Lake Silence

CHAPTER 10

Grimshaw

Sunsday, Juin 13

Detective Swinn gave Grimshaw a look that would have scorched paint. Then he turned that look on Julian before he walked out of the police station.

“He doesn’t like us,” Julian said.

Grimshaw blew out a breath. “He’s going to run a background check on you.”

“Someone usually does, sooner or later.”

And then that someone suggests that you move on?

“Why would the Sanguinati be interested in Vicki DeVine?” he asked.

“Might be as simple as she’s the person who has control of The Jumble,” Julian replied. “She arrived in Sproing last fall and started renovating the main house and some of the cabins with an eye to having things ready for the summer, when you’d expect people to want to rent a place for a weekend getaway or a lakeside vacation. As far as I know, this is the first time the Sanguinati have made contact with her.”

“If the vampires own as many buildings in this village as Ilya Sanguinati implied, then how did everyone pretend the Others kept their distance from the people who live here?”

Julian hesitated. “In another place where I lived for a while, I took a job as the land agent—the person who collected the rent and arranged for repairs and listened to complaints. It was a small community like this one, and the humans swore there had never been a sighting of any kind of terra indigene in their village, despite the fact that they lived around the Addirondak Mountains and, occasionally, when the ground was soft after a rain, they would find huge prints under a window—evidence that something stood on its hind legs to look into the second-story window. There was a man in that town who had a side business making plaster casts of those prints. People would hang them on the walls of their family rooms and show them to guests—and they still swore the Others didn’t prowl the streets at night, that some of the particularly gruesome deaths that occurred weren’t caused by a large, angry predator. Wayne, a lot of people stay sane by pretending the terra indigene are Out There and not the individual sitting next to you at the counter in the diner.”

“The only lodger currently at The Jumble is one of the Crowgard,” Grimshaw said.

“Vicki knows?”

“If she didn’t know before, she does now.”

“But the Crow is still there?”

“Still there.”

A hesitation. “The Crow she knows about may not be the only terra indigene living in one of the cabins or, at the very least, living on the land connected to The Jumble.”

The phone rang. As Grimshaw reached for the receiver, he said, “That did occur to me.” Then: “Sproing Police Station.”

“O-officer down. O-officer needs a-assistance.”

Gods. There weren’t any other cops in the area, except . . . “Where are you?”

“Th-The Jumble.”

“Can you hold your position?”

“Yes.”

“We’re on our way.” Grimshaw hung up and called the Bristol Police Station’s number. “This is Officer Grimshaw in Sproing. Tell Captain Hargreaves I’ve got a situation at The Jumble. Officer down and another officer requesting assistance. I’m heading there now. I need whoever you can send me.”

“Isn’t there a CIU team in the area? Can’t they supply backup?” the dispatcher asked.

“I think it’s the CIU team that got hit.”

A heartbeat of silence. “I’ll put out the call.”

Grimshaw hung up and looked at Julian. “You’re coming with me.”

“No.” Julian took a step back. “I’m not a cop anymore. I don’t have a gun.”

Grimshaw headed for the door. “You still have a gun. After what you went through, you wouldn’t leave yourself without a weapon. I need someone to back me up, Julian. Someone I can trust.”

He went out the door. He wasn’t an Intuit like Julian, but he had a feeling that the man he remembered—the man who had been a damn good cop—wouldn’t let him go into trouble alone.

“You can take the shotgun,” he said when Julian got into the passenger seat.

“Which one of them called?” Julian asked.

Grimshaw pulled out of the parking space and made a U-turn to head for The Jumble, lights flashing and siren screaming. “My guess? The baby cop. Before Swinn sent me on my way, I saw a kid with the team who didn’t look old enough to be in CIU. Barely looked old enough to have graduated from the academy.”

“Swinn is his commanding officer. Why didn’t the kid call him?”

“Maybe because Swinn is his commanding officer.” Grimshaw concentrated on driving for a minute. Then he pulled a business card out of his shirt pocket. “Call Ilya Sanguinati and warn him not to take Vicki DeVine home until we know what’s going on.”

Julian took the card and pulled out his mobile phone.

“Mr. Sanguinati?” Julian said when the vampire answered the call. “There’s some trouble at The Jumble. Officer Grimshaw is on his way there now. Could you . . . I see.” Pause. “Yes, I understand. I appreciate the information.” He ended the call. The hand holding the mobile phone flopped into his lap.

Grimshaw spared a glance at his friend, who looked unnaturally pale. “What?”

“Mr. Sanguinati is taking Vicki to Silence Lodge. He said the Elders aren’t happy with humans at the moment, but the police will be safe enough to retrieve the survivor as long as no weapons are drawn.”

He barely checked the reflex to slam on the brakes. “Elders? Gods, Julian.”

When people spoke of the Others, they thought of the vampires or the ones who could shift to animal forms like Wolves and Bears and, yes, Crows. But as threats to humans went, those kinds of terra indigene paled in comparison to the terra indigene that were known as the Elders and the Elementals. They had been the killing force that had swept across the continent of Thaisia last summer—across the whole damn world. Unlike the shifters and vampires, who might let a human live if the encounter was peaceful, the Elders weren’t that tolerant—a fact every police officer who did highway patrol recognized. Those men traveled the roads through the wild country every single day, and every day there was the chance that something watching from the verge would decide not to let the human driving the noisy metal box with the flashing lights live to reach his destination.

“He say anything else?”

“He said you should request an ambulance or whatever vehicle carries the dead when police answer a call. And you should bring some body bags.”

Grimshaw slowed as he made the turn onto the gravel road that led to The Jumble’s main house. He cut the siren but could hear other sirens in the distance, coming closer. Backup. Help. He hoped.

They saw the unmarked car where it had landed just off the gravel road. What was left of a car. Something had smashed the trunk and roof, punched in the doors, broken all the windows, and ripped off the front tires. Made sure the vehicle—and the people—couldn’t escape.

“Let me out here,” Julian said. “I’ll see what I can do for anyone inside the car.”

“You’ll be in the open. Exposed,” Grimshaw protested.

“I won’t be carrying a weapon, so I should be safe enough.”

The baby cop was still up ahead, so they had to split up in case anyone in the car was still alive.

“Watch your back,” he said.

Julian opened the door but hesitated. “I have the feeling we’ll be all right as long as everyone remains calm and professional.”

And if fear makes someone twitchy? Didn’t need, or want, an answer to that question.

Julian got out and Grimshaw continued up to the house. When he saw the young officer standing with his back to the house’s front door, he put the car in PARK, touched the medal under his shirt, and whispered his prayer to Mikhos. Then he stepped out of the car, using the door as a shield while he looked around.

Man on the ground within sight of the house, not moving. The baby cop didn’t look injured—at least he wasn’t bleeding anywhere—but could be in shock.

Grimshaw stepped away from the car, closed the door, and approached the survivor. “Officer?”

“O-Osgood, sir. David Osgood.”

“You hurt?”

“No, sir. I was . . . I was just . . .”

Grimshaw held up a hand. “We’ll get to that. Anyone else around?”

An abrupt, hysterical laugh, quickly cut off.

“Caw.”

“Caw.” “Caw.” “Caw.”

One question answered but not in the way he wanted.

“Stay there.” Not that he expected the kid to move while he approached the man on the ground.

He didn’t know when he stopped moving. He just gradually realized his feet had frozen in place once his brain understood what he was seeing.

The CIU officer lay facedown. Grimshaw clearly saw the back of the man’s sports jacket and the back of his head. He also saw the shoes that were pointing up.

Spinal injury. Gods above and below.

After that moment of shock, he approached the man to check for a pulse—and hoped he wouldn’t find one.

Satisfied that he wasn’t leaving an injured man, he returned to Osgood and led the young officer to his vehicle. Once inside the car with the doors locked—as if a locked door would provide any kind of safety—he called Captain Hargreaves to let him know backup wasn’t required but another CIU team would be needed to investigate the reason for the attack—or at least to take possession of the damaged vehicle.

He finished the call to Hargreaves and turned in his seat to look at Osgood. “Can you tell me what happened?” They would need to take a formal statement, and maybe he shouldn’t be the one asking questions now, but Swinn wasn’t here and he didn’t want anyone trying to convince Osgood to change his story.

“Detective Swinn and Detective Reynolds took Ms. DeVine to Sproing to answer some questions,” Osgood said. “But not before Ms. DeVine made it real clear that we weren’t allowed to snoop around inside her house or car or the cabins. And some of them heard her say it.”

Snoop. An interesting word for a cop to use. What it said to him was the baby cop had felt uneasy about Swinn’s orders.

“There was a girl with Ms. DeVine, a girl with black hair,” Osgood continued. “I think she was one of them.”

“She’s one of the Crowgard.” He studied Osgood. “They’re called terra indigene or earth natives or Others. Talking about us and them is part of what caused the trouble and got a lot of people killed in the past year.”

“Yes, sir.” Osgood said nothing for a minute. “Once Detective Swinn left, Detective Calhoun told me to stay out front while he and Detective Chesnik took a look around back. I was checking out the wooden chair near the front door. Nice chair. I was thinking my grandma would like one like that when there was a . . . well, a scream from around back. Baker told me to stay put and ran around to the back of the house. The three of them returned in a minute. Calhoun and Baker had Chesnik between them. There was a necktie tied around Chesnik’s leg, and his pants leg was soaked with blood. They yelled something about him being attacked and needing to get him to a hospital. So they put Chesnik in the back seat and Calhoun started driving down the gravel road.”

“What was Chesnik doing when he was attacked?”

“I didn’t see anything. I was out front.”

Good guess that the next CIU team to come calling would find someone had tampered with a lock but didn’t manage to get in.

“I heard the car crash into something,” Osgood said. “I thought maybe Calhoun had been driving too fast on the gravel and hit a tree or something, and I started down the road to see if I could help. But Baker must have heard something in the trees over there because he headed away from the house and drew his service weapon, and I wasn’t sure if I should stay and help him or go and help Calhoun. And then . . . then . . .”

“What did you see?” Grimshaw asked when Osgood stopped talking. “Officer! What did you see?”

“I didn’t see anything!” A note of hysteria. “One moment Baker was running away from the house and had his weapon drawn and the next . . .” Osgood swallowed convulsively. “Something grabbed him and twisted him like it was squeezing water out of a wet rag.”

Osgood scrabbled at the door. Grimshaw released the locks in time for the young man to bolt out of the car and stagger a few steps before he bent over and puked.

Grimshaw’s mobile phone rang. Keeping an eye on Osgood, he answered. “Grimshaw.”

“The driver is still alive but has severe head and neck injuries,” Julian said. “I don’t think he’ll make it, but the EMTs are here. So is the Sproing volunteer fire department. They said someone called them and the EMTs and told them to get over to The Jumble. My guess is it was one of the Sanguinati who were at the bank. The volunteers and EMTs are working to get the driver out of the car so the ambulance can take him to Bristol Hospital.”

The driver. That would be Calhoun. “Long drive for a seriously injured man.”

“Nothing closer. One of Sproing’s doctors is also here. He’ll do what he can to help the EMTs stabilize the patient, but he says the man needs more help than he and his office can provide.”

“And the other detective?” When Julian didn’t answer, Grimshaw’s voice sharpened. “Julian?”

“Something shredded his legs.”

“Elders?”

“Not for me to say.”

Yeah. Especially out in the open where you didn’t know who, or what, was listening.

“What about you?” Julian asked. “You find the baby cop?”

“He’s puking his guts out at the moment, but doesn’t appear to be physically injured. The other man, Detective Baker . . .”

“What about him?”

“He’s dead. Spinal injury.”

He heard Julian suck in a breath.

“I’ll walk up and meet you.”

He wanted to tell Julian to stay put, but he realized if Julian Farrow felt all right about coming farther into The Jumble’s land, they weren’t at risk—until someone did something stupid.