Chapter 5
Someone was staring at me. Since I was sleeping, in my bed, in my house, the sudden knowledge that I was not alone was more than a little disconcerting.
My gun rested on the wooden stepladder I used as a night stand. I could grab for it, but whoever was staring at me would see that move coming from a mile away.
Unless they had already found the gun and were pointing it at me.
That thought pushed me right over into instantly awake, eyes open, adrenalin pumping, sitting up.
“Delaney, dear. It’s about time. I’ve been waiting.”
I blinked at the voice, and also at the face of Bertie, our town’s one and only Valkyrie who was sitting in the corner of my room, in a chair, sipping something that smelled like tea.
Bertie’s white hair was cut short and a little spiky, making her sharp green eyes too large in her heart-shaped face. She wore a pantsuit in a lovely red that might make other people think of roses, but made me think of blood, and a scarf with little red cherries printed on it tied at her neck.
The tea was in a china cup that must have come from her kitchen because I didn’t own anything that delicate. Her fingernails were sharp and painted gold.
I should really start locking my front door.
“Why are you in my bedroom?” I glanced at the clock. “At six-thirty in the morning?”
“Because I need to be at work by seven, of course.”
“Of course.” I echoed like that made any sense. “Bertie? Seriously?”
“I’m delivering your package.”
“Package?”
“The one your sister left with me yesterday.”
I pressed at my eyes with my fingertips and tried to get my brain working. “Crow. You brought Crow here.”
“Exactly. Now, since you’re awake, I’ll get my day started. The fundraiser is taking quite a lot of time to coordinate. I’m always so short on volunteers. I’m going to have to reach out into the community more vigorously if people don’t start stepping forward.”
Subtle, she was not. But then Bertie didn’t so much recruit volunteers as conscript people into service. “Coffee before blackmail,” I said.
“If you want breakfast alone, you should really start locking your front door.”
I shoved the heavy quilt off my legs and swung my feet down to the floor. I was wearing what I usually wore to bed: T-shirt and boy shorts. “Not a lot of people bother to climb the million steps to my house, and those who do aren’t usually criminals.”
“Yes. Still. Most people don’t have to be murderers to have ulterior motives.”
“Did you hear about Sven?” I asked.
“Yes.”
I wouldn’t have expected another answer. She was, after all, a creature who pulled fallen warriors off the battlefield and escorted them to the party pub in the sky. It made sense she would be in the know about the newly departed.
“Do you know anything about his death that might help me find his killer?”
She paused with the graceful curve of the cup poised right at her mouth. Her eyes went hawk-sharp at that question. “Are you accusing me of something, Delaney?”
“No.” I rubbed at my forehead, stared at the floor a second, then back at her. “I’m not accusing you. I’ve just never dealt with something this...big before. Vampires don’t just show up murdered in this town. I’m not sure that it’s ever happened before.”
“It hasn’t.”
“The whole thing has me on edge. I’m new to this position.” I pointed at my chest, just over my heart. “Bridging power for the gods is one thing. Police chief is another. And this death is going to bring too much attention to our little town.”
“No one has to know about it. He was a vampire, dear. He didn’t have family outside Ordinary.”
“Apocalypse Pablo already knows about the body.”
“One mortal can be easily convinced not to remember what he saw. Old Rossi should have already taken care of that by now, actually.”
Vampires and their mind-suggestion power. It should be against the law.
“Ryder knows too.”
She raised one eyebrow and sipped tea. Apparently, her previous suggestion stood for Ryder too.
Yes, I understood that Ryder was just as mortal as Apocalypse Pablo or me...well, maybe a little more than me, but I hated the thought of stealing away his memories just because we could.
“That won’t really solve the problem.”
“The problem of the outside world finding out about Sven?”
“The problem of who killed him.”
“You are sure it was murder?”
“Yes.”
“None of the Wolfes have been brought in to question?”
The Wolfes were a big extended family of werewolves that owned the rock quarry in town, among other things. Granny Wolfe had made a truce with the Rossis years ago. The terms of the truce were that they’d both keep the murdering of respective family members to a minimum.
“I haven’t checked in with them yet. But I will. Have you heard anything concrete that would make you think they took out Sven?”
“No. Nothing at all.” She frowned a little. “How was he killed and where was he found?”
I figured she already knew this information. “Bullet through the head. The shed outside Joe Boy’s gas station.”
She sipped, her eyes focused somewhere else as she thought that over.
“What kind of bullet?”
“Silver.”
She blinked, then shook her head slightly. “I was asking about the caliber, but silver is also interesting. Several of the Wolfes carry guns.”
“Several of everyone in town carries guns.”
“What did Rossi say?”
I stood, winced a little at my stiff back and scowled at my bed. I hadn’t been asleep long enough to get a crick in my back. “Rossi is not pleased.”
“But he’s taking care of it, is that correct?”
“It’s not something he can take care of, Bertie.” At her look, I continued. “Not something that he alone can take care of. Someone killed Sven. Murder is against the law. Mortal law, which is the law we follow in this town, the law I enforce. Someone in town committed murder. I’m going to find them, arrest them, and lock them away for life.”
“What if it’s not a mortal?”
“I’m worried at how much you’re insisting it might be a werewolf. Did the Wolfes do something to bother you? Forget to fill out their volunteer forms for the next festival? Laugh at your Cakes on Skates idea? Overcharge you for gravel in your driveway?”
“Don’t be silly,” she said primly. “My driveway is clay pavers.”
“If it is someone in the Wolfe family, then that’s up to Rossi to deal with, since they have laws in place between their kind,” I said. “If it’s a mortal, or any other creature in town, then that’s on me and the law.”
“And if it’s a god?” She watched me over her cup, golden fingernails gleaming in the low light coming through the windows.
“If it’s a god, then I’ll deal with that too. Just like my fathers and mothers before me.”
“You think you can handle a rogue god?”
“I think there isn’t anyone else around here who could handle it better than me.”
She sipped tea, the last of it, from how deeply she tipped the cup.
“Well, then. Since you have god powers to track down and a killer to find, I’ll be on my way and let you do your work.” She stood and started toward my bedroom door. “I don’t know who killed him, Delaney. That is beyond my knowing. I do know he wasn’t killed in Ordinary.”
“What? Wait. How?”
“Because that is within my knowing. Every death that happens on this soil, I will know.” She shrugged. “Mostly the gods, but I am old enough and have been here long enough that I’ve developed a sense of when mortals and creatures die too.”
“And Sven wasn’t murdered here?”
“No.”
“Do you know where he was killed?”
“No.”
“Does Rossi know Sven wasn’t killed in town?”
“Do you think anyone could be quick enough to kill one of his before he was there to stop them?”
Vampires were not slow.
“No.”
I chewed on that information. If Sven hadn’t been killed in town, I’d need to find out when he left and where he went. Unlike the vacationing deities who were on a pretty tight leash went it came to walkabouts, creatures could and did wander the world at their leisure and pleasure.
If Bertie was right, and Sven had been killed outside of Ordinary, then why had he been found in the shed inside town? Yes, it was on the outermost northern edge of town, and a person wouldn’t have to drive more than half a mile to be officially out of town, but either someone had brought him back or he had somehow gotten that far on his own.
Rossi said the ichor techne was an invitation, which would mean someone had dropped off Sven’s dead body. Dead before he was even inside of Ordinary again.
Another reason Rossi was so angry. Since all the vampires seemed to be able to speak with each other thought-to-thought, he would have known where Sven was, might even have heard his last thoughts.
I’d need to talk to him to find out exactly how the telepathy worked, and what rules and restrictions he enforced. There might be other details that he or another vampire could give me, clues that could lead to the killer.
“Yes, then,” Bertie said into what I realized was a long span of silence. “I’ll leave you to your busy day.”
“Thank you, Bertie.”
“Thank you for giving ten hours of volunteer time for the Cake and Skate.”
“Eight hours.”
“Excuse me?”
“We agreed to eight hours each. Jean told me.”
“Oh,” she said with a playful glint in her eyes. “I must have remembered incorrectly. Thank you for eight hours.” She gave me a quick smile and I knew the next time we spoke she’d accidentally forget again.
“When is it, again?”
“Saturday. Starts at eight in the morning. I’ll expect to see you at the Puffin Muffin bright and early.”
Bertie was nothing if not persistent.
“Coffee’s free for volunteers, right?”
“So is the cocoa and marshmallows.”
Like I was a child.
“Fine.” I padded across the floor to the bathroom. “I’ll be there. But I’m not skating.”
“Oh, I’m sure we’ll find a better way to use your talents.”
She said it so sweetly, it shouldn’t have sounded like a threat. But it totally was.
A shower was definitely in order. After a good hot soak in the nice strong spray, and as much vanilla body wash as I could spread over every inch of my skin, I stepped out of the shower and got dressed.
A quick glance out the window told me we were looking at rain with a chance of downpour today—no surprise there—so I gave my summer shorts one longing look and, instead, pulled on a pair of jeans and tank top.
Over the tank top I layered a thin T-shirt and over that I buttoned up my work uniform. I attached my badge over my heart, just below my name tag, and checked my reflection in the standing mirror propped against one wall.
Well, my tan wasn’t getting any traction this year, but my wash of freckles still spackled my nose, cheeks and forehead. Eyes with that in-between blue and green color looked a lot like my dad’s. I brushed my hair even though it was still wet and wrapped it back in a quick pony tail at the base of my neck.
I thought I had the kind of face and build that most people would say was average or maybe just on the athletic side of average. Jogging, which I’d missed out on yesterday, kept me lean, and my job kept my fashion choices practical.
I wondered what Ryder saw when he looked at me. Was I more police chief now than the girl he’d grown up with? Was I still the woman following doggedly in her father’s footsteps? Was I the small town girl he was just humoring?
Was I someone he could love?
Or was I the person who was going to lock him away?
And not in an adult-fun-time kind of way.
I pulled on socks and my boots—boots, in August—and walked through the small living room to the smaller kitchen.
“You’re out of cocoa mix.” Crow hunched at my table, elbows planted and palms spread on both sides of his face like he was trying to keep his head on where it belonged.
“Drink a little too much last night, did we?” I strolled over to my coffee pot, measured out grounds and hit the go button.
“That Valkyrie could out-drink a sailor. Or a fish. Or a sailor fish that’s been stranded in the desert with nothing to eat but salt for a week.”
He hadn’t moved so his words were coming out a little smooshed from how his mouth was also a little smooshed between his palms. His eyes were closed and he wore the same clothes I’d seen him in yesterday.
There was no umbrella hat in sight.
Thank goodness.
“She didn’t even let you get a change of clothes?”
“Said you’d handle that. Wouldn’t let me go home. Evil babysitter. I would have just slept.”
From the way his words sort of faded off there near the end, I wasn’t sure he hadn’t been sleeping at the table.
“Any ideas about the powers?”
“They’re still lost?’
He didn’t add to that, so I poured coffee in my big travel mug, threw in some sugar and cream and grabbed a granola bar out of the drawer.
“Let’s get to it.” I patted the top of his head.
“Don’ wanna.”
“Don’t care. You’re in my custody and I need to get to work.”
I walked out into the living room and pulled on my jacket. Maybe the rain would lighten up today.
Yeah, I might as well wish that the god powers would show up in a basket on my doorstep with a note on them.
“C’mon, Crow. Move it.” I opened the door. There was not a basket of god powers on my doorstep. There was a god.
Death, to be exact.
“Good morning, Delaney.”
“Hey, Than. What brings you by? Want to see me bleed again?”
He raised an eyebrow as if he had no idea what I was talking about.
“The last time you showed up on my doorstep? I got shot. I’m thinking you might be bad luck.”
“I am very good luck. You were lucky I was here, vacationing when you were shot, as your wounds did not prove fatal.”
I smiled. “Nice try. Just because you don’t have your power doesn’t mean someone can’t die, I recall you telling me that before you signed the contract to vacation in Ordinary. Although if someone does die, they’re gonna miss out on your delightful sense of fashion as their soul goes to the great beyond.”
He glanced down at his neon green shirt that said LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN across the chest. I wasn’t sure if it was a bowling team, or a comic book club, or maybe part of that croquet team Odin and Thor had pulled together.
“Are you insinuating that this attire is unsuitable to a vacationing man?”
“No. Not at all. Join the bowling team?” I pointed at his chest. “Shirt?”
“Polo.”
I wasn’t sure if he was telling me what kind of team he was on or shirt he was wearing.
“Come again?”
“I’ve joined the polo team.”
“We have one of those? With long handled mallets and horses?”
“We use croquet mallets.”
“So either you’re playing with a team of long-armed Sasquatch, or you’re riding really short ponies.”
He sniffed. “I take it you find this hobby of mine amusing?”
“No. I’m glad you’ve found a hobby. How goes the kite shop?”
Crow shuffled up behind me, zipping his coat and shoving a beanie over his head. He still looked hungover as hell, but at least he was moving. He produced the umbrella hat from out of nowhere and gingerly fastened it over his head.
Great.
Than’s obsidian eyes flicked to Crow, keen with interest in this new fashion statement, then away, as if ignoring a worm among the fruit.
“The shop is adequate. The sales are not. Weather,” he added as if I hadn’t noticed the non-stop rain. “But I did not come to discuss the weather.”
I stepped aside so Crow could exit my house, then followed him and Than off my tiny covered porch since there wasn’t enough room for three people to stand on it. Of course, now we were all getting wet—well, Than and I were. Crow looked smugly dry under his stupid hat. I started down the stairs.
“What did you come to discuss?”
“The contract of Ordinary. A contract you are currently in breach of.”
Right. Death. Had a steely eye for rules and dotted lines being signed.
“I thought only Mithra would take me to the mat for that.” Mithra was among other things, a god of contract. He had never been to Ordinary, as far as I knew.
“I assume you’re talking about the missing powers?” I went on. “Technically they are still inside Ordinary, still together in one place, and therefore still within the contract guidelines.”
“Do you know for certain that those things are true?”
We’d reached the bottom of the hill and I continued on to my Jeep. “No. But I don’t know they aren’t true.”
Crow sniggered and got into the passenger side of my Jeep. Than didn’t even crack a smile. But then, Than never smiled.
“One day,” I said. “One day I’m going to get you to smile, and it is going to be one of the proudest moments of my life.”
The eyebrow twitched again, but his face stayed the kind of bland that would make oatmeal jealous.
“I am not the only god who will not tolerate a breach of contract.”
“Understood. But since we haven’t broken the contract yet, well, only Crow has broken it, I say the rest of you are still in the green.”
“Green.”
“Maybe yellow. But we aren’t in the red yet. Trust me.”
I opened the Jeep door, waited to see if that brush off and false confidence would be enough to hold him. I knew he wasn’t the only god who was a stickler for contracts. I knew he wasn’t the only god who was angry about the missing powers.
Heck, if I were a god, I’d be angry about it and would certainly do a lot more than politely remind the police chief that she had screwed up big time.
“I will, Reed Daughter. But even my trust must be earned.”
And now my little goose bumps shivered to full quack. “I’m doing everything I can. We’ll find the powers. We’ll get them safely back under lock and key and if you want to reclaim your power and leave town, I’ll be more than happy to help with that too.”
He nodded, just a fraction of a movement. Rain spattered down on his head, soaking his dark hair and tracing rivulets through the creases of his face.
I wondered what he’d look like in an umbrella hat.
“I do not doubt you, Reed Daughter, but I do not trust in your choice of guardians for the power.”
“Yeah, maybe Crow wasn’t the best idea.”
“Hey!” he said from inside the Jeep.
“But it was his turn. I won’t make that mistake again.”
That seemed to ease some of the darkness in his gaze. “Excellent. If I can be of assistance, please do call upon me.”
I nodded. “Thanks, Than, I will. Two things: you might want to wear a jacket in the rain, or at least a hat. An umbrella is another popular wet-weather choice.”
His eyes glittered. I wasn’t sure if it was with humor or annoyance.
“And please call me Delaney.”
His mouth twitched, but didn’t quite pull into a curve.
Darn it.
I slid into the front seat of the car.
“Delaney?”
Death held a white envelope between his fingers. He must have pulled it out from beneath that crime-against-nature green shirt of his because it was mostly still dry.
“This is for you.”
“What is it?”
“An envelope, I presume.”
Ha-ha. Funny guy.
“From you?”
“I found it on your doorstep.”
My stomach clenched at those words. I mean, it wasn’t like people left me unmarked envelopes every day. I had every right to assume it contained trouble, bad news, or both.
“Thank you.” I took it, glanced at the front, which was plain white, unmarked, then the back, which was the same, and also sealed. “Would you like a ride?” I tucked the envelope into my inside pocket.
“Yes, thank you.” Than settled into the back seat of the Jeep. “If I may inquire, Crow,” he said primly. “Just where could one purchase such fetching head wear?”
Before Crow could answer, I started the engine and flipped on the windshield wipers hoping to drown out Crow’s laughter.
No luck.