“Better days? Better weeks is more like it, wouldn’t you say?” he asked, crossing a leg and leaning back in his chair. It was the same black pinstripe zoot suit. But his tie was even more obnoxious than last time: light blue background with a dazzling array of multicolored butterflies, all with a metallic sheen.
“What’s with the garish tie?” I asked.
He grinned, the painfully white teeth lighting up against his deep tan. “That’s for me to know,” he said, “and for you, to find out.” He paused, leaned forward, tented his fingers. “I tell you, Ghost, I cannot for the life of me understand why you insist on doing things the hard way.”
“Maybe you could help me do things the easy way?”
“Oh, most certainly,” he said. “I already have, of course, many times.”
“I told you before: I don’t remember you.”
“Pity,” he said. “I certainly cannot imagine why you would wash away memories of someone like me. Doesn’t it trouble you at all? This isn’t the first time you’ve forgotten me, you know.”
“Actually, it does bother me,” I said.
“Such admirable honesty,” he said. “One thing I can count on from—”
“It bothers me because I don’t wash something from my memory unless it’s deeply disturbing, corrosive even. You know what else bothers me?”
“Pray, do tell.” He tugged gently at the brim of his fedora. Honestly, the man seemed to be made of jazz. Every movement was stylishly graceful.
I lowered my voice to a caustic whisper. “It bothers me that you know something about Smiling Jack that you aren’t telling me. It bothers me that you sit here wasting my time with your punk smug routine while innocent women are dying.”
“Are you not thankful for that dreadful tool of yours that I so generously returned?”
I blinked a glance down. The Edge was in the top left hand pocket of my cargo shorts. It was a great comfort. “Changes nothing,” I said.
He laughed jauntily. “Oh, yes,” he said. “Yes, it most certainly does change things. I have helped you twice now and asked nothing in return.”
I ground my teeth, tiring of his nonsense. “Your advice was lousy,” I muttered.
“What you mean to say is that your intuitive faculties were too limited to unravel my advice in a…timely manner.”
Sometimes the way forward is the way back. What kind of stupid, cryptic—then, it dawned on me. “Graziano,” I whispered. “Smiling Jack took them as children.”
“Ah, there now, you see?” Scratch said, “that was useful, was it not? My advice is always useful. Useful and rich, layer upon layer of meaning.”
Melanie appeared at the table. “My shift is over,” she said, gesturing to my mug. “Can I get you anything else before I go?”
“No, thank you,” I replied. “You more than earned your tip.”
“What about your friend?” she asked.
“Brilliant young woman,” Scratch said. “Here just a moment and yet, she intuits that we are indeed friends. Splendid.” His left hand sliced a velvet curve in the air and ducked beneath the table. When it returned, he had the gold pocket watch. “But I am afraid that I don’t have time for coffee. Thank you, dear, for the courtesy.”
Melanie blushed and left the table.
I watched closely as Scratch twirled the pocket watch once on its chain and then replaced it. “That’s an ugly scar on your wrist,” I said.
“What?” he snapped. And I saw again that lightning glimpse of pure hatred.
I decided to press him. “Your left wrist,” I said, nodding. “The scar. Looks like it must have been painful.”
He uncrossed his leg and leaned forward, the very first bit of motion from him that didn’t look like ultra-slick dance. His dark eyes smoldered, the irises tremoring slightly as if boiling in the whites. His glare was painful and searching, and I found myself holding my breath.
“Have you remembered…something?” he hissed.
I didn’t answer. The question didn’t make sense. I’d seen the scars on his wrists the first time we met. You didn’t forget that kind of thing. It didn’t seem like that could be what Scratch meant. I did my best to glare back.
Suddenly, like the switch of a light, his face melted back into smooth. “No,” he muttered. “I thought not. You know, Ghost, it’s a shame you had to get nasty. I could have given you a great deal of assistance tonight. A real shame.” He stood up and, in turn, pulled taut the cuffs of his shirt. He walked slowly past our table but stopped near my side. He whispered, “Another will die tonight because of you.”
Rage bubbling up inside, I spun out from my chair and took hold of his forearm. At least…I thought I had. With speed that shocked me and that easy fluidity, Scratch shook off my grasp and moved a step backward. He wore that sharkish grin when he said, “Perhaps, it was good for you to forget about me. Perhaps, I ought to forget about you, as well.”
“Wait,” I said, the rage draining. “Please, tell me what you know. Tell me something. How can I save her?”
He shook his head and made a tisking sound. “Too late for that, my dear Ghost,” he said, and his eyes flashed with that horrible malice. “I have borne your stupidity with graciousness. But no more. How dare you offer me such effrontery and then beg for help.”
“I’m not begging,” I said, the words gone before my thoughts could caution me against using them.
Scratch blinked. “To think I came prepared to bail you out…all manner of information to share. I even dressed for your benefit.”
It was my turn to blink. Dressed for my benefit? What kind of ridicu—the tie. Something about the tie. Butterflies?
“Hmph,” he said, the sound somehow thoughtful…calculating. “Perhaps, you aren’t as dull-witted as I feared. Good luck, my dear Ghost.” He turned his back on me and swayed toward the cafe door. He paused there and gave his head a half turn. “Just remember,” he said, his voice taking on a saw’s edge, “the next time we meet, things will be different. This is three times I have given you aid. Your side of the ledger is ruefully empty.”
He turned the corner. I went after him, but when I set foot outside the cafe, there wasn’t a zoot suit to be seen.
Chapter 29
“No, no, no!” I yelled at the cell phone, getting all kinds of concerned looks from the nice folks behind the cafe counter. Thanks to the new car charger I’d purchased at a local Radio Shack, the unit had power. But no battery in the world could force someone to answer. “Come on, Rez. I’m trying to keep you in the loop here.” I kept muttering, kept mashing the redial button, and kept getting Rez’s answering service.
But there was nothing for it. She wasn’t answering. Maybe her phone was dead. I couldn’t know. That left me with two options: contact someone else in the FBI or search it out on my own. No contest. If I called the FBI, I would waste precious time with red tape and run around as some junior agent tried to figure out who I was and whether I was credible or not, and, Oh-by-the-way, Mr. Spector, was it? Did you know you’re on a special list here at the FBI?
The bottom line was: even if I could somehow persuade them to use their computer muscle to find the place Mr. Scratch hinted at—a butterfly place?—the place where the killers might strike again, the FBI would never share that information with me. I’d be left in the dark while they scrambled black SUVs to come pick me up. Fact was, I needed the FBI’s help, but not at the risk of their interference. I hoped to save the remaining captive girls, but I had less constructive plans for Smiling Jack and his accomplice.
I pounded the computer keys, searching out: butterflies, Panama City Beach, butterfly farm, insect zoo, and everything else I could think of that might connect me with the link I needed. I skittered through a dozen unsuccessful results, modifying my search terms again and again. At last, I came up with a few viable options: exactly four.
Gulf Coast Insect Zoo, Bug Crazy Museum, The Butterfly Conservatory, and The Butterfly Refuge. The first two were close to Pa
nama City. The other two—much farther away—but closer to the original Fort Pickens crime scene.
Four.
Twenty minutes for the first two. An hour for the others. That’s enough time for the killers to get in, leave their victim, and get out. More than enough time for a young woman’s life blood to leak away.
If I drove.
I finished writing the directions to all four locations onto the back of a real estate flyer. I didn’t know how much more my body could take, but driving was out of the question. Time was not my friend. Even if I got lucky and found the killers at the first location, I could still be too late to save lives.
Besides, I don’t believe in luck.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
“We should have had this list YEARS AGO!” Deputy Director Barnes raged.
“Yes,” Rez replied, rolling her chair a few inches back, “yes, we should have. If we’d correctly identified the knife to begin with, maybe we would have gotten the list years ago. Maybe we would have saved lives.”
“Cain’s Dagger,” he muttered. “What a name for a thing.” He typed into the term field and pulled up a photo of the abortion tool from a surgical museum. Then, he brought up a weapon isolation shot from one of the Smiling Jack photos. Finally, he pulled up a third knife image: the turn of the century abdominal blade that FBI forensics had declared a match for Smiling Jack’s weapon. He brought all three images together, side-by-side. Then superimposed.
“Can you tell these things apart?” Barnes asked, rolling his chair away from the HD monitor.
Rez leaned in. “The woodgrain is a little lighter on the abdominal blade. But that could be from age or maintenance. Something looks a little different on the blade’s edge too, but…I’m not certain.”
“No wonder they missed the ID,” Rez said. “But a collector would know, especially a collector who is also a surgeon.”
“Unbelievable.” Barnes muttered a string of curses, this time, something about the unclean habits of alien life forms. “If this gets to the press—”
“Screw the press!” Rez shouted. She glanced through the command center’s windows and saw other agents popping up from their cubicles like prairie dogs. I may have just gotten myself fired, she thought. But she was already committed, so she said, “Really, Sir, with all due respect to you, we should be about saving lives, not saving face. When did the Bureau lose track of that—”
“I know when I did.”
“What?” Rez thought she’d misheard. At the same time, her cell buzzed in her suit coat pocket. Poor timing. She ignored it and said again, “What?”
“It was when I took this ridiculous promotion,” he said. “Deputy Director, hmph. I thought I could brace myself. Do the job without political trickle-down from the Director, but it’s like a slow-acting poison.”
“Sir?”
“I’m saying you’re right, Agent Rezvani,” Barnes said, leaning back, his eyes still combing the list of knife histories. “Never thought I’d see the day that a woman would grow a pair bigger than mine.”
Rez stifled a laugh. “Sir, that could be considered sexual harassment.”
“Stow it, Rezvani!” Barnes growled. “My Clara wouldn’t believe it for a second. Now, why are you still here?”
Rez bounced up out of her chair. “I…uh…?” She looked at him blankly.
“Scan this list,” Barnes commanded. “Get it out to every field office within fifty miles of these last-known addresses. These two in the U.K.…get on the horn to Scotland Yard. Ask for Chief Inspector Cornell, and tell him I’m calling in the chip he owes me. And, for Heaven’s sake, handle the Florida knife owner yourself.”
“But, Sir, the Director gave you orders to sideline me.”
“Whatever,” he replied curtly. “Maybe she’ll bust me back to Senior Agent. Might be where I belong.”
“Thank you, Sir!” Rez said, half-tempted to salute. She turned to leave, but he called her back.
“Not so fast,” he said.
“What?”
Barnes stood up and glowered at Rez. “Do not take this personally,” he said. “It’s for the good of the Bureau.”
Agent Rezvani looked up questioningly. “Uhm…”
Deputy Director Barnes’ face turned as red as a cut watermelon. His eyebrows beetled like knotted caterpillars, and the creases on his face deepened to fault lines. When his mouth opened, Rez felt like she’d been caught in the wash of a dragon’s breath. He unleashed a series of condemnations the likes of which Rez had never heard before or imagined.
He blasted her for her incompetence on every case she’d ever had the gall to work on. He questioned her work ethic, her drive, her personal code of conduct…and her ancestry. And mingled with all the caustic phrases were enough sonic expletives to wilt Holland.
Rez didn’t have to try hard to look browbeaten. She felt like she’d just been inducted into the Marines and been welcomed by a bunch of soldiers with tube socks full of soap bars.
The cell phone still buzzing off and on in her coat pocket, and still ignored, Rez trudged out of the room, her head bowed, shoulders drooping.
She was defeated…and triumphant.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Like I said, I don’t believe in luck. That probably explains why I don’t have any.
I struck out at Gulf Coast Insect Zoo and Bug Crazy Museum, the two local places. I’d wasted a total of seventeen minutes in the process, plus another forty for travel to Pensacola.
I stood outside The Butterfly Conservatory. It was a glassy building that stood between two thatches of swaying palms. The moon was behind clouds, and the nearest streetlight was at a skate park across the street, so there wasn’t a lot of light.
I trod up to the front entrance, a surprisingly modern-looking, brushed-silver pair of doors covered with surprisingly cheesy-looking butterfly stickers. I found no signs of forced entry, ran around back, and found nothing there either. I did, however find a couple of concave, bubble windows that gave me a pretty good look at the interior of the building.
Inside, there were dozens of tall glass cubes, presumably full of slumbering butterflies. Did butterflies sleep? I really didn’t know. A useless waste of thoughts. I stopped, leaned my forehead up against the off color glass and exhaled a hot breath. I had been ignoring the nagging pricks of reality since I’d left the Internet cafe.
I was painfully aware of how futile this hunt was. I didn’t know Mr. Scratch. Therefore, I couldn’t trust him. For all I knew, he could be Smiling Jack’s accomplice. Or, he might be something worse.
But even if Scratch was altruistic, accurate, and reliable…even if his information was spot-on, I was still fighting a losing battle. A young woman was going to die, and there wasn’t a solitary thing I could do about it.
The timing was the most vexing variable. Did Scratch offer me the hint because the killers were leaving a new victim tonight? If tonight, when exactly? The killers might be slaughtering a young woman right now and leave her at one of the insect zoos I’d already visited. It was equally possible that, the moment I depart the Butterfly Conservatory of Pensacola, the killers could emerge, leave the victim, and escape without any interference from me.
So be it. If traveling back-and-forth between the four locations all night long, gave me my best shot at catching the killers, then I would do just that…until I collapsed from utter exhaustion. I’d made a fool of myself for lesser things.
I had one stop left before I repeated the path: The Butterfly Refuge in Navarre. I’d have to—
The crawling, itching sensation that passed through the glass to my flesh was otherworldly and frightening. It traveled like a stinging electric current onto my fingertips, my forehead, and even up through the soles of my shoes. Any piece of me in contact with the physical surroundings, felt this intense, skittering surge.
I snapped away from the glass and flexed my still tingling fingers. But I still felt it. In fact, it was slowly increasing its voltage. Som
ething was drawing near.
It wasn’t a Shade. It wasn’t a Knightshade. Not even Forneus the Felriven had generated such a threatening aura. I found myself backing away from the building, my hand reflexively going to the Edge in my pocket.
I crossed the alley, clambered up onto a dumpster, and used it to get to the roof of the thrift store next to the conservatory. Then, I ducked down next to a whirring air intake and waited. The crawling electric current continued up through the roof’s gravel, the metal of the intake, and now even the air around me. It intensified yet again and made my teeth feel strange.
I really didn’t want to stay. Every impulse told me to get far away as fast as I could. But if what I felt was Smiling Jack arriving, it was a game-changer. I had to see. I had to know just what I was up against…because it wasn’t human.
My heart stroking a deep staccato, I watched the other end of the alley. My eyes had adjusted to the low, moonless light, and I could see a few crates piled against the far corner of the Conservatory. A recycling dumpster jutted out from the base of the thrift shop.
At the opening of the alley, a thin road ambled by, and across the road, a line of palms stood sentry. What I saw in the air above the road, left me breathless. A kind of darkling mist appeared there, maybe nine or ten feet above the road, and rapidly thickened to a writhing inky wound. A viscous dark fluid, like black blood, spilled out of it. It reached the surface of the road and began to pool. Irregular shadows rose up from the growing puddle. Slowly, like a vortex of wood smoke, the shadows coalesced into a tall figure. Its edges were still indistinct, and the shadows seemed to whirl around it like a cloak. The streetlight at the far end of the alley flickered and blinked out.
The headlight of a passing truck vanished as it went by the alley. The charge traveling up from the rooftop doubled. It was all I could do to stay still and silent.
When the figure, cloaked in murk, strode forward into the alley, I panicked. I rolled backward as if I’d been struck, scrambled to my feet, and sprinted across the rooftop. This was not Smiling Jack. This was something I had heard whispers about long ago, something that supposedly had gone out of the world. It was something I could not hope to face and win. I reached the far end of the roof and dove.