"Told who?"
"Some people I know. There's been a lot of talk in the local community-"
"You mean the vamp, uh, vampire community."
"That's the only one I hang with, these days. Some of them are saying that you're giving this guy, the killer, a free pass because he's hunting vamps. Your feelings about us aren't exactly a secret."
"Listen, I just told you-"
"I know you did." She placed her hand on my wrist for a moment, and I made myself not pull away. But her touch was cold, so cold. "And I said the same thin, myself."
"Thanks for the endorsement," I said. "And you're telling me about this because…"
"Because some of them are saying they should deal with this themselves. Find the killer themselves. And dispense justice themselves."
"That would be about the worst thing they could do, for a whole bunch of reasons. Vigilante is just another word for murderer, as far as the law's concerned."
"I know." It must be hard to sigh when you don't need to breathe, but she managed it. "I said that, too."
"And did they listen?"
"I think so. For now. But if these murders continue, with no arrest, people are going to start paying attention to the hotheads."
"I don't think Vollman would like that too much."
She didn't react to the name the way the vamp in Susie B's had, but I'm pretty sure I saw her back straighten a little.
"You know Mr Vollman?"
"He's helping us with the case. And, far as I know, he doesn't think I'm slacking off."
"I'll be sure to pass that along."
I noticed her shoulders were shaking slightly. "What?"
"You and Mr Vollman – working together. You must love that!" She sounded genuinely amused. I guess it was kind of funny, at that.
"Well, since you know so much already, you might as well know this: I don't think the killer's a Van Helsing."
"Really? What, then?"
"Some kind of wizard, looks like. He's got his hands on a copy of something called the Opus Mago, which is supposed to be the Holy Grail of grimoires."
"I think I sense an oxymoron in there someplace."
"You know what I mean."
"Yeah, I do. So this book is supposed to be highoctane evil."
"Exactly. And it looks like the two dead vamps, uh, vampires are the first couple of ingredients for some kind of spell he's working."
"Holy fuck."
"I think I sense some kind of oxymoron in there."
"Yeah, and fuck you, too," she said, but without any heat behind it. "Must be one hell of a conjuring he's got going – and that's not a fucking oxymoron."
"No," I said, as a ball of ice formed in my stomach – the same one that showed up every time I thought about what this wizard might have in mind. "No, it's not."
"Two dead, so far – and vampires, at that."
"Two, maybe three. I'll know that later today, probably."
"Maybe three." She nodded slowly. "What do you figure his magic number is, so to speak?"
"That's something Vollman is trying to find out," I said. "I hope he does it pretty damn soon."
I checked my watch. "Not to rush you, or anything, but the sun'll be up in-"
"Seventeen minutes. Plenty of time."
But she stood up anyway, stretching a little.
"Where are you crashing these days? Someplace close by?"
She turned to look at me. "I'll tell you that," she said, "the first time you invite me inside."
I nodded, letting nothing of what I was feeling show on my face. Or so I hoped.
I stood up, too. I wanted to put my arms around her and hold her close, just for a couple of seconds. Instead, I just nodded and said, "'Night, Christine."
"Goodnight, Daddy."
And she was gone.
Driving through downtown Wilkes-Barre, you'd never know the place had been practically underwater for several days, back in 1972. That's when Hurricane Agnes passed through the Wyoming Valley. Worst storm we've ever seen, and it sent the Susquehanna River over its banks and into the city. I was just a kid then, and Scranton wasn't affected by the flood, but I remember the TV and newspaper pictures of the huge mess it made.
One of the grisliest forms of damage occurred when the flood reached the local cemeteries. It washed some of the dead out of their graves and then deposited them all over town, once the water receded. Corpses, some long dead and others more recent, were found on people's lawns, in the middle of streets, just everywhere.
I understand the local ghoul community still talks about those days among themselves. They refer to it as the Great Smorgasbord.
Thinking about stuff like that helped keep my mind off the fact that we might have a third murder in this spell cycle, or whatever it was, with no real leads and no way to know how many more deaths had to occur before the shit really hit the fan. We didn't even know what form the shit would take.
But it was going to be some seriously bad shit, I was pretty sure of that.
The taxpayers of Wilkes-Barre must be pretty generous, because their police department is located in a nice new building that always made me a little envious whenever I visited – not that I'd ever admit that to Lacey. Anyway, there's a downside to working there. It is in Wilkes-Barre.
Even if I hadn't been in the building before, I wouldn't need to ask where to find Lacey. Along with the rest of her unit, she was in the basement. The Supe Squad is always in the basement.
Their P.A. was a young black woman named Sandra Gaffney, who was getting her PhD in Criminal Justice from Penn State. She took this gig to support herself while writing her dissertation. You can tell right off she's not a typical civil servant – not only is she intelligent, she's actually pleasant most of the time.
"Hey, Sandy," I said. "How's it going?"
She looked up from her computer and gave me a smile. "Hey yourself, Sergeant. You drop by to see how some real police work is done?"
"You got it," I said. "Detective Brennan said she'd give me some pointers. She's expecting me."
"I'll give her a buzz."
Sarah picked up her phone, punched in three numbers, and muttered something I couldn't hear into the receiver. I noticed that next to her computer she kept a small stuffed toy bear with a dirty face, who looked like he'd seen better days.
Hanging up the phone, Sandra said to me, "She'll be right out."
"Thanks. How's the research going?"
"Pretty good. This place gives me more data every damn day."
Detective Lacey Brennan came around the corner. A little taller than average. Blonde hair, worn short. Blue eyes. Killer body – not that I ever paid much attention.
"Guy walks into a bar," she said. "Orders a cocktail, sips it for a while. But it turns out that he's a werewolf, and while he's sitting there drinking, the full moon comes out. So the guy transforms, right? Fur, fangs, the whole nine yards. Then he trots over to the window and sits there, on the floor, howling at the moon. Well, there's a couple of tourists from East Podunk sitting a few stools away. They take all this in, you know, then one of them turns to the bartender and says, 'Fuck – we'll have what he's having!'"
Behind Lacey, Sandy justder and sak her head. I looked at Lacey, kept my face impassive, and asked, "Yeah? Then what happened?"
She gave me a knuckle punch on the arm. Being a real he-man, I didn't show how much it hurt.
"Come on," Lacey said. "The file's on my desk."
I followed her into the squad room, which looked in most ways like every other detectives' bull pen I've ever seen, except with fresh paint and newer carpeting.
Of course Supe Squads tend to have some features you don't find in, say, a Homicide unit. I passed a wall rack containing several sizes and varieties of wooden stakes, and next to that was a glass-fronted case full of magically charged amulets. A poster on the opposite wall listed the six known defenses against ogre attack. Then there was a big bulletin board full of wanted posters showing renegade vamps, bail-jumping werewolves, a child-killing troll, and one I recognized from our own squad room: an artist's rendering of a wimpy-looking dwarf with a severe widow's peak. His name was Keyser something-or-other, and he was supposed to be the kingpin of a shadowy gang of fairy-dust smugglers. Some crooked supes call him the devil incarnate, but others say he doesn't even exist.