“This is personal,” I said. The dead girls were tied to me now and their deaths, this fire, all of it was meant as some kind of message…for me.
“Has been since the beginning,” she replied. “There’s nothing more personal than killing someone.”
Unless it was violating them by stealing a patch of their skin, a piece of who they had been in life. I bit the inside of my cheek, reminded myself Zery didn’t know this piece of information.
“I want to help,” I said.
Zery raised a brow, then turned and walked back to the fire.
Hating every step, I followed her like a puppy. If I was going to find the killer, I needed to know more about the girls who had been killed. To do that I needed access to the Amazons who knew them. I needed access to the safe camp.
I was on her heels when she turned. “Why? You don’t even want us here. Why say you want to help now?” She waved at the smoldering mess. “Because of this? Why would this change your mind? Make you want to come back to the tribe?”
“I didn’t say I wanted back in.”
She grunted and shook her head, then ignored me again to start shouting orders to her warriors.
I grabbed her by the arm-a bold, probably stupid move. She froze and stared down at my hand.
I didn’t let go. “You made it clear the Amazons want me to be the killer. Wanted you to bring me back for trial. I have twenty Amazons living in my gymnasium practicing with broadswords. And now, I wake to a bonfire in my front yard-a bonfire it looks like the killer set. Why wouldn’t I want to help? It’s the only way I’ll get rid of all of you, and get my life back. Besides…” I dropped my hold on her arm, but she stayed put, twisted her mouth to the side.
I breathed in, then continued. “I’m not a monster. I don’t want any more girls killed either. And I can help. You know I can. I’m the only Amazon who really understands the human world and Madison, who has lived here.”
“That’s not important. We won’t let humans get in our way,” she replied.
“Do you want to endanger the whole tribe? There are laws, Zery. The police are already involved. A detective came here. He showed me pictures of the girls’ telios tattoos, wanted to know if I could identify them. You don’t know how to talk with the police, but I can. I can get information for you.” It was a big promise and not one I was sure I could deliver on, but I was desperate.
I’d interested her; I could see it on her face. “You think he’d talk to you?”
I nodded. “But I need something from you first. I need safe passage to the tribe’s camp, need to know more about the girls.”
Without warning, she grabbed my hand and squeezed. “Why ask for passage now? You didn’t the other night.”
My breath caught in my throat. The totems; they’d found them and sensed me.
She leaned closer, whispered in my ear. “I didn’t want to believe Alcippe when she said you delivered those totems, but it was you, wasn’t it?”
I licked my lips. Across the dampened fire, Mother and Bubbe watched us. I didn’t trust that Bubbe couldn’t hear every word.
Zery let go of my hand. I squeezed my fingers in and out of a fist, forced the blood back into the digits.
She stepped to the side, blocking my view of my family-and their view of our conversation. “How’d you get them?”
It was my chance to share, to lighten my load, but as I looked at her, the smoke from the now-dead fire still hanging in the air behind her, I realized I couldn’t. At some point I was going to have to open up to someone, tell them what had happened, but I wasn’t ready yet-not until I understood why the killer had brought the girls to me.
I realized some part of me wondered if something I had done had cost the girls their lives. The killer hadn’t picked me at random. I needed to know more, do more, then I’d share.
I blew out a breath and stared my old friend in the eyes, prayed some of our lifelong bond still existed. “I didn’t kill those girls and I don’t know who did, but I want to find out-just as much as you do, more than you do.”
There was doubt in Zery’s eyes, indecision. I clasped her hand in mine. “Let me help.”
The expression on her face was serious, deadly serious. I thought she was going to say no.
Instead, I got, “I’m sorry for the loss of your son. I never said that before, and I’m sorry for that too.”
Damn her. My eyes began to leak. Tears hung on my lower lashes, threatening to fall.
She squeezed my hand, then dropped it and took a step back. “I’ll let Alcippe know you’re coming. You’ll have to deal with her. She doesn’t trust you, and she won’t like you being there.”
Alcippe, the high priestess who killed my son. The feeling was mutual.
Chapter Ten
I went to bed antsy and woke up feeling pretty much the same.
Sunday was my usual day off, when I took one. Today, Janet was scheduled to be in and in charge-making it a perfect time to head south to the safe camp. Unfortunately, in the early hours of the morning she’d left a message on voice mail saying she was sick. I alternated Sunday management between her and Cheryl. But Cheryl had her kids every other weekend, and this weekend was special. She’d taken them to the Dells, a city just north of Madison filled with water parks.
I wasn’t ready to ditch my plans, though. After pressing the 3 on my phone to delete Janet’s message, I scribbled out a short note and taped it to Mother’s door. She wouldn’t like being tied to the shop instead of being free to play Amazon warrior, but she’d do it. I just had to be out of the building before she got back upstairs from her morning workout.
One good thing…Harmony was still at her friend’s and probably would be most of the day. I had purposely not given her a “must be home by” time. I figured I wouldn’t see her until dark.
My business and home life were covered for today, but I was going to have to find some regularly scheduled activity to occupy my daughter soon. With the killer free and targeting Amazons-even if she didn’t know she was an Amazon herself-I couldn’t do the normal suburban thing and tell her to hang at the mall. I needed to know someone was watching her, would let me know if anyone approached her. And I couldn’t continually send her to someone else’s house. It broke the unspoken code of playdate etiquette that still applied, even though her playdate days were long behind us both.
I needed my girl watched, safe and away from warring Amazons. Something I’d have to work on when I got back from today’s jaunt.
I walked out the front door at nine fifteen. The black mark the fire had left on my lawn was impossible to miss-as was the over-six-foot-tall male standing beside it.
With a sigh, I walked down the incline, curious as to what brought Peter here so early, but more occupied with rehearsing my feeble cover lie for the burnt disaster that was my front yard.
He was rooting around in the ashes with the toe of his boot when I arrived. I’d made sure to remove all signs of the totem animals last night before deserting the site for my bed.
“Bonfire? Are those allowed in Madison?” he asked.
I brushed hair from my face. “I don’t know, and luckily no one showed up from the city to tell me.” Luck had nothing to do with it. Bubbe had cast a spell, similar to the ones used to keep safe camps secret, over the space. It had been a quick and dirty piece of magic, but I guessed it had done the job. At least no police or neighbors had called to complain. Obviously, it hadn’t been strong enough to keep Peter from noticing the mess, though.
“The new tenants got a little carried away.” I picked up a piece of charred wood and tossed it in the air. Soot rubbed off on my palm. With a frown, I dropped the wood and rubbed my hand on my jeans.
“Weenie roast gone wrong?”