Kelly Meding - As Lie the Dead

“I’m thinking we should go.” I spun in his arms and put my palms on his chest. His hands slid to my waist. We drew together at the same time, mouths finding each other in perfect sync. It was a gentle kiss, without the fervor of lust or need, but I still felt it in my toes. The touch and taste of him, the smell of him in my nostrils. The soft stroke of his tongue against my lips, and the way my belly quivered when his fingers pressed into my hips.

“For luck,” I said when we parted.

“Think we need more luck than that?” he asked, arching one eyebrow suggestively.

“I think it’ll tide us over. Come on, Truman, we’ve got a date with some shape-shifters.”

Michael Jenner’s house turned out to be a two-story condo in a new development ten minutes’ drive outside the city, tucked several miles west of Parkside East. Nearly in the mountains that bordered that side of the valley. He drove a Cadillac, which didn’t surprise me in the least, and he coasted along the winding roads like a practiced race car driver. Fast turns on sharp curves, as though exhilarated by the speed and danger.

I was enjoying myself and the view from the front seat, but Wyatt had a death grip on his door. He sat behind Jenner, at an angle from me. Every time I cast an amused smile his way, he’d glare.

As we closed in on the city, the whispering tendrils of the Break sparked brighter, and I realized just how faint it had been at Jenner’s house. Isleen was right—the center of the city, specifically the northern section of Mercy’s Lot and the mountains above, was like a beacon to those who could sense the Break. No wonder Wyatt had never moved out of the city. And leaving hadn’t done much for Chalice’s mental health.

“It won’t be like facing a panel of judges,” Jenner said when the first hints of the Uptown skyline came into view. “They won’t bite you, and they can’t sentence you. Just say what you wish to say, and then wait to be told what to do.”

“You mean either wait to be told what I want to know,” I said, “or to be told to get the hell out?”

“Yes. Most likely, though, they’ll ask you to leave the room while they argue among themselves.”

“Sounds a lot like a courtroom to me. Will Wyatt be allowed to go inside with me?”

“No, the audience is with you alone.”

Wyatt grunted his disapproval. Nothing to be done about it now.

“I don’t suppose the Assembly has anything on the name Leonard Call?” I asked.

“Nothing that they’ve shared with me, no.”

“It’s odd, since he’s been recruiting a large number of Therians.”

“True. However, my answer remains the same. If your police records were unable to produce an identity for this man, it’s likely the name is merely a front. Right now, our best option for identifying him lies with Phineas.”

“I know.” Wrapping my brain around the idea of a human turning against the Triads just made my head ache. What could have happened to make someone so angry at their own species? Granted, I’d been pissed at the Triads when they killed the Owlkins and took the last of my friends away. Stripped me of the last of my family … “Hey!”

I sat up straight so fast I banged my knee on the underside of the dash. I ignored the flash of pain and twisted around to face Wyatt. “This Call, or whatever his name is,” I said, “he’s got to be super-fucking pissed to go after the Triads like this, right?”

“Either pissed or he’s making some sort of power gambit,” Wyatt replied, eyeing me cautiously. “Why? What are you thinking?”

“That the violent loss of a family can make someone homicidal. You remember the Greek restaurant ten years ago? You said two teenage sons were left behind.”

Wyatt stiffened. “Yeah.”

“Do we know what happened to either of them?”

It seemed like a good epiphany, and the motive fit the pattern. From Wyatt, I got something I didn’t expect—a sharp head shake and terse “It’s not them.”

“How do you know?” I asked, a little deflated. It felt like a good lead. Granted, it hadn’t been the Triads who’d killed those women, not exactly. But close enough for someone still holding a grudge to—

“Because I knew them, Evy. Catalyst for the Triads, remember? One of them died less than a year after the fire. The other isn’t Call.”

“How—?”

“Just trust me, he’s not.”

“Fine.” So much for my investigative instincts. Wyatt’s refusal to offer up more information was vastly annoying, but it made sense he’d know. I could imagine him keeping tabs on those early victims out of some noble sense of guilt, even though he’d not been responsible for the deaths of their parents.

“But maybe you’re onto something,” Wyatt said a moment later. His eyebrows scrunched in thought. “Instead of looking at it from Call’s angle, look at it from the motivation angle. They’ve been recruiting for a month, right? What happened, Dreg-wise, roughly five weeks ago?”

Middle of April. I’d been down with the flu for the first half of the month and had just been allowed back to work. Confinement to our crappy apartment, sipping tea and cocoa, and listening to Jesse and Ash chat about their latest assignments for ten days—five of which were spent in the haze of a high fever—had been hellish. Most of the details of those conversations were lost. I really remembered only the four-day goblin hunt I’d gone on my first day back.

“You’re going to have to fill in those blanks,” I said. “I wasn’t in much of it, as I recall. What was everyone up to?”

“Routine stuff, as far as I remember.” He gazed down at his interlocked hands, as though the answers were etched on his skin. “Baylor, Sharpe, and Nevada all had extended assignments south of the city. Rufus was looking into a string of muggings in the Lot that were linked to Dreg activity. Willemy’s team was off duty, recovering from some nasty magic virus they’d stumbled into while on routine patrol.”

I listened, attentive and amazed at his recollection of so many events. He rattled off three more Triads and their whereabouts during the time frame. All accounted for except one. “What about Kismet and her boys?” I asked.

“Neutralize job Uptown.”

Those had always been my favorite. We got our suspect and our choice of weapons and, depending on the victim, our own time frame in which to “neutralize” them. Goblins and Halfies were always easiest, but we also had open Neutralize orders on them—if you saw one, kill it. The more specific Neutralize jobs were given over high-profile suspects—vampires, Therians, even the occasional psychotic Gifted human. They were rare assignments, which made them preferred. A nice change to the routine.

“Do you know the target?” I asked.

Wyatt looked up, his hands no longer interesting. “You know we don’t share that information among Handlers.”

“Figured it was worth asking, especially since, of all the things happening during that time frame, it sticks out the most. Think Kismet would tell you if you asked?”

“Maybe, given the circumstances. It isn’t really a policy to not share, it’s more of a safety measure. The less we know about one another’s business—”

“The less likely someone else can beat it out of you.”

He smiled grimly. “Exactly.”

We’d passed through Uptown and were pointed toward the Axelrod Bridge, the only major crossing over the southern tributary of the Black River—below where the Anjean connected—that separated Uptown from the East Side. For some reason, I’d expected the Assembly to meet in Mercy’s Lot. Showed how much I tossed all Dregs into one basket, even though Jenner’s own address proved that Therians did indeed live all over the city.