I worried it in my brain, but was too exhausted from pushing back against the Grey all night to get an answer. I shook it off for now and headed home. I felt better as the distance increased between me and Pioneer Square.
It was almost one in the morning when I parked in a space under my building. I was tired, distracted by thoughts of Alice, and not paying attention. If I had been, I might have spotted the son of a bitch when he first stepped out of the shadows by the laundry room door.
Chapter 22
Clouds and mist played around the edges of vision and I was too tired to push it back. A solid shape reached for me under the silver mist-world and I coiled back, skipping behind the nearest car. "What in hell's little half acre do you want?" I demanded, trying to shake off the obscuring haze of Grey.
He was clean-cut, bulked buff, and dressed neatly—hardly the usual mugger. "Just you. You won't stay dead long enough."
He sprang forward, snake-quick for a guy with such bulky muscles. I turned to the side and backed up, giving him a kick in the seat as he brushed past. My high heels wobbled.
He turned, whipping out an arm to grab me. I hopped backward and slid onto the truck hood, putting distance between us.
He looked annoyed. Reached into his jacket pocket. "I'm not going to hurt you. A lot." He drew out a knife.
Bigger, faster, and stronger than me. And holding a knife like he knew it well. I didn't like those odds. I dropped onto the other side of the Rover. He started around the rear. He passed into the blind spot and I dug under the back of my jacket.
He cleared the end of the truck. I pointed the business end of the gun at his face. "Back off." I squeezed. The HK's cocking lever made a click that cracked the cold air like a hammer on thin ice.
He gaffed a chuckle that went right through me. "You're not going to shoot me." He lunged, tucking down.
I lowered aim, squeezed the trigger, twisted away.
The bullet gouged a chunk out of his shoulder. I stepped down hard and felt my heel break off as my ears shut down from the roar of the gun.
He staggered, but kept his feet and came after me, grimacing evil glee as he swung the blade.
I lurched sideways, stumbled, fell flat on my back. My skirt ripped, fouling the blade in a cloud of fabric. I tilted the pistol. Squeezed. Felt it buck, heard the underwater roar of the shot in my already ringing ears.
He swayed back, but didn't fall. Black blood dripped down the front of his jacket. He glared at me and bared a mouthful of shark's teeth.
I swallowed hard. "Oh…"
"Hey! What's going on down there? Was that a gunshot?" The voice sounded distant and tinny to me.
The uncanny man stared up toward Rick and his dog, emerging on the upper landing. He shot a look back at me and the gun, then whirled and bolted into the darkness outside.
I slumped against the Rover, letting out a gust of breath. I was thoroughly shaken, and too watery to stand up.
"Yes, Rick!" I yelled back, feeling woozy.
"Harper?" A moment later, they popped out of the foyer door, the dog in the lead and Rick dragged behind. "Harper, are you OK?"
"I'm fine, Rick," I said, shoving the dog back. My head was throbbing and sounds were muffled by a high-pitched whine in my ears.
"What happened?"
"Huh? Just a mugger. And I want to get upstairs and go to bed."
"We should call the cops."
"What? Why? He's gone." I doubted they had a mug book of the undead, and though I didn't know what he was, normal lie was not.
"You don't want me to call the cops? You're sure?"
"Yeah," I said, nodding. "I'll deal with it." I hoped.
Rick preceded me upstairs. The dog wagged like a puppy all the way, grinning a pit-bull grin of satisfaction with the commotion. He, at least, was having a great time.
I woke up in the morning sore and tired. My pumps and skirt were trashed and I had a long, deep scratch on my thigh, but my ears had stopped ringing.
While I waited for the coffee to dribble through the filter in the coffeemaker, I paged Quinton and left my office number. Then I poured the coffee into a travel mug, packed up and headed out.
I walked into my office to the sound of the ringing phone. It was Quinton.
"Hi," I said. "Something was wrong with the office alarm yesterday. Can you come by and take a look?"
"What kind of problem did you have?" he asked.
I described the alarm's nonfunction during Sergeyev's visit. I had to eliminate the plausible first, before I could go leaping to the impossible.
"That's strange. I'll be up in about half an hour. OK?"
"Great," I said and hung up.
I checked my messages and discovered one from Mara Danziger.
"Hmm, Harper, the problem with magic is getting worse. I'd be grateful for your help. Give me a ring."
Curious, I called her back.
"Hello."
"Hi, Mara, it's Harper."
"Harper, I'm worried. The blockage is worsening. To be shocking honest, Ben's no help with this, nor Albert. I simply must be finding the source. And all divinations keep coming back to you." "Still?" "Yes. Have you any idea why this is happening? Could it be Cameron?"
"I don't think so. But I've been mixing with vampires and there've been a few weird things hanging around."
"I told you they would—"
A knock on the door came a moment ahead of Quinton's face peeking around the doorframe. I waved him in and leaned back in my chair. "Mara, I have to deal with something here, but I have to go out to the Madison Forrest House later and look at a piece of furniture. There's something a little strange about the situation surrounding this thing." I paused, thinking, then sat forward. "Would you be willing to come with me to Madison Forrest? We could discuss this other situation then, too."
"Well… I suppose so. I'll have Ben look after the baby for a bit. Then, what say I pick you up?"
"That'll be fine, Mara. Come by in about an hour. OK?"
"All right. Be seeing you, then."
Quinton had already begun poking around with his Multimeter. As soon as I was off the phone, he asked me to move and ran a check of the computer program. He looked at the video capture that should have shown Sergeyev, but didn't.
"I'm not sure why this guy didn't show up, but there's nothing wrong with this system and the diagnostic says there never was," he said, frowning at the computer screen. "You sure he was here?"
"Oh, yeah."
"It's a head scratcher, but the system's working fine now."
"OK."
"Keep an eye on it, and let me know if it does this again. You might try it on that client of yours, because I'm not really sure what effect some people have on electronics."
I wondered how he knew about Sergeyev. Had I mentioned him? "I'm not following you. Which client?"
"The one with the Camaro. The vampire."
"Excuse me?" I choked.
"Don't expect me to believe that you didn't know," Quinton said.
"Took me a while to be sure, but you've been in much closer contact with the guy."
"Why would you think Cameron was a vampire?"
"Lots of little signs. The weird eyes, the dirt in the trunk, the weird habits. The fangs. I've seen plenty of them around here. I steer clear of those guys. Even if they like you, you can't really trust them. 'Course, you can't trust most people. But drinking blood and turning on your fellow man is a bit worse than the usual sort of trust-breaker."
I blinked at him. He finished speaking and looked at me in silence a moment. Then he asked, "You do a lot of work for vampires?"