Mark Del Franco - Unperfect Souls

“Leo went to your funeral,” I said.

She met my eyes. “You’re a detective. Go investigate. If anyone was in that casket, it wasn’t his mother.”

“I still don’t believe you.”

She sighed. “I don’t care, Connor. He had me followed all those years ago. He knew who you were. Your youth saved you then. I’m surprised he didn’t shoot you long before now.”

A conflicted look passed over her face as she stared down at Scott Murdock. “I did love him then, you know. That surprised me more than anything. He was a strong and attractive man. I knew he hated the fey, but my heart ruled my head, and I didn’t want to lose him. So I said nothing and married him. I never intended any of this to happen, Connor, but I didn’t deserve what he did.”

I frowned. Her story kept getting better all the time. “If you expect me to say ‘boohoo,’ don’t hold your breath.”

Tibbet allowed six brownie servants into the room and closed the door again. “Bring him up the back way. I have Dananns guarding the upper floors.”

They lifted the old man with care, shifting and folding his wings gently around him. Tibbet let them through a door at the back of the room.

“The police are arriving,” she said.

Moira went to the door. “I will be tending Manus.”

“Stop right there, Cashel,” Tibbet said. “I am barring you from his presence. Once you deal with the police, you will be escorted to your rooms to retrieve your possessions. They are being packed as we speak. You are no longer welcome in this house.”

Moira drew herself up in a classic court hauteur. “The Queen’s Herbalist does not take orders from a servant.”

Tibbet strode toward her with a predatory grace, her fingers elongating as she edged toward her boggart nature. I followed, ready to pry them apart if necessary. She stopped inches from Moira. “Listen carefully, Cashel. You will leave this house on my orders. Maeve is far away, and I am very, very near. Do not think for one moment you can best me in the house of Manus ap Eagan, underKing.”

Moira didn’t completely back down, but the truth of what Tibbet said penetrated. “As you wish, then. Maeve will hear of this.”

Tibbet nodded once sharply. “As will all the underKings and -Queens. Now, go.”

Moira slipped out the door. Tibbet’s eyes glowed with a fierce yellow light. She touched my face. “Gillen Yor is on his way. Are you okay?”

I took her hand in both of mine and kissed it. “All I remember is the muzzle flash and a sharp pain, then waking up.”

She examined my jawline. “It was horrible, Connor. After the commissioner shot you, a bright flash came from your body. When you sat up, I thought I was seeing something I only wished to see.”

“I’ll let Gillen look me over. Right now, we have an international disaster on our hands,” I said.

She gave me a crooked smile. “My hands, handsome. It’s my job. If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s damage control.”

“You are good at more than that. You and Manus would not have stayed together all these years otherwise,” I said.

She smiled more fully. She paused, her eyes shifting as she received a sending, probably several under the circumstances. Her eyes came back to mine. “Leonard Murdock is here and one of his brothers . . . Gerard? . . . Yes, Gerard. I need to be out there.” She moved to the door. “You can stay here tonight. I can protect you from what’s coming for a while.”

“I’ll think about it,” I said, as she slipped out into the grand hall.

I reached down and closed the commissioner’s eyes. His sons didn’t need to see the damage. Guests clustered outside the door, shock and excitement on their faces. The music had stopped long ago. Police officers marched in, Leo and Gerard pushing to the front. My chest ached at the pain on their faces. When they reached me, I held my hand lightly to Murdock’s chest. “He’s on the floor. He was essence-shocked. I don’t think he even knew what hit him.”

Gerard muscled in front of Leo. “Let me through, dammit.”

I let them pass and followed another four officers inside. They closed the doors. A strangled sob came from Gerard as he stood with hunched shoulders. Leo knelt on one knee and checked his father for a pulse. He knew what essence shock looked like. His hand fell away slowly, and he stared at his father as the other officers spread around the room. He rose, and Gerard clung to his lapel, shaking it with his fist. Murdock hugged his brother close as he shook with sobs. Our eyes met.

“You’ve got blood on you,” he said.

“It’s mine. He . . . I was shot,” I said. It didn’t seem like a good time to tell them their dead father shot me.

Gerard whirled around. “Who did this?”

“Manus ap Eagan. He’s in a coma,” I said as neutrally as possible.

Gerard’s face became redder. “I want to see him. I want to see the bastard. Where is he?”

I lightly put my arm across his waist as he tried to pass. “Give yourself a minute, Gerry.”

Leo hugged him from the side, his body shield flickering. I gently squeezed Gerry’s arm, then dropped my hand. Murdock closed his eyes and touched his forehead to his brother’s.

Paramedics and more police entered. The medical examiner hovered in the background like a carrion crow. I didn’t know the Chestnut Hill police, but they were a lot more professional in a fey situation than I was used to. Maybe because Chestnut Hill had a lot of fey folk—a lot of rich fey folk. One of the officers moved me to a couch on the far side of the room and began to interview me. He asked several times if I were injured, confused by all the blood on me. A paramedic made me take off the jacket, convinced I was in shock and bleeding profusely somewhere. I didn’t blame them. I was uninjured, yet soaked in my own blood.

The interview was thorough. It helped that I was a druid. Between my inborn talent for instant recall and my understanding of what the police needed to hear, it went quickly under the circumstances. I did not hide the fact that Manus killed the commissioner. There was no need. Eagan’s essence signature saturated the commissioner’s body. When his body arrived at the morgue, Janey Likesmith would have no difficulty registering it. Besides, the Guildmaster was acting in my defense in the confusion of the moment, though why he used so much essence I didn’t understand.

The real aggressor in the room was dead.

I waited on the second floor of the Guildmaster’s house. At either end of the hall, Danann security agents guarded the stairs. The Guild and police had locked down the entire property while the local police went through the list of guests and released them one by one. Commissioner Murdock’s body was long since gone. Ryan macGoren had arrived shortly after the first responders, along with the mayor of Boston and the governor of Massachusetts. They spent time behind closed doors in a meeting room downstairs, emerging hours later with grim faces.

Tibbet came out of Eagan’s bedroom, and we hugged. As a fey, she could count on a resilient physical constitution, but that didn’t prevent deep worry lines from forming around her eyes. She idly rubbed my arm. “I’ve had a room prepared for you upstairs.”

I adjusted some of her braids away from her forehead. “I’ve been thinking about that, Tibs, and decided I should go home. Eagan had his reasons for keeping a public distance from me. I don’t think he’d want me here. You have enough to deal with anyway without me complicating things.”

“Are you sure?” she asked.

“I’m sure,” I said.

A commotion at the top of the main stairs drew our attention. Several police officers—Leo and Gerard among them—were arguing with the Danann agents. I trailed after Tibs as she rushed toward them. Halfway down the flight of stairs, Barnard and Kevin Murdock waited with intent, angry faces. Davis Jones, the Superintendent in Chief and the commissioner’s second-in-command, gestured for the officers to step back as Tibbet approached.