Unshapely Things (24 page)

Casually, I looked over. The elf was not quite my height, decently built, and dressed in old jeans and a white T-shirt. Two little earrings hooped around the point of his right ear, and dark sunglasses covered most of his face. I hate people who wear sunglasses at night. He nonchalantly looked over at me as he collected his change and gum, then strolled out.

Dmitri came back and finished making my sandwich. He wrapped it up, and we went to the register. I handed him a few bills. "Ever see that guy before?"

Dmitri shook his head and gave me change. "Not really. He was in about an hour ago."

"Thanks." He picked up his car magazine again.

I stood in front of the deli for a long moment. The street was empty again, but I could sense the elf's essence trailing to the right—toward my apartment building. Shaking off my apprehension, I walked home. The elf was probably just a party guest, and I wasn't about to go a block out of my way just to satisfy a little prickling paranoia. As I turned the corner, I realized that this would be the scene in a movie where I would think, "Why would that idiot walk around that corner?"

Sleeper Street was quiet. Too quiet, I thought with delicious omen. I mentally chuckled at my own melodrama. Sleeper Street was always quiet; that's why I liked it. A few cars were parked haphazardly along the curb, sharing space with an old refrigerator, mildewed cartons, and glass fragments. No one ever parked in the loading lane of the warehouse across the street. Delivery trucks showed up way too early in the morning for most of my neighbors to get up and move their cars.

In the dimness ahead, I saw movement near my building. A bit of sheet lightning flashed against the overcast and in the brief instant of light, I could see it was an elf with a crew cut. Dressed in a tank top and shorts, he was leaning against the building. He pushed himself away from the wall and moved toward me slowly. I purposely activated my shields. He wasn't the guy from the deli, but that guy was nowhere to be seen. I gauged how far ahead of me he could have gotten before I left the deli and came up with a very short distance. Without breaking stride, I cut into the street. If the guy coming toward me were innocent, he would probably think I was an overly cautious wimp.

In the light of a loading dock, I stopped and made a show of tying my boot-laces. As I came up from the crouch, I discreetly pulled my knife out of my boot, using the sandwich to hide the motion. I held the shaft against the bag, the six-inch blade pressed between it and my forearm. As I started walking again, I heard footsteps behind me. Looking over my shoulder, I saw the elf from the deli about thirty feet behind me. He had doubled back somehow. Not a good sign. Turning away, I felt a rush of adrenaline. The other elf had stepped into the street as well. Definitely not a good sign.

I kept moving at my normal pace, closing the distance between us, pretending I noticed nothing amiss. I could hear the one behind me pick up his pace. The one ahead of me made no pretense of nonchalance. He came directly toward me. When he was ten feet away, I put on a sudden burst of speed and gave him a flying kick to the chest. Before turning away, I had only a brief moment of satisfaction at the startled look on his face as he fell over backwards.

I moved into a fighting stance, flipping the knife forward in my hand as I dropped the sandwich. The other elf ran toward me, shouting in German. A momentary wave of paralysis hit me. The little punk was trying to immobilize me with a grade school spell. His research obviously hadn't revealed that some of my defense shields still worked. They were good enough to blunt the thrust of a simple spell, but not anything stronger. Instinctively, I muttered my own warding spell, forgetting that no ability had responded to my command in months. A spasm of pain flickered in my head, and my knees went weak.

He was chanting again, a more focused immobilizer. I lunged at him with the knife. He smiled cockily at me as he easily avoided the blade. The move was enough to let me know I wasn't dealing with a professional. I hadn't meant to connect. I wanted to distract him from chanting, and he'd amateurishly obliged. With a quick roll to the left, he lost the physical advantage of pinning me between himself and his accomplice. I came up on my feet at a run. If I could make it to my building, I'd be safe. The front door had been keyed to my voice for just that sort of situation. If I could get through it and into the vestibule, no one would be able to open it again until I released it—or someone from the Guild showed up.

Something hit me hard in the back of the knees, and I fell. As I rolled onto my back, the elf in the shorts grabbed me by the shirt and hit me in the face. The blow glanced off my cheekbone, but still hurt. The other elf was chanting again from a safe distance. As the one who held me hauled his fist back for another blow, I could feel my limbs starting to compress against my sides. Before I lost all mobility, I heaved up and grabbed him in a hug. We fell to the ground together in a tangled knot of arms and legs. I would have laughed if my situation hadn't been so precarious. I had broken the spell by using the puncher as a shield. Whoever the guy in the jeans was, he wasn't adept at spell-casting if he needed a clear line of sight and an isolated target to succeed. Score one for me.

Before short pants could get his bearings, I bit him on the shoulder. No one ever expects a guy to bite. It's dirty fighting, but so's two on one. He made an odd barking sound and wrenched himself away. I scrambled to my feet. The apartment building door was still too far away to make a run for it fully exposed like I was, so I turned toward the spellcaster and ran right at him, my knife held ridiculously out in front of me like a spear. He tried his damnedest to keep chanting this time, but he still didn't get that the knife was just a feint. I didn't want to kill him, just shut him up. He backpedaled away in fear and never noticed my fist making for his throat until the last second. With a pained choking sound, he grabbed his neck. I gave him a knee in the stomach for good measure, and down he went.

Before I could step back, short pants sucker punched me in the kidneys, and I clumsily fell over the caster. He recovered enough to grab my legs. This time I slashed at him for real. He gasped as the cloth and skin split open on his chest but held on to me. The other one kicked the knife out of my hand and hit me in the ribs. As he leaned over to punch me again, a blaze of white lightning shot over our heads. I could feel the electric charge dance through my hair.

"Leave off!" someone shouted.

We all froze. At the end of the street, the black silhouette of a woman strode toward us, her hand raised palm out and glowing white. Short pants chose to ignore her and hit me in the face again. Blood shot out my nose. Another bolt of light blazed at us and knocked him off his feet.

She came nearer. "I said leave off!"

The spellcaster released my legs and crawled away a few feet.

"Face me or flee!" she shouted, boosting a little power to her hand to make her point. They didn't need any more time to consider. In seconds, they were on their feet and running.

I sat up and cradled my nose with my hand. With all the blood pouring out, I couldn't sense who my savior was. She moved out of the light from the end of the street and leaned over me, and I saw her face more clearly. "Hi, Keeva."

She knelt on one knee beside me with a concerned look on her face. "Is it broken?"

I shook my head. "Looks worse than it is."

She stretched her hand toward my face. "Here, let me. I'm not much of a healer, but I can mute the pain." I felt a brief surge of warmth, and the pain did lessen. The blood still flowed copiously though.

I let her help me to my feet. "Don't waste time here. Go get them."

"It's over, Connor."

"They were trying to kill me!"

She sighed and shook those long red tresses. "Only you can turn a mugging into a murder conspiracy."

I peeled off my T-shirt and wadded it up. Gingerly, I pressed it to my nose. "What are you doing here?"

"Saving your ass, as usual."

"I want to know what you're doing on my street."

"I don't need this." She started to walk away, and I grabbed her arm. She glared at me with her best imperious haughtiness. "You dare!"

I dropped my hand. "Can the more-royal-than-thou crap. You know I couldn't care less. I want to know what you're doing here, and you're going to tell me or I will make your life miserable until you do."

She compressed her lips into a very thin line. I didn't have much concrete to hold over her except for the same petty stuff everyone has. But I had gotten hints of bigger stuff here and there when we were working together. Nothing I couldn't follow up on if need be. I could see Keeva's mind working through the same chain of thought.

"I'm working on an investigation that macDuin wants kept quiet."

"And how does following me fit into it?"

She folded her arms across her chest. "I am not following you. I had no idea I'd end up talking to you tonight If I see you getting beat up again, I promise I won't interfere."

I dabbed at my nose. The bleeding had slowed, but some swelling had begun. I knew Keeva well enough to know that would be the end of her explanation. I couldn't force her to tell me any more than she had. I leaned down and picked up my knife. "Who's working the serial killer case?"

She smiled smugly. "I am, like I told you I would. MacDuin spent today reviewing the files. I'm getting it tomorrow."

"Want some help?"

She laughed, like I knew she would. "You are priceless, Connor. The last thing macDuin wants is you anywhere near this case."

I shrugged. "He doesn't have to know."

"But he would. He probably has someone watching us right now."

Looking for a clean spot, I refolded the bloody T-shirt and pressed it against my nose again. "And you like working under those conditions?"

She found something fascinating to stare at on the ground. "It suits my purposes for the moment. Stay out of it or he'll force me to bring you in on interference charges. We've already got you for tampering with a murder scene."

"You forget, Keeva. I was born here. I may be fey, but I'm also an American citizen. He only has free rein with non-citizen fey. He'd need the Commissioner's approval—which I'm betting he won't get—and a federal court order—which won't happen quickly on such a minor charge."

"Just stay out of it," she said.

"Suit yourself. I'm not backing off." I walked angrily away from her toward Summer Street.

Scanning the sidewalk, I found my sandwich and picked it up. Thankfully, the bag was still intact and closed. I walked back to Keeva and passed her without a word. "I can make your life miserable, too, you know," she called out.

I looked back at her, but kept walking. "Keeva, I just picked my dinner out of the gutter. I doubt you can make my life any worse."

The Murdock residence on K Street in South Boston had the kind of silent repose that buildings have on Sunday mornings. The well-kept row house had stern black shutters and double-mullioned windows in a brick façade, the forest green door firmly shut. A cement urn on the top step overflowed with white petunias. It was all very respectable. I felt awkward hesitating on the sidewalk, praying that I had arrived after Mass. The Murdocks were church-going Catholics, and I had a vague recollection that services ended about noon. Dinner followed at two, so I had planned on arriving about an hour before. Whenever I had visited in the past, the door had stood ajar, and someone was either coming or going. Most people seemed to just walk in without knocking, a custom I had not grown up with just a few blocks away. That kind of familiarity meant family or very close friends. As I debated whether to knock or ring the bell, someone called my name, and I turned.

I breathed a small sigh of relief at the sight of Kevin Murdock. I had debated how casually to dress for dinner and gambled that even the commissioner would not mind shorts in such unbearable heat. To hedge the bet, I wore a polo shirt so I would at least have a collar. Kevin strode toward me wearing cargo shorts and a T-shirt. Cradling several loaves of bread in one arm, he extended the other to shake my hand.

"Nice eye. What's the other guy look like?" he said, as we walked up the steps.

My hand went up to my cheekbone, and I winced. It was still tender, a little dark under the left eye, with a nice red-black smear near the bridge of my nose. "I think I broke his sunglasses."

Kevin mock-cringed, sucking in air between his teem. "Damn. Oakley's, I hope?"

I followed him into the oddly quiet house. "Urn, a drugstore brand, I think."

He led me through the front hall, past the formal parlor, and into a kitchen rich with the smell of pot roast. He dropped the bread on a pink Formica counter and opened the refrigerator. He handed me a beer and started pulling plates out of a cabinet. Checking the stove, he sipped broth out of a pot and adjusted the spice. I couldn't help thinking of him as a kid. He was still in his early twenties, the last of seven children, and given that the next oldest sibling was pushing thirty, probably a surprise baby. He didn't even look like a Murdock, with his almost black hair and deep blue eyes, but then I'd never met Mrs. Murdock. All I knew about her was that she was gone some fifteen years and not a topic for conversation with anyone.

"Your turn to cook, I see."

He went back into the fridge and rummaged around. "Oh, we always follow the schedule around here. Everyone's up on the roof. Go on up. I'll call everyone down in a bit."

I had never been beyond the first floor of the Murdock house. As I climbed the stairs, I passed two men in deep conversation on the first-floor landing. I recognized one of them as a city councilor. They nodded courteously as I passed but continued talking. On the next floor, Grace Murdock sat in one of the bedrooms talking with her sister Faith and two other women. They waved at me in a way that said join us or not, either way's fine. I didn't know them more than to say hello, so I waved back and kept going. I always had to make a conscious effort not to make fun of their names in front of Murdock. Whatever his religious convictions were, his father's were definitely enough for the whole family. The next two floors held more bedrooms and a closed door that, by the look of the other rooms, probably was the commissioner's bedroom. To the left of the door, a last flight of stairs was a little steeper, added on well after the townhouse was built, when homeowners finally shed the old Brahmin decorum and started hanging out on the roof.