Unfallen Dead

CHAPTER 13

The only thing more surprising than getting an appointment with Keeva macNeve on short notice was getting an appointment that did not require me to get up before noon. I wasn’t a morning person, and I didn’t apologize for it. Keeva, on the other hand, played the corporate game and was at her desk before most people got out of bed. She liked rules. That didn’t mean she always followed them. She’s more subtle about getting around them. Me, I break them if they’re in the way.

As I crossed the central lobby, the line for help looked like it hadn’t moved since the day of the hearing. But that was cynical. The line had moved at least twenty feet.

In the two years since my accident with Bergen Vize, I had regained minor essence abilities. For most of that time, I’d moped and whined about not being a top Guild investigator. I was over that part. I couldn’t go back. Not with Keeva in charge of my old department. I was bitter and angry with the way the Guild booted me out and kept me out. That part I wasn’t over. If I knew myself as well as I thought I did, I never would be.

A surprisingly long line led to the appointment desk. The elf receptionist had managed to personalize her security uniform by adding a bright yellow scarf. She probably wouldn’t get away with it for long. While I didn’t care for the style, I had to give her points for simultaneously matching her eye shadow and sticking it to the Man.

A motley group going to the hearing waited at the elevators. A surprising number of solitary fey mixed in with fairies and elves. Solitaries usually avoided the Guild. Even though a bunch of them had tried to kill me, I felt bad about the number of bruises and bandages I saw. Like everyone else, they had been provoked by a spell to do what they did. Most people aren’t at their best when they’re on a murderous rampage.

When the elevator arrived, a brownie security guard waited inside again. Before anyone else could board, four brownie security guards hustled me into the elevator and the doors closed. One of the guards grabbed my arm. “Connor Grey, you are ordered held for questioning.”

Despite my inclination to clock the guy, I simply pulled my arm away. I hate being manhandled. The four brownies positioned themselves around me.

“Ceridwen can’t just grab anyone she pleases,” I said.

The lead brownie glanced at me and away.

“What am I being held for?” I asked.

They stared straight ahead. Even the lead guy didn’t bother looking at me. “You are on Guild property and are being detained for questioning.”

I glared at him. “That’s not what I asked.”

The elevator doors opened. The lead brownie waved off someone trying to board.

“I’m not putting up with this.” I pushed forward. The two brownies behind me grabbed my arms. The doors closed.

“Fine. You’re just making this worse. I’m going to sue Ceridwen for unlawful detention, and I’m going to name all of you.” They did a good job of being unimpressed. Whatever Ceridwen was up to, she wasn’t going to get any cooperation from me if she thought this was the way to get what she wanted. Especially after her little game in the hotel.

The elevator opened on a quiet lower floor. The brownies escorted me down an empty corridor. The Guildhouse had entire unused sections. The lead brownie opened a door and stuck his head inside. He motioned for me to enter. I pushed open the door. The small, spartan conference room held a table with four chairs around it. Two of them were occupied. On one sat the brownie I had left in the basement storeroom. On another, Meryl sat with her face in a cool, neutral pose. She folded her hands on the tabletop. “Have a seat, Mr. Grey.”

I dropped in the seat and crossed my arms. “Very funny,” I said.

Meryl looked at the brownie. “Did I say something funny? I don’t think I said something funny.” The brownie had a hangdog expression.

Meryl turned back to me. “Let me introduce you, Grey. This is Tobbin Korrel. Tobbin has been a security guard at the Guildhouse for three years. He has an excellent employment record and is well liked by his coworkers. Not two weeks ago he managed to prevent a mentally ill selkie from drowning a receptionist in the lobby without anyone getting hurt. He has a wife and three kids. He gets up every day, comes to work, goes home, pays his bills, and maybe occasionally takes the family out for ice cream. When he is asked to do something at work, despite whatever utter stupidity it may involve from his superiors, he complies as long as he isn’t asked to do something illegal. In short, Grey, he’s a nice guy who does his job. What do you have to say to that?”

I frowned at her. “Hi, Tobbin.”

She arched an eyebrow at me. “Is that really all you have to say to Mr. Korrel?”

I sighed impatiently. “Look, I’m sorry, Korrel. I have a problem with rules that make no sense, in this place in particular. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.” I glared at Meryl. “Satisfied?”

She pursed her lips. “That covers your behavior in the elevator. There’s the little matter of the storeroom.”

I closed my eyes for a moment, trying not to be angry. “I’m sorry I trapped you in the storeroom.”

“And?” said Meryl.

I couldn’t think of anything else I had done. “And what?”

“And if there’s anything you can do for Mr. Korrel to make up for it, you will be glad to, right?”

I gave in. “Yes. I really am sorry, Mr. Korrel. I was a jerk. Call me anytime.”

Meryl slid paper and pen toward me. “Now give him your number.”

My face felt hot as I wrote it down. Meryl intercepted the paper as I handed it to Korrel. “It’s the right phone number, Meryl.”

She smiled as she passed it to the brownie. “Just checking. Is that satisfactory, Tobs?”

He nodded. “Really, this wasn’t necessary.”

Meryl tapped his arm. “You have no idea how necessary this was. I apologize for wasting your break time.”

“Thank you.” He nodded with a nervous smile and left.

Meryl and I stared at each other. I counted to ten before I trusted myself to speak. “That was a nasty thing to do.”

Her blank expression vanished behind an angry frown. “How’s it feel?”

I stood, the chair skittering back a little more dramatically than I intended. “I got your point. I’m not a child, Meryl.”

She shrugged, indifferent to my anger. “You think? Then don’t act like one. Here’s the thing, Grey. You knew I wouldn’t leave you in that storeroom. You knew I’d be right back. He didn’t. He also knew those rooms are warded, and no one would hear him. He had to take a sick day to recover from the boggart mania. I have no sympathy for you right now.”

I bit back what I was going to snap at her. I hadn’t considered that. I sat again. “Okay, now I really feel like crap.”

She compressed her lips. “Good. Karma’s a bitch.”

I rubbed my fingertips across my scalp. “Okay, okay, I hear you.”

She lifted a huge black pocketbook onto her shoulder. “Good.”

As she came around the table, I took her arm as gently as possible. “Will you have drinks with me later?”

She checked her watch. “We both have meetings. Call me, and I’ll let you know if I’m free.”

I smiled. “It’s a date.”

She rolled her eyes. “Here we go with that again. I’ll call you.”

She outpaced me down the hall. When I reached the elevator lobby, the stairwell door was closing. I didn’t know what to think. First we have sex. Then we have a disciplinary meeting. If that was Meryl’s idea of hot, I sure as hell was baffled.

I took the elevator without further incident to the Community Liaison Department. The user-friendly name implied it was some kind of fey boosterism group. In reality, it’s a crime unit, pure and simple. It used to be the center of my world, but not anymore. I could probably get a research position with the unit. In fact, Keeva macNeve had even offered me one. I turned it down. I didn’t want to define myself by my job anymore. Not after I realized that it could all be taken away without any say from me. Besides, with Keeva in charge, I’d go insane answering to her.

The department buzzed with activity. A few people acknowledged me, but no one made the step of engaging in conversation. When I worked there, I tended to socialize only with other high-level agents, the ones who had the option of not being nailed to their desks. It was an elitist division that I had no problem with. Of course, the payback is that people I considered underlings no longer have to give me the time of day.

The Guildhouse had dampening wards everywhere to keep the ambient essence levels down. The side effect was that you couldn’t always sense who was coming your way. Dylan didn’t realize I was standing at the door, watching him work. He had been moved into an office that last I knew was being used as a storeroom. The storage boxes were cleared out, and the original office furniture was rearranged so the desk angled in the corner, facing both the window and the door. I knocked.

He looked up as though rising from a deep pool of concentration. When his gaze reached me, he smiled broadly and started to stand. “Hey! I didn’t know you were here today.”

I waved him back down. “I just stopped by to say hello.”

He gestured at a guest chair. “Sit. Sit.”

The chair was not as comfortable as I thought it would be. Dylan rocked back in an oxblood leather chair that coordinated perfectly with the expensive mahogany credenza behind him. “What are you up to?”

“I stopped by to ask Keeva some questions about a case.”

He gave me curious look. “I didn’t know you were working together.”

I shook my head. “It’s an old case that’s related to the thing I’m working on with the Boston P.D. You look like you’ve settled in.”

“They gave me a great space. Check out the view.”

I didn’t need to look out the window. “I like how you can see the fairy hill on Boston Common and the dome of the statehouse at the same time, sort of a metaphor of the city.”

Dylan started to say something, but stopped as sudden realization came over his face. “Danu’s blood, this is your old office.”

I laughed. “Yeah. How do you like the chair?”

Grinning, he swiveled in it. “I should have known. Extremely comfortable and expensive.”

I nodded. “I tried to take it with me when I left, but they wouldn’t let me. It’s probably for the best. I would have sold it by now to pay bills.”

I glanced down. Dylan had several open files and a number of photographs scattered about the desk. “Are these the missing museum pieces?”

He picked up a stack of photos. “I’m trying to figure out why these particular pieces were taken.”

He pushed a photo toward me, a shot of a torc. The one Belgor had given me. The one hidden in my kitchen cabinet. I hate lying to Dylan, especially when he knows I’m doing it. He knew something was up at Belgor’s. I didn’t want to linger on the topic. “That’s pretty.”

Dylan nodded. “Expensive. Probably from an old Irish king.”

He examined another photograph. “This one’s odd. It’s a Saxon ring. It was in the Celtic collection because an old fairy donated it.”

He handed it to me. The gold ring was a classic design of the ouroboros, a scaled snake biting its own tail. The snake eyes were set with small rubies. It was as nice as Belgor said it was.

The remaining photos were of three fibulae, antique brooches for holding clothing together: a horned serpent in gold, a tree made of silver with tiny gold apples, and another gold one that looked like mistletoe. “The fibulae all have druidic symbols. That could be a connection.”

Dylan nodded. “Arguably, it’s all druidic. I think the motive is most likely profit. Boston’s Samhain draws a lot of people, so the market’s here.”

I slid the fibulae photos to the bottom of the stack. “Which is why you were staking out Belgor. You mentioned your agents were distracted when he was attacked.”

He looked out the window in thought. “They didn’t see the attacker enter the store. A distraction spell must have been used on them to lull them into inattention.”

“They were spotted,” I said.

“They’re very good agents. I’d be surprised if both of them were seen,” he said.

“Then I’d say whoever the attacker was knew Guild operations, either through experience or a leak.”

He sighed loudly. “Yes, well, the organization here is lax, if you ask me.”

It’s funny. I had issues with the Boston Guild, but hearing Dylan criticize it made me bristle. “Guildmaster ap Eagan has been sick for a long time,” I said.

“Yes, well, I don’t get why Maeve hasn’t stepped in sooner.”

“Maeve doesn’t do a lot of things she should,” I said.

He smiled to soften the tone of the conversation. “Okay, buddy, calm down. I was only making an observation. Auntie Bree said you have issues with the Guild, and obviously I don’t know them all.”

“Sorry. Bad habit. How’s the rest of the show going?”

Dylan rocked his head. “Busy. Incredible number of assault and batteries in the last few weeks. The Boston P.D. is staying out of it, which is and isn’t helping. The police are much more cooperative in New York.”

“We have Commissioner Murdock to thank for that. He would like nothing better than for the Weird to break off and float out to sea,” I said.

Dylan chuckled. “Yes, I’ve talked to him. Walks the line a hairbreadth from insulting.”

I saw an opening to take Meryl’s advice and spread a little more good karma. “Keeva can help you with him.”

He arched an eyebrow. “Really? I didn’t think diplomacy was one of her skills.”

I had to laugh at that one. Obviously, he had been on the receiving end of one of Keeva’s barbed comments. “She and the commissioner are two sides of the same coin. She can help you.”

He pursed his lips. “You know she’s on suspension.”

“She’ll be cleared. She’s good at what she does, Dylan. Let her do it.”

The sly smile came back. “Why the support? I don’t get the sense she likes you.”

I shrugged. “I owe her a couple of favors. Putting in a good word for her is a no-brainer.”

His smile became a little more genuine. “I’ll take your word for it, then. I’ll cut her as much as slack I can.”

I stood. “Thanks. I should let you get back to work.”

From another folder, he took out more pictures, grainy shots of a building interior, and slid them across the desk. “I shouldn’t show you these. Security photos from the Met.”

It took me a moment to realize the same person appeared in them, a small, blond-haired woman with a rather plain face. He spun the photos back toward himself to examine them. “We haven’t identified her yet. I was hoping you might recognize her. She entered the U.S. three weeks ago and visited the museum twice before the robbery. We know she met with Bergin Vize at least once in the month before she left Germany.”

In addition to being the thug who either accidentally or intentionally destroyed my fey abilities, Vize was an international terrorist, part of a group of people intent on bringing down the Seelie Court. He’d helped plan a major attack in Boston the previous spring and manipulated a mentally unstable fey man into nearly causing a cataclysm. I killed the plan, and High Queen Maeve apparently executed the perpetrator. “Why didn’t you arrest her?”

“We wanted to track her movements. We lost her in New York, but we believe she came to Boston. She’s the reason I’m here. I thought you should know,” Dylan said.

I don’t have proof, but the fact that Vize had been involved in two terrorist plots that also almost killed me was no coincidence. “Do you think she could be behind the odd attacks against me?”

He shook his head. “I don’t see any connection to you at all other than Bergin Vize, and he’s connected to a lot of stuff. I’ve never heard of spells that work the way you’ve been describing. But there’s more going on than just that. We suspect a major terrorist operation is in the works. Her friends in Europe have gone into hiding,” he said.

“You mean the Guild has lost Bergin Vize again,” I said.

“You’re not supposed to know that,” he said.

I didn’t know what to think. First Ceridwen dangled Vize in front of me, then Dylan. Ceridwen I didn’t trust. Dylan I wanted to. He surveyed the piles of paper on his desk. “You can be part of this again.”

I shook my head. “Freelancing suits me for now.”

He looked at the photos, then back at me, slight disappointment on his face. “Okay-for now. If you hear anything related to this, let me know?”

I don’t know why he trusted me. “Sure thing.”

I walked the corridor on the opposite end of the floor until I reached Keeva’s office. She had two nameplates outside her door. The top one had most of her full name with its old country spelling, CAOIMHE AP LAOIRE MAC NIAMH AES SIDHE. Fairy commoners often ended their names with their clan affiliation, like Danann Sidhe. The monarchy, though, used the simple Aes Sidhe. Everybody knew they were Dananns. Americans had a hard time with the old spellings and diphthongs, so like a lot of fey, Keeva anglicized her name for easier pronunciation by the local folks. Hence, the bottom plate read a simple KEEVA MACNEVE.

Her door was ajar. I pushed it open with my foot and found Keeva staring out the window. She had a great view of South Boston and the harbor beyond it. When I knocked, she pivoted her chair slowly toward me, an annoyance on her face that did not change much when she saw me. “How do you do it?”

Without waiting for an invitation, I took the guest chair. “Do what?”

She pulled her chair up and leaned across her desk blotter. “How do you not work here and still manage to make my life miserable?”

I tried an apologetic smile. “It’s a knack?”

She glared. “I’m not amused.”

“Why don’t you clue me in to the problem?”

Her eyes flicked to the door for a fraction of a second. “Dylan macBain.”

I shrugged. “I’m not responsible for him.”

She rubbed her neck in frustration. “If I have to hear one more story about what great fun it was working with you ‘back in the city,’ which I assume he means that slab of concrete and garbage on the Hudson River, I will not be responsible for the removal of his tongue.”

I exaggerated looking up in pleasant memory. “Yeah, it was fun working with me back then.”

She growled. “You must have used up all the fun part before you came here.”

“So, I’m guessing you’re not happy with the current job share?”

She huffed and turned back to the window. “It’s only procedural. It’ll be cleared up in another day or two, and Mr. Wonderful will be on his way back to the city.” She used her fingers to make air quotation marks when she said “the city.”

I leaned back. “He’s just doing his job, Keev. He’s good at it. Like you said, he’ll be gone soon.”

She didn’t move. “How’d you like me to sign off on that visa request?”

I had been banned from entering Germany. For more than six months, I had been trying to persuade Keeva to let me have a diplomatic visa from the Guild to go there and hunt down Bergin Vize. The Germans weren’t pursuing him, and I wanted to see him face justice. Besides being responsible for my loss of abilities, he had a litany of terrorist crimes to his name. Keeva had denied my request every time I asked, so I decided not to sound enthusiastic. “Sure.”

Keeva whirled back to her desk with a sarcastic smile. “Sorry, my signing privileges have been revoked.”

I disappointed her by chuckling. “At least you made me laugh this time. I thought you were going to bribe me to do something.”

She narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips. “Hmm. Interesting. Let me get back to you on that.”

“Come on, Keeva. It can’t be that bad.”

She sighed. “Not only does he talk about you incessantly; he shadows me on everything I do, which is very little.”

I had sympathy pangs for her. I knew what it was like to be sidelined by the Guild for reasons beyond my control. “For what it’s worth, I don’t think it’s fair you’re on suspension. It wasn’t your fault.”

“I know that. I don’t understand why Ceridwen’s being such an ass about it.”

Keeva is always careful about appearances and her political gamesmanship. “Oh, my, my! Did I just hear you insult a queen?”

She gave me a smug smile. “Even if you do tell her I said that, I doubt she’d listen. She’s not exactly on your list of admirers at the moment.”

“Word travels fast.”

“All joking aside, Connor. You should be careful. She is a queen. If you must annoy her, please leave me out of it.”

That was the Keeva I knew, always watching her own back. “I’ll keep that in mind. Anyway, I have something you can do without permission. I need a copy of a Guild file.”

Keeva’s expression brushed up against a sneer. “Why don’t you ask your little friend in the basement?”

Meryl wasn’t one of Keeva’s favorite people, precisely because Keeva didn’t impress her. I didn’t rise to her bait on that. “Because I thought you could give me a little insight on the case. The Boston P.D. file says you were the agent in charge.” Appealing to Keeva’s vanity tended to work like a charm, and Murdock did say I should charm her.

“Which one?”

“Olivia Merced.”

Keeva considered, then nodded as she remembered. “I know the name. She was part of the Ardman case. Liddell Viten.”

Typical of the Guild to name the case after the fey victim and not the human one. “Merced is dead. So is a guy named Josef Kaspar.”

She arched an eyebrow. “Murder-suicide?”

I frowned. “No. Why would you say that?”

“He was her fiancé before Viten showed up. Never got over it. I think he was homeless. In fact, he figured out Viten was fey and turned him in to the Guild hoping Merced would go back to him. That woman annoyed the heck out of me with her constant calls about him. I told her to call Boston P.D.”

Once again, the Guild took a case only to screw over the human-normal element. Merced never got her justice. I ran down the basic details of the current case. “They were ritually murdered the same way. You probably have the report from Murdock here somewhere.”

“If that’s an ogham curse, I’ve never heard it.”

“Well, you’ve connected the two murders. We definitely should look at the file.”

She sighed. “I’ll send the report to Murdock. I’m so depressed, it wouldn’t be any fun to say no.”

Keeva glanced out the window. “Boston wasn’t the only place Liddell Viten scammed women. He had a partner in New York named Rhonda Powell. He killed her for some reason. When we were transferring him there for a court hearing, he overpowered his guards and escaped into the storerooms. He seriously injured three people before he was taken down.”

“You took him out?”

She shook her head, a curious and smug gleam in her eye. “She didn’t tell you? Meryl Dian killed him.”