Chapter Three
Chapter Thre e
Stronger Stuff
Felipe hesitated outside the laboratory door. Even from the hallway, he could smell the metallic tang of blood and organ meat beneath the punch of fresh coffee. He winced as his stomach painfully knotted and roiled. Pressing a trembling hand to his abdomen, Felipe drew in a long, slow breath until he could choke down the saliva pooling in his mouth. Throwing up in Oliver’s lab once was embarrassing enough; if he did it again in front of Gwen, he would never hear the end of it. When Oliver’s laugh rose above the gurgle of the coffee pot, Felipe’s lips drew into a faint smile as he straightened. It was probably drinking sherry on an empty stomach that made the smell of organ meat so much worse. Once he ate, he’d feel better. As he pushed open the laboratory door, Gwen and Oliver’s heads swiveled toward him.
Watching Oliver’s features brighten upon seeing him on the steps never got old. His lover’s grey gaze swept across his face for signs of fatigue, yet all Felipe could feel was the swirl of warmth that hovered beneath his heart where the tether connected them. Oliver’s black hair had been pomaded to the side to keep it out of his face during work, making his pale features all the more stark against his funerial clothing and drawing Felipe’s attention to the tempting pink of his lips. Later . As Felipe trotted down the steps, Oliver whisked the lid off his lunch tray and patted the empty stool at the bench beside him and Gwen. Felipe’s mouth watered and his stomach keened in anticipation at the sandwich stacked high with bloodied roast beef along with a wedge of cheese and a pile of runny eggs beside it.
“Is that the correct order?” Gwen asked dubiously.
“Yes, why?” Oliver replied as he kissed Felipe and grabbed the file from his hand on his way to the percolator.
“It’s a little… excessive for lunch, even for Felipe. No offense.”
“None taken. It was Oliver’s idea,” Felipe said, picking up the weighty sandwich. He needed to remember to eat slowly, even if his body protested; talking would help. “We’ve been keeping track of what I eat during the day and how awful I feel after. This combination is apparently what I need to eat to feel like a functional human being for as long as possible.”
Oliver placed a cup of coffee beside Felipe and beamed at Gwen as he added, “The experiment has been on-going for weeks, but I think we’ve finally nailed down what works best. If breakfast and lunch are both protein-heavy meals, Felipe seems to get on better than if lunch is an afterthought. If dinner is light on meat or dairy, that’s fine because he’ll sleep through the worst of it, but vegetables and fruit are a must.”
“You know, to counterbalance the excessive dairy and meat intake. Aren’t I lucky?” Felipe said to Gwen between bites, though there was a hint of a smile in his voice.
When Felipe had confessed to Oliver that being dead was changing him, he had expected Oliver to be worried, and he was, but not for the reasons Felipe had anticipated. Oliver didn’t seem to care that he needed more food than a normal person or that he could now see in the dark; he cared that Felipe didn’t feel well more often than he would care to admit. In the weeks after he told him, Oliver had taken getting to the bottom of his new dietary needs as seriously as he would an autopsy or ballistics test. There had been an observation period, several weeks of adding and removing things from his meals, and finally, the fine tuning of what his body required each day.
His hands still shook by lunch some days, but the hunger pangs and fatigue had greatly improved. Having less choices and having to remember to eat consistently chafed, especially on days when he wanted to work without stopping or having to think about what he should or shouldn’t eat. Oliver tried to make it easier for him by having lunch sent to wherever he was working or shoving hunks of cheese or strips of jerky into his hands if he let time escape him. He wasn’t even sure where the random bits of meat and cheese came from. They seemed to appear in the lab as if pulled from the aether. Despite the minor annoyances, Felipe was grateful.
“At least it seems to be helping,” Gwen replied, giving him a once over as she levitated the Fig Newton box down from the top shelf. “I wondered why you looked less ragged. I thought Oliver was letting you get more sleep.”
Felipe barked a laugh as Oliver blushed furiously and snatched the box of cakes from the air. As Oliver and Gwen good-naturedly bickered, Felipe polished off the second half of his sandwich and was about to move onto the pile of eggs when his gaze snagged on the ticking clock. He could smell Mrs. Ennis’s organs still laying out on the table behind him despite the open windows; better to tell Oliver now about the head inspector’s meeting than when he was done eating and mentally preparing to finish her autopsy.
“I ran into one of the pages on my way down. The head inspector wants to see us in his office after lunch. All of us.”
“Gwen too?” Oliver asked.
When Felipe nodded around his food, Gwen gasped, leaping up from her seat and slapping her palms on the tabletop. “I bet it’s about vampires.”
Oliver gave her a long-suffering look as he held out the box of Fig Newtons. “I highly doubt it. There’s—”
“ No such thing as vampires ,” Gwen parroted, waving the box away. “But that’s where you’re wrong, Oliver Barlow, because there is, and it’s finally my time to shine.”
Felipe snorted a laugh when Gwen turned to him with narrowed eyes.
“Excuse me, but did I hear you snicker, Inspector Galvan?”
“No, ma’am,” Felipe replied, stuffing a hunk of cheese into his mouth.
“That’s what I thought. Really though, what else could it be? It has to be about vampires.”
“There are plenty of other options.” Oliver counted off on his fingers as he spoke. “The head inspector could be reprimanding us for eating lunch in the laboratory as it’s unsanitary. Or he could have decided we take too long for lunch despite being within the hour guideline if you allow for occasional dillydallying. Or he could have decided we need to be disciplined for the Jed Monroe incident after all. Or—”
“It’s probably about the New Jersey case no one wants. That’s what DeSanto said when I asked.” Stacking his empty plate on top of Oliver and Gwen’s, Felipe carried them and the trays into the hall. “What that has to do with you, Gwen, I have no idea, but I assume the head inspector is going to try to stick us with the case.”
“How do you want to handle it? I assume you don’t want to take it,” Oliver called over his shoulder.
Felipe sighed. When he decided to semi-retire, part of the deal was no more drawn out cases that would take him far from home. New Jersey wasn’t far by any means, but if the New Jersey Branch of the Paranormal Society had kicked the case to the larger branch to deal with, it probably wasn’t a simple one. Part of him still wanted to volunteer to keep the investigators who couldn’t self-heal out of harm’s way. Unfortunately, he couldn’t do that and keep Oliver safe at the same time. Returning to the lab, Felipe watched Oliver thumb through Mrs. Ennis’s file with a quizzical frown. It wasn’t fair to put Oliver in harm’s way or make him stress about having to pretend they weren’t a couple while they traveled. Some old habits had to die.
“Let’s go to the meeting with an open mind. If it’s an interesting case that probably won’t end horrifically, we can think about it. If it sounds like it’s going to be a bloodbath, we’ll pass.”
“Does that happen often?” Gwen asked with a raised brow as she refilled her coffee cup.
“More than I would care to admit.”
***
Waiting outside the head inspector’s office, Felipe tried not to let his disquiet show even as little barbs of anxiety slipped across the tether from Oliver. Gale’s voice drifted from the other side of the closed door followed by Head Inspector Williams’s low rumble. Felipe didn’t like that they had heard so little about this case. Tight lips never boded well in an office where investigators never stopped gossiping or complaining about their cases, and it set off his danger senses. If the head inspector was keeping the details quiet and only speaking to teams individually, it had to be bad. Beside him, Oliver stood ramrod straight while Gwen tied and untied Oliver’s left shoe with unseen fingers. Felipe was about to lean over to tell him they should not take the case when the door opened.
Gale, the head inspector’s secretary and partner—bedmate—he wasn’t sure, stuck their head out. Despite wearing lavender trousers instead of a gown that day, Gale still had their hair piled into an elaborate knot of curls and wore what looked like a corset under their shirtwaist and lace trimmed jacket. They rarely ever wore trousers, yet they somehow still managed to blur the line between masculinity and femininity. Gale’s brown eyes flickered between the three of them before coming to rest on Felipe.
“Gang’s all here? Good. Come on in.”
As they filed in, Gale swept over to their chair and lap table in the corner behind the head inspector’s larger, more austere desk. The head inspector’s office resembled the inside of a ship with wood paneled walls that held only a few maps of the city and the surrounding areas. If Felipe sat very still, he swore he could feel it sway ever so slightly, but he tried not to. Head Inspector Williams didn’t look up from his papers but gave them a curt nod and a grunt of acknowledgement behind his thick, grey mustache. The ship in a bottle on the corner of the desk roiled on an unseen storm, and the usually tidy desk looked as if it had been ransacked. Usually, the head inspector had everything in folders and bins, but today, papers were strewn across open ledgers and stacks of file folders. Gale met Felipe’s gaze with a roll of their eyes and mouthed behind the head inspector’s back, He’s in a mood .
While Oliver and Gwen took the seats before the head inspector’s desk, Felipe stood behind them and waited. The head inspector’s eyes darted across the page in his hand, but he still didn’t look up. Gwen shifted in her seat, and Felipe could tell she was angling to read the page. He suspected she could read upside down and backwards as easily as she could forwards. Laying a hand on Oliver’s shoulder, Felipe gave him a reassuring squeeze. He could already feel the tension in his chest pulling tight as a bowstring the longer they waited. With a huffed breath, Head Inspector Williams set the report aside and scowled at Gwen as her gaze shot up from the page.
“Do you all know why I’ve called this meeting?” the head inspector asked, leveling a look at each of them in turn.
Oliver opened his mouth to speak, but Felipe squeezed his shoulder more sharply. “No, sir.”
“Good. What I’m about to tell you is confidential. You cannot breathe a word of this outside this office, and if there is any panic, I will place the blame squarely on you three.”
Tension crept along the tether, though Felipe didn’t know where his fear ended and Oliver’s began. Definitely not disciplinary action, then.
“Has Galvan told either of you about the case we received from the New Jersey Paranormal Society? ”
“Only that it exists and that none of the investigators want to take it,” Oliver said hesitantly, oblivious to Felipe’s wince.
The head inspector’s lips thinned. “Of course they don’t.”
“But you want me and Dr. Barlow to take it?” Felipe added, keeping his voice level despite his growing irritation. “Sir, when we talked about my semi-retirement, you agreed that I wouldn’t have to take cases outside of the city anymore.”
“Did I say you were assigned to it yet, Galvan? Trust me, I’d rather kick this mess back to the New Jersey Branch, but I’m offering the case to you because it fits your unique skillsets.” The head inspector picked up a paper, but at Gale clearing their throat, he begrudgingly pulled a pair of pince-nez from his pocket and set them on his nose. “The New Jersey Branch received a letter last month claiming that the dead are coming back to life and terrorizing people in a town at the edge of the Pine Barrens.”
Felipe could see the thoughts flickering through Oliver’s mind about the logistics and specifics, but all Felipe could think of was what sort of town this was. He had an inkling, and he didn’t like it one bit.
“Supposedly, the dead have already attacked four people that we know of, though there might be more. The head of the New Jersey Branch wasn’t clear on that, and neither was the original letter. At least one person has been killed. Now, I don’t know if we have a rogue necromancer or possibly a—”
“Vampire!” Gwen exclaimed, shooting Oliver a smug look.
“It’s possibly a vampire or some other creature, but either way, it needs to go. Miss Jones, Mr. Turpin informed me that you are the Paranormal Society’s resident expert on vampires, on paper at least. I assume you can give Galvan and Barlow all the information they could need for this case?”
Gwen’s eyes brightened behind her spectacles. “Head Inspector, I have been preparing for this moment for years. My magnum opus on vampires isn’t complete yet, as I’m still researching the vampire-like creatures of Africa and Asia for volumes five and six, but I already have a volume and a half typed up with extensive notes and a lengthy bibliography for the rest. The sections on American and European vampire mythos should be complete enough for your purposes, though. Dr. Barlow even helped me with some of my medical questions and theories.”
“Of course he did.” The head inspector barely suppressed a world-weary look. “We don’t need a tome, Miss Jones. A few pages of key information are more than enough until we have a better idea of what’s going on. A few meaning less than ten.”
Gwen looked as if she wanted to argue, but Felipe cut her off. “Sir, may I ask why the New Jersey Branch hasn’t handled the case themselves?”
“Because when they did, two of their investigators went missing, and the other two who tried to investigate their disappearance fled town and refused to go back.”
“So it’s a murder town?” Felipe replied, shaking his head. Of fucking course, it was.
“There is no such thing as a murder town, Galvan.”
Gale scoffed. “Like hell there isn’t.”
“What’s a murder town?” Oliver asked Felipe quietly.
“It’s a town where too many weird things happen,” Felipe explained. “Every investigator has stumbled into at least one. If a town is a hotbed of monsters, disappearances, and unexplained, gruesome deaths, it’s a murder town. They’re bad news, and no one wants to go to them if they can help it.”
“It has to do with too much magic,” Gale added from behind the head inspector’s desk without raising their head from their notes. “That’s my theory, at least. The energy that stokes magic is like mercury. You can drink a little and survive, but too much will make you go mad or kill you. Sometimes, it’s the land that’s the problem. Sometimes, it’s the people. You can’t really tell until you’re in it, not that it matters. It’s all bad.”
“There’s no proof murder towns exist. They’re an old wives’ tale and nothing more.”
“Your leg says otherwise,” Gale muttered under their breath .
The ship in a bottle on the edge of the head inspector’s desk rocked dangerously on a roiling sea as the head inspector leveled a tempestuous look at the three of them. “It doesn’t matter if it’s a murder town or not. The New Jersey Branch seems to think we are made of stronger stuff than they are. Whatever is going on, Galvan, you can handle it. I’m sure you’ve seen worse. Barlow, you’re the only necromancer we’ve got. If there is one of your ilk running amok, you should be able to tell the same way you could with your dead man during the institute case. And Miss Jones, you will provide them with whatever information they need to figure out if this is a vampire.”
“Sir, with all due respect, vampires don’t really exist,” Oliver replied. “The vast majority of vampire panics are caused by consumption sweeping through families, and people taking too much stock in bad dreams and portents. Do we even know if people are being murdered or if they are dying mysteriously from disease?”
“That’s your job to find out, Barlow.”
“ If we agree to take the case.”
The head inspector held Felipe’s gaze for a long moment. He debated tacking on a sir or backing down, but after twenty years, he was tired of taking cases like this. He had been killed for this god forsaken job and had nothing to show for it but bitterness. I don’t need to be here. I’ve done my time , Felipe wanted to yell. A smarter man would have turned in his retirement papers once and for all, but he couldn’t let a fit of pique ruin things for Oliver. Ripping his gaze away, Felipe crossed his arms with a huff. The ship in the bottle lurched on its stand a second before the head inspector grabbed an overstuffed file and tossed it across the desk toward Oliver.
“The residents of Aldorhaven are being attacked by something. If it’s a bunch of hypochondriacs and mass hysteria, then it should be an easy few days of work for you. If it’s something more, then you two should be well equipped to deal with it, or should I assign you a more experienced partner for this case, Inspector Galvan?”
Anger constricted Felipe’s ribs. He was about to tell the head inspector where to put his case when Oliver’s hand caught his wrist. A strange sensation trickled across the tether that felt like a mix between dread, curiosity, and doleful longing. When Felipe looked at Oliver, he found the other man staring down at the case file with a frown and his dark brows knit thoughtfully.
“Can— can we think about it?” Oliver asked with measured slowness. “I would need to see if the other medical examiner would be able to cover my cases and such.”
“Don’t take too long to decide. The New Jersey Branch is getting antsy, and if it isn’t you two taking it, I will need to reconsider some things.”
Nodding, Oliver swallowed hard and stood. “Understood, sir.”
Oliver took Felipe’s hand and made for the door with Gwen at his side. The moment Gale shut the door behind them, Felipe turned Oliver toward him and held his shoulders. At the look on his face, Oliver blenched with a grimace.
“Why did you say that?” Felipe said in a hissed whisper. “You do realize you all but agreed to take this case, right?”
Oliver’s hands tightened around the file as he opened his mouth to speak but stopped himself each time. Biting back his annoyance, Felipe firmly stroked Oliver’s arms and released a tense sigh as a familiar wave of panic and misery Felipe hadn’t felt from Oliver in months burbled through his chest. He hadn’t meant to do that. Behind Oliver’s back, Gwen gave Felipe a sharp look that bordered on menacing as he tried to get Oliver to unclench enough to speak. He wasn’t mad. He truly wasn’t. He just couldn’t understand why he would agree to risk his life going to a murder town. The head inspector could make as many veiled threats as he wanted, but Felipe wouldn’t have gone anywhere without Oliver, even if he physically could.
“I’m sorry for snapping at you, but please tell me what’s going on in your head, Oliver. I want to understand.”
Oliver’s grey gaze swept over Felipe and Gwen’s faces as he struggled to work the words free. “I’m— I’m from the murder town.”