The Grotesques (29 page)

“He givin’ you a hard time again?”

Brodie scuffed a boot along the ground. “Time I started my own business if he won’t let me in on his.”

Ace shook his head but avoided Brodie’s eye. “I dunno, man. What sort of information?”

“That’s what I wanna find out.”

“Yeah, well what’s to say you ain’t gonna be the next victim?”

“I ain’t a sheila. ’Sides, I got this.” He pulled a second gun from his other pocket.

Ace smiled. “Where’d you get that?”

“Pinched it off me Dad.”

“Doer know?”

“What d’ya reckon?” He passed Jake’s weapon back to Ace. “You up for it?”

Ace nodded. He enjoyed a bit of fun just as much as Brodie. “Yeah, I’m game.”

“Just give me ten minutes to get in position.”

They rode across the parking lot into the parking spaces on Church Street. Ace was one smart dude to rev his engine before he circled the Old Port Canal Park. The moment his bike shot off, Brodie sauntered across. The raised flower beds provided awesome cover if he crouched. He ducked behind one just a few metres from a marked patrol car. Five minutes later Ace gunned past, did a u-turn on dead end The Minories, and tore back along the road, shooting at the church as he hurled past the police. No way were the pigs ignoring rapid fire. Their wheels screeched after him, giving Brodie ample time to swagger across the road and through the unlocked church door with all the brash self-assurance of a future crime boss.

WORD OF THE
raid on the church had leaked. Major Crime was bustling with more activity than the early hours of the morning should warrant on any occasion. Ella tagged along as Rob escorted Romain into a bare interview room. Chief Inspector Thomas Roan, a case file in hand, strode up to them. His mouth formed a displeased line as he cast a quick glance over her before addressing Rob.

“I have just spent the last forty minutes on the phone listening to Mr Genord complain about police harassment. I hope you have a reasonable explanation for using a general search warrant twice in one day on the same premises, especially when the supposed victim is standing before me.” His white hair was in disarray over a forehead creased with worry. This case was aging them all.

“We entered under the assumption Ella Jerome might be in danger. Given what we saw down by the canal tonight, it was a reasonable supposition.”

“Genord tried to kill me,” Ella said, her voice flat. The buzz she ought to feel, a reporter in her element, was a distant memory. She was still not sure she had not hallucinated the entire experience. Perhaps Adam would walk in. She cast a longing look toward the main room.

Chief Inspector Roan exhaled audibly. He gestured toward Ella. “Get her into an interview room.”

“You need to hear what she has to say.”

“Now.”

Rob opened the door to the room opposite the one in which he had deposited Romain. “I’ll be in shortly.”

Unable to settle, Ella paced. Rob closed the door gently; he had brought her here to assist in their enquiries, after all. Ella cracked it open again; she had agreed to accompany him only to dig up facts. Unfortunately, Roan was not finished with Rob. “Are you too close to this?”

“Ella and I haven’t been together for a year. Nobody knows this case better. If you take me off it, you’ll be starting from scratch because I’m not about to tell anybody except you what is happening down there.” Before the Inspector could reprimand him, Rob nudged the door to the interview room and added more calmly, “You’re going to find this difficult to believe. If you don’t accept what we are about to tell you, then I’ll resign from this case.”

“I need this case solved.”

“Then keep an open mind.”

“I want a moment with Detective Hamlyn,” Ella said. Arms crossed and jittery, she had to be looking a wreck.

“This better be above board.” Roan slapped the file onto the table. “You have two minutes,” he said to Rob, and parked himself outside the window.

There was no easy way to do this. “Rob, I need to ask you something and I need a serious answer. When we were together, did you ever think there might be something wrong with me? I mean, was there ever any indication I wasn’t quite . . . rational.”

“Other than your single-minded obsession with your work?”

“Damn it, Rob. Be serious.”

“That was a serious answer.”

Putting a hand over her mouth, she turned away.

“What’s this about?”

“I . . .”
I’m hallucinating
was nearly out of her mouth. She caught herself at the last moment. Until she got Adam back, she had to appear sane. “I’m tired that’s all.”

“You don’t think I’ll believe you.”

“I don’t think your boss will.” Roan had an eagle-sharp eye on them.

“They’ll have to lock us both up. Danes as well. And Adam when we find him.”

The problem was he didn’t know the half of it. She nodded. “All right.”

Rob signalled for Roan to enter the room.

“Chief Inspector Roan needs to know what we’re dealing with.” Rob pulled out a chair for her.

“Genord tried to kill me,” she repeated, before recounting the horror of last night. Inspector Roan remained silent throughout her testimony.

“Did you recover the gun?” Roan asked Rob at last.

“We found no evidence of a weapon.”

“It’s in the Port Canal. I kicked it in.”

“So what this comes down to is Ms Jerome’s word against Genord’s,” Roan said, standing.

Ella closed her eyes. Worry and fatigue were taking their toll. Now her reputation was back on the table.

“Romain can corroborate my story.”

“Your word and that of a mentally challenged man. You’ll have to excuse me if I choose not to have Genord arrested just yet.”

“Romain saved me. Twice. You need to let him go.”

“He was dangling you over the edge of the roof.” Rob was standing now. His neck had turned red.

“He was holding me after Genord pushed me over.”

“The officer who broke into the roof said Genord was nowhere near you.”

“He made a
tomb
for me.”

“In most churches that’s considered a high honour.”

They glared at each other.

“Why haven’t you hauled Genord in for questioning?” Roan asked Rob.

“He disappeared.”

“From a scene teeming with officers?”

Rob shifted from foot to foot. “His lawyer also had a great deal to say.”

Roan pursed his lips. “What about these creatures?”

Glad of the change of focus, Ella added snippets of information Rob was unaware of, right down to her stabbing the grotesque after the fire.

Rob, sitting so he could jot notes, interrupted to clarify several points. His frustration at her mounted. “If you’d given me all the details, it might have saved us a lot of trouble,” he snapped at one point.

“And you’d have thought us credible, a reporter for the
Informer
and a relative last seen with the first victim?” she retorted. “Your boss can’t even decide whether to believe me now.”

Rob leant back in his chair. It was the closest he was going to come to admitting she was right.

“Where were you when the detectives were searching the church?” Roan asked.

“In Romain’s workshop and then on the roof,” she said.

“We searched the entire church.”

“You didn’t see me enter after you, though, did you?” Ella pointed out. She had to make what she needed to say seem credible.

The detectives looked at her. “Why didn’t we see you?” Rob asked.

“Ask Romain. If you believe him, I’ll corroborate his story.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means your mind needs to be as open as you want Chief Inspector Roan’s to be.”

“Lowell is a zoologist. Does he have any idea what these creatures are?” Roan asked.

“None.” Then Ella stated outright what she knew for a fact but Rob was having such a hard time accepting. “Everything points to those grotesques being alive.”

Chief Inspector Roan flicked his eyes onto Rob. “Do you concur?”

Rob took a deep breath. “The statues were probably modelled on living creatures, yes.” He couldn’t look her in the eye. “Given we have carved effigies of the missing and murdered girls, the mason, Romain, must hold the key.”

“You believe he has the brains to mastermind this?”

“No. My gut screams that Genord is behind it all, but Romain knows something. If we’re lucky, he might hand us hard evidence to nail Genord.”

Roan handed the case file to Rob. A child’s drawing of a carved pumpkin with the words
To Grandpa
was tucked underneath. Roan folded the picture and tucked it into his pocket. “Get in there and interview the mason.”

THE LAD SHUFFLED
into the nave without caution. The protection he believed his father’s name conferred appeared to have made him careless.

“It is Brodie, I believe,” Genord said as the lad passed, drawn to the glint of the candlelit altar.

Brodie came to an abrupt halt. To his credit, he showed no surprise. “Who are you?”

Genord sighed. The youth of today lacked even rudimentary manners. Rather than pursue their betterment, they seemed intent on devising ever more debasing forms of behaviour. He pressured a fire elemental into lighting an old-fashioned lantern. At his age, Genord insisted on civility. The unimpressed youth obviously thought he had flicked a switch.

“I think the more relevant question is what do I want.” He waited for a reply. The slouching youth only sulked. “I have a business proposition to put to you.”

“That’s the old man’s territory, and I ain’t your messenger boy.” Brodie strode toward the altar. Genord tutted. This death would be no great tragedy. The boy was no more than a thug, a common thief looking to loot the building and not at all in his father’s league.

The acoustics in the church were excellent so Genord did not bother to raise his voice. “Yes, I was given to understand you aren’t trusted with even that much responsibility. The head of the empire believes you are too young. An untried and incompetent child who might run his business into the ground. Am I right?” Genord had hit his mark. The boy hunched his shoulders as he turned, his eyes narrowing and pout deepening.

“Then why are you dealing with me?”

The lad had some brains after all. “I require the stamina of someone young and healthy. Then there is the matter of ingratiating myself with the future underworld boss, someone who might be more, shall we say amenable, to my interests.” The lad’s eyes sparkled with interest. “Of course, if you respect your father’s opinion there are plenty of young men who would leap at the chance of brokering a deal smart enough to convince Daddy once and for all they are capable of taking the reins,” Genord said, rising.

“Maybe I’ll find dirt on you. Blackmail pays bucketloads.”

Insinuation was a dying art. “Yes. I imagine Daddy’s got a tight rein on your finances.”

“Whatever.”

“If you are not interested, you have only to say. I’m hardly going to shoot you. Your Daddy’s name is your protection, after all.”

The lad positively glowered. “What’s in it for me?”

“More wealth than that solid gold altar represents.”

“I’m listening.”

“Let’s walk while you do. Would you be so kind as to bring the lantern?”

The lad obliged, albeit with a smirk. Genord led the way into the lower chamber and down the stairs to the crypt, locking the door so it would be impenetrable to the grotesques. Brodie shuffled his feet the whole way.

When they reached the tombs, he hung back. “You murdered those girls.” A tiny splinter of fear had crept into his insolent voice.

“Are you concerned for your young life? It is a perfectly reasonable fear.”

“I’m stronger than you, old man. Anyway, Ace knows I’m in here.” He feigned interest in the effigies, pretty young girls in the prime of their life. “Is she dead, too?” he growled, lingering over Ella’s.

“Not yet, although I do imagine you might desire her after what your father revealed about you. I’m sure you would agree a reporter should never have that kind of leverage over an underworld lord.”

Brodie tensed. “What’d she say?”

The gullible boy. “Perhaps we could throw a few hours alone with her into the bargain? Then you could ask her yourself.”

He was rewarded with a leer, which grew as Brodie pressed an uncouth hand over a stone breast and ran it down the length of the statue. Genord gripped the stone ankles of Melanie Denham. The boy’s flush was unearthing humiliating memories. He cursed Ella for evading him. Just as well the dragon would relish the tender, young male. The sacrifice of a criminal would bring her full circle. It would bear him one victim closer to lordship over Samhain. How unfortunate this particular offering would do nothing to sate his craving for revenge on the fair sex.