Лей Бардуго - Ninth House

“Were they dealing to students? To the societies?”

“They had a long roster.”

“Who?”

Turner shook his head. “Let’s go. Now. ”

He reached for her arm but she sidestepped him. “You can stay here,” Alex told the coroner. “The handsome Detective Turner will see me out.”

“What did you do to him?” Turner muttered as they stepped into the hall.

“Freaky shit.”

“This isn’t a joke, Ms. Stern.”

As he hustled her down the hall, Alex said, “I’m not doing this for fun either, you get that? I don’t like being Dante. You don’t like being Centurion, but these are our jobs and you’re screwing it up for both of us.”

Turner looked slightly put out by that. Of course, it wasn’t really true. Sandow had told her to stand down. Rest easy.

They stepped into the waiting room. Dawes was nowhere to be seen. “I told your friend to wait in the car,” said Turner. “At least she has the sense to know when she fucks up.”

And not a single warning. Dawes was a crap lookout.

Moira Adams smiled from the desk. “You get your moment, hon?”

Alex nodded. “I did. Thank you.”

“I’ll have your family in my prayers. Good night, Detective Turner.”

“You do some freaky shit to her too?” Turner asked as they stepped into the cold.

Alex rubbed her arms miserably. She wanted her coat. “Didn’t have to.”

“I told Sandow I’d keep him up-to-date. If I thought any of the young psychopaths under your care were connected, I would be pursuing it.”

Alex believed that. “There could be things you’re not seeing.” “There’s nothing to see. Her boyfriend was arrested near the scene. Their neighbors heard some ugly arguments the last few weeks. There’s blood evidence linking him to the crime. He had powerful hallucinogens in his system—”

“What exactly?”

“We’re not sure yet.”

Alex had stayed away from any kind of hallucinogen after she realized they just made the Grays more terrifying, but she’d held plenty of hands during good and bad trips and she had yet to meet the mushroom that could make you feel like you weren’t being stabbed to death.

“Do you want him to get away with it?” Turner said.

“What?” The question startled her.

“You tampered with a corpse. Tara’s body is evidence. If you mess around with this case enough, it could mean Lance Gressang doesn’t go away for this. Do you want that?”

“No,” Alex said. “He doesn’t get away with it.”

Turner nodded. “Good.” They stood in the cold. Alex could see the old Mercedes idling in the lot, one of the only remaining cars. Dawes’s face was a dim smudge behind the windshield. She raised her hand in what Alex realized was a limp wave. Thanks, Pammie. It was long past time to let this go. Why couldn’t she?

She tried one last play. “Just give me a name. Lethe will find out eventually. If the societies are messing around with illegal substances, we should know.” And then we can move on to kidnapping, insider trading, and—did cutting someone open to read their innards fall under assault? They’d need a whole new section of the penal code to cover what the societies dabbled in. “We can investigate without stepping on your murder case.”

Turner sighed, his breath pluming white in the cold. “There was only one society name in her contacts. Tripp Helmuth. We’re in the process of clearing him—”

“I saw him last night. He’s a Bonesman. He was working the door at a prognostication.”

“That’s what he said. Was he there the whole night?”

“I don’t know,” she admitted. Tripp had been banished to the hallway to stand guard. It was true that once a ritual started, people rarely went in or out, only when someone got faint or sick or if something had to be fetched for the Haruspex. Alex thought she remembered the door opening and closing a few times, but she couldn’t be certain. She’d been worrying about the chalk circle and trying not to vomit. But it was hard to believe Tripp could have skipped out on the ritual, gotten all the way to Payne Whitney, murdered Tara, and gotten back on duty without anyone knowing. Besides, what homicidal beef could he have with Tara? Tripp was rich enough to buy himself out of any kind of trouble Tara or her boyfriend might have tried to make for him, and it wasn’t Tripp’s face Alex had seen hovering above Tara with a knife. It was Lance’s.

“Do not talk to him,” Turner said. “I’ll send you and the dean the info once we lock in his alibi. You stay away from my case.”

“And away from your career?”

“That’s right. The next time I find you anywhere you’re not supposed to be, I’ll arrest you on the spot.”

Alex couldn’t help the dark bubble of laughter that burst from her.

“You’re not going to arrest me, Detective Turner. The last place you want me is in a police station, making noise. I’m messy and Lethe is messy and all you want is to get through this without our mess getting on those expensive shoes.”

Turner gave her a long, steady look. “I don’t know how you ended up here, Ms. Stern, but I know the difference between quality goods and what I find on the bottom of my shoe, and you are most definitely not quality.”

“Thanks for the talk, Turner.” Alex leaned in, knowing the stink of the uncanny was radiating off her in heavy waves. She gave him her sweetest, warmest smile. “And don’t grab me like that again. I may be shit, but I’m the kind that sticks.”

Alex parted with Dawes near the divinity school, at a sad horseshoe-shaped apartment building in the grad school ghetto. Dawes hadn’t wanted to leave the car in Alex’s care, but she had papers to grade that were already late, so Alex said she would return the Mercedes to Darlington’s home. She could tell Dawes wanted to refuse, papers be damned.

“Be careful and don’t… You shouldn’t…” But Dawes just trailed off, and Alex had the startling realization that Dawes had to defer to her in this situation. Dante served Virgil, but Oculus served them both. And they all served Lethe. Dawes nodded, kept nodding, nodded all the way out of the car and up the walkway to her apartment, as if she was affirming every step.

Darlington’s house was out in Westville, just a few miles from campus. This was the Connecticut Alex had dreamed of—farmhouses without farms, sturdy red-brick colonials with black doors and tidy white trim, a neighborhood full of wood-burning fireplaces, gently tended lawns, windows glowing golden in the night like passageways to a better life, kitchens where something good bubbled on the stove, breakfast tables scattered with crayons. No one drew their curtains; light and heat and good fortune spilled out into the dark as if these foolish people didn’t know what such bounty might attract, as if they’d left these shining doorways open for any hungry girl to walk through.

Alex hadn’t driven much since she’d left Los Angeles and it felt good to be back in a car, even one she was terrified of leaving a scratch on. Despite the map on her phone, she missed the turn into Darlington’s driveway and had to double back twice before she spotted the thick stone columns that marked the entry to Black Elm. The lamps that lined the drive were lit, bright halos that made the bare-branched trees look soft and friendly like a winter postcard. The bulky shape of the house came into view, and Alex slammed her foot down on the brakes.

A light glowed in the kitchen window, bright as a beacon, another up in the high tower—Darlington’s bedroom. She remembered his body curled against hers, the cloudy panes of the narrow window, the sea of black branches below, the dark woods separating Black Elm from the world outside.