Лорел Гамильтон - Dead Ice

“Is it just me that doesn’t have a badge, or are you with Jean-Claude?”

“I left him back in town to go to his job. We’re a working couple; we can’t spend every waking minute together.” Again it sounded grumpy, but I didn’t care; I was tired of Manny’s issues with Jean-Claude. It wasn’t personal exactly, but Manny didn’t like my dating a vampire. He’d been the one who taught me that they weren’t just people with fangs; they were monsters. The trouble was that I’d learned that wasn’t true and Manny still believed it. It was ironic that he’d stopped killing vampires but still hated them in that racist sort of way, while I’d gone on to execute dozens more and I thought of them as people.

Nathaniel glanced over at me and cocked his head to one side. It meant a question, like what?

“Then if you can’t talk to me about the case, why call me at all?” Manny asked.

“True.” I sighed, and then tried to snake my way through what I needed to share, and what I felt I should hold back. I also didn’t want to give away Manny’s secrets, not even to Nathaniel, not because I didn’t trust my sweetie, but because it wasn’t my secret, and if the police ever found out Manny’s secrets he could go to jail, or if he got the wrong judge he could be executed within a matter of weeks, or days. Some of the things he’d done when he was with Dominga Salvador fell under the magical malfeasance laws, which meant any death caused was grounds for automatic execution, none of that years-on-death-row shit. The laws had been designed to keep the human public safe from beings with so much power there was no way to keep them in jail without risking more death. Manny wasn’t that dangerous, but the law is enforced the way the law is written; it’s not about true justice, it’s about interpretation of the law and who has the best lawyer. Cynical, yes, but the longer I was in law enforcement the more I knew that cynical was often just the truth.

“Remember Dominga Salvador?”

“You know I do.” His voice was suddenly much more serious.

“I’ve run across a case that’s using powers I thought only she had.”

“What kind of powers?” he asked.

“Remember the scheme she wanted my magical help for?”

“Work question, I’ll be right back,” he said, and I heard his footsteps over the phone. Was he at home with his family? Was I interrupting some warm domestic scene with this scary shit?

The next thing he said let me know he was alone. “You mean her wanting you to help her raise zombies to be sold as sex slaves?”

“Yeah, that,” I said.

“There are zombies sold as sex slaves all the time, Anita. The people don’t keep them after they rot, but there’s a niche market for it. You and I both get requests for it.”

“And we both say no.”

“Of course, we say no, but other practitioners of our art are not so choosy.”

“But it’s not that kind of zombie, Manny. It’s one like she raised at the end, the one with scared eyes.”

“Zombies don’t feel fear, Anita.”

“No, they don’t,” I said.

“Then what are you talking about?”

“Think it through, Manny.”

“She raised very good, lifelike zombies, but others do that, as well. Yours are almost alive now.”

“Souls, Manny, souls.”

“I don’t . . .” Then he stopped and I heard his breathing speed up. “Are you saying someone else has figured out how to capture a person’s soul and put it back in their rotting corpse so the zombie doesn’t rot?”

“And her trick of removing it, then putting it back, so it’s a little bit rotted, yes.”

He swore in Spanish. I caught that he asked for the Virgin Mary’s help, though I think it was the Virgin of Guadalupe specifically. When he finally spoke English again, his accent was still thicker than normal.

“It can’t be her, Anita. She is dead; even she could not come back after being torn apart by zombies and eaten.” Manny was one of the few people I’d told about Dominga’s real death. She’d been trying to force me to use an innocent victim as a human sacrifice to raise a very old zombie at the time, and only luck had put her henchmen in the circle so I could kill them, and raise a hell of a lot more than just one zombie with the rush of power those deaths gave me. He’d feared for his safety and that of his family from her, so I’d told him the truth. To my knowledge he’d never repeated it.

“I don’t think it’s her come back from the grave, Manny, but could it be someone who knew her? When I turned her down, did she recruit anyone else?”

“I don’t know; the day I took you to see her was the first and last time I’d seen her in years.”

“Who would know if she’d recruited someone else?” I asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Think, Manny, think; these women are being tortured in a way that no one should have to endure outside of a lower circle of hell.”

“I will think on it, Anita, but I don’t know who would be willing to talk to me now. They know I brought the police to the Señora’s door, and only fear of my own power kept them from trying to retaliate.”

“I’m sorry, Manny; I didn’t mean to endanger you by asking for your help.”

“A good man must help stop evil when he is called, Anita; do not apologize for that.”

“I’m just tired of endangering people. I mean, it’s dangerous just to be around me sometimes.”

“That is not true,” he said.

“Isn’t it?”

“Anita, I don’t know what part of your past you are fighting, but fight harder, because you are a good person, you fight the good fight.”

“Thanks, Manny.”

“De nada.”

I smiled. “If you think of anyone to ask, or anywhere to look for this bastard, let me know.”

“I will.”

“Now go enjoy whatever family thing you’re doing.”

“I’m coming, Rosita,” he called out. I heard more voices, and then the voice on the phone was a woman’s. “Anita, congratulations on your engagement; I am so happy you are finally getting married.”

“Thank you, Rosita; now you don’t have to keep worrying I’ll be an old maid.”

“A woman should be married, Anita, that’s all.”

“You know I don’t agree with that.”

“But you are getting married anyway,” she said, as if that proved her point.

I sighed, and laughed a little. “We’ll agree to disagree, but yes, I am getting married once we work out all the details.”

“If you want help with anything, just call.”

“You’re planning Connie’s wedding, isn’t that enough?”

“Consuela’s wedding is almost done.”

“Congratulations to you and her.”

“ Gracias , but I have been to every wedding shop, caterer, everything. I would be happy to give you a list of the places we found most helpful.”

“Okay, that might actually be useful, thank you.” I’d pass the list on to Jean-Claude.

“I will have Manny email it to you.”

“Thank you, Rosita.” It was probably the longest conversation I’d ever had with Manny’s wife.

“I hope you do let me help; I’d forgotten how much I love weddings.” She laughed, one of the best and happiest laughs I’d ever heard from her. She was usually pretty stern and uncompromising. I tried to picture that girlish laugh from the Rosita I knew, who was five-eight and last I’d seen her well over three hundred pounds. Manny was still lean and shorter than her, so that they looked like the Jack Sprat nursery rhyme. The laugh belonged to that young slip of a girl that Manny had met in Mexico long ago.

“So no issues with me marrying a vampire?” I asked, because I couldn’t leave it alone.

She made a harsh sound. “I am a devout Catholic, you know that.”