David Coe - Spell Blind

After a few moments of silence, Gann started to get real nervous. He stared at me and narrowed his eyes. I guessed that he could tell I was a weremyste. But it also seemed he didn’t want to admit that if he didn’t have to. After a moment or two, he turned his attention back to Kona.

“Who the hell are you guys?”

“We’re priests, Mike,” Kona said, still pacing, still not looking at him. “We’ve come to hear your confession.”

“I haven’t done anything wrong.”

“The guys at Robo’s say different.”

I watched him as his eyes followed Kona. He was definitely a weremyste. I could see a faint shimmering around his face and shoulders. It might have been somewhat stronger than the blurring I’d seen on Sophie and on Robby Sommer, but it wasn’t as obvious as what I’d seen on Luis. It wasn’t even close. And Luis’ power was no match for that of the Blind Angel. There was no way this guy had left that magical residue on Claudia. Asking him to cast a spell that powerful would have been like asking a ten-year-old little leaguer to hit a home run off a major league pitcher. He didn’t have the strength or the skill to pull it off.

“I just went in there for a minute,” Gann said. “I heard music and I wanted to see who was playing.”

“It said out front who was playing, Mike. Randy Deegan’s name was on the marquee, in the windows, on the door. Unless you can’t read, you couldn’t have missed it.”

Gann glared at her, but didn’t answer.

“What were you doing there?”

He crossed his arms and stared at the table.

Kona flicked a glance my way, a question in her eyes. I shook my head, drawing a frown.

“All right, Mike,” she said, sounding like a parent who’s disappointed in her kid. “You give that question some thought, and I’ll be back.”

Kona and I stepped out into the hallway and she closed and locked the door. I knew better than to say anything right away. We started back down the corridor toward the detective’s room and once we’d put some distance between ourselves and Gann, she glanced my way.

“Well?”

Before I could answer, two guys came around the corner in front of us. One of them I didn’t know. The other I recognized, but couldn’t name. He must have remembered me, because he stared at me the way he would a guy he knew from a wanted poster. He muttered a hello to Kona, but his gaze kept swinging back in my direction. I’m not one to feel self-conscious, but in that instant I wanted to make myself invisible. Had I been more comfortable with the spell, I would have spoken it.

A moment later, we turned that same corner and were alone again. I exhaled.

“Justis?”

“Yeah,” I said. “He’s not our guy.”

She did nothing to mask her disappointment. “You’re sure?”

“Pretty sure. Unless he’s found some way to dampen his magic and make himself appear to be less of a weremyste than he really is, it couldn’t be him. I didn’t see that much power in him.”

“Is what you just said possible? That part about dampening?”

I shrugged. “I’m not sure, Kona. I wouldn’t know how to do it, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be done.”

She started to say something, then stopped, shaking her head.

“You really think he’s our killer?” I asked.

Kona rubbed her eyes with her thumb and forefinger. “Maybe,” she said with a sigh. “He’s the best prospect we’ve had since that groundskeeper at Red Mountain you and I brought in two years ago.” She smiled faintly. “But that’s not saying much.”

“If this was a normal case I’d agree with you,” I said. “But whoever this guy is, he’d not a typical serial killer. He’s smart and he’s ruthless and he has a specific goal in mind. A magical goal. He’s building up to something. I don’t know what it is yet, but there’s more to this than trying to get back at the Deegans. And there’s more to our killer than I saw in Mike Gann.”

“I’m not the only one who likes him for this,” Kona said. “Hibbard is giddy as a little girl who just got her first pony.” I snorted and she grinned. “Yeah, and I can tell you, that’s not a pretty sight.”

I laughed.

“The Deegans are convinced he’s guilty,” she went on, her smile disappearing, and her voice falling to a whisper. “And the Feds are about this close”-she held her thumb and forefinger a hair’s breadth apart-“to taking him themselves. They’re leaning pretty hard on Latrelle and Hibbard to release the guy into their custody and be done with it. And with the assistant chief and the commander of violent crimes pushing us, that’s probably what’s going to happen. I’ve never seen pressure like this. Randolph Deegan is one powerful man.”

“Do you want me to keep poking around?” I asked, whispering as well. “Hibbard doesn’t have to know. Whatever I do, I can claim that I’m working for Wriker and the Deegans.”

She eyed me. I could tell she didn’t like the idea, but she was considering it just the same. “Where would you go?”

“I’d start with Robo’s, maybe learn a bit more about Gann. And then I’d go see Brother Q.” I hesitated, but only for a second. “Truth is, I was planning to see Q anyway. I talked to Luis Paredes last night, and he seems to think that Q might know something about our guy.”

“And when were you planning to tell me all of this?”

I smiled. “I hadn’t decided yet.”

Kona shook her head. “I don’t like putting the future of this case in the hands of Orestes Quinley, Justis. The man’s certifiable.”

“He’s eccentric.”

“My grandma’s eccentric. Q is nuts.”

I didn’t say anything; I didn’t have to. All I needed to do was watch her make up her mind.

“Yeah, all right,” she said. “Let me know what you find out at Robo’s.”

“And Q?”

She rolled her eyes. “Sure, tell me what he says, too. Just keep him the hell away from me.”

“You’re starting to sound like Hibbard,” I said with a grin.

“Great,” she said. “That’s what I want to hear.”

Robo’s was one of the hottest music and booze joints in Tempe. It was upscale enough to serve all the best beers and trendy drinks, and to provide its bands with a professional stage and quality sound equipment. But it was also seedy enough around the edges to seem cool to the university kids. On nights when there was live music-Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays of most weeks-the line to get in could stretch all the way around the block.

When I got there, the doors to the place were closed, including the second set of glass ones past the window where patrons paid the cover charge. As Kona had told Gann, the marquee read “Electric Daiquiri: Featuring Randy Deegan and Tilo Ruiz.” Inside one of the windows was a black and white picture of the band standing in front of some vague photo studio backdrop. Randy stood at the center, wearing jeans and an untucked dress shirt. The guys around him came across as cool and a little unsavory, which I’m sure is what they were going for. But Randy couldn’t help but look like an all-American kid, even with that serious, “I-really-am-a-badass” expression on his face.

It didn’t surprise me at all that a place like this would be interested in having Randy Deegan’s band headlining for it. What did surprise me was that a buttoned-down guy like Randy would stoop to play there. Then again, from all I’d seen in the papers and on television over the past year or so, I had the sense that Randy wanted to follow in Dad’s footsteps, and maybe he figured anything that made him out to be a regular guy would help.

Despite the locked doors, I could hear music coming from inside, so I knew the place wasn’t empty. I knocked several times until at last a large man in a Robo’s t-shirt came to the door and tried to shoo me away. I pulled out my private investigator’s ID, which has a terrible picture of me and looks official enough to impress.