Caitlin Kittredge - Bone Gods

McCorkle raised his nearly white eyes to hers. “Perhaps,” was all he said.

“Oi, Pete!” Ollie said, dumping the takeaway on his desk. “Fuck you doing here? Homesick?” He pulled the wrap off his plastic fork and threw it at McCorkle. “Freddy, go eat at the kid’s table or something. Pete and I need to have a talk.”

Pete gave McCorkle a cheery wave as he grabbed his food and slumped away, pouting. Ollie sighed and opened his kebabs. “Fucking twat. Wasn’t bothering you, was he?”

“On the contrary,” Pete said. “He’s a veritable ray of sunshine.” She listened to the trill of phones and the click of keyboards, the inspectors and their detective sergeants and constables going about their day. “I’m making progress,” Pete said, before Ollie could ask. He dabbed at a spot of brown sauce on his shirt.

“You close to telling me why this bastard got himself topped? Because his life is a blank fucking slate. Good schools, competent at his job, no dodgy tax shelters, bank balance not even enough for a night at the pub with a discount prozzie. Lived with his mum, for Christ’s sake.”

“That what you needed to talk about?” Pete said, helping herself to a cube of beef.

“Right,” Ollie said. “It’s a bit too perfect. Somebody that boring, you either expect them to do themselves in with Mummy’s sleeping tablets, or have a dungeon full of Estonian teenagers hidden under the back garden. But I’ve turned up shit, and that bothers me, because shit means I’ve got shit on who’d want him killed.”

“He was definitely arse deep in black magic,” Pete said. “The symbols are necromancy, but for what I don’t know yet. Beyond that, all I can say is idiots who dabble in that sort of thing often find themselves dead or otherwise inconvenienced. Since Carver was the first to go, I’m betting he had something they wanted, or had served his purpose. Not sure what the purpose was yet.” Or his flesh-crafting friends had found Carver’s dirty secret. Pete wondered about that. The death felt like overkill, even for a traitor. There was purpose behind it, rather than punishment. And the power dripping from Carver’s corpse was something no socerer who wasn’t completely addled would allow to go to waste.

Gerard Carver had died for something other than his penchant for deception. Pete wagered when she knew what, she’d know who.

Ollie tossed his empty takeaway container into his overflowing desk bin. “You’re good, Pete. Always said, give you twenty-four hours and a cuppa and you’d solve the Lindbergh baby and the Ripper killings.” He folded his hands over his stomach. “The better one of us, you were.”

“Don’t say that, Ollie,” Pete told him. She stood and collected her things, being quick about it. “I wasn’t a good cop. I quit.”

“Do you ever miss it?” Ollie asked, as Pete made her move to leave. The CID room didn’t feel welcoming and familiar any longer. Now she could feel the stares and hear the murmured conversations over the everyday sounds. She was a visitor, and an unwelcome one at that.

“All the time, Ollie.” She turned her back and passed down the wide center avenue between the desks, which started at the door and ending at the big murder board where she’d put up her share of case notes. She turned her back to that too, and studiously ignored the stares of the working detectives as she left the station.

Retrieving the Mini, Pete drove toward Kensington. She passed the red brick edifice of the Victoria and Albert Museum and the pavilion at the edge of Kensington Gardens, gold leaf gleaming in the late morning light against the nascent green of the foliage beyond, which had just begun to show signs of life after a winter that hadn’t done anyone, plant or human, any favors.

She picked up Bayswater Road and circled in ever-widening loops through single-lane back streets leading to tourist-choked main roads until she found parking near Queensway. Threading her way through the gawkers and well-heeled locals outside the tube station, she climbed to Lawrence’s flat and knocked.

Right now, Gerard Carver was the last thing on her mind, but she had to think about him. Thinking about her mother, or the Order, or what the Hecate had said just made her want to curl up and never leave Jack’s flat again. Murder was the saner option. Murder, she at least understood. Perhaps she could even do what Morningstar demanded, though she doubted it. She was opposed to turning over the necromancer responsible just on principle, even though the git probably deserved it. Morningstar was a sanctimonious twat, as only old, white Englishmen with the Lord in their corner could be, and she hated him reflexively, far more at the moment than Carver’s killer. But she owed Ollie answers, and needed something to leverage to keep him safe from the Order, so she hit the door again. “Lawrence! I know you’re bloody at home. You never leave.”

After a moment of locks scuffling, the door opened. “Your knickers on fire?” Lawrence demanded. “Why the fuss?” He blinked when he really saw her. “Pete!”

She managed to spread her hands and apply what she hoped was a charming expression. “Knew you were in. You’re fucking agoraphobic these days.”

Lawrence stepped forward and yanked her inside and into the fold of a bear hug. “You know where I live, you feel like stoppin’ by. Why I need to go out?”

“Get some sun,” Pete said, and poked his arm, which gave not an inch. “You’re looking positively Caucasian, Lawrence.”

“Fuck off,” he said amiably, locking the door behind her and twitching a bindle of herbs and red thread back into place over the frame. “Glad you’re here, you and your little razor blade for a mouth. Beginnin’ to think you didn’t like me.”

“Been busy,” Pete said, staying in the front hall while Lawrence went to his pocket-sized kitchen. In point of fact, she hadn’t seen him since the day Jack had gone. She’d wanted it that way. Lawrence was Jack’s best friend—which was no mean feat, considering the rapidity with which Jack alienated almost everyone he crossed paths with. Lawrence was as replete with memories as Jack’s flat. Plus, he was a decent bloke and a decent friend, and in the way of decent people would want to commiserate, give and get sympathy. He would want to remember Jack, and Pete didn’t have the strength to heap on any more memories.

Lawrence came back with two tumblers full of thick, viscous green liquid and held her at arm’s length. “So. Miss Petunia. You blown back to my door—for what?” He grinned at her crookedly, teeth white enough for an advert. “I know you never be without trouble riding on your shoulder.”

Pete decided blunt was best. Lawrence was at least too polite to throw her out. “I need you to tell me whatever you know about necromancy.”

The smile and the warmth went out of Lawrence’s face, a candle covered with a jar. Taking a seat on the leather sofa, he drained his tumbler and offered Pete the other. She caught a whiff of something dead and sea-borne and crinkled her nose. “Fuck, no thanks. What is that shit?”

“Seaweed,” Lawrence said, as if it were a natural thing to pour down your gullet. “Your loss. Might improve your mind, so you don’t go around askin’ about black deeds that’ll get you dead.” He took a joint from the mellowed ivory box at his elbow and offered it to her once the end was a cozy orange. Pete inhaled and passed it back. Like the Newcastle for Mosswood, it was a gesture of hospitality, the handshake of Lawrence’s mostly white witchcraft and Pete’s talent, which was no color she could discern.

Lawrence dragged like a movie cowboy on a handmade cigarette and let the pleasant murk fill his sitting room when he exhaled. “Now,” he said. “I’ve gotta ask: Why a smart girl like you messing with necromancers?”