Obsidian Curse (12 page)

Chapter 22

I grabbed a couple of umbrellas and Birdie’s rain slicker with the triple goddess on the back and we headed out.

On the way to the police department, Cinnamon called.

“Three more packages arrived today,” she said.

“Did you open them?”

“Yes. There was a Cinderella teapot, an iced tea pitcher hand-painted with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and a Jack and the Beanstalk soap dispenser.” Her voice had a nervous edge to it. On the one hand, I found it rather comical that my cousin was being tortured by fairy-tale characters; on the other hand, I’d never known her to be so unsettled before.

“Why don’t you unpack them, put them in the kitchen, and see how you feel afterward.”

Because maybe it was Uncle Deck. Maybe he was trying to buy his granddaughter a few things from beyond the grave. Although why he didn’t just opt for a rubber ducky and a stuffed bear like normal people do, I wouldn’t know until I tried to contact him.

“Okay. I’ll try that.”

“If you still feel funny, load up Thor and head to the inn. I’ll be there after I take care of a few things.”

“All right. Later.” She hung up.

The windshield wipers on Blade’s car were swooshing back and forth on high speed as the rain pelted the hood.

I sighed, worried about my cousin and, well, pretty much everyone. What if I didn’t find the Leanan Sidhe? Samhain was coming up and there was a good chance that if I didn’t find her by then, she’d grow stronger. Maybe stronger than I could handle. I wondered if I should call in Ivy and John to help—the other members of the Council’s team of operatives. Except this wasn’t a Council mission. It was a family mission. And as important as it was, there was no doubt that this thing with Blade was equally important.

Blade said, “Is someone sick?”

It took me a moment to realize what he meant and then I recalled what I had said on the phone. “My cousin. She’s pregnant.”

“Oh. Boy or girl?”

“They want to be surprised.”

The street that led to the police station was coming up. “Turn right here.”

Blade made a right and pulled into the parking lot of the police station. I put the hood of the slicker over my head and handed him one of the umbrellas.

I opened the door, stuck the umbrella out, and fanned it open.

We trotted to the steps and scaled them two at a time. The overhang on the building shielded the rain and I took a moment to shake out the umbrella before closing it.

The perky new receptionist, whose name I couldn’t recall, looked happy to see someone in the station. She was a young girl with fluffy blonde hair and a dazzling smile.

“Hi, Stacy! How you doing? Don’t tell me you found another dead body. Is that why you’re here? Because I had October in the pool and Gus had November, but don’t tell Leo, cuz we aren’t supposed to be betting on dead bodies anymore. He thinks it’s disrespectful, but I don’t really see the big deal, I mean there ain’t much else to do around here, not that I wish anyone to be harmed, but—”

“It’s not about a body.”

She looked disappointed.

“But I do need to talk with the chief. Is he in?”

“Sure thing. Go on back.”

I started to push through the little half gate that led to Leo’s office. I stopped when I realized Blade wasn’t behind me.

“You coming?” I asked.

He was staring at the receptionist like a scientist examining a newly discovered gene under a microscope.

“Be right there.”

I cocked my head at him.

He shrugged. “Research.”

I left Blade there, walked down the short, brightly lit hallway, and turned toward Leo’s office.

He was sitting at his desk, shaking his head, and mumbling to himself. His dark hair was slicked back and damp as if he’d been caught in the rain, and he was still wearing a trench coat. He looked like a character from a Raymond Chandler novel.

I knocked on the open door. “Hey there.”

He glanced up, smiled. “Hey yourself.” The smile faded. “Please tell me you didn’t find a body. I’m having the worst day.”

“Nope. Didn’t find a single corpse. What’s so awful about your day?” There was a wooden chair against the wall and I dragged it over and sat in it.

“For starters, I just got back from the Shelby Farm, where someone dressed up all the goats in cheap Halloween costumes.”

I stifled a giggle. “What was your favorite?”

“Favorite what?”

“Costume. I’m sure one of them jumped out at you that made you say, well, that is kind of funny.”

Leo tried to hide a smirk, but failed. “Cher.”

“Awesome.”

“Not awesome. I swear if I ever find the idiots who pull these stunts…” He shook his head. “Plus, the phone won’t stop ringing about a kid wearing a
Star Trek
hat stealing pies, candy, flowers, and gazing balls. Gus is out taking a report right now, in fact.”

Gus was Leo’s deputy. He wasn’t exactly Monk, so I didn’t think he’d actually be able to catch Pickle, but I’d have to have a talk with the fairy anyway about true offerings and taking things that belong to others.

Leo looked up at the ceiling and muttered, his hands spread wide, “Who the hell steals gazing balls?”

The Fae do love their shiny things.

Leo finally took off his coat and draped it over the back of his chair. He sat down. “So what’s up?”

“I need you to pull up a cold-case file for me. The Conrad murders. Around thirty years ago.”

He narrowed his eyes, clasped his hands out in front of him. “Why?”

“Because I’d like to read the file,” I said, matter-of-factly.

“Is this about the other night? Did something happen at your place?”

“Are you going to make this difficult? Because it’s public record.”

“Are you going to put yourself in danger again?” His voice was unflinching. “And technically, if the killer was never caught, I don’t have to show it to you.”

“So you are going to be difficult.”

“If it means I can keep you from getting hurt, then yes.” Leo sighed and ran his hands through his hair, as he often did in my presence. As if he were trying to wash me out of it. “Just tell me why you want to go digging around in a thirty-year-old murder.”

“Because I asked her to,” Blade said from the open doorway.

Leo practically fell out of his chair. “Mr. Knight, hello again.”

“Hello, Chief.”

Leo wagged a finger at the writer. “I told you to call me Leo.”

“Right. Leo. I believe you also said if there was anything I needed…?”

Leo fired a frustrated look at me. I sat back in the chair and folded my arms, grinning.

Leo was visibly conflicted when we left his office, but he gave us the report anyway, along with the crime scene photos. Blade gave Leo the note and told him about the shots through my window. He wasn’t too happy about being lied to, but Blade was able to smooth things over with the promise of free signed copies of all his books for life. Leo said he’d be at my place as soon as he could to investigate the “vandalism.”

Back at the cottage, Blade and I spread the photos out on the counter and I looked at those while Blade read the report. There were a few suspects. A handyman who had installed a deck on the back of the home, two petty criminals, and a man who Blade’s father had gotten into a heated altercation with at a local sporting event. All of them had alibied out.

I said to Blade, “Did the police know if the hammer that was used belonged to your parents?”

He flipped through the pages of the report. After a minute, he shook his head. “It doesn’t say. No fingerprints were found on it, though.”

“So it was either wiped clean or the killer wore gloves.”

“Looks that way.”

“Hmm,” I said.

Blade tossed me a glance “What are you thinking?”

“If I were going to kill someone in their own home, I wouldn’t bring a hammer to do it, would you?”

Blade got my meaning. “No. I’d bring a gun, maybe a knife.” He thought for a moment. “So it had to be in the room. It had to belong to my parents.”

“Right. And your mother was an artist. Your dad was struck from behind, so maybe he was hanging a picture.”

“Which means it could have been a weapon of convenience. Maybe they knew the person. Invited whoever it was in while they were in the middle of hanging some artwork.” He thought for a moment, walked over to the far wall where a photo hung of my parents. He twisted his neck to face me. “Do you have a hammer?”

There was one in the junk drawer in the kitchen. I grabbed it and handed it to him.

Blade took the hammer and stood in front of the picture. “I’m about my dad’s height, so if I were hanging a painting, I’d take the nail about here”—he pretended to hold a nail up—“and then swing like this.” He feigned hammering a nail into the wall. “Now, the doorbell rings.” He paused and looked at me.

I ran to the cottage door, opened it, and reached around to press the bell.

“Come in,” Blade said, still holding the hammer.

I did.

“So maybe they talk for a while. Dad insists he doesn’t have whatever the killer was looking for. The killer gets angry. Decides to try to find whatever it is, steal it, but in order to do that, my parents have to die.” He looked at the wall, feigned hammering a nail. “Now step behind me and try to grab the hammer.”

I tried, but I couldn’t reach.

“How tall are you?”

“Five six.”

“Do you have a stool?”

I dug a step stool out of the utility closet. “It’s six inches,” I told him.

I climbed on top and Blade did the hammering motion again. This time, I was able to grab it with inches to spare.

He said, “So he, she, whoever, grabs the hammer and strikes him in the back of the head. Then my mom probably rushes to my dad, the killer goes after her, they struggle, she tries to fight back, tables get knocked over, lamps crash to the ground, but the killer was able to overpower her.”

His jaw hardened for a moment and the darkness that I had felt from him when we first met mired around him in a cloud of anger, frustration, and grief.

I gave him a moment to compose himself before I asked softly, “You okay?”

Blade looked at me, his eyes full of pain. I knew that pain all too well. Knew how it pillaged your heart, crept around your soul, lurked in the corners of your mind until, eventually, you just accept that it’s eaten away the best parts of you. I ached to make it disappear for him, because no one deserved to live that way.

He attempted a smile. “Yes. I keep trying to think of this as a plot for a book I’m writing. Trying to cut my emotions from it, but it’s not always easy.” He walked back over to the counter and placed the hammer on top of it.

I joined him there. “I know.” I looked at Blade for a long time. Finally, I put my hand on his. “I’m not going to tell you that it gets easier once you know the truth, but I can say that it shifts. The loss is still there, but a quiet peace settles in right beside it and you feel a sense of relief. Not knowing is the hardest part.” I paused, then added, “We’ll get them justice, Blade. I promise you that.”

He turned to me then and squeezed my shoulder. “Thank you for helping me. I’m not sure I could do it on my own. It feels good to talk about it with someone who understands.” Our eyes locked and my breath caught. He was standing so close, I could smell his aftershave. An ocean scent.

I thought for a moment he was going to kiss me and I froze. Instead, he pulled me in for an embrace. His cheek brushed mine and I broke away.

I cleared my throat, circled around to the refrigerator, putting the counter between us, and grabbed two waters. I slid one to Blade.

“So we’re looking for someone at least five feet eight inches tall,” I said, unscrewing the cap on the water bottle.

Blade adjusted his shirt and reached for his water. “Right.”

I tapped the photos, trying to refocus on the task at hand, forcing myself to ignore the fact that a successful, wealthy, devastatingly handsome man just had his arms around me.

We stood in silence for a few moments, looking at the photographs. I mulled over everything I’d learned about the murders. Something about our theory gnawed at me.

I said, “But if your parents knew who it was, knew the person or persons were coming, then why go to such great lengths to hide you? Why not just stick you in your room?”

Blade took a swig of water. “Maybe they thought an argument was inevitable. Maybe whatever the killer was after was something they didn’t want me to know about.”

“What did your father do for a living?”

“He was a teacher at the high school and a soccer coach.”

That was why Chance felt Blade was familiar. His brother was a star soccer player and every picture of the boys’ sports teams hung proudly on the walls of the Stryker home. Blade must have looked like his father. I asked him if that was true and he said it was.

I pondered that for a few moments.

Blade said, “Or it could have been dangerous, could have been illegal.”

I shook my head. That didn’t seem to fit their lifestyle,
Breaking Bad
aside.

Then a lightbulb went off in my head like a giant flashing marquee.