Forsaken (8 page)

I could see him shake his head from the corner of my eye. His logical brain would have a hard time wrapping itself around the occult goings-on happening right under his nose. Even
I
had to give up on my stubborn sensibilities and give in to the truth, which had been carefully shoved up my ass.

“I know you’re having a hard time. I talked to your mom–"

“Fuck me running,” I groaned.

“Seriously, we’re worried. More than worried, we’re –"

The jingling of my phone cut him off in the nick of time as it rattled against the cheap plastic in my cup holder. I answered it hurriedly, not wanting to hear any more about how he and my naïve mother had plotted my committal in my absence.

“Hello?” I answered, too excited to be on the phone at whatever likely ungodly hour it was.

“Ms. Hart?” a deep, southern drawl asked from the other line.

“Yes, Detective Colorado.” I let my eyes slide in Mike’s direction. He was at attention and leaned closer to my head to hear the other end of the call.

“I’d like to meet up with you and your friend, Mr. Petersen this morning.” He referred to Mike as ‘mister’ for the second time since I’d met him.

“It’s
Detective
,” I insisted, falsely proud. “I’ll get him on the line in a bit. Where’d you like to meet?”

“I’m at the Days Inn near the airport. Let’s meet in the lobby café.” His cadence was slow and nearly lost my attention from the beginning of a sentence to its end.

“Give me an hour?” I wanted more time, but I didn’t bother pressing my luck.

“Will do, ma’am.” He hung up his line without anything further.

“We’ve got us a date,” I said to Mike who had heard most of the conversation anyway.

“You better come inside and shower.” He stood and I started to protest, but he leaned in inches from my face. “You reek like rotten meat.”

He left me to sit stunned in my tiny, smelly car. Something fucky was afoot. Too many so-called nightmares in too short of a time. Stinky remnants weren’t the norm for a run-of-the-mill scary dream. It was obvious something quite real was lurking in the shadows, something with me in its sights. I couldn’t stop long enough to figure out the bump-in-the-night boogeyman; I had human issues to deal with.

I left the sanctity of my car to take Mike up on his shower offer. Recalling the last encounter with Mike and running water, I locked the door behind me. He had pulled out a pair of my old jeans, which were tucked away in the closet we once shared and one of his t-shirts. The ensemble wasn’t the picture of innocence, but it was better than smelling like decaying meat.

My skin smelled fresh like Mike. He hadn’t said much of anything to me since I’d stepped foot in his house. I didn’t blame him. Honestly, I didn’t want to be anywhere near him. I used to think I would just move on, I’d get my shit together and live a normal life on my own without his grinding thumb restraining me. That never really happened. It wasn’t clear if that was just fate or my subconscious guilt, but either way it was becoming more obvious as the time passed that regardless of where I thought my life would go, it wasn’t the same without him. Being a hard-ass took effort; it required guts and energy, and an unhealthy sense of pride. Spiteful, vengeful, and fucking stupid, I didn’t know how to handle my own life any more than I knew about the world I’d fallen into ass-first.

I’d been a prick, I’d fucked up, and he still wanted me. It didn’t make sense and it likely never would, but the reality of it was I forced myself to hate him because hating myself was just too damn hard. I’d lopped that nose right off to spite my bitch face and ruined my entire existence. If I had just said yes that night, if I had just let him have me, I wouldn’t be in the situation I was in. I wouldn’t be running from beasties and Tatum wouldn’t be dead. He would have prevented all of my stupid, selfish, reckless choices. He would have stopped me from fucking up everything. I would have resented every last second of it.

Michael Petersen could be a douche, he could come across as controlling, he could even make me hate his guts on occasion, but of all the people on the planet, he was one of my favorites. As I stood in our once-shared living room looking at all the pictures of the two of us he’d never taken down, I made a promise to myself not to let my only-living best friend leave my life for any reason. Even my own fucked-up bullshit.

“You ready?” His tone was curt and let me know he wasn’t happy to have me standing in his house wearing his Zeppelin shirt.

I turned quickly and my eyes met the best-dressed
Detective
Petersen I’d seen since he’d made detective. My heart thudded, for a shit-ton of reasons, but the smile I couldn’t stop from hitting my face was all for him. “Yeah,” I nodded and tried not to look as stupid as I felt.

My own wishy-washy bullshit was getting old, even to me. Honestly, if I were the world and had to deal with me, I’d have kicked myself square in the throat long ago. Seeing my own mortality, my own villainess, knowing there was a monster living inside me brought forward feelings I tried really hard to quell. Inadequacy topped that list with self-loathing coming in at a gleeful runner-up. Things needed to change and most of them belonged to me.

“Let’s go, suspect.” He added the last with a crooked brow, which left me questioning whether or not he was playing good cop or bad cop.

Changes would come, I’d make sure of that, but I had to survive my own life first. The bitch would be addressed, assessed, and repressed, but first she needed to fuck shit up. Then, perhaps, a long turn in the clink could provide me with the time and resources I needed to turn my life around. Maybe I could plead insanity. In that sense, crazy looked like a free and clear alternative to reality. Can we say, death penalty? Either way, I was fucked.

And apparently, pretty damned stinky.

Chapter 7

The lobby café was a glorified Denny’s, done up in the usual red leather and yellow accents. Detective Colorado sat in a far corner booth. A single cup of coffee sat in front of him, surrounded by empty packets of sweetener. I wondered if he wanted some coffee with his sugar, but decided it best not to piss off the detective about to question me regarding the murder of my best friend.

“Detective Colorado,” Mike said cordially and stuck his thick hand out to shake.

“Mr. Petersen,” the big man replied.

“
Detective
,” Mike and I said in unison.

I smiled and could see Mike resisting the urge to pinch and poke me.

“Excuse me,” Detective Colorado dipped his head. A modest form of apology for a social faux pas he had committed not once, not twice, but thrice.

“Miss Hart.” I didn’t get a handshake, just a nod. I narrowed my eyes at the man. I’d yet to pinpoint his agenda –
let’s face it, everyone has one
– but it looked more and more like his seeing me as an innocent bystander was a pipe dream.

Mike scooted into the half-circle, red-pleather booth, letting me sit gracefully at the end. A waitress shuffled to the table and asked us in a thick Spanish accent what we’d like to order. I hadn’t eaten but what my mom had shoved down my throat in more than a couple days because, well, it seemed like the worst thing I could do for whatever stress-related reason my brain had. But, oddly, I was ravenous. I wanted meat. Bacon sounded like the best thing I could put in my food hole at the time, and without thinking about my situation, I ordered hash browns and seven strips of bacon. Mike had ordered a coffee before I had my turn so when the woman nodded her head and scooted off, Mike didn’t have a chance to change anything. The detective didn’t seem to notice my piggery, but Mike stomped on my foot under the table. I was supposed to be in mourning, and I was, but it didn’t mean I couldn’t eat. One look at my fat ass could tell anyone watching I didn’t get by in life living on salads.

“Sir,” Mike started the conversation, “thank you for coming all the way out here, but it really wasn’t necessary. Miss Hart and I–" The southern drawl cut him off.

“Mr. Petersen.” I heard Mike grind his teeth. “My coming to the West Coast was necessary, and if I had it my way, the two of you would be on a plane back to New Orleans with me until I’m satisfied this case is solved.”
Fuck
. “Unfortunately, that isn’t possible at this point.”

“
Mr
. Colorado.” He made a point to emphasize ‘mister’. “I can assure you Miss Hart and I are here at your disposal for any questions you need answering. We are just as eager for our friend’s murderer to be brought in. You can understand our need for closure.” He played the pity card.

“Oh, surely.” He nodded and his big, fat face squished and unsquished. “
You
can understand my need to follow up on all leads, even the most pitiful.” He glanced two, brown, glaucoma-ridden eyes in my direction. His age hadn’t been obvious when we’d first met, but in the light of day, I wondered how close to retirement he was.

“Like I said, whatever you need from us.”

“I’d like to know why the two of you, and a third person, returned to New Orleans only hours after Miss Hart had flown on home.”

Mike took a breath. I opened my mouth to answer, but his hand squeezed my leg and I stopped. Allowing him to ‘handle’ things,
me
, might’ve been the best idea I ever allowed myself to have. “We returned to find Miss Price.” Simple. Easy. Explainable. Way better than any snarky crap that would’ve come out of my mouth.

“Mmm.” He nodded. I expected him to be jotting down information into his cheap spiral pad, but it didn’t look like he had one. Either he really didn’t care what we had to say, or he’d been in the crime-fighting biz so long he really didn’t need it.

No one said anything for a long minute. My lips itched to move, but Mike squeezed my leg again. He knew me too well. He knew I couldn’t handle the silence; like a ‘toon forced to listen to the tune of “Shave and a Haircut”, eventually it’d just bust out. Mike knew the routine and when we were all done, I’d ask him what it was all about, but for the time being, I held my tongue.

“Sher Mahin.” His name made us both tense. Even if I hated Mike’s control, I knew he was the go-to-guy on the law and order front and would let him save me just this once. Neither of us had any control over Cyrus. “Where does he fit into this rescue mission?”

Cyrus hadn’t changed his name legally, so his credit card used to buy our plane tickets wouldn’t really be associated with anyone or anything.

“He’s a friend,” Mike said.

“Of yours?” The detective’s brows lifted as he looked under them at Mike.

“Of Miss Price,” I added quickly, regretting it. “Of her boyfriend, actually.” I wanted to make sure Colorado knew about Malcolm and his sudden disappearance following the death of his newfound love.

“Mm.” He took a long pull of coffee, adding to the suspense. “Mr. McTavish.” I nodded and gulped back the nervous bile which had crept up my throat. “And where can I find him?”

He didn’t know. My heart raced my mind to the finish line. Years of bullshitting hadn’t prepared me for this. The general public was easy; Mike and my mom could always catch my lies, but normally, it took a bit more planning to bullshit the authorities.

“I don’t know,” I answered, Mike squeezed again and a sting of pain shot down my leg. “He was with Tatum. Cyrus came along with us when we couldn’t contact either of them.” It was the truth. Some of it. If the police didn’t know Malcolm was dead, I wasn’t about to tell them. Malcolm McTavish, my personal red herring.

“Who’s Cyrus?”

Suck me sideways
.

I cleared my throat. Someone needed to hand me a Snickers bar; I needed a break. “It’s the stage name of Mr. Mahin,” Mike said instead. His words closed my eyes in shame. He’d gladly thrown Cyrus under the bus, but I’d put him on the damn road in the first place.

Colorado pinched his face into a scowl and nodded his head over and over again. “Where can I find him?”

Mike dug his fingers into my leg. “He is the proprietor of a local private club called Embrace.”

It was obvious Mike didn’t give a shit what happened to Cyrus. I was glad he had my best interest at heart and pointing fingers in the vampy direction was a damn good plan, but it wasn’t fair to lead the law to a place like Embrace. I’d never promised I wouldn’t bring the law down on them—in fact, I’d explicitly told them all I had no control over that, but it was wrong to blatantly take eyes off the actual criminal and point them in the direction of the one mother fucker interested in helping us. Even if he’d also helped to fuck up the situation from the beginning in his quest to save his own ass and keep me clear of any watching bad-guy eyes.

“Miss Hart, I’d like you to tell me how you came to be in my town and why you left your friend behind.”

It was easy enough. All I had to do was tell the truth and pluck out all the occult and incriminating stuff. No need for all that. “Tatum had invited me to a weekend-long event to be an escort–" I stopped myself. Escort made me sound like a hooker. “It’s a term they use for a date not affiliated with their community,” I clarified. I was saying too much in my not-enough kind of way. “Malcolm, Tatum, Cyrus, and I flew out on Friday the thirtieth. We were invited to stay at the home of a colleague of Malcolm’s. By that Saturday the thirty-first, I’d had about enough of their events.” I didn’t know how to say it without implicating everyone as a suspect.

“As a Christian,” that wasn’t a true statement really, but it sounded good, “I found it hard to swallow their ideals. Please understand these people did nothing wrong, nothing illegal, but in my eyes, I couldn’t allow myself to be a part of it. When I left, Tatum and Malcolm were together. Cyrus was concerned for me and followed me back here without my knowing. When neither of us heard from Tatum or Malcolm by the following day, we decided to go back to make sure they were okay. Honestly, I didn’t care much about Malcolm. He was the one who turned my curiosity into disgust, in fact. The way he treated my friend, like she was his property, made me wonder why she would ever want to be with him in the first place. I can’t tell you too much about Cyrus. I don’t know him well, but I can say he was always a gentleman. I was concerned for my friend. Having not heard from her in over a day was weird. It felt weird. Wrong. I went back on instinct.” That was the cold, hard truth.

“Your instinct proved right.” He took another sip from his steaming cup.

“Sadly.” I let my sorrow hit my voice. “I never found her. We tried to locate them both over nearly a day and eventually, I called the local police before I had to leave the city. I did what I could, but it wasn’t enough. I tell myself I shouldn’t have left her there alone--maybe if I’d stayed, she’d be alive, but then again, maybe I’d be dead, too.” I realized I wasn’t actually talking to anyone anymore. Thoughts were coming out, honest ones, and thankfully innocent ones which I couldn’t control.

“I understand you’re executor of Miss Price’s estate.” He made it a statement, as if I was fully aware Miss Price even had an estate. Before he’d mentioned it the night before, I hadn’t. It seemed too grown-up for the likes of her and me. It was too easy to forget the two of us
had
grown up. Well, grown older.

“I wasn’t aware she had anything in order. It wasn’t something we’d ever discussed.” I tried to keep my big-girl words on my tongue even though I wanted to say ‘fuck’ this and ‘fuck’ that. Any help I could get.

“These types of things aren’t really in my job description, but I assumed you knew. You’re the benefactor of everything.”

“How did you know this and I didn’t?” Mike shifted like he knew the answer, but he kept quiet and let the actual detective on the case handle it.

Colorado shifted his gaze to Mike for a long breath then back to me. He knew that Mike knew what he was about to say. “These are the sorts of things we investigate. Connections between victims and suspects.”

He used the word ‘suspect’. He was investigating me, officially. Any hope I’d had that maybe I’d skate by under the radar was gone. Mike had already put his ass on the line getting me out of deep shit when I had to execute Sam and Diego at Midnight’s Dream. It was self-defense. I had a reason to be there and a reason to take lives in order to save my own and those around me. There was no logical, reasonable, sane, mundane reason for Tatum. The fact that Malcolm wasn’t included, Marienne, Azelie and Zorin, was anyone’s guess. I wasn’t about to bring it up.

“Sir.” My eyes welled with tears. “She was the only thing I had in the world. You investigate me all you want, but you’ll never find anything. I’d go to Hell and back to have her here with me. I lost her the moment she gave herself to Malcolm McTavish, but I always thought she’d get over him and move on. That will never happen. I understand my actions seem suspicious to you. You weren’t there; she wasn’t yours to worry over. I’m well aware of police procedure,” I glanced at Mike and back again, “but while you’re sitting here wasting your time on me, there are bad things out there that hurt people I love.” I wasn’t talking about anything he could stop, of course. I was talking about
my
time wasted discussing a woman who would never have a life again. A life I took. I knew damn good and well who killed Tatum Price. It was me. I’d live with that for the rest of whatever life I had left. My punishment had already been exacted; Azelie d’Entremonte made sure of that. “Go find
those
things.” I looked away from them, across the room at the bustling people chewing and swallowing. “I have a funeral to plan.”

My performance was Oscar-worthy, but not a second of it was bullshit. Whether he bought it or not was irrelevant; I said what I needed to. I’d made sure he knew what I’d lost and I’d made sure to finger a man--
ha-ha finger a man
--who couldn’t come to his own defense. I wondered what Tatum had to say about the whole thing and wished she’d pop up in the booth next to the big, round black man and scare the coffee right out of him. Either of his exit routes would suffice.

No one said anything for a full minute. I held in tears which had seemed to form a mind of their own in the recent week. Mike kept his hand on my leg but had cooled it with the squeezing. I’d handled myself. I’d let my mouth run, but for once, it didn’t let me down.

“Miss Hart, I can sympathize with your situation. I appreciate your cooperation and understanding. As it stands, I can fairly assume you’re the only surviving family of a violent-crime victim. I want you to be prepared for what will come next. I will verify what you’ve told me here and hopefully be able to release the victim’s home and belongings within the next week. As for funeral plans, I suggest you take the weekend to be with your loved ones, and begin the process at the start of the week. Miss Price’s remains will be transported to the city of your choosing in about seven days, give or take.” He stopped to clear his throat and make eye contact with Mike. They seemed to have been having a silent cop-talk conversation in the midst of his talking to me. “The medical examiner will need a few days to process her body for evidence and after that time, she will be ready for burial.”

“I may not be a cop, but I have been around the dead-body tree a time or two. You guys don’t have to eyeball fuck each other; I get the process. I’m not some fragile little girl. I can handle it.” The squeeze was back.