Chapter 16
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
After another half hour, Dante told me I should go home.
“We don’t know how long it’s going to be until I can talk to her,” he said. “I can call an R-N-R when I’m ready to go.”
R-N-R was one of the multitude of rideshares around the city and country.
“Hold on.” I opened my phone and brought up my What-The-App. There were a string of messages waiting for me. Jet was love-bombing me like crazy again. There was a certain mania to his texts. “I’m going to ask him if we can meet.”
“Don’t seem too eager—you don’t want to scare him away. He seems to enjoy the chase.”
“I suppose so,” I said. I texted him back telling him I was all right and that I was thinking about him. I asked him if we could voice chat tomorrow. Within seconds he answered back that he’d love that and gave me a time that he’d call me. “Well, at least we’re getting somewhere with him.”
“Seriously, go home, Kyann. Tilly’s out of danger, and who knows how long the evening’s going to take. I appreciate you being here, but all we can do is wait.” He reached out and took my hand, holding it tight. “Thank you, for caring.”
I leaned over and kissed his cheek. “I love Tilly. I love you, too. You know that.”
“I know,” he gave me a tired smile. “You’re my best friend…and I bless the day we met.”
“Me too, dude. Me too. All right, I’ll go, but if you need anything, call me. Promise?”
“I promise,” he said.
As I left the hospital, I glanced back. He was leaning back against the sofa, looking exhausted. I vowed right there we’d find out what happened to Tilly. And we wouldn’t let it happen again.
I got home around eight o’clock. Penn took one look at me and pointed me toward my bedroom. “Take a bath and I’ll make you some supper. I don’t care if you think you’re too tired to eat—you’ll be hungry enough once you relax.”
She guided me to my bedroom and, as I stripped, she found my favorite velour pajama pants and cami for me. Then, as I headed into the bathroom, she took off toward the kitchen.
I thought about a bath, but decided I’d rather take a shower, so turned on the water and settled on the walk-in shower seat, I was so tired. My body was fine, but emotionally ? I felt fragile. I sat there, the water pounding down on me, and leaned my head back against the shower wall. As I slowly lathered up, I realized that I was on edge.
Sex had always been a no-brainer for me. I’d had plenty of sexual partners over the years, but like Penn, I wasn’t looking for a relationship. At least, not now. I had enough on my plate without having to deal with other people’s baggage as well. But sex? It was like breathing, and I managed that on my own without help. As I slid my hand between my legs, I tried to clear my mind and focus on the sensation of my fingers on my skin. It wasn’t long before the tension drained away with the water.
“So, what’s going on with Tilly?” Penn asked. She had brought our dinner—she’d waited for me, after all—into the living room. We were having comfort food: Macaroni and cheese, fried chicken, and coleslaw.
I filled my plate and settled back, flanked by Jangles on one side and Murdoch on the other. “We’re not sure, except that something’s been feeding on her life essence. She’s also anemic, and she was drugged with razapahn. Overdosed, in fact.”
“Cripes,” Penn said, settling back in the recliner. “Do you know what caused the drain in life force?”
“No, but we suspect Jet.” I told her everything that had happened. “I’m supposed to talk to him tomorrow, as Estelle. I need a voice changer app before then, to make me sound older.”
“That’s not difficult,” she said. “When you do, let me listen in. I might be able to pick something up from him.”
“I should have Sophia do the same—she’s an oracle.” I forked up a heaping bite of the mac ‘n cheese, letting it melt in my mouth. It was so creamy and cheesy that all I could do was close my eyes as the flavor trickled down my throat. “I needed this tonight.”
“I’m glad you like it,” she said. “What do you want to watch?” She held up the remote.
“I’m not sure. Something that doesn’t require me to think. I feel fried. Oh,” I said, leaning forward. “I almost forgot. I met Dante’s father. Kind of.”
Penn set down her fork. “Really? Is this the first time you’ve met him?”
“Yes. By the time Dante found me and took me in, he had been excommunicated from his family. I never met any of them except Tilly.”
“When was Dante born?” Penn asked.
“Close to when you were born. October 31, 1950. In shifter years, he’s still young. Shifters age a lot slower than humans, as you know.”
“Not as slow as the Fae,” Penn said.
“True. I have no idea how long demons live, but we’re all going to live longer than someone who’s human,” I said.
“Like Carson,” Penn said.
That was a sobering thought, but accurate. “True, that. Anyway, I’m young still, compared to you and to Dante.”
Penn grinned. “Your birthday’s coming up, though. January third. You need to tell me what you want for a present. So… Dante’s father. You’ve met my mother. How does he compare to her?”
Eileen, her mother, was human. Penn had never had the chance to meet any of her father’s relatives—they would never accept her.
But Eileen tried. I’d met her once. A quiet woman, she lived in a small beach house in Aberdeen, a run-down city on the Washington coast that overlooked the Pacific. Fran was a recluse who had missed the hippie era but who hearkened back to it. Penn loved her, but Eileen didn’t understand her daughter. They both did their best to bridge the vast gap that Penn’s Fae heritage created, but they never quite met in the middle. But they got together for Thanksgiving, and usually for New Years.
I thought about it for a moment. “Cold. I didn’t like him at all. He reminded me of someone who would walk away from a dying friend if there was money to be made. Dante said he thinks his parents are waiting for Tilly to die, so they can take their places as the leaders of their clan…family unit…whatever you call it within the Pack.”
“Lovely,” Penn said. She picked up her plate again and turned on the television. “Family of choice is always stronger. At least for a lot of us.”
“I agree.” At the next commercial, I asked her to pause the stream. “So, you said you set up everything for tomorrow night?”
“Yep. We’re going to meet there at 7:30. That way Lazenti won’t have any trouble. I also asked Sophia to call your client. He asked if he could be there. I told her absolutely not. He could really mess things up.”
“Good,” I said. “I’ve been worried about the spirits there trying to jump him.”
“You’re right to be concerned,” Penn said. “As it is, I’m going to give Carson a charm to protect him. He’s too vulnerable, even though he doesn’t consider himself so. But I asked him to let me make one for him, and he relented.”
“Good, he’s going to need it.”
“Okay, let’s get back to the movie. We’ve got a full day tomorrow, and I want to lose myself in somebody else’s adventure tonight.”
So we settled back, playing with the cats and eating and letting the day dissolve as night crept in and lulled us to sleep.
Morning came, and with it, temperatures were heading back up for a while. It was thirty-four degrees, and instead of snow, a light drizzle was falling. It would turn the compacted snow into slush, which was almost worse.
I headed to the office. Dante hadn’t texted me since I left him at the hospital and I hoped to hell it was just that he was too tired to remember. But his car was in the parking lot as I drove up. I crossed the parking lot, picking my way around the worst of the slushy puddles that had already formed.
As I entered the office, Sophia waved at me. “Hey, welcome back.”
“I’m sorry we’re in on the weekend, but I want to try to wrap up Michael’s case as soon as possible and get him and his family back in their house,” I said.
“Well, given we took our weekend in the middle of the week, I think we’re all okay,” Sophia said. “Oh, about Michael?—”
“Penn told me he asked if he can be there tonight. Absolutely not. I want no chance for the revenant—or the shadow man—to possess him. Any other calls?”
Sophia glanced at her screen. The software we used turned voice mail into easy-to-read messages and made it easier to keep track of. We could print them out and file them so we’d have a record in their folders, but we could also store them electronically.
“We do. I’ve made two appointments for next week. One was a woman who says her sister is missing, and the other’s a man who says pixies are ruining his garden.”
“I doubt if they’re pixies. Pixies generally don’t bother gardens, so it’s probably some other kind of nature Fae or sub-Fae. Okay, you scheduled both?”
“For mid-week.”
“Is Orik here? Carson?”
“Yes, both are back in their office.” She handed me the mail.
I sorted through the opened envelopes. Nothing that I needed to worry about, so I handed the envelopes back to her. “Do what you need to with them. And can you call a staff meeting at noon in the breakroom? We’ll eat lunch in. Penn’s coming in.”
“Will do, boss!” Sophia saluted me as I headed toward Dante’s office to ask about Tilly.
He told me she was awake, couldn’t remember anything at this point, and was starting to feel better with the blood transfusion for her anemia and the IV fluids that helped wash the razapahn out of her system.
“What did she say when she found out she’d been drugged?”
Dante ducked his head. “She doesn’t want to believe that Jet did it, but she’s starting to waver on the subject. She agreed that there weren’t many people who could have had access to her. She’s smart enough not to blame the waiters at dinner.”
“I’m supposed to talk to Jet this afternoon, so maybe I can lure him into a meeting,” I said. “I downloaded a voice changer app, so I’ll sound older and fragile.”
“Good, because you sound anything but that now.”
“We’ll see what happens. If we can get our hands on him, I plan on detaining him, with or without his permission.” I arched my eyebrows. “He’s not getting away with this.”
“Where, might I ask, do you plan on putting him?”
I laughed. “Oh, I have my plans. Trust me—there’s a reason I keep friends like Benny around. As a matter of fact, I have to make a call. I’ll talk to you in the breakroom at noon.” As I headed back to my office, I called Benny.
“Hey, I need a favor. And you know I pay well for favors,” I said when the weaselly goblin came on the line. “I need a secure place to stash someone without anybody else finding out about it. It needs to be secure, or I’ll come after your hide, and you know I carry through my promises .”
Benny coughed. “I’ve got just the place. Let’s talk about payment.”
“Oh Benny, you never disappoint me. How about two hundred up front for one day, and more if we need more time?”
“I’m good. When will you need it ready?”
“Hopefully by tomorrow night. I’ll call you a little later. Make sure you pick up.”
“Will do, Legs. Talk to you later.”
As I stared at my phone, thinking about Benny, it occurred to me that sometimes, we had to walk on the outskirts of the law, in order to keep it from being broken.
Promptly at noon, we gathered in the breakroom. Penn had taken a Rent-a-Ride here, because it was still slippery enough that she didn’t want to drive. But we were all around the table, and everybody was in one piece.
Penn immediately handed Carson a necklace, with a carved wooden rune on it. The necklace smelled like bergamot and lily. He sniffed it, and smiled.
“I like this. I’d wear this as a cologne, if you made it for me,” he said, draping it over his head.
“I can make you some, if you like,” she said.
“Sure—let me know how much it costs,” he said, holding her gaze.
Penn blinked, then smiled and turned back to her notebook. “So, I’ve examined all the footage you sent me, and from what I can tell, we’re dealing with a revenant, a shadow person, and several lost spirits. We’ll need to take care of the spirits first, or they might unwittingly interfere with exorcising the other two. The way we’re going to do this is that I need the shadow man and the revenant distracted while I lead them through the Veil.”
“How do we do that?” Sophia asked.
“We’ll discuss that. I have parts for all of you, including Lazenti, to play. After I’ve freed the spirits, we’ll take on the shadow man, which means that the revenant still has to be distracted.” She sighed. “After the shadow man is gone, then we go to work on the revenant.”
“Which is stronger? The shadow man or the revenant?” Orik asked.
“That’s a toss up. Both are strong, both are deadly.”
“What can they do to you?” Sophia asked.
“Shadow people can drain you dry—they devour life force and they can make you physically ill, as well. Revenants—well, they can beat the crap out of you, feed on your life force, throw things, and, if they kill you, they can absorb you.” She shuddered. “Both are bad news, and both can be deadly.”
“So, as Orik asked, how do we distract them so you can go after the others?”
“Lazenti will be there, and I’m assigning him the job of distracting the shadow man. As far as the shadow man, well, I’m going to attempt to send him through a portal, back to his realm. I’ll bind him so he can’t return, at least for a while. As for the revenant, I’m going to teach you how to use charmed crystals and an incantation to deflect it. I’ll train you on what to do. As for the revenant, well, I’ve got several spells ready and I hope that one of them works.”
“You can destroy the revenant?” I asked.
Penn nodded. “Yes, because it’s an amalgamation of other energies. The shadow man is a creature in his own right. In a sense, he’s harder to destroy, but I can banish him. The revenant can be destroyed, but they aren’t easily banished. They’re tied to our plane more than they are to the astral plane.”
With that, she brought out a bag of rainbow quartz crystal spikes that were practically humming with energy. She gave one to each of us, and then spent the next hour teaching us how to focus our energy through them.
Penn stuck around so she could listen in while I talked to Jet. Carson showed her some more of the footage of the entities haunting Michael’s house. She listened intently, soaking up the information and asking questions.
“Okay, quiet people. Let’s get ready for my scammer beau to call.”
Carson had come up with a device that hooked up to my phone. If Jet had his location services turned on, we might be able to pinpoint where he was. Carson had tried to make a video out of the picture but it looked too jerky.
“Just tell him your camera’s not working,” he said. “At least the voice alteration app works.”
“Will I hear the difference?”
“Not really, but don’t worry.”
“I guess I’m ready,” I said. “Is everything ready to try to find his location?”
“As long as your phone is hooked up to the device.” Carson took a deep breath. “Okay, chief. You’re ready to rock.”
At that moment, Dante’s phone rang and he answered it. A few minutes later, he returned, pale.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“That was Aunt Tilly. She’s still at the hospital, but Diana called. She found Tilly’s safe open and empty. Also, her banker called to ask if she had written a check for fifteen thousand dollars made out to ‘Pay to Bearer.’ Tilly told them no, and set up a password.”
I sighed. “We’ll deal with that after Jet calls. When he does, I’ll put him on speaker, so nobody make a sound.”
Before I could finish, my phone rang. I glanced at Caller ID. “Okay, folks, it’s show time!”