bedeviled & beyond 01 - bedeviled & beguiled (6 page)

No doubt about it, my preacher wasn’t killed by any human. That narrowed it down a bit for me, but still left a short list of about a dozen possibilities. I forced myself to step closer to Deaver and examine the wounds on his body more closely.

His torso, which appeared to have borne the brunt of the damage, was torn from just under his chin to just above his groin. The rips appeared random, crisscrossing his unfortunate, white flesh with brutal efficiency but with no apparent plan. They could have been inflicted by an animal with large claws, except that I knew they were not the result of any natural predator.

My mind unwillingly returned to the gargoyles on the roof and I shivered as I again thought about the malevolent spirit I’d felt outside the church. It was clear that I’d sensed the very creature which had hacked Deaver to pieces. And that I’d been just a few steps behind it as it completed its gruesome task.

~SC~

The Strange Death department of the police hadn’t been too surprised when I’d called them. They’d dealt with me before. They weren’t wild about the kind of business I always brought to them, but aside from the occasional verbal attack from a cynical rookie, they generally left me alone. Though it had been a different story once. I guess even the cops couldn’t believe that I’d be stupid enough to kill all those people and then keep calling them to show them what I’d done.

Besides, in the larger scheme of things we kind of worked for the same boss.

With a grimace on his face, Death Detective Raoul stood over the mess that had once been my client. He shook his head with its short, brown curls. Deaver’s body had been cut down and was lying in an unappealing puddle on the floor. I watched the Death Detective’s square, masculine features twist with disgust before he turned back to me. “Phelps, you have got to get a different career assignment.”

I forced a smile. “Hey, we don’t get to choose what we do DD. You know that.”

He grimaced again and nodded. “Damned shame. I knew this man. My aunt’s sister’s brother’s wife used to come to this church.” He grinned a little guiltily and leaned closer, speaking softly so that only I could hear him. “My aunt asked me to check him out before the woman joined. Don’t tell anybody, I’m not supposed to run those kind of checks for my personal use.”

I grinned and drew a zipper across my lips.

“Anyway...” he straightened up and spoke in a normal tone again, “I checked Deaver out and he was clean. Better than that, he’s been strangely successful against the devils. Helped a lot of people out with what he could do for them.”

A young, female cop handed Raoul a vacuum-sealed, clear bag that contained the rope which had been around Deaver’s throat. She tossed me a frigid look as she handed it over. “This is the last of the physical evidence, sir. We’ll get the body wrapped up and send it off to the lab for a full sweep.” Once again her dark eyes swung my way and her pretty, pink lips twisted. “You want me to escort this...person out of here?”

Raoul looked up from the bag and met my gaze. Being a death detective, of considerable rank in the Strange Deaths department, he was no stranger to the bigotry of others. Civilians and cops from the other departments didn’t seem to understand the importance of the Strange Deaths squad. Many of the cops liked to joke about dealing with fairy tale monsters and the bogy man and went about their lives thinking that, because they were armed with street smarts, knowledge of the oriental fighting arts and laser canister weapons, they had control over their own survival. By denying the existence of all things spiritual and bogy, they could tell themselves that they were on equal footing with the bad guys. What they didn’t know, they somehow reasoned, couldn’t hurt them. Ironically, it had been just this narrow type of thinking that had been the catalyst for creation of the Strange Deaths Department of the police in the first place.

It had happened about twenty years earlier, several years after the Big War, when devils and demons and their various dependent sub-species had been among us for several years already but had been cautious enough to stay in the shadows and pretend they were still the stuff of grim fairy tales and monster stories told over a crackling bonfire.

Because they’d stayed silent and hidden, humans began unknowingly taunting them and decrying their very existence. As rumors of mutilations and strange killings began to move through the human underground, the police and elite scholar-snobs merely scoffed and proclaimed the degenerative effects of alcohol and drugs, which, along with cigarettes and chocolate were no longer legal but which could still be purchased on the black market if one knew where to look and had the means to purchase them.

The taunting served as bait to the spiritual world, which had hungered to be recognized and given the fearful respect it felt it richly deserved. So, gradually, the spirits left the filthy, malodorous underbelly of humankind and moved into the limelight. They cast aside their drunks and prostitutes and began killing the bright and beautiful people who lived in the clean, comfortable, church-going neighborhoods. They killed them with abandon and giddy pleasure, consuming unsoiled, sweet-smelling flesh and severing trim athletic limbs from lean, beautiful torsos. They were careful to always leave enough of the mutilated bodies behind for recognition. And gradually, even the most closed-minded of the humans had to admit that something decidedly malevolent, if not quite of the spiritual realm, had moved into the neighborhood. And whatever it was, it wasn’t looking to borrow a cup of sugar.

That was how the Strange Deaths Department had been born. With his unusual and only partially known background and training in voodoo and white witchcraft, DD Raoul had been an obvious choice for the department and had been one of the first to volunteer for assignment there. He’d quickly gained a certain notoriety as a tough cop with a nose for finding and prosecuting the bogyman. Since he’d been on the job, whether by coincidence or design, the number of strange crimes in the Angel City area had lessoned markedly and the bogyman seemed less inclined to practice his deadly art.

Raoul looked down at the petite rookie standing before us and gave her a beautiful smile filled with straight, white teeth. “You got a problem with halfling Phelps, Rogers?”

“She’s a halfling, sir”

His grin widened, but a dangerous glint touched his brown eyes. “That is a fact, Rogers. I repeat, you got a problem?”

Rogers’s pretty little nose wrinkled in disgust but she wasn’t stupid, she knew she was outnumbered. She pushed her hands into the pockets of her uniform gray slacks and shook her head. “No sir.”

Raoul’s smile disappeared as the dangerous glint in his eyes sharpened. “That’s good, Rogers, ’cause I got no time or patience for bigots in my squad.”

Rogers nodded mutely and walked away, her narrow shoulders drooping from the rebuke.

I sighed and stuck out my hand. “Why do you always feel inclined to defend me, DD? I’m a big girl.”

He turned a genuine smile on me and took my outstretched hand softly, almost caressingly. “I got my reasons. Besides...” a different kind of glint entered his liquid, brown eyes, “you’re kind of cute.”

I laughed and shook my head at him. I knew that DD Raoul was not nearly as flip as he tried to appear about bigotry. He’d fought the same battle many times, donning his white armor for other poor souls whose DNA wasn’t “human” enough. His reputation was well known throughout the force and even to outsiders like me. Bigots didn’t get very far around him.

Raoul was probably the most powerful DD in the strange crimes unit. His success rate was as good or better than any other cop’s in the country. His dedication to his job and sense of fair play were especially noteworthy under the current socio-political climate.

Since the equality movement really took hold in 2010, no one on the force or in the military was allowed to have a rank and no one was paid more than any other, no matter how successful he/she was. The not too surprising result was that most cops approached their jobs with an obvious lack of motivation and a slight chip on their shoulders. Why kill yourself if you’re not going to get any reward for it, either monetary or commendatory? Raoul was different. He cared about the cases he worked. He had his own personal reasons for everything he did. Most people didn’t know what those reasons were. I did.

He put an arm around my shoulders and walked me out of the office, which was filled to overflowing with cops and technicians. “You got any idea what did this, Phelps?”

I looked him right in the eye and smiled. “You don’t wanna know what I think.”

He smiled right back at me. “I’m sure you’re right, but tell me anyway.”

My eyes climbed toward the ceiling and I pointed upward with one finger. He frowned his confusion. I didn’t want to speak it out loud, but I didn’t seem to have much choice. Sometimes if you said their name out loud they woke up. You never want to wake up gargoyles if you can avoid it. They generally don’t wake up happy.

I decided to whisper it into Raoul’s ear. He groaned and closed his eyes. “I been tellin’ the Chief we need to round up all those little bastards and exterminate ’em. He says they’re protected until they do something. I’d say this is something.”

I nodded. “I am a little surprised though. Ever since the Big Guy took out that rebel group of them in ’49 they’ve just been sitting quietly up on top of their buildings like they used to before the Big War. If one of them woke up and did this, there must be something really big brewing.” I leaned closer to Raoul and lowered my voice. “Or they think they have adequate protection.”

“You know somethin’ you aren’t tellin’ me?” His dark eyes narrowed suspiciously.

I nodded. “Yeah. But I can’t tell you. At least not until I figure it all out myself.”

DD Raoul didn’t like that one bit. But there wasn’t much he could do about it except tell me to be careful. Which he did, as I left.

I bid Raoul goodbye and trudged wearily to the Viper. I was asleep before the Viper dropped gently into my vehicle shelter at home. I roused myself just enough to drag my weary body to bed and collapse on it. I was so tired I thought I’d probably sleep until well into the following day.

Which just goes to show you how naïve I can be at times.

CHAPTER SEVEN

When Dreams Try Your Soul

I tossed and turned and flailed around and thought I was in hell

But how to justify those heav’nly thoughts that in my mind did dwell.

He loomed over me, his dark golden skin touched with soft, caressing light, his bottomless, black eyes fixed intently on my face. I seemed unable to move as he knelt beside me on the bed and touched my hair, which was spread across the pillow.

“Like silk, pretty one and heavy against my hand. Do you know that beautiful hair is a sign of power in the Devil Court.”

I opened my mouth to give him a snotty response but nothing came out. His fingers threaded through my hair and cupped the back of my head, lifting me toward him. His soft lips parted and I could see the sharp tips of his beautiful, white teeth. He raised me until I was entirely too close to that sensual mouth, until I was just inches from those eyes. Those velvety black eyes were pulling at my thoughts, making me dizzy and confused.

Just before our lips touched, I turned my face away and raised feeble arms between us. I tried with all my might to push him away. The wimpy result was embarrassing at best. It reminded me of that dream state where you keep trying to get somewhere but never do, like when you find yourself unable to reach the top of that staircase you’ve been climbing for about eight hours in your sleep...or like when you show up at an interstellar mud wrestling convention wearing nothing but a large, green snake and can’t seem to get your foot untangled from the frothing purple demon’s slimy hair ’cause the mud’s too slippery and the snake won’t stay still...well...I think you get my drift. Suffice it to say that my mind was willing but my body was frunkin’ worthless. Failing in my attempt to evade my dream devil, I gave up trying to kick his well-formed ass and gathered all of my hate and contempt into my eyes, which I then blasted at him like a laser weapon set on kill. Instead of dying from the blast of hate in my eyes, the damnable creature simply laughed at me.

“You mustn’t fight your destiny, pretty one. It will do you no good and it will only increase my pleasure.”

That was too much for me. Even in my sleep I can’t resist a challenge. I squeezed my eyes closed and threw out my power, I felt it surge away from me and flow around him. I wrapped him in a tight, form fitting blanket of my power and opened my eyes to give him a smug smile. He laughed, that deep, throaty laugh that made me warm in places where I didn’t want to be warm.

I laughed too, because he actually thought I’d given him all I had. His eyes narrowed and he pulled me closer, his lips just touching mine as I tightened the power around him and ripped him off my bed and out of my, unfortunately reluctant arms. I watched his eyes grow round with surprise as he hung, suspended above my bed, his long legs crossed casually as though it had been his idea to dangle there. Then his beautiful mouth curved in a knowing smile and he disappeared in a silvery shimmer. Leaving behind only a whisper in my mind. “Sleep well, pretty one. We have only just begun this battle.”

“Bite me.” I murmured in my sleep and then I drifted soundly and thankfully into the sandman’s less-than-sexy, but eminently restful arms.

I woke up several hours later with a start. The dream still clung to me like a bad smell. As I went about my morning rituals I couldn’t seem to shake it. It had felt so real. Could it have been real?

Naaahh. It couldn’t have been. I don’t have the kind of power I’d displayed in the dream. I smiled as I had the thought. But it would be really crashin’ if I did.

After I’d showered and dressed, I fixed myself a breakfast hydrate and sat down in front of my information unit. I sent a quick note off to Emo, telling him I’d be in later to meet with a new client who was coming into the office and told him he would either have to make himself scarce or put some clothes on. I smiled as I sent the note off because I knew there would be some blue devil curses flying around at that piece of instruction. Then I put my mind to the job at hand, which was getting some additional information on the royal devil clan.