Haunted (32 page)

Trsiel stiffened. A long raucous laugh swirled around us.

“Don’t like that, do you?”

“I am a full-blood,” Trsiel said.

“So you’ve been told, and so you wish to believe, but you know better, don’t you? You are no more akin to the full-bloods than this pretty half-demon whelp is to me.”

“Come on, Eve,” Trsiel said, wheeling. “He’ll tell you nothing but lies.”

“I’m not the one who’s lied to you, Trsiel. Oh, but your Creator hasn’t lied, has He? He never
said
you were a full-blooded angel. He just doesn’t care to correct that misconception. No sense sowing more dissension in the ranks. Quite enough of that already—”

“Eve,” Trsiel said, voice sharpening.

“Why don’t you ask Him, Trsiel?” the demon continued. “Ask Him what you are. Or does this great warrior of truth prefer the comfort of lies?”

I turned to Trsiel. “Don’t listen to him. He wants you to leave—wants us both to leave.”

“Oh, but I don’t want you
both
to leave. Just him. Get out, mongrel. Thy presence doth offend me.”

Trsiel strode back to the center of the room and planted himself there.

“See?” the demon said, chortling. “Your defiance gives you away, half-blood. No true angel would have so much pride.”

When Trsiel said nothing, a current of hot air snaked from the couch and encircled me, wending its way up my legs, over my torso, and to my ear.

“You wish to bargain with me, whelp?” the demon whispered.

“Perhaps,” I said. “Do you wish to bargain, demon?”

“Your Nix annoyed me. You seem, if not properly respectful, at least courteous.”

“Or perhaps you just wish to cause trouble,” Trsiel said. “By giving her false information.”

“And what, sweet mongrel, would be the fun in that? There is no ‘trouble’ to be found in watching a half-breed demon and a half-breed angel pursue an arrogant Nix. The trouble comes when they
catch
her.”

“You can’t trust him, Eve,” Trsiel said. “You know you can’t.”

When I hesitated, the demon only chuckled, hot breath tickling my ear.

“When you’re ready to bargain, you’ll know where to find me.”

A blast of tropical heat, and he was gone.

We finished searching the castle, but we’d already found what had enticed the Nix here. As for the demon’s offer, the cardinal rule of bargaining is to never let your opponent know how badly you want what he has. And the encounter with the demon had left Trsiel unsettled. Better to let him cool off before I raised the subject again.

Outside the walls, Trsiel turned to me. “The Fates will want us to sit with Lizzie and Sullivan again. If you have a better idea…” He gave a distracted half-shrug. “I’m sure you do, so go ahead and do that. I’ll cover the babysitting. If you need me…”

I grinned. “I’ll whistle.”

He nodded, unsmiling.

I looked over at him. “I have no idea what that demon was needling you about, but it obviously got to you, and if you want to talk about it, I’m a pretty good listener.”

His eyes met mine, and I saw a loneliness and a sadness there that jolted through me.

“I appreciate the offer,” he said softly. “But I won’t take you up on it—not yet.”

I did indeed have a fresh plan. Thinking of Lizzie made me realize that I had to speak to another partner, one who’d enjoyed the relationship with the Nix. Getting her to talk would be a challenge, but I had an idea.

Given Jaime’s response when I asked her to summon Robin MacKenzie, I knew she’d be less than thrilled at the prospect of traveling across the ocean to summon another serial killer. And she did grumble, but it seemed more a token complaint. She didn’t have any shows scheduled for the rest of the week, so a trip to Edinburgh wasn’t a complete inconvenience. She decided to make a tax-deductible “research” vacation out of it, called her travel agent, and managed to get a last-minute ticket for a flight leaving from O’Hare in two hours.

When I met Jaime at the cemetery gates, it was almost noon.

“I don’t suppose this can wait until tonight,” she said as we wove through a posse of dog walkers.

“Hey, you’re getting better at that.”

“At what?”

“Talking without moving your lips.”

A tiny smile. “I’m a woman of many talents.”

“And if the showbiz spiritualist thing doesn’t work out for you, there’s always ventriloquism.”

She shook her head and ducked around an elderly couple bearing wreaths of plastic flowers. “Is there something going on today? Or is it always this busy?”

“I think it doubles as the neighborhood park.” I looked around at the treed landscape, dotted with people out enjoying a rare day of early-spring sun. “The way it should be, really. Otherwise, it’s just a waste of good land. It’s not like the spooks care whether you Rollerblade over their graves.” I glanced at a dog squatting next to a cenotaph. “Although that might cross the line. Hey, you! Don’t pretend you didn’t see him do that. Get back here and scoop!”

Jaime laughed. “Sic ’em, Eve.”

“I could spook the dog, but that’s not fair. Well, not unless I could spook him so he drags his owner right through that steamy pile o’ shit.”

“Speaking of alternate careers, there’s one for
you.
”

“Yeah, and if I don’t catch the Nix, that’s probably what I’ll get: celestial poop-and-scoop enforcer. Probably wouldn’t even get a sword. Just a big shiny shovel.”

“Sword?”

“Don’t ask.” I instinctively moved aside for a pram parade. “So are we going to be able to do this during the day?”

“That was my question. Remember? Possibilities of postponement?”

“Next to none, I’m afraid.”

“Damn.”

32

CONDUCTING A MIDDAY SÉANCE IN A CROWDED
cemetery…I’m sure it appeared near the top of the list of “don’ts” in the necromancer handbook.

After we tossed around a few suggestions, we decided she’d pretend to be meditating, which let her sit cross-legged on the ground, close her eyes, and mumble without attracting attention. Well, without attracting too much attention, although more than once she had to stop mid-incantation when some curious passerby stopped to ask whether she was trying to communicate with the dead.

Jaime sat about ten feet away from Suzanne Simmons’s grave, with her back to it. Meditating in a cemetery was strange enough—doing it right at the foot of the grave of a notorious serial killer would be asking for trouble. Because Jaime’s back was to Simmons’s headstone, I had to stand watch, to let her know when Simmons popped up. It took nearly two hours. More than once Jaime snuck a look my way, as if maybe she’d raised Simmons and I’d somehow failed to notice.

Unlike Robin MacKenzie, Suzanne Simmons didn’t just drop into our plane. It took at least ten minutes for her to fully materialize. When she did, there was no question of asking for ID. I’d seen her full-on in the vision the Fates gave me, and I’d never forget that face. She was still wearing prison hospital garb. The beehive hairdo from the vision was gone, and her dirty-blond hair hung about her shoulders, lanky and unwashed, as if no one bothered with that nicety while she’d lingered on her deathbed. Her feet were bare. That was the first thing she noticed—her feet. She stared down at them, lifting one, then the other, toes scrunching as if gripping the grass. Then she smiled. Eyes closed, she lifted her head and took a long, deep breath.

Jaime turned, mouth opening to speak, but I cut her short and motioned for her to wait. Wait and watch.

Simmons opened her eyes and looked around. Her gaze crossed the tombstone. A blink. She tilted her head to read the text. A tiny nod, as if the confirmation of her death was neither unexpected nor terribly alarming.

As she turned, I sidestepped, staying out of her field of vision. Her gaze passed right over Jaime, and she surveyed the cemetery grounds, gaze flickering from person to person, a slight frown as she looked out on a world that was familiar…and yet not familiar.

Two teens whooshed along the path on Rollerblades, lips and brows a patchwork of metal studs that glinted in the sunlight. The girl yapped into a cell phone while the young man skated beside her, eyes half-closed, immersed in the thumps from his headphones. As they approached, Simmons reached out. The girl on the cell phone passed right through her fingers. Simmons nodded, as if this, too, was not unexpected.

“Welcome home, Suzanne,” I said.

She turned, hands going up as if to ward off a blow. I leaned back against a neighboring tombstone, my hands shoved in my pockets.

“Are you a ghost?” she asked.

I reached down into the bouquet of flowers at the grave’s base and plucked the one I’d conjured there earlier. I held it up.

“Does it look like it?” I asked.

“Then how—?”

“Necromancy,” I said. “Ever heard of it?”

A pause, then a slow shake of her head. “No.”

“Well, necromancers can contact the dead.”

“And that’s what you are?”

“Nah.” I waved at Jaime. “That’s what she is. I’m just the client.”

Simmons looked Jaime up and down, then stepped toward her. Jaime struggled to hide her distaste, but it seeped out. Simmons cocked her head, gaze boring into Jaime’s, then took another slow step toward her, and watched the necromancer inch back.

Simmons smiled, a tiny little Mona Lisa smile. “Your friend doesn’t like me.”

“Employee, not friend. Like I said, I’m the client. I hired her to set you free.”

“Free?” Simmons’s head jerked up.

I smiled. “You like that word, don’t you?”

She shuttered her excitement and shrugged. “It’s not…unpleasant. But I suspect this act of generosity comes with a price tag.”

“That it does. No sense pretending otherwise. I brought you back to ask your advice on something. I—”

Simmons’s attention was riveted to a young boy strolling past. Her eyes gleamed like a hawk spotting a mouse. Jaime’s lips twisted. Simmons turned on her. Jaime stood her ground, arms crossed, and glared back.

Simmons turned to me. “Make her leave.”

I looked from Jaime to Simmons. It was obvious Jaime wasn’t going to be able to control her contempt—and probably wouldn’t even try. Not the most conducive atmosphere for a friendly girl-to-girl chitchat.

“Just a sec,” I murmured to Simmons, then led Jaime aside, pretending to grip her arm and tug her away.

“I’m not leaving you alone with her,” Jaime said. “So don’t ask.”

“Because you’re afraid she’ll do something to me? She can’t—”

“That’s not what I’m worried about.”

“Oh. I see. So you think this is all part of my master plan to release a league of murderers back into the world?”

“No, but I set her free. She’s my responsibility.”

“She’s not going anywhere unless I let her. She runs, I can take her down. You know I can. I’m not asking you to leave. Just back off a bit. Better yet, let us back off. We’ll take a walk, but stay within sight.

Jaime agreed, and I returned to Simmons and led her onto the path, being careful to avoid body contact with her, and to avoid walking through anything that should be solid.

“It’s about the Nix,” I said.

Another Mona Lisa smile. “I thought it might be.”

“She’s approached me with an offer. Sounds good, but so does ‘prime real estate in the heart of sunny Florida’ until you realize you’ve bought a hundred acres of swamp.”

“Caveat emptor.”

“Exactly, so I’m doing my homework. She gave me your name as a reference.”

The corners of her mouth twitched. “Ah, yes. She does like to do that. Praised me to the heavens with that other one.”

“Cheri MacKenzie.”

A small roll of the eyes. “Whatever her name was. Quite desperate of the Nix, really. Like a man who picks up a piece of street meat because she reminds him of his dead wife.”

“She did kind of look like you.”

“You noticed it, too.”

I circled a large oak, skirting the picnickers beneath, and headed back in Jaime’s direction.

“Is that a ‘no’ for the recommendation?” I said.

“Not at all. As a partner, the Nix was splendid. I would have traded Eric for her, if I could have.”

“So she’s straight-up, then. I can trust her not to betray me.”

Simmons laughed, a tinkling, girlish laugh. “Oh, of course she’ll betray you. Or she’ll try to. She betrays us all.”

I looked over at her. “You don’t seem to hold a grudge about it.”

“I don’t blame her for trying. I knew she would. As soon as I started spreading my wings, wanting to do things my way, I knew she’d turn on me. I saw it coming and avoided it. Not that it did any good in my case. That idiot, Eric, loused it up for us. As for the Nix, she delivered what she promised. I reaped the rewards…” She smiled at me. “And I still reap them.”

“Through the visions.”

Her smile broadened. “She takes good care of us. Special little treats that make the torment almost sweet.”

Something to the left caught her attention. I turned to see a child crouched on the ground, poking a finger at something. A little girl with short, wild red hair and bright blue eyes, her jeans and sneakers filthy the way only a five-year-old can make them. She poked again and a toad jumped. With a gap-toothed grin, she shuffled forward, still crouching, finger outstretched.