The Dark Communion (The Midnight Defenders) (13 page)

“We need to call Ape and ask him to look into places where dragons have been known to live. Also, maybe he can cross-reference Elensal in myths.”

“He’s not home.”

“What do you mean? Where is he?”

“Out looking for Arthur.”

“Why didn’t he tell me?”

“He said he was doing the case on his own. Why would he tell you?”

I sighed.

“So did you get anything on Adam’s friend Dewey? Maybe what he looks like?”

“Not yet. I think I’ve seen Pierce, Julie’s friend, in the reading I got from the bear.”

“And? What did he look like?”

“A big grey blob.”

She shook her head. I saw the amethyst that hung around her neck, mostly hidden by the collar of her shirt, and for a moment, it looked like the gem was glowing. “Maybe,” she said slowly, “Whatever it is doesn’t leave a sense memory on the objects it touches.”

“How did you come to that?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know, but it makes sense.”

We lapsed into silence, and my mind began to wander, playing things back in my head. Eventually, Nadia asked, “So, what did you and Stone talk about?”

“Elliot Ness. That old chestnut.”

“The FBI agent after Al Capone?”

“Kind of.”

“I don’t think I know that story then.”

“Well, remind me to tell it you sometime.”

“What about now? We’ve got a few minutes.”

“I’d rather not.” She just looked at me with those big, pleading eyes. I rubbed my brow in one hand, and took a deep breath. “Fine.”

.

16

About three years ago, I was hired by a neighborhood watch group in the suburbs to investigate an ongoing vandalism problem. It wasn’t normally my bag, but it was a slow week, so I settled. The money was green.

It was a gated neighborhood with curb-side recycling, street lamps, and smoothly paved roads. Not the kind of place that normally catered to the criminal element.

So I staked-out, curled up in my car with logs of beef jerky and a couple extra tall grande mocha fraps. Did crossword puzzles and listened to talk radio.

Nothing happened that first night.

The next morning, as the sun was coming up, I noticed a woman, short and round in a pink bathrobe and a towel on her head, taking the garbage out. She stopped when she saw my car, and slowly, she approached me.

I’d met the woman the day before, as she was one of the chairpeople on the watch and thus one of the people responsible for hiring me. Her name was Mrs. … ah, bollocks. Call her Mrs. B.

It was the middle of summer, too warm and too humid for as early as it was. She was barefoot as she crossed the lawn – I didn’t want to think about what else was bare under the robe – and she rapped on the glass of the passenger door. My car was never blessed with power locks or windows, so I leaned across the seat next to me, fresh with wadded fast-food wrappers and empty disposable coffee cups, and I cranked the window down about half way.

She was pleasant enough, nice in an awkward way, and she flashed me a toothy grin, her eyes behind her glasses squinting as she faced the rising sun. “Mr. Swyftt,” she said. “Have you been out here all night?”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

She seemed surprised by this. I wasn’t sure if she knew what a night watch really did. “When do you sleep?”

I yawned. “In a few minutes. Can I help you with anything?”

She shrugged. “I was just out looking for my cat. We let him out every night, but he’s always right there waiting by the back door in the morning. When I open the door, he’ll purr at me and rub his face with his paws, bless his little heart.”

“He wasn’t there, then?”

“No. No, he wasn’t there. It worries me a little, what with all the strange things going on.”

“Cats wander. He’ll be back in time for lunch.” I didn’t think the cat’s disappearance was related to what was “going on.” A few nights ago, one of the houses had the garbage cans knocked over and smashed in, litter everywhere through the freshly groomed grass. Then the little glass square in someone’s rear garage door had been smashed through. Some things were missing from inside, tools and such, some food from the deep freeze unit they kept out there, but the alarm went off when whoever it was tried to enter the house; I guess the noise scared them and they fled. The night before last, a couple of cars were broken into, glove boxes rummaged through, but nothing missing.

“Oh, you’re probably right,” she said. “Would you like to come inside for a cup of coffee?”

I yawned. “Nice offer. But if it’s all the same, I think I’m just gonna head home and grab some shut eye.”

“I understand.” She smiled. “Pleasant dreams then, Mr. Swyftt.” And then she hobbled back to her house, turning and waving as I started the car.

I circled the block and then drove down a couple side streets, checking to make sure everything was still in order. Every house looked nearly the same as the one next to it. I don’t know if the neighborhood was built on a budget or what, but there were only three different looks, three different styles of house, and each had a small neatly-trimmed square of grass in the front, the garages all out to the side. The only thing that set any of them apart from the others was the occasional political sign, Re-elect Jim McTierney, or a windsock in the purple and gold colors of the University of Washington.

The one house that really stood out didn’t have signs or flags, but it did have a blonde in a bathrobe. She was quite the knock-out from behind – I couldn’t see her face – and she was bending over to grab her newspaper from the front walk. I caught her stealing glances at me in the rear-view and made a mental note to make sure her house stayed safe that night.

I was still studying her in the mirror when I almost hit the kid. I slammed on the breaks quickly, squealing and skidding on the pavement, and he staggered to the side, falling off the bike that had thrust him into my path, steadying himself on one leg. I threw the car in park and opened the door, calling out the window to him. “What the hell’s wrong with you? Aren’t you supposed to be getting ready for school or something?” He couldn’t have been older than fifteen. He had brown hair under a backward ballcap, baggy jean shorts, and a faded Nirvana t-shirt.

The initial shock in his expression, probably brought on by his near-fatal almost-collision, melted coolly into a devil-may-care attitude and swagger. “Wouldn’t have been a problem, faggot, if you hadn’t been checking out my neighbor. She’s married anyway.”

I looked back over my shoulder, but the blonde had gone back inside. I felt a pang of disappointment. “Obviously the term faggot doesn’t apply, you fucking shit, if I’m looking at a woman.”

“Ooooh,” he said, mounting his bike a little more steadily.

“Why don’t you scamper on back to wherever it is you came from, huh?”

He arched an eyebrow at me, looked as if he were about to say something, shook his head and walked his bike to the side of the car, giving me room enough to pass. As I started to roll my window up, I heard him say, “You’re the guy, aren’t ya?”

I rolled it back down. “Which guy?”

“The watch guy. My dad’s on the council, he said they hired some idiot to find out what’s doing all the damage at night. I told him it was pointless, but he didn’t want to listen to me.”

I thought it was pointless too, but it paid. “Listen to you about what?”

“Kids talk, man. Everybody knows what’s doing it.”

“What are they saying?”

“You haven’t heard? Shit. I thought you might talk to some people.”

“I talked to the members of the council, your dad probably. They’re all convinced it’s a bear or another animal from the woods nearby, maybe some neighborhood kids getting drunk and playing pranks.”

“Yeah, it’s kids alright,” he said. “But not like they think.”

“Alright, genius. What is it then?”

“Chuck Finway and Mark Barring.”

“Okay. Which house is theirs?”

“You don’t get it. They’re dead. That’s why nobody will listen.”

That got my attention. I doubted it was some roaming vengeful spirit I was on the lookout for, but the mystery was enough to engage me. “Go on. I’m listening.”

“A few weeks back, there was a party at Marcy Taylor’s. Chuck and Mark got shit-faced and they tried to drive home. They ran off the road, plowed through some old farmer’s fence and into his field or whatever, crashing the car into the side of his barn. Nobody had seen it, and I guess they tried to go for help, but Mark was bleeding pretty bad, I heard, and they ended up falling down some abandoned well.”

“How do you know all this?”

“They found the car. Farmer was pissed. Of course, it took a couple of days before the police found both the bodies down at the bottom of the well. Looked like something had been feeding off ‘em.”

“Feeding? Like what?”

“I don’t know. Rats, I guess. So anyway, kids at school say that now their spirits can’t rest or something. Since their bodies were eaten, they wander the night looking for things they can eat.”

“Sounds like bullshit to me.”

“Yeah, well, whatever man. You asked, I told ya.”

I nodded. I rolled the window back up, and the kid just looked at me. There was just a crack left when I said, “Don’t fall in any wells.” He gave me a look that said, “Go fuck yourself, asshole.” And I drove home, thinking about what he had told me.

That night, I was back, but I didn’t park by Mrs. B’s house. I parked in front of the blonde’s. It seemed like a better vantage point to…I don’t know, see something. It was dusk as I pulled up, having stopped on the way and picked up a dozen donuts and a jug of coffee that was supposed to feed ten. I figured maybe it would get me through the night. I’d brought a book and a couple magazines and settled in, poured my first cup of coffee and began to read, stealing glances out of the corner of my eye at the house.

Just after dark, I was startled when someone rapped on my window. I don’t know how they had snuck up on me, but they did. What surprised me even more was seeing Natasha Stone, Special Agent of the FBI, standing in a fuzzy robe, flannel pants with rubber duck print and bunny slippers. She had her hair up in a loose pony tail and she wasn’t wearing any makeup. I almost didn’t recognize her.

She muffled something at me through the closed window, and I rolled it down. “What are you doing outside of my house, Swyftt? You trying to take this relationship to the next level?”

“What…what do you mean?”

“I thought that was you this morning. Are you stalking me?”

And then it clicked. The blonde hair, the bath robe – I was sitting outside her house. “I was…oh. Sorry, love, didn’t know you lived here.”

She seemed to chew on that a moment, wrinkling her brow at me and asking, “You’re serious. So then what are you doing here?”

“Your neighborhood watch hired me to find out what’s vandalizing the neighborhood. I’m surprised, now, to see that such an accomplished agent as yourself couldn’t handle it.”

She showed me her best mocking smile. “Ha. Ha. FBI doesn’t handle small cases like this. It’s all violent crimes and terrorism. But you know that. I guess I’ve just been so distracted lately with these internet guys we’re tracking. It’s a mess. I’m just getting home.”

I nodded in understanding and motioned to the passenger seat. “You want some coffee? Donut?”

“No,” she said, “I just want a hot bath and my four hours of sleep. I’ve gotta be at the office early. I just saw the car and wanted to make sure you weren’t some pervert that I had to worry about.”

“Pervert?” I asked with a grin. “I actually chose this spot because there was some hot blonde over here this morning. She was wearing a bathrobe just like that.”

“Cute,” she said. “I guess I’m lucky I don’t have any windows in my bathroom.”

“I guess so.”

“Well, just be ready,” she said as she turned away. “If anything happens like last night, you won’t have any time to be spying in windows.”

I couldn’t hide the surprise in my voice as I said, “But nothing happened last night. I was here the whole time.”

She shook her head, turned casually back to face me. “Then I guess you aren’t earning your keep. Mr. Beasley next door just told me about Mrs. B’s cat.”

“Yeah, she told me this morning. It’s missing. So what?”

“It’s not missing. She found the collar in her backyard, by the garden. It had been torn from the cat’s neck and there were spots of blood that trailed off into the bushes.”

“Why would the ghosts of two stoned teenagers eat a cat?”

“What?” Apparently she hadn’t heard this story. “Who told you that?”

“Some kid I almost ran over on a bike this morning.”

“Oh, Geoffrey.” She shook her head. “I wouldn’t listen too much to him, Jono. He’s kind of known as a troublemaker and a liar. If anything, it’s probably him that’s causing all the trouble. Keep your eye out tonight, okay?”

“I will. Go enjoy your bath. I’ll be thinking about you.”

“I’m sure you will,” she said with what sounded like a playful smile, but she’d already turned away. I watched her go, watched that swagger in her step, until she disappeared into her house.

About an hour later, Stone’s porch light flicked off. Other lights followed hers, and soon, the few street lamps that lit the little suburban road were all that glowed in the night.

With so much darkness, it was easy for my mind to play tricks. Several times, I thought I saw shadows move in the small alleys between houses or at the far end of the street. I even got out of my car a couple of times to investigate, but there was nothing. Tricks of the light, perhaps.

A little after one, I heard a house alarm chirping somewhere nearby. I strapped Grace to my leg and got out of the car.

As I shut the door, I saw a figure about a quarter mile down running at full sprint from the crowded neighborhood on the right toward the houses on the left and the tree-line beyond. I probably should have driven, it would have been a lot bloody faster, but instinct took over, and I started to run.

I wasn’t in the world’s best shape, and having a Soviet combination rifle strapped to my leg didn’t help matters much either. But I watched the shadow disappear between two houses, and a moment later, I was taking the same alley, breathing heavily and feeling the burn in my lungs, the heavy warm night air almost choking me as I gasped for breath.

I came around the house just in time to see the gate swing closed in the wooden-plank fence of the backyard. The fence was too tall to jump, so I fumbled with the latch. Pried it loose. Kicked the gate in. Drew Grace and held her at the ready.

I entered the backyard on a cobblestone walkway, bypassed a brick patio, the largest barbeque grill I’d ever seen cemented in red stone to the landscape, and saw the figure, sprinting, head-down, at the hard plastic Toddlersized swing set/slide combination.

I yelled, “Freeze!” Opened the barrel and slid in a flare shell, snapped the rifle shut, and fired. The gun popped, and red-orange flame hissed from the barrel, blindingly bright in the darkness. It hit the grass in front of the figure, and whoever it was slowed to a stop.

I popped Grace once more, extracted the spent shell and loaded three fresh ones, sliding a silver bullet in the rifle barrel, another flare and a rock salt shell in the top two. I made so much noise while I did this that the shadow I’d been chasing turned to face me, trembling as it did, and in the white-bright, crimson glow of the sparking grass, I could see Geoffrey.

“Kid,” I said. “What the fuck are you doing?”

He looked agitated, nervous. His jittery eyes scanned me, behind me, behind him. “Calm down, okay,” I said. “I just want to talk.”

“I…God…fuck…I,” he mumbled.