“That may be,” I said, “but whether Jack the Ripper wrote it or not-”
“No, I mean it wasn’t a real portal device. It was a fake. That’s what Mr. Shanahan-Patrick’s father-always said.”
As he looked across our faces, he must have seen our confusion, and continued, “Geoffrey Shanahan was what you’d call an affable drunk. Normally, he barely said two words to me, but when he’d been drinking, he liked to talk, especially about his father’s collection. He’d take Pat and me in there and regale us with the stories behind the pieces, what they were supposed to do, who had exposed them as fakes-”
“Fakes?” I said.
“Of course.” Again, Tolliver looked at us, then Zoe. “You must know this, Zoe. You put some of those artifacts in that collection yourself.”
She shook her head. “Theodore Shanahan placed the order and I filled it. Half the time, I barely even knew what I was stealing.”
“Not surprising, I guess. He was an arrogant old bugger. Like most men who get their money from shady dealings. If you act like you’ve been born to it, no one questions where the money came from.”
“So it’s a collection of…fakes?” I glanced up at Clay, remembering the files we’d found in the house, where we’d thought he’d cleverly documented his artifacts as counterfeits. “Supernatural curiosities.”
Tolliver nodded. “All of them, including that letter.”
“So it supposedly did contain a portal,” I said. “One that was believed to be fake.”
“I don’t remember the exact story behind it, but Patrick will have it on file.”
“File’s gone,” Clay said.
Tolliver nodded, as if neither surprised nor indignant that we’d searched Shanahan’s house.
“Can you remember anything about it?” I asked.
He paused, then shook his head. “I’ll think on it some more, but that piece never interested me. Neither did Jack the Ripper in general.” A small laugh. “Even as a child, I think I was offended by the suggestion that a doctor might have been responsible. Patrick would know more. The letter was one of his favorite pieces.”
“Which brings us back to square one…” Clay said.
“Finding Patrick. I agree that the portal needs to be closed, and quickly. Even if I don’t know how much help Patrick can be, I’d be happy to help you locate him…if I could.”
“Why can’t you?” I said.
“Because, while Patrick and I were close as boys, we’ve barely seen one another since college. He only calls now and then to see whether I’ve come to my senses and taken up a more profitable branch of medicine…with profits he could help me invest. When he learns I haven’t…” Tolliver shrugged. “That’s the end of our contact until the annual Christmas card. I can try-”
Tolliver’s cell phone rang. He answered. As he listened, he closed his eyes, suddenly looking very tired. “Tell them I’m on my way,” he said, then hung up.
“There’s a small outbreak of intestinal upset at a nursing home I cover, and they’re worried it’s the cholera. More likely food spoilage from the heat, but I need to check it out immediately. As I said, I’ll think about the letter some more, and Patrick as well, and see what I can come up with.”
I took out a piece of paper, jotted down my number and gave it to him. He was out of the courtyard before I got to my feet.
Zoe made us promise to call and update her. In the meantime, she’d try to track down more on the story behind the letter.
The five of us went to dinner before the meeting with Matthew Hull. Jeremy had decided we’d go-that the potential reward outweighed the risk.
We found a sit-down restaurant and a quiet table. Easy enough now-in the wake of the cholera “epidemic,” they were all quiet. The city still hadn’t cleaned the water supply. They’d taken every step-multiple times-but the problem persisted. As long as the portal remained open, the cholera was here to stay.
While Jeremy and Antonio updated us on their dead-ended investigations, Clay kept casting anxious glances at me as I picked at my dinner.
When it was our turn and I asked Clay to tell them what we’d learned, he leaned my way.
“What’s wrong?” he murmured.
“Noth-”
“You’ve barely touched your meal.”
“It’s just the heat.”
“You look pale,” Jeremy said. “I thought it was the lighting, but-”
“It is. I’m fine.”
“You’re probably dehydrated,” Antonio said. “Finish your milk and we’ll order you another.”
I lifted my hands. “Enough. The pregnant woman is fine. Not terribly hungry tonight, that’s all.” I felt Clay’s gaze boring into me, and sighed. “Okay, maybe a little tired, but no more than everyone else, I’m sure. It’s been a very long day.”
Clay pushed back his chair and stood. “Come on. I’m taking you up to our room.”
“Before I finish my dinner?”
That gave him pause, but only for a second. “We’ll ask for takeout.”
I shook my head. “Yes, I am tired, probably from the heat, but the sooner we get this done, the sooner I can go home and really rest, in my own bed. Now sit down and bring everyone up to speed on what Randy Tolliver said.” I looked up at him. “Please.”
Sorcery
“SEE?” I SAID AS JEREMY LEFT OUR HOTEL ROOM. “DIAGNOSIS: just tired.”
“Exhausted,” Clay said as he handed me a bottle of water. “And dehydrated.”
I took the water and made a face. “Oh, that’s just Jeremy.”
“He’s right, though, about tonight. You need to rest, not run off again in a few minutes.”
“Notice how he tossed out that ‘suggestion,’ then bolted, leaving you to handle the fallout?” I shrugged off my shirt, which, despite a morning shower and liberal applications of deodorant, smelled faintly of body odor. “Can you hand me that one over there?”
“We haven’t even discussed it yet, and you’re already changing to go out. You need to rest, Elena.”
“And I will. Right after that portal is closed. If Hull is working with Shanahan, then this meeting might be-”
“The end of it? How many times have we said that in the last few days? Just steal the letter, and it’s done. Just kill the second zombie, and it’s done. Just follow the zombie back to Shanahan, and we’re done.” He wrapped his hand around my other forearm and faced me. “Forget the meeting. I’m pretty certain Hull has no intention of showing up. Even if he does, he found us today, so he can find us again. Right now, it’s this I’m worried about. You and the baby. You need-”
He jerked his left hand back, and blinked.
“What is it?”
“Your stomach. It-”
“Oh, please. Jeremy said I’m fine, so don’t go trying to convince me something’s wrong.”
His mouth set. “You think I’d do that? I was going to say I felt-” He stopped, anger falling away in a quick grin. “There. Give me your…”
He took my hand and put it on the side of my stomach.
“I don’t feel-” Something jabbed my hand. “Oh, my God. A kick! That’s a kick.”
“Or a punch,” Clay said, still grinning. “If it’s our baby, it’s probably a punch. Trying to fight his or her way out already.” He steered me across the room. “Here, look in the mirror. You can see it.”
After a minute of watching, a lump poked from the lower right of my belly, then disappeared.
“Can you feel it?” Clay said.
I nodded and realized that Jeremy was right. I had been feeling the baby moving for weeks now, though never this obvious. Even this didn’t feel so much like a kick as a stomach gurgle. I don’t know what I expected-I guess when someone says “kick,” I think of something hard enough to hurt.
A knock at the door. Clay leaned over to open it.