Chapter 7
I wasn’t going home. Not immediately, at least.
It probably would have been smart to head straight home as, by the time I walked out of Central Precinct, dusk was only an hour or so away and I wouldn’t be able to drive much longer—legally or in actuality. Years of magic had destroyed my night vision. But there were too many questions boiling in the back of my mind. I needed to talk to Death. He’d snatched that ghost right out from under me. If he’d given me five minutes, maybe I’d have more answers now—something to tell my client at the very least. Hopefully he’d have some idea what was going on, if I could get him to answer. Besides, it had been too long since he’d visited. I didn’t like feeling like my boyfriend was avoiding me.
The problem was, as always, how to contact him. He hadn’t visited me in over a week, and I had the feeling that after today’s brief disagreement about the ghost, he wasn’t going to drop in tonight. Which meant I needed to get a message to him. And I knew only one way to do that. I had to pay a visit to the Raver, the only collector whose haunt I knew.
The temperatures were quickly dropping with the drooping sun, and I set a brisk pace for my car, turning the heat up to high as soon as I cranked the engine. A charm worked into the air system and seats made the heat kick in and warm to a nice toasty temperature quickly, and I held my hands in front of the vent, letting the warmth flow over them. This car soaked up a sizable chunk of my income, but times like this made it totally worth it. That, and the fact it was fae-engineered without a trace of iron so it didn’t make me sick to sit inside it, of course. Always a plus to not be on the verge of passing out every time you crawl behind the wheel.
On the drive, I made the call I really didn’t want to make, but it was better if my client heard it from me than from the news. Telling someone her boyfriend was dead was news you should deliver in person, but there was only so much time before sunset and I couldn’t drive after dark. So it was the phone, or risk her hearing about it some other way, which would be even worse.
“Hi, Taylor. This is Alex Cra—”
“Did you find him?”
“I did, but, Taylor, it’s not good news.” I paused, unsure how to continue.
“What do you mean? He wasn’t with another girl. I know he wasn’t. Is he okay?”
“No,” I said, and then blew out the breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. “No, he’s not okay. You’re probably going to hear a lot of confusing stories about . . . about how Remy died. But, Taylor, I don’t want you to jump to any conclusions. No matter what you hear, remember that you knew who he really was.”
A jagged sob cut through the line, and I heard a loud clattering crash as she dropped the phone. I didn’t think she’d fainted because I could hear her crying on the other side, long, loud cries of pain ripping from her heart to her throat and out. I waited, keeping the line open but staying silent.
It took several minutes, but finally the screams and sobs coming from the other side quieted. A moment later, something scuffed along the microphone of the phone and Taylor returned.
“Ms. Craft, are you still there?” she asked, and at my affirmative said, “How did he . . . ? How did it happen?”
“The police are investigating. My personal belief is that whatever happened, started last night before he was supposed to pick you up. Magic of some sort was almost certainly involved. His body was at the First Bank of Nekros near the East Town Village shopping center.”
“Why would he be way out there? Magic? So not an accident. You’re still investigating, right?”
I wanted to say that looking into a murder wasn’t part of our contract, but that seemed too blunt, too heartless to say to someone who’d just received the news I’d given her. Instead I said, “It is an active police investigation now.”
“The police didn’t do squat when he was missing,” she yelled, and then it sounded like she slapped a hand over her mouth to try to reclaim the frustrated sentence. I heard her take a long, shaky breath before she continued. “Sorry. I didn’t . . . No, I did mean that. But I paid you for five hours of investigating already. Surely some are left?”
If I didn’t count the time I’d spent at Central Precinct—and I hadn’t planned to charge her for that time despite the fact that I’d only been there because of my work searching for Remy—I still had a couple of hours left. I’d planned to issue a refund for those remaining hours, but I could use them following up on the remaining trace from the tracking spell. I was fairly certain it was Remy’s soul, and I had the sinking feeling I’d find it in someone else’s body. That might answer some of the questions that had been cropping up since I’d spotted the first walking corpse yesterday, but it also sounded more dangerous than it was worth and would probably get me in further trouble with the police.
“I will look over what I have on the case and see if there are any leads I can follow for you,” I said, not committing to continuing but not dismissing the possibility. It wasn’t the answer she wanted, but it was the best I could offer right now. I’d weigh the options tonight but would probably turn the tracking charm over to the police and let them follow up on it.
I had Taylor promise she’d stay with family or friends tonight before wrapping up the conversation. I hung up as I pulled into a parking lot in front of a large, squat industrial-looking building. It looked like just another warehouse, but it wasn’t. The low, rhythmic pulse of a bass beat proved that this was exactly the building I was looking for.
A large man with bulging muscles and two full sleeves of magic-laced tattoos sat on a bar stool just inside the door of the building. His arms were crossed over his chest, his posture announcing that he was imposing, and going for a touch of menacing. Maybe it was just the fog in my eyesight in the dim entry, or the fact that the bar I usually frequented kept trolls as bouncers and this guy was small in comparison, but I just wasn’t impressed by his show.
I paid my cover and he let me pass with a disparaging look at my less-than-club-ready attire. I pulled open the second door and passed from the relative calm of the entryway into the chaos of sound and light of the club.
What was mostly bass outside the building became full-bodied synthetic electric music once I entered the club proper. Strobes flashed, black lights glowed, and fog machines filled the air with cloudy water vapor. It was early evening on a Saturday, and the club was already hopping, but not as packed as it would be later in the night. While it was loud, and the lights were disorienting, at least there wasn’t a crush of bodies to contend with.
I moved forward slowly, weaving between tables and trying not to trip over chairs, which appeared to all be gathered around the outskirts of the room and the back where the bar was situated, leaving the bulk of the large space open as a dance floor. I could make out several dark shapes moving on the dance floor, as well as a few who glowed fluorescent in the black lights. None were who I was looking for. When I finally spotted my target, it was obvious—she was the only person in this club I could see clearly. Mainly because I saw her with my mind more than my eyes.
She spotted me before I made it halfway across the dance floor, and she stopped undulating to the beat to glare daggers at me.
“Didn’t we discuss this club being off-limits to the likes of you?” the Raver asked, pressing her fists against hips clad in orange pants that glowed even brighter than normal under the black lights.
“I need to talk to him, but I don’t know how to reach him. You do.”
She huffed, cocking a hip. “He should be staying away. You’re nothing but trouble.”
Neither one of us had to clarify who “he” referred to. Death. Of course, that wasn’t his real name, or a name the Raver would recognize him by. I didn’t know his real name—or hers, for that matter—and as far as I’d observed, collectors didn’t use names at all. It could make things confusing, but we both knew there was only one person I’d track her down for.
“He’s my boyfriend.”
She rolled her eyes so hard her whole head moved with the action, making her long dreads twitch like snakes curling around her.