I took out my switchblade, flicked the penlight part, and shone the beam on my face. "Does better lighting help?"
She went still. Then she backed to the light switch and turned it on. I put away the knife and flipped open my wallet. "Olivia Taylor-Jones."
"Taylor..." Her eyes widened. "You're..."
"Yeah, hence the demon-spawn jokes. Totally groundless. I'm working as an investigator for Gabriel Walsh."
Her head shot up, her eyes narrowing.
"You know his name, then."
"He's the son of a bitch who defended--"
"--some scumbag you think didn't deserve a defense. Yep, that's my boss. Which is not why I'm here. I was going to give you a story about how I was visiting the prison with him and heard some chatter about a guy killing teen prostitutes, but apparently we can cut through that bullshit. You thought I was fae."
"What?"
"Fae. Faeries. You thought--"
She forced a laugh. "A faery? Really?"
"Right, and that"--I pointed at the metal inset under the door--"isn't cold-forged iron. Nor is that flask. You just happen to be throwing water at strangers and seeing if they can cross an iron plate. I passed. I'm not fae. However, those girls who went missing are another story. It's also why you have the plate at the back room and not the front door. Because you don't want to keep them out."
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
I sighed and put away my wallet. "So much for cutting through the bullshit. Do you want me to keep pretending I'm investigating these missing girls on a whim?"
"I want you to get the hell out."
"Nope. Sorry. Can we lower the weapons, at least? Please? I suspect you're better at shooting a camera than a revolver."
"Want to test me?"
"I already did. You're holding it wrong, for one thing. You've had some basic training, but I'm pretty sure I'm"--I fired at a wall calendar, putting a bullet through today's square--"a better shot."
"Are you crazy?"
"I'm not the one testing for fae intruders. Maybe we can talk about that."
"Maybe I can tell you to get the hell out of my--"
"You already did. I declined. Now, I understand that this conversation is making you very nervous, but how about we go grab a coffee and talk."
"You're kidding, right?"
"Two girls are missing," I said. "They're dead. I'm sorry if you didn't know that, but they are. I'm trying to stop the guy who's doing it." I won't mention that it's your brother-in-law. "If you want to test my motives, go ahead, but I'd really rather do that over coffee. This"--I waved my gun--"is just awkward. And kind of rude."
"I..." She trailed off, looking rather like someone who has stepped into a fae realm herself.
"You can check my ID," I said. "But since it could be fake, just take out your phone and google me. You'll get plenty of pictures. Further research will reveal that I've officially solved four murders in the past six months. All were related to that." I pointed at the cold-iron inset. "Which we can talk about, or we can just pretend you know nothing about fae and proceed from there. But I'd really like to get to work finding a killer. So...coffee?"
"Twelve hours," she said.
"What?"
"Give me twelve hours to check out your story."
"You don't need--"
"Then we don't talk."
I started to reply when a board creaked overhead.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Aunika and I went still.
"What's up there?" I whispered.
"My apartment."
"And I'm guessing you don't have visitors tonight?"
"Just you." She started backing away, gun still raised, her attention on the ceiling as she tracked the steps. "Get out of here. I can lose them."
"Lose who?"
She didn't answer, just turned and ran, silently, into the next room. When I went after her, she said, "Damn it, girl. You really don't give up."
I lifted both my gun and switchblade. "Whatever this is, I can help."
She loped down the hall. Halfway to the end, she stopped and cocked her head. Then she eased open a closet door, prodded me inside, followed, and shut the door. I was still mid-step when the light went out, and I bashed into a wall. I clicked on my penlight.
"We're hiding in a closet?" I said.
Aunika waved me into the corner and pulled something on the floor. A panel opened.
"You have an escape hatch?" I whispered.
"Doesn't everyone?"
She reached inside, pulled out a flashlight, and started down. I crouched and shone my penlight to see a ladder. I started after her.
"You need to--" she began, then stopped as she saw I was already shutting the hatch behind me.
The ladder only went about six feet. When I stood, I could reach up and touch the ceiling. The dirt floor was damp, and I could smell the river and hear water trickling down a distant wall.
As I looked around, I said, "Shadowy mystery stalkers? Hidden escape hatches? Creepy subterranean tunnels? My mother tried to get me to take social work for my master's. I told her it was boring. I was so wrong."
Aunika snorted and set off, saying, "Keep your voice down."
"Because sound echoes. Radio silence, then."
"Don't strain yourself."
I looked around as we walked. It was indeed a subterranean tunnel. Like The Count of Monte Cristo, locked away in a dungeon, digging your way out with a rusty spoon, and creeping along the rat-infested warren of abandoned passages deep below the prison. At least this one didn't seem to have rats.
I ogled as we went, touching a rusted metal pipe, leaning into a dark side passage.
"This isn't a sightseeing tour," Aunika whispered back.
"Life is a sightseeing tour," I said. "By the way, do you know how old these tunnels are? They're definitely not part of the original city system for transporting goods to and from the railroad. For those, they had to put in a foot of concrete and run sump pumps to keep them dry." I touched a rivulet, running through a groove at least a half-inch deep, worn by decades of such rivulets. "They really skimped here. Tunnels built for nefarious purposes, I'm guessing. Or by government contract."
She shook her head and continued on. When she heard a beep, she looked back to see me getting out my phone.
"Taking pictures now?" she said.
I shook my head. "Calling my boyfriend."
"You need a guy to come rescue you?"
I waggled my gun. "I have that part covered, but given the situation, I'm going to let someone know where I am. I'm a feminist; I'm not an idiot. And...no cell service. Naturally."
A pipe clanged ahead. When I went still, Aunika looked at me and said, "Now what?"
"You didn't hear..."
Her expression told me I didn't need to finish that sentence. I started forward, only to catch the whisper of voices. When asked if she heard them, she screwed up her face.
"Shit, you really are crazy, aren't you?"
I was about to answer when another voice came, speaking a language I didn't recognize, but loud enough that there was no way Aunika wouldn't hear. A shadowy figure slid past ahead. When she didn't see that, I cursed under my breath.
"What now?" she said.
"Nothing. Just...ignore me."
"I'm trying to. Really, really trying to."
She resumed walking. I caught snatches of voices and saw more streaks of movement as a vision encroached on the world of the living. That was not a good omen. It meant I was teetering on the edge of a full-blown vision.
Not now. Please, not now.
I kept my eyes open, as I mentally recited Dickinson's "There Is Another Sky," but stopped short because, well, there was another place here, another world, and I was desperately trying to stay out of it. I switched to Dylan Thomas's "Do Not Go Gently into That Good Night," which seemed thematically appropriate. The voices faded, and I stayed firmly in these subterranean tunnels, my penlight beam shining on Aunika's back.
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"You doing okay?" she asked.
I nodded, and she peered at me, as if not quite convinced.
"I'm being quiet," I said. "It is a strain."
She shook her head. "The exit is just ahead. I'll go up first. Keep the light down and let me make sure it's clear."
We reached another ladder, this one wooden and not nearly as sturdy. As she pushed open the hatch, I moved to the bottom, partly to defend her but also to race up that ladder if she tried to lock me in. But she only went through the hatch and then shone her light around before motioning for me to follow.
We came out in a different building. The night wind whistled through holes in the stonework. That gave me pause. Every abandoned place I've been in lately has spelled fae trouble. But when I looked around, all I saw was a cavernous room with rotting crates and barrels and holes in the roof.
I got about five steps, following Aunika, when I heard the voice again, louder now, a man saying, "Put it over there," and another man, with a younger voice, replying in the other language, which I now recognized as Gaelic.
The first man snapped, "You're in America now. Speak American," and the young man said, "It is called English."
A smack, as if the older man had slapped him. "Don't be smart, you mug. You want to go downstairs, don't you?"
"Yes, sir. I would very much like to go downstairs."
The older man chortled. "I bet you would. Then do as you're told. Finish loading those barrels in the cart and haul them to the wharf. We've got about three hours of night left."
"But it is only midnight."
"And we've only paid the coppers to look the other way until three. Now dry up and move!"
Bottles clinked. Prohibition? The conversation and the slang suggested it, but why the hell would I be getting visions of Prohibition-era smugglers? When I see past events, they're fae memories, locked deep in my brain and poked by my environment.
"We go this way," Aunika whispered, pointing. "And then run across to the building next door. That should get us far enough--"
I cut her short with an impatient wave.
Her eyes narrowed. "I'm trying to..." She trailed off as she heard what I had--the sound of actual movement, like a footstep on old concrete.
I pinpointed where the noise came from and took a slow step in reverse. Then another. Backing toward the wall, because there was no place to run.
Aunika saw me and did the same, and when a man slid from the shadows, he had two guns pointed at his chest.
I looked at him and my brain shot out biker and cop. Yes, there's a world of difference between the two, yet there is an uncomfortable similarity, too. Paramilitary organizations, insular, male-dominated, an edge of machismo, devotion to the job...The guy had the military stance and the bold smirk, that preternatural sense of calm from a guy with two guns pointed at him. A man accustomed to having guns pointed at him. From which side of the law, though? A tattoo peeking from under a short sleeve looked military...
"Nicely done, girls," the man said. "But you do know you're surrounded, right?"
"Good," I said. "Have your friends step out and say hello."
The shadows stayed still and silent. Aunika snorted. I slid her a look, one that said not to be too certain he was bluffing. My gut told me he wasn't.
"So, little Aunika has a friend herself," the man said. "Or did you hire a bodyguard? If so, you have excellent taste, sweetie."
"Stop talking like you know me," she said. "Like I have the first damned clue what's going on here."
"Don't play the innocent for your friend. We've been in communication for a while, and you know exactly why I'm here."
"Stalking me and leaving cryptic messages is not communication. I have no damned idea what you people want, and I'm starting to think you have me mistaken for someone else."
"Aunika Madole. Daughter of Gwen and Grant Madole, both deceased. Sister of Lucy. Also deceased."
Aunika went still. "Does this have something to do with Lucy's murder? I've been trying to get a hold of Ciro for days."
There was a flash and a bang as some kind of strobe hit the floor. Aunika fell back, seeming to move in slow motion with the strobing light. I recovered fast, my gun never wavering, but the guy stumbled himself, as if equally caught off guard.
"Run!" I yelled to Aunika as she got her footing.
I went one way, she went the other. I dove behind barrels, expecting gunfire. The only noise that rang out, though, was footsteps. Two pairs, coming from opposite directions. I kept moving, doubled over, as fast as I could move. When I reached a broken window, I vaulted through it. As usual, my move was a bit less graceful than I might have hoped, but I made it out. Even managed to land without twisting my ankle.
A second building twenty feet away was the obvious choice, but I spotted a broken basement window on the building I'd just come out of. I waited until I heard a set of running footfalls. Then I pitched a chunk of brick toward the neighboring building. A man shouted, "She's next door."
I slid through the broken basement window, back into the building I'd left. A fine escape plan, except that I failed to check before going through. There was enough glass left in the frame to slice open my arm as I dropped. I fell, hissing, and crouched there, cradling my arm.
Shit, it was a good gash. Probably stitch-worthy. I tugged off my jacket and shirt. Backing into the shadows, I kept an ear open as I ripped my shirt and bound the gash. Then took out my phone. I had enough bars to make a call. I went to speed-dial Ricky...and my phone vibrated.
Gabriel didn't even wait for a hello. "Did you get a chance to speak to Ms. Madole?"
"Mmm, kind of."
"Good. Can you talk now?"
This wouldn't be the first time he just happened to call when I was in trouble. Gabriel has a sixth sense for trouble, and he would say it's honed from his years on the street, but I suspect there's a sprinkling of fairy dust in it, too.
"I'm in a...bit of a spot," I said.
He exhaled, as if in relief. Something had prompted him to phone. That relief, of course, only lasted a second, his voice tightening as he said, "Where are you?"
Not What's wrong? or Do you need help? Simply Where are you?
Tell me where you are, and I'll be there.
I eased farther into the room, watching the bars to be sure I still had cell service. Then I gave him a version so condensed that even Ricky would have been asking questions to sort it out. Gabriel only said, "Where are you precisely?"
The chime of his car door sounded. The Jag roared to life as he said, "Olivia?"
"An empty building to the left of the drop-in center. Maybe one or two down. I'm in the basement. Text me when you get close."
"Ten minutes."
"It's ten miles through the city."
"Ten minutes. I'll text you."
CHAPTER TWELVE
After I got off the phone, I planned to head back into the tunnels to wait until I could reasonably expect a text from Gabriel. But my room led to another just like it, which in turn led...nowhere. There appeared to have been a doorway, at one time, but it had been sealed off by a pile of wood and dirt and brick, as if the ceiling had collapsed.
I climbed onto the mound of debris. My injured arm protested, but it only took a few minutes to clear enough to squeeze through. I poked my penlight through, making sure I wasn't going to drop into a pit. I saw a room with a floor. Good enough. I wriggled through, touched down, and my foot slid, sending me falling backward, arms windmilling uselessly.
I dropped onto something both hard and soft and stinking of mold and mildew, and when I put my hands down, I recoiled as I touched...well, I wasn't sure what I'd touched, only that I didn't particularly want to do so again.
I peered down to see the side of a rusted metal bed, and a memory flashed, of the abandoned mental hospital, those rows of metal beds and the woman from my vision--my great-aunt--lying in one of those beds, her eyes gouged, tongue cut out, and the horror of that memory had me leaping
up. My foot slid again, and I went back down on the bed, my left hand gripping what I'd touched before--the moldering remains of a thin mattress. My right hand had landed on something hard and knobby. When I saw what I was holding, I yelped and scrambled, shoes sliding on the slimy muck of the floor, and I had to grip the side of the metal bed and propel myself up. Then I stood there and looked down at the bed--at the body in the bed, a skeleton covered in tatters of cloth.
I lifted my penlight and saw two other beds, two other skeletons. I shone my beam over the one I'd landed on. My fall had dislocated the hip bone, and the left leg now lay separate from the body. What I'd grabbed had been the arm, and when I'd jumped, I hadn't let go fast enough and I had pulled that away, too. The ulna and radius bones now hung from the side of the bed. I crouched and lowered my light for a better look, and sucked in breath when I saw why it dangled there.
Enough remnants of flesh remained to hold the forearm and hand bones together, and they hung suspended by manacles. When I shone my light over the other two bodies, I saw each had one hand in a rusted metal manacle.
Handcuffed to the beds.
The nearest body wore a tattered and grayed nightgown. The skull still had long dark hair. I was moving toward it when I tripped over something, and I shone the light down to see another corpse on the floor, also skeletonized, wearing enough clothing for me to suspect this one was male. I crouched beside it. He'd fallen facedown, hands outstretched over his head, as if--
"Well, go on, then," a voice said. "You've earned it, boy. Have your fun."
A door clanged and the body vanished. Beside me, something hissed, and I turned to see a dark-haired girl, no more than seventeen, wearing a thin shift. She sat on the edge of the bed with one hand cuffed to it. She leaned forward, her lips curled back as she hissed.
"Oh, enough with you," a man said as he walked in. He raised a metal baton. At the press of a button, it jolted to life, electricity flashing. The girl pulled her legs up into the bed, her arms wrapping around them as she stared at the man, her eyes black with hate.
Two girls sat on the other beds, both also dark-haired and dressed in shifts. They kept their gazes down, defiance gone, like dogs that have been whipped often enough to know it does no good.