Wild Things

Chapter Ten PAPER MOON

We worked quietly, deliberately, searching through the only potential bit of evidence we had. And it wasn’t much.

“I think keeping all this stuff would weigh me down,” I said, pulling out a grocery receipt for utterly innocuous items: milk, eggs, cookies, paper towels.

“Yeah,” he said, flipping through a stack of greeting cards. “But you have Ethan, a family, friends. You have connections.” He flipped open a card, grimaced at whatever he found there, and closed it again. He put the card in the pile and looked at me. “I don’t think she does. I mean”—he spread his hands over the stack—“all this stuff would be relatively meaningless to us. Cards from people who don’t sound like they know her at all, bills, receipts. Photographs of other people’s kids. It’s almost like she was trying to build a life from paper, from the stacks of stuff that she kept in the house.”

That was both poetic and sad, and it made more sense than I preferred to admit. If Jeff was right, Aline led a sad and lonely life that had been capped by a potentially sad and lonely end. We just weren’t sure yet.

“So where does that get us?”

He pushed his hair behind his ears. “I’m not sure.”

I stood up, getting a fresh perspective on the piles we’d made on the dark wood table. “Okay. So she’s missing. The question right now is whether she’s missing on purpose, or because she’s a victim of the mattacker.”

“The ‘mattacker’?” Jeff asked, blinking.

“The magical attacker. I shortened it a little.”

Jeff chuckled. “Shorten it all you want. But nobody else in the house is going to refer to the perp as a ‘mattacker.’”

“You’re probably right. But they aren’t in the room right now. So—we know a flight was purchased for Aline—whether or not by her.” I looked back at Jeff. “I don’t suppose you know anyone with an airline connection?”

“No,” he said, frowning. “Why?” But before I could answer, his brows lifted in understanding. “Because if she got on the plane, she probably wasn’t kidnapped. I don’t know anybody offhand, and I’d prefer not to hack into transpo databases. That kind of stuff gets you flagged.”

“I think that’s a legit reason,” I assured him. “So she gets a storage locker, buys a flight, comes to Lupercalia. Leaves right before or right after the attack.”

“There’s just nothing here that touches on any of that,” Jeff said. “At least, not that I can see. But that’s part of the problem—it could all be relevant, and we wouldn’t even know it because we don’t really know what’s going on here.” He picked up a faded and water-stained receipt. “She got gas.” He picked up a strip of three yellow tickets. “She went to the carnival.” He picked up a small wax paper bag with a logo on one side. “She bought cookies at Fran’s Delights of Loring Park. That has got to be the most pretentious name for a cookie joint I’ve ever heard, but I’m getting off track.”

I was proud he realized that. He didn’t always.

“None of this stuff means anything without context, and shifter context isn’t helping much. None of it, as far as I can see, is shifter related. She lived like a human. Bought things like a human.”

“Could that be the reason she’s gone? She pretended to be a little too human?”

Jeff shrugged. “I don’t think we can rule it out. It might be time to call your team.”

I smiled at him. “I think we can arrange that.” I pulled out my phone and started up the program Luc had created for the House’s guards. It had timers, alarms, alerts, and, according to him, a “slick” little videoconferencing setup.

I set up the phone on the table and turned on the app, selecting the option to connect with the Ops Room.

An animated clip of Luc filled the screen. His animated cowboy hat bobbed back and forth as he screeched “Show me the Ops Room!” over and over again.

“Is that supposed to be a play on ‘Show me the money’?” Jeff wondered.

“God only knows,” I said, smiling with relief when the real Luc replaced the faux one.

He smiled brightly at Jeff and me. “Sentinel, I’m glad to see you’re taking advantage of the technological resources we’ve provided for you. And that you’re alive. Ethan said things got hairy. And for you, too, Jeff.”

“Being a hostage is always a bummer,” Jeff said. “But we came out all right.”

“Have you heard anything about Scott?”

“Scott?” Jeff asked with alarm.

“Kowalcyzk’s interviewing him today,” Luc explained. “Jonah said the lawyers are negotiating with the mayor’s office, the police commissioner, the feds. No other news yet.”

“At least he’s got advocates,” Jeff said.

“And loud ones. The lawyers are all over TV, the Web, talking about how poorly their client is being treated, how it’s baldly unconstitutional. They’ll get him out, or set him up for a civil suit later.”

“Sometimes you play by the rules they give you,” I said. “I assume Ethan gave you the rundown about everything here?”

“He did. He’s talking to the librarian. And good timing there; he just got back to the House an hour or two ago. What can I do you for, Sentinel?”

“We need to borrow your brain.”

• • •

Ethan had given Luc the overview, heavy on the elves and their apparent existence. We stuck to the facts of the attack, walked him through what we knew, and brainstormed about the potential cause.

Luc wasn’t convinced they were related at all. “Two different methods,” he said. “One much more violent than the other. One kills, the other—what would you say—violates? One attack during the day. The other at night.”

“On the other hand,” I said, “it’s two attacks on supernatural groups in Illinois within twenty-four hours. The methods may not have much in common, but they have to be connected.”

“We need to know if she got on that plane.”

“That’s exactly what Jeff and I were saying. I don’t suppose you know someone?”

He was quiet for a moment. “I might, you know, know someone.” His cheekbones glowed faintly pink, and there was a bashful look in his eyes.

“Former girlfriend?” I asked with a grin.

Luc hunched over a little, as if shielding the camera and his answer from the other people in the room. From the topic, I assumed Lindsey was one of those people.

“Briefly,” he said. “And I can’t stress that enough. We haven’t talked in a while, but I could maybe make a phone call. I wouldn’t, of course, want it to become a thing.”

“I’m empathic,” we heard Lindsey call out offscreen. “And you’re hardly whispering. I can hear you, Merit and Jeff.”

We waved weakly back at Luc, whose face had turned a mottled shade of crimson.

A flounce of blond hair popped into view. “’S’up?” Lindsey asked with a grin. “Jeffrey. Merit.”

“Will you please give your boyfriend permission to call his ex-girlfriend and ask if our victim-slash-perpetrator boarded her flight?”

“She hardly qualified as an ex-girlfriend,” Lindsey said. “They may have bounced around together a smidge, but that’s it. It barely counts.”

I’d have much preferred to dive into Lindsey’s scale of what did and did not “count” for purposes of “bouncing,” but this wasn’t the time.

“Excellent,” I said. “I’m going to assume that means you have no objection to Luc calling Bouncy so we can continue our supernatural investigation and get the shifters and elves off our backs.”

“Roger that,” she said, before Luc nudged his way on-screen again. He no longer looked especially amused.

“So you’ll let us know?” I asked cheerily.

He grumbled something, and the screen went blank. I scratched absently at an itch on my shoulder, glanced at Jeff.

“That was pretty awkward.”

“Vampires,” Jeff said with a shrug, as if that explained everything.

I yawned hugely, stretching back in the chair. I was still residually sore from being dragged around and bound. It was nothing that a little sleep wouldn’t fix, but I was getting achy from sitting.

“It looks like bedtime for you, Sentinel.”

I looked back, found Ethan in the doorway, hands in his pockets, lips curled in amusement. “Having any luck here?”

“Not a damn bit,” I said. “We can’t find anything that gives us a motive for Aline, or indicates she was a target of the attack. What about you? Any luck with Paige and the librarian?”

“They’re looking through the archives,” he said. “I was advised my request was substantial and it would take them some time.”

Ethan’s voice was flat, and I could easily imagine the librarian giving him a very pointed speech about the time he’d need to complete an assignment. Like most of the vampires of Cadogan House, the librarian was particular.

Another yawn racked me, and I raised the back of my hand to my mouth. I was too tired to hold it in.

“You’ve had a bit of an evening,” Ethan said. “I think it’s time to head back to the carriage house.”

I nodded and stood up, regretting that the end of the evening hadn’t been more productive.

“I’ll get this cleaned up,” Jeff said. “And check in with Damien.” He glanced at Ethan, smiled. “Merit held her own. Had those elves shaking in their boots.”

“I’m sure she did. And it probably didn’t hurt to have a tiger in her corner.”

Jeff smiled shyly. “I’m just glad we got everyone out of there okay. Hopefully, we’ll find Aline tucked away on holiday, and Niera on a jaunt, and everything can go back to normal.”

I didn’t disagree with the hope, but I was beginning to think crisis was the new normal.

• • •

We had an hour until sunrise, but my body was already shutting down. Ethan all but carried me back to the carriage house, where Mallory and Catcher had showered and were lying on the couch, a predictable Lifetime movie on the television. Some men golfed; some wrenched. Catcher Lifetime’d.

I headed straight for the bedroom, stripped down to bare skin, and blistered myself in the shower. My body ached like I was awaiting the onset of the flu. I could only assume the elves had thrown me around like a sack of potatoes in the process of getting me into the village.

When I’d risked using all the hot water, I flipped off the faucet and wrapped myself in a fluffy towel. They had their prejudices, but you couldn’t fault their taste in linens.

I pulled on a Cadogan T-shirt and plaid pajama bottoms, and then took care of the other necessary bit of business—sword care. I’d managed to snatch my sword back from the elves, but it hadn’t come away unscathed. The steel was filthy, dotted with mud and probably worse, little clumps of dirt clinging to the scabbard. I placed both carefully on the floor, then grabbed the small kit Catcher had given me from my duffel bag. Rice paper. Oil. A whetstone to hone the surface.

I hadn’t yet used the whetstone. The katana had been made by hands significantly more experienced and learned than mine; I’d long ago decided to leave sharpening to the experts. But I was good with oil and rice paper, which would clean the steel to a sheen and protect it from nicks during the next battle.

After removing the gunk with a soft cloth, I dotted oil onto a square of rice paper and folded the small sheet around the blade. With a smooth, swift motion, I wiped the oil from one end of the katana to the other, then repeated the process until the blade gleamed. The blade had been tempered with blood and magic, and with each pass of the paper I felt the answering shiver of satisfaction, as if the sword appreciated the care.

When I was done, I slid it back into the sheath with a zing of sound, and placed it on the top of the bureau beside Ethan’s sword, already scabbarded. They made a beautiful pair, artisanal weapons of death, handcrafted protectors of honor.

As I patted myself on the back for my mental poetry, a knock sounded at the front door.

I opened the bedroom door and peeked into the living room.

For the first time tonight, it wasn’t bad news. A teenager with pink cheeks stood in the doorway wearing a Loring Park Pizza cap, and the siren’s call of roasted meat spilled into the air from the four steaming pizza boxes he carried. The scent was nearly tangible; I could practically see the wavy lines of meat smoke rising off the box.

A victim to my hunger, I marched into the living room.

“What’s this?” Catcher asked.

“Dinner, I guess.” The kid shrugged. “Guy at the house paid for it, sent me out here with it.” He grinned. “Said you should tip me really well.”

“I’ll just bet he did,” Catcher mumbled, pulling his wallet out of his back jeans pocket. He snatched out bills, then exchanged the cash for pizza and watched the kid head back down the driveway—as if there was a threat the pizza delivery boy might change his mind and attack.

After a moment, Catcher closed the door and put the pizza on the table. “I guess the Pack felt bad about last night’s grub.”

“Or tonight’s hostage situation,” Ethan said, throwing open a box and grabbing a steaming slice. Without napkin, fork, or plate, he dove into the slice, earning openmouthed stares from Mallory, Catcher, and me.

“I’m not that pretentious,” he said over a mouthful of a pizza that looked like a butcher-shop special. I recognized pepperoni; the rest of it was a hearty, delicious mystery.

“You are,” the three of us said together, but we were smiling when we said it. We all grabbed slices and took seats on the sofas.

“You find anything in your magic box?” Mallory asked.

“Receipts and ephemera. In other words, a big, fat nothing. You get anything else about Baumgartner or Simon?”

Catcher chewed, shook his head. “Simon is in South America. Decided a change of scenery was a good idea. I’m not crying that he’s on a different continent. I told Baumgartner what we saw. He denied they were really elves—probably fairies or humans dressing up like elves—and said the magic sounded like vampires.”

“Baumgartner is a royal sack of crap,” Mallory said.

“And still prefers to keep his head in the sand,” I suggested, then glanced at Ethan.

He’d opted for the forkless slice and was now swabbing his hands with napkins. I predicted fork in his future.

“The pizza’s good,” Mallory said. “It’s not Saul’s, of course, but it’s not bad.”

“You’re a pizza snob,” Catcher said.

She elbowed him. “No, I was raised right. Don’t deny a Chicagoan the right to pick her favorite slice. It’s un-American.”

I was inching into my second when my phone beeped. The slice went back to the plate, and I scrubbed grease from my hands before pulling it out of my pocket. I checked the screen . . . and my stomach curled with icy-cold nerves.

It was Lakshmi.

She was reminding me—as if I’d somehow forgotten—of the favor I owed and the message she wanted me to pass along. And she’d carefully drafted her message to ensure I recalled her larger point.

THE HOUSES DESERVE A MASTER WHO CAN TRULY LEAD THEM, she texted. DO NOT LET SELFISHNESS DEPRIVE THEM OF THAT.

Was it so selfish to want him close? To keep on the same continent the man I’d come to love, to need, to depend on? Or was it selfish of her to ask, to demand sacrifice of others instead of putting herself forward as a candidate, taking her own stand against tyranny?

“Sentinel?”

At the sound of his voice, I remembered I was sitting in mixed company—and with him. I plastered on a smile I didn’t feel and tucked the phone away again.

“It’s nothing,” I said, and grabbed a piece of pizza as if hunger was my only concern.

But of course it wasn’t nothing, and the curiosity didn’t disappear from Ethan’s gaze.

• • •

Sunrise found us tucked into the bedroom. The house was locked, the guards outside, Mallory and Catcher curled up in the living room. While Ethan showered, I plumped pillows and folded back the covers, climbed into cool sheets.

And then I obsessed about the GP.

My phone was in hand, Ethan on my mind, Lakshmi’s text under my squinty gaze. Jonah had tattoos on each arm—a devil on one side, an angel on the other. I thought of both, miniature devils and angels sitting on my shoulders, offering contradictory advice. But in my case, the angel looked like Seth Tate, Chicago’s former mayor, a former angel of peace who’d become magically linked to his identical twin, Dominic. Dominic had been an angel of judgment, a devil, and was as fallen as they came.

The devil derided me for even considering giving in to Lakshmi, a member of the GP, which had caused so much trouble for Cadogan House we’d been forced to quit it.

The angel shared Lakshmi’s fire, promising that I would be doing the right thing.

And all the while, as they debated, I still had to keep Ethan out of prison.

The bathroom door opened. Ethan, wearing only a towel, looked out. He’d brushed his hair, which was water-slicked back from his face.

Guilty and torn, I stuffed the phone hastily under the covers. But not so quickly he didn’t see me do it.

I’d never been a good liar, and this wasn’t an exception. “Arranging a secret rendezvous, are you, Sentinel?”

“No. Just checking in.”

He arched an eyebrow. “You’re a miserable liar.”

“Actually, I can usually bluff pretty well. But apparently not to you.”

“Is this about the message you got during dinner?”

“It is.”

“And would you like to tell me about it?”

There were things I could have said. You’d be the best GP leader. You should run. Take your position as the sire of vampires. Challenge Darius. But seconds passed and the sun inched higher toward the horizon, robbing me of the ability to debate. And I wasn’t going to take on something this serious when I wasn’t at full capacity.

“Nothing big,” I drowsily said. “Just a personal concern.”

“A personal concern?” he asked, a spark of green fire in his eyes that I recognized as jealousy. He probably imagined the personal concern involved Jonah and the RG, as that was the only thing I normally wouldn’t discuss with him in detail. But Ethan was the only man on my mind.

Apparently intent on guaranteeing that fact, he flicked a finger, and the towel fell to the ground, heaping at his feet. Ethan stood there, still damp, golden hair around his shoulders, hands on his hips and a less-than-modest expression on his face. Considering his impressive erection, modesty would have been wasted on me anyway.

I ignored my body’s undeniable twinge of interest and dragged my gaze to his face. “Not that kind of personal concern.”

He cocked an eyebrow. “You’re certain?”

“That you’ll be the only man on my mind?” Especially with the image of him standing there seared into my retinas and memory. “Yes. I’m quite certain. Positive, you could say.”

He smiled a little. “Sentinel, you’re mumbling.”

“I’m tired. And your nakedness is distracting.”

But I moved to him anyway. Because sometimes distraction was just the thing you needed.

Some hours later, darkness fell without a knock at our bedroom door or any other. But alarms weren’t always raised with fists.