“They’re headed west,” Valentine mused. It was an unnecessary observation, but he’d worked with Eliot long enough that the other man understood, and played off of, his personal tics.
“I-80,” Eliot said. “Whole lot of nothing till you get to Cheyenne. Nebraska’s a shit drive in the daytime.”
“Whole lot of flat,” Val agreed. “That was ‘07, right? The wendigo.”
“Yeah. Other than that, it’s not exactly a hotbed. So where are they going?”
Morgan cut in. “Vegas. Last text, ‘hey girl headed to Vegas. Don’t have too much fun in class.’”
Val leaned in and looked over her shoulder. “How can you read that? It’s all gibberish. There are not six R’s in ‘girl.’”
The other agent shook her head and smiled. “You’re such a Luddite, Valentine.”
“Flattery will get you everywhere. Any places of concern left in Vegas?”
Morgan considered for a moment, then shook her head. “Surprisingly, no. Black magic doesn’t appeal to the mom and pop crowd, and that’s the target audience these days.”
Eliot snorted. “I’m guessing mom and pop don’t spend much time at the Bunny Ranch.”
“That’s just you,” George called out from the front.
Morgan waited until the laughter died down. “Gentleman,” she sighed. “Focus, please. George, travel time to Las Vegas.”
He considered the GPS mounted on the van’s console, then replied, “Over a day, and that’s driving nonstop. 1,700 miles plus.”
“This is time sensitive,” Val pointed out. “For all we know, Vegas could be a pit stop. We need to get in the air as soon as possible. Can we get another ride from the Air Force?”
Morgan made a face. “I’ll have to give the Director a call. This is a top priority, but even so, our budget does not runneth over.”
“You can always point out that Val wanted to sanction her years ago. A couple of bullets would have been a lot cheaper.” Eliot grinned.
Morgan pinched the bridge of her nose, annoyed. “I’m guessing that wouldn’t be helpful.”
“Well, I guess it’s a good thing we have you here to be the voice of diplomacy,” Val said.
Paxton
Flagstaff, Arizona—Wednesday afternoon
Heading south on I-17 was, as always, a surreal experience.
Atop the plateau of the Coconino National Forest, we enjoyed the sight of tall pines and the distant promise of the mountains on the way to the Painted Desert. If this had been a pleasure trip, we could have turned north along US 180, past Humphreys Peak, and headed toward the Grand Canyon.
I’ve seen magic and monsters, but there’s nothing in this world that has made me more aware of the ephemeral insignificance of life than the Grand Canyon. The realization that my own existence has been the blink of an eye compared to the work of tens of thousands of years was at once jarring and humbling.
Though the journey had been an enjoyable one, something told me that we had limited time. The closer we came to our destination, the greater my sense of urgency. And so we pressed on. The RV performed well at high altitudes, and even though the long descent after we crested the Mogollon Rim was nerve-racking, the slow increase in the outdoor temperature was a welcome one.
We’d overnighted in Winslow, and when we rose to run this morning the thermometer had scraped forty degrees Fahrenheit. Now, outside of Prescott, the gauge read a much balmier sixty. Our eventual destination promised yet another jump, and I grinned as I broke the silence. “I hope you packed some shorts.”
She turned from her study of the red rock vista outside the windows. “Why’s that?”
“I checked the extended forecast the other day. It’s going to be in the eighties for the next week or so.”
“Good Lord, I might melt.” As far as I knew, Cassie had never left Wisconsin for an extended period of time. Even when she’d taken college classes, she’d stayed at home and commuted to the nearest campus to save money. In a very real sense, joining up on my mission was the least sensible thing she’d ever done in her life.
I grinned. “Well, I guess I need to do some shopping anyway.” Pretty much everything I owned, save for the battered Kawasaki motorcycle riding on the RV’s rear rack, had burned up in the fire Mother had set at my childhood home when she’d learned that I’d escaped from Melanie’s clutches. A couple of hours away, a replacement driver’s license, ATM card, and other vestiges of modern life waited for me at my current mailing address, the home of my friend Kent Sikora.
If it had been up to him, I would have been out west last week. The detour I’d taken back to my childhood home at the urging of a desperate and terrified ghost had thrown a wrench in the works, but on the bright side, I was no longer working alone. And Cassie’s newfound talent might be the edge we needed—despite the fact that her first use of it had been highly embarrassing.
When I finally decided to use my talents to make a living and help others, I’d almost exclusively worked alone. Oh, I leaned on Kent’s expertise from time to time, and my best friend Carlos acted as a gatekeeper to prevent the crazies from wasting my time.
While it was nice in terms of loneliness to add another soul aboard the crazy train of my life, there was just as much responsibility that came with it. Cassie’s dad had a vague idea about what had gone down with my mom and dad back in the day, and he had a general sense that I wasn’t the average layabout. He’d trusted me with his only daughter, but he’d made me swear to him, right there in my hospital room, that I’d keep her safe.
Fighting the salesman, I hadn’t thought about the potential danger being around me presented to Cassie. For most of the past few years, pissed-off poltergeists were the most exciting thing I’d dealt with. Carlos’ careful screening had failed once, and I’d ended up visiting the very haunted house of a serial killer. If anyone deserved a haunting, it had been Ray Brannigan. I’d sent the ghosts on their merry way—but only after I ran the booby-trapped obstacle course of his home and subdued him.
In the past week, I’d dealt with worse things than ghosts—all more dangerous than anything I’d seen in the decade since Mother had gone to prison. Sumerian shadow demons, witches, cloned familiars, and whatever in God’s name that guy at the truck stop had been.
“I’ve seen too much weird crap over the years to believe in coincidence,” I said, breaking the comfortable silence. I glanced over and met Cassie’s eyes.
“I can see why you could reach that conclusion,” she said. “But how’d you get there?”
“Just thinking, you know. I got used to ghosts, maybe even bored with them. And bam, just like that, weird stuff starts coming out of the woodwork.”
“What do you think it means?”
“Beats me. Maybe I should ask the book.” I was only half-joking, but I was also more than a little bit afraid of what it might reveal to me. “I don’t watch the news much, but I hear people talking. Seems like every day there’s some new depravity, some new horror, and they only pop up until the next incident pushes them into the memory hole.”
“Things fall apart; the center cannot hold,” Cassie intoned. “Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.”
“Yeats, right?”
“I thought you doodled your way through English Lit?”
“I paid attention some of the time. That stupid poem about the fish scarred me for life, though.”
“So, what, you think this is the end of the world?”
I shifted in the driver’s seat, uncomfortable with the direction I’d steered the conversation. “Maybe. Dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria. Fire and brimstone.” I sighed. “I should have listened more to Father Rosado.”
“Who’s that?”
“Priest at the parish where Esteban De La Rosa and his family attend. I stayed with them for a while, after mom’s case.”
“So that’s where you ran off to.”
“Sunny San Diego. Spent eighteen months soaking up the rays and trying to lead
a normal life.” I shrugged. “The investigation into Mother hit Esteban and Kent pretty hard. They both moved about as far away as it gets. Kent stuck around a little bit longer, so I went to San Diego first, though I bounced back and forth between there and Phoenix.”
“Since you started doing your thing, banishing ghosts—have you gotten more or less busy?”
I had to think about it for a bit. My initial sense was to think that yeah, things had been getting worse. All things being equal, the death rate was pretty consistent, so in theory, the number of ghosts should be the same.
It doesn’t work that way, of course. A ghost is, for lack of a better term, a psychic Xerox of a dead person, the residual energy of a thinking, sapient being. The soul, the actual essence of what they were, that moves on elsewhere.
I have the last part on pretty good authority, from the grimoire and other, less flaky sources.
Most deaths aren’t traumatic or painful enough to leave that impression. And it doesn’t always happen. I’ve seen some pretty heinous killings that never resulted in a revenant. Maybe that speaks to something about the person who passed, I’m not sure.
But a consistent rate of death and an increasing rate of ghost work for me left only one logical explanation. Traumatic deaths were increasing. That could be fodder for the TV news, but I’d seen the evidence of it myself over the years, hadn’t I?
“More,” I murmured. “And that’s not a good sign.”
CHAPTER 9
Helen
San Francisco, California—Wednesday evening
The hatching of the familiars brought their numbers to ten. In Vegas, a subtle push had been more than enough for a slick-haired car salesman to exchange the minivan they’d driven from Wisconsin for a more spacious full-sized Chevrolet model. They had room to spare now, which was to the good since they’d added more baggage than Helen might have liked. No matter. Surrounded by fellow practitioners and blood-loyal attack dogs, she felt safer than she had in years.
Who would have thought that strength in numbers would be such a comforting concept? Ever since her initial discoveries in the arcane realm, her sole focus had been on developing her own power so that she’d never be obligated to another for her own preservation. Her relationship with the Edimmu had been an equal partnership. Even as the ancient Sumerian shadow spirit had expanded her horizons, she’d worked to break the creature free from the prison holding it at bay.
She’d never say it to the girls, but she missed the spirit far more than she missed Melanie, the fourth member of the coven. In some regard, that was due to the fact that she’d never met the dead witch in real life. The destruction of the Edimmu at the hands of her fool of a son had eliminated an irreplaceable font of priceless knowledge.
The death of one person was nothing in comparison.
Helen took a deep breath and forced herself to focus on the road ahead. The streets of San Francisco were narrow enough at the best of times, never mind riding in this beast of a vehicle. The familiars had driven most of the way from Las Vegas, but she’d taken over as they entered the city proper. It was far simpler to reacquaint herself with the streets behind the wheel than to shout out directions.
Behind her, the girls murmured as they looked out on the sights of Haight Street. A burger joint, with brightly painted murals in incandescent colors passed by on one side. Roxanne leaned forward between the front seats.
“I don’t get it. Why would a magic store be here?”
Helen smirked, though there was no antipathy to the expression of her emotion. Ever since she’d absorbed the life force of the coed, she found that she related more easily to the younger women. Their prattle made her less impatient and more desirous to talk. In a sense, she found herself as more of an older sister, or what she thought that might be like, had she had any siblings.
“It’s camouflage,” she explained. “Put it in some shadowy, one-way street, or in some back alley, it sticks out like a sore thumb.” She waved a hand. “There’s a Buffalo Exchange, there’s a pizza place. Who the hell expects someone to be selling black magic in a place like this? It’s the perfect disguise.” She pointed left, at the artistic pair of high-heeled legs jutting from the window of the Piedmont Boutique and laughed. After a moment, the girls joined in.
The sidewalks bustled, but as the van moved further away from the restaurants and cafes, the foot traffic died down. Past a bookstore that proudly, if illogically, claimed itself to be anarchist, she pulled the van over and glanced in the rearview mirror. The sidewalk and the street behind them were empty.
“It’s two doors back,” she said. “But look ahead, half a block down on the left.”
“The black car?”
“That’s the one.” Helen turned the engine off, leaving the keys in the ignition. “I’ve been thinking about how Division M swept up so many of my hiding places. I’m starting to think my friend is bent.” She turned around in the seat. “One companion each. The rest stay in the vehicle. Be good boys and keep an eye on the van. We’re going shopping.”
Agent Beckwith
San Francisco, California—Wednesday evening
Division M had worse postings than San Francisco, but not many. The worst part about being on the director’s shit list, and the cherry on top, was that you got the worst details of bad postings.
Which was how Special Agent JD Beckwith had ended up here, behind the wheel of an ancient Crown Victoria with a rookie partner who was still scrubbing the boot camp out of his ears.
Craig Reed had been an Airborne Ranger for five years. According to his file he’d seen some action, so if it came to a fight JD at least knew that the kid had his back, but damn if he wasn’t the most taciturn jerk he’d ever worked with.
And I’ve been on stakeouts with Agent Valentine, for God’s sake! The senior agent wasn’t the greatest conversationalist in the world, but at least he did a bit to help pass the time. With Reed, you got nothing. Beckwith was reduced to guzzling coffee like there was no tomorrow, which meant more frequent piss breaks and incipient heartburn.
And all for a low-profile investigation that consisted of little more than taking pictures. Walter Braun had flipped years ago to save his own ass from a hole in Gitmo, and now he sold ineffective trinkets to those who didn’t know any better and fingered his high-end customers for later bag-and-tag by the strike teams. Reed and Beckwith were just here to make sure the concealed cameras on the light poles around the antique shop did their thing. The fun part of the job was left to agents who hadn’t come this-close to blowing a years-long investigation.
Beckwith settled down into the driver’s seat and tried not to think about it. All things considered, he was lucky he hadn’t gotten fired. He’d always had a bit of a smart mouth, and telling off the West Coast assistant director hadn’t been one of his smarter moves. Even if he had been right, his lack of discretion was a career-killer.
He took a sip of coffee and straightened in his seat as a full-sized van pulled over a few doors down from the antique store. He nudged Reed as the driver stepped out.
“Hey, check out the legs on that chick.” Legs, ass, hell, the driver of the van had it all. She stepped around the front of the van and conferred with another young woman near the passenger side for a moment before heading down the sidewalk toward Braun’s place.
Beckwith flipped up the lid on the laptop mounted on the console, checking the view from the surveillance cameras. In the passenger seat, Reed leaned over and stared, then pulled back and began flipping through his phone.
“Hotties in sight and you’re playing Candy Crush? Sometimes I wonder about you, Reed…”
“Shut up,” the other man said. His tone was mild, but there was an undercurrent of steel in it. Beckwith recoiled slightly, opened his mouth to rebuke the junior agent, then caught the look in his eyes as Reed flipped his phone around.
“There are new fliers up on the BOLO board. Those four are on it, sir.”
Beckwith’s jaw dropped as
he looked at the artist’s rendering of the four suspects. Holy shit, Helen Locke! He reached under his coat and double-checked that his holstered sidearm was still there.
“Grab the M-4 out of the trunk. We’re taking them down. It’s Helen Locke and her crew.” Reed hesitated, and Beckwith barked, “What?”
“We’re going to need backup, right?”
“I’ll call for backup, but this time of night, who knows how long it will the response team to roll out. We can’t risk losing them, but especially her. This is number-one on the most-wanted list, kid.”
Reed stared, and Beckwith got the sense that the other man was leery of his sudden gung-ho attitude. Well, so what? This was a chance to kill two birds with one stone. They could take down a dangerous coven and resuscitate his career at the same time. Reed glanced back at the antique shop and sighed. “All right. Call now.”
Helen
San Francisco, California—Wednesday evening
The bells mounted over the door tinkled as she pushed it open and led the girls and familiars inside. The shop was narrow but deep. The closely-packed aisles overflowed with goods of all descriptions and shelves overflowing with books lined the walls. The rich smell of old paper mixed with the vague scent of cinnamon and other spices to form a potent and comforting aroma. Despite her focus on the task at hand, Helen couldn’t help but smile.
It felt like home.
The man behind the counter was older, in his late fifties or early sixties. He wore his hair in a bushy, swept-back style. If possible, his beard was even fluffier, which gave his head the unfortunate silhouette of a squished-figure-8. He peered over the top of his half-rimmed glasses and frowned at the crew picking their way through the aisle toward him.
“Don’t touch anything, please. Can I help you find something?” The disdain in his voice was obvious. He’d obviously presumed that this crowd was much too young to take interest in antiquities.
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