Matthew had Dillon outside of the booth and marching toward the front door before I could take a breath.
“I’ll talk,” he muttered. “Let me go—I work here. I don’t want to cause a scene.”
“That’s what I figured,” I said, once he returned. “Thank you, Captain. Now, let’s keep this friendly—and honest. I catch you lying, and we’ll parade you out the front door in front of all your coworkers and your boss.”
“Fine,” he said, his voice lowering. “I was trying to impress this chick—”
“Crystal?”
“Of course Crystal,” he snarled. “Last week. She kept asking about what I liked to do for fun, if I liked to go out, if I—whatever. I told her sure, and that if she wanted me to show her a good time, I had this new...thing.”
“What sort of thing?”
“I don’t know the official name. It’s some sort of stimulant, and I’ve heard a few people call it PowerPax.”
I leaned toward him and caught a whiff of fried food lingering on his clothes. “A stimulant? That must be a new narcotic—I haven’t heard anything about it. Nash?”
My brother shook his head, which was a big surprise. As a former narcotics officer, he kept his nose close to the ground and often heard about new drugs the second they were developed.
“PowerPax,” I said. “Where’d you get it from?”
“Well, I found it.”
“Excuse me?”
He shifted uneasily in his chair. “I found it.”
“What did I say about lying?” I frowned, glancing over his shoulder to Matthew. “What kind of idiot picks up an unidentified drug and uses it? And how’d you find the name?”
“Fine, I didn’t exactly pick it up off the street, but I’m the idiot who used it anyway.” His eyebrows furrowed with concern. “There’s this guy I buy SpellHash from—don’t crack me on the Hash, alright?”
“The Hash is the least of your concerns,” I assured him.
Oddly enough, he seemed relieved. “Don’t ask me the guy’s name. He was referred from a friend—he’s anonymous to my friend also. These guys, they’re good. They don’t want any connections.”
Nash gave a single nod, confirming Dillon’s statement.
“Anyway, once in a while my guy will send a sample along.”
“Fishing,” Nash said under his breath. “Trying to hook them onto the harder, more expensive stuff.”
“Fishing,” Dillon said, though he seemed to dislike the term. “Sure. Well, normally I don’t try it because I don’t got the money to buy more, and that shit is addictive.”
“Yep,” I said. “Go figure. Drugs.”
“Well, this time, I tried it. I ain’t never seen anything like it before, and I figured it was free, and it’d be a one-time deal. Special treat, you know what I mean?”
“But you liked it,” I said. “And you needed more.”
“Yeah. I put in a request to my guy—don’t try to find him; I’m sure he’ll already know I’ve been talking to cops. These guys spook easily.”
Nash again looked pained, signaling that Dillon was likely right.
“Sorry to inconvenience you into having to find a ‘new guy’,” I said. “Keep talking.”
“Lady, I’m trying to help,” Dillon said. “Yeah—I needed more of it. I got my request filled the day before Crystal showed up here. I swear, it was only the second time I ever used it. I don’t have any left.”
“You could only afford one serving?” I asked. “Guess customers need to tip better around here. The good stuff doesn’t come cheap.”
“I could afford two servings, alright? But when the first one ended, the second one, man, I needed it. It was like...ugh, like I couldn’t breathe without it.”
“Wait a minute,” I said, holding my breath as I studied him. The twitchiness, the dark eyes, the odd behaviors. “Are you still on it right now?”
“I have no clue how long they last. I took the second dose a few days after I met Crystal, so maybe I’m weaning off it. The first one lasted half a damn week.”
“At its strongest, what does it do?” Nash’s curiosity got the better of him, and he leaned forward, interested. Nash had a complicated history with narcotics. “How do you feel on it?”
“Dude, the name,” he said. “PowerPax. You feel like you’re on top of the world. Freaking invincible. I ran a mile in five minutes the other day. Why? No idea. I just could. I haven’t run since...well, since my ma chased me around with a ladle as a kid to smack my behind. It’s incredible.”
Nash was transfixed by Dillon. “How much does it run?”
“Cost me a month of pay for two doses.”
“Ouch,” Nash said, sitting back in his seat.
I pinned Nash there with my gaze. “Now that the fun’s out of the way, tell me what the talk was about yesterday.”
“Crystal came in here, as you know, and she took a seat in the booth. I came over here to say hi to her, you know—I liked the chick.”
“Where’d you sit?”
“I sat right where I am. She sat sort of where you are. The mayor joined later and took up most of the space on that side.” He gestured toward the wall, directly under the place where Mayor Lapel’s Spell Splash Residuals faded from view even as we spoke. “Yo, lady, is that what you were looking at? Where he sat?”
“Sure,” I said, not wanting to e
xplain again. “Where was the mayor when you sat down?”
“No clue. I only had eyes for the girl. If I had to guess, he was either hiding out in the restroom or he hadn’t come into the bar yet.”
“After you sat, what happened?”
“Started with basic small talk again.” Dillon sat back, bit his bottom lip as he contemplated. “She seemed eager again, and excited, but a little too energetic. Like, she was zooming off the walls. I wondered if she hadn’t had a PowerPax herself—in fact, I think I joked about it.”
“She knew the name of the drug?”
“Yeah, well, I called it that. Didn’t know it was a secret.”
“How’d she react when you made the joke?”
“I guess she just brushed that part off. She did ask...” Dillon shrugged. “Actually, she asked if I had any left. Mentioned she might be interested in going out, maybe to a party together, like I’d suggested.”
“Romance is in the air,” I said. “But unfortunately, you didn’t have any more.”
He gritted his teeth.
“But you didn’t tell her that,” I said. “You told her sure, you’d pick some up and meet her—when?”
“This weekend,” he said. “My friend’s having this thing Saturday night, but, obviously that’s not gonna happen. That’s when she asked if she could tell me a secret.”
“And?”
“I said yes, duh. I liked her.” He stared at me like I was the idiot. “I let her put a Shusher on me—I thought she was just doing it to be cutesy. You know, like the human pinky swears or whatever. Then the mayor walked up, and the mood was broken.”
“Tragic,” I said. “What’d he say?”
“That’s when shit got weird. I think the two of them were working together. They definitely didn’t seem romantic. He was all nervous and sweaty, and she was like I said—zooming with energy. Real nervous or whatnot.”
“Why the binding?”
“They wanted something from me—I guess you could call it a favor.” He shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “It was about the PowerPax. They wanted to know if I had any left, and if I knew where to get more.”