Chapter 7 #2
“She did,” Caleb put in. “But since the guy who asked her for the favor is someone who was involved in that mess at the Desert Paradise, we don’t know for sure if a regular old spirit is what we’re dealing with here…or something much worse.”
Pru fiddled with her seatbelt, then said, “I’m surprised she trusted him after everything that happened at the tournament.”
That makes two of us, Caleb thought. However, since he didn’t want Delia to sound like she’d been a complete sucker, he replied, “She saw Aaron’s thoughts, or at least enough of them to convince her that no ulterior motives were involved.”
“‘Aaron’?” Pru echoed. “Aaron Sanchez, that guy she had me look up before she went on a date with him?”
Even now, Caleb didn’t like thinking about that date, although he knew it had come to nothing. “Yeah, that guy. He’s fallen on hard times since then, and his family wants to sell the supposedly haunted house and give him a cut. That was why he came to Delia for help.”
“And of course she said yes, because she can’t resist helping any sad sacks who come across her path.”
Caleb wondered if that was how Delia had seen him when they first met. Had she thought he was a sad sack who needed her assistance because otherwise he’d flounder on his own?
He didn’t want to believe that. Sure, he’d been more lost than he wanted to admit when he’d come to Las Vegas, and crossing paths with Delia Dunne had felt almost like divine intervention, but….
He set those uncomfortable thoughts aside to be revisited at a later time, well after he knew Delia was safe and he would have the leisure to explore them…if he even wanted to.
“Something like that,” he said. “When Aegis Holdings fell apart, Aaron lost his condo, and I guess he lost his job, too, because it sounds like he was pretty much a basket case for almost a week after the Desert Paradise tournament. So of course Delia wanted to help him out.”
Prudence tapped her fingers against the knees of her skinny jeans, which were just as black as her tank top and the pointy flats she wore. Unlike Delia, who never seemed to bother with polish, Pru’s nails were painted a deep metallic green to match her hair.
“And now she’s missing.”
“Yes,” Caleb replied. It seemed as if Pru was willing to move past the whole part-demon thing and focus on the facts of the matter, and he was damn glad of that.
They needed to put all their energies into finding Delia rather than worrying about who was a quarter demon and who was an angel, or whatever.
Prudence looked past him to the spot where Ty sat in the back seat. “And you’re just helping out of the goodness of your heart?”
“Delia has certain unique abilities,” he said, still with the same utter calmness of voice and expression that made the tennis pro look like some sort of modern-day Buddha.
Well, if the Buddha reincarnated with a ponytail and faded jeans and the face of a GQ model.
“Like talking to ghosts,” Pru supplied, and Ty nodded.
“That, and a good deal more. She’s already begun to hear people’s thoughts, but soon she will also be able to catch glimpses of the future, among other things. Gifts like hers will be invaluable in the fight ahead.”
Caleb wasn’t sure he liked the sound of that. While he’d already guessed there might be some kind of confrontation involved in rescuing Delia, he got the feeling that Ty had been talking about something entirely different, something much bigger than that.
Well, he’d worry about it later. The guy did have a tendency toward pronouncements that might or might not even be provable.
Once again, Pru was silent as she appeared to absorb what Ty had just said.
Despite her crazy hair, she seemed like a pretty down-to-earth person, which was probably part of the reason why she and Delia got along so well.
However, that kind of temperament also made it a lot harder for her to accept that the universe was much stranger than she could have ever imagined.
“If you’re both a couple of supernatural beings, I’m not sure how much help I can be,” she said at length.
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Ty replied at once. “You have very useful skills. Just because Caleb has demon blood, that doesn’t mean he’s omnipotent. We can use all the help we can get.”
Noticeably, Ty hadn’t made a single comment about his own blood, or whether he himself was also a supernatural being. Just the guy being cagey again, although Caleb couldn’t help being a little irritated.
This would have been a lot easier if he’d stopped playing games and fessed up to who he really was.
“Especially because of where we’re going,” Ty continued, and now it was Caleb’s turn to send a questioning glance over one shoulder.
“What about it?” he asked. “I thought Laughlin was just another gambling town, sort of a mini-Vegas on the river.”
“The town isn’t our concern,” Ty replied. “No, it’s the river itself. The Colorado River has its own power, a kind of power you may find difficult to deal with. Laughlin does sit at the intersection of two ley lines — ”
“Those again,” Pru interjected, tone wry.
“ — but the river itself has an energy that is diametrically opposed to all things demonic.”
Well, that was just great. Here they were, basically flying blind, and now he was supposed to rescue Delia while being handicapped by the Colorado River’s energy, whatever that was?
“This just keeps getting better and better,” he muttered.
Ty smiled. “It might not be as bad as you think. Your human blood may be enough to buffer you from the draining effects of the river’s energy.”
Caleb couldn’t help noticing how Ty had said, “May be enough.” Nothing seemed to be certain here, and he knew he’d just have to roll the dice and go with it.
But he’d find Delia even if he had to crawl on his hands and knees to get to her.
“Do you know why the Colorado in particular?” he asked. “I know it isn’t all rivers, because I spent plenty of time on the White River in Indiana when I was growing up. It didn’t have any effect on me.”
“I can’t say for sure,” Ty said. “You might not want to believe this, but I certainly don’t know everything. I haven’t lived in Las Vegas my whole life, only the past seven years, and I haven’t had much need to get out and explore.”
“Because you were assigned to Las Vegas?” Caleb asked. He had a feeling the other man wasn’t about to give him a straight answer, but he figured he would try anyway.
“I’m not sure if that’s the best way to describe the situation.”
Of course not. Caleb sent a sideways look at Pru, but now she was staring forward, her expression distracted, as if she was already mentally running through the methods she might employ to track down her missing friend.
And really, that was what he should be doing, too. While he hated to have Ty dodge every single question regarding his past, that wasn’t the important thing here. If he wanted to keep his secrets, so be it.
“We’re getting close,” Pru said as a sign for the turnoff to Davis Dam flashed by.
Yes, they were. He’d looked up the route on his phone, so he knew they needed to keep going but then take the first exit in Laughlin and head north to the park.
They didn’t have to cross the Colorado River, and yet Caleb could still sense it as they approached, its strength pulsing in the background like the bass beat of music playing off in the distance.
He didn’t feel particularly debilitated, but maybe that was because they hadn’t gone over the water yet.
With any luck, they wouldn’t have to at all. On the other side of the river was Bullhead City and Arizona, and it didn’t sound as if any of Delia’s business had taken her there.
He followed the signs to Heritage Park, and within a few minutes, they were pulling into one of the parking areas. Sure enough, there was Delia’s little white Hyundai Kona, although he noticed that she’d removed the magnetic signs from the front doors that advertised Dunne & Dunne Realty.
That wasn’t so strange, though. The whole point of them being magnetic was that she could put them on and take them off as needed…and he guessed she would have wanted to maintain a low profile on this trip.
The spaces on either side of the little SUV were empty — the park didn’t look too busy on this hot Tuesday afternoon — so Caleb pulled into the one on the right and turned off the Range Rover’s engine.
As soon as he opened the car door, a blast of warm air caught his hair.
It was windier than he’d been expecting, but he assumed that had something to do with the way the park sat high above the river, giving a spectacular view of the Colorado as it wound its way past the casinos and restaurants that clustered on its banks.
He wasn’t here about the view, though. Pru and Ty had just emerged from the SUV, so Caleb directed his next words to her.
“What should we do first?”
“Let me take a look at the car,” she said. “I’ll try dusting for fingerprints and see if I can find any that don’t look like Delia’s.”
“You can tell which fingerprints are hers just by looking at them?”
Now Pru grinned, even as she opened up her satchel and started hunting around inside. “Actually, yeah,” she replied. “But that’s only because I used her as a guinea pig when I was first teaching myself how to do this.”
Caleb looked over at Ty, whose shoulders hitched almost imperceptibly.
All right, he’d just stand back and see what happened.
Prudence produced a small vial of powder and a brush from her satchel, and then went over to the driver’s door and dusted some of the powder around the handle. “These are all Delia’s,” she announced after a moment. “Let me check the passenger side.”
Again, Caleb and Ty watched as she used the brush to apply the powder to the door. It didn’t seem as if she’d found anything of note, because when she looked up, her expression was noticeably annoyed.
“Nothing over here, either. I’ll check the back hatch and the rear doors, too.”