Jayne Castle - After Glow

Hell, not another body. He glanced down as he caught his balance. There was just enough light from the alley outside to reveal the bunched-up carpet that had snagged his boot. The intruder must have removed it to get at the floorboards, he thought. The guy had been searching for something.

The delay cost him a crucial few seconds. By the time he reached the window and flattened himself against the wall, he knew he was too late.

From where he stood he could see a section of the fogbound passage that ran the length of the building. The combination of river mist and darkness made it impossible to spot his quarry but he heard footsteps pounding toward the entrance of the alley. A lot of footsteps; he thought. Two people, not one. He considered summoning a ghost to stop the fleeing intruders out in the street. The problem was that he had no way of knowing who else might be in the vicinity. It would not look good in the morning papers if the headlines implied that the new Guild boss made a habit of singing innocent bystanders with wild ghost energy. The damn image thing.

"Emmett?" Lydia's voice came from the front room. She sounded anxious and alarmed. "Emmett, are you okay? Answer me."

"I'm okay."

So much for following orders. Out of nowhere he suddenly recalled the records of the inquiry into Lydia's Lost Weekend. They had been marked confidential, of course, but he had not had any trouble getting a copy through his Guild connections.

The two hunters who had been assigned to Lydia's team had testified that she had gotten into trouble because she had not obeyed their orders.

Sometimes it was all too easy to comprehend just how that might have happened, he thought. She was, by nature as well as by training, strong willed. In the pursuit of an objective, she could be very, very determined.

He turned away from the window and saw four eyes glowing in the darkness a short distance away.

"Thanks for the backup, Fuzz." He reached down and scooped up the dust-bunny, who was sleeked into full hunting mode. "But we missed 'em."

Carrying Fuzz, he walked out of the study and went into the living room. Lydia was a silhouette in the doorway.

"They're gone," he said.

"What happened?" she asked, closing the door.

"Some other folks got here first. They made it out through the window before I could grab them."

"You're all right?" she asked sharply.

"Fuzz and I are both fine. Probably a couple of burglars. Not a big surprise in this neighborhood. They must have got the word that Maltby was dead and thought they'd drop in to see if he left any drugs around."

"Hmm."

He did not like the sound of that hmm , but he chose to ignore it. Instead, he removed the flashlight from his pocket, rezzed it with a small pulse of psi energy, and played the beam across the room. "They really tore this place apart looking for his stash."

Together they surveyed the chaos that had overtaken the tiny living room. The carpet had been rolled up and shoved to one side. Foam spilled out of ripped cushions on the sofa. Books had been swept off the shelves and dumped unceremoniously onto the floor.

"They were certainly looking for something," Lydia said ominously.

"Leftover Chartreuse, like I said."

"Maybe." She directed her own light at a dismembered sofa. "But there's another possibility."

He glanced at her. "You think they wanted to see if he left some clue about whatever it was he wanted to tell you? Don't go there, Lydia. We don't need any conspiracy theories to explain this search. Maltby did drugs, remember? Odds are this was done by a couple of opportunists looking for some free dope."

"You've got to admit that Maltby's accidental overdose today, the very day he chose to leave a message saying he had something important to tell me, is what you might call a very interesting coincidence."

"It's a coincidence. Period." Resigned, he led the way back to the study.

"I really hate when you get that tone in your voice," she said, hurrying after him.

"What tone?"

"The tone that says you know I'm right but you don't want to admit it."

"I'm a bigger person than that," he said. "I can admit when you're right."

"Really? Try it sometime when I've got a rez-corder handy."

She peered over his shoulder while he aimed the light into the room. "Jeez, they really made a mess in here, didn't they? Look, they even pulled up a couple of floorboards."

There was no denying that the study was in far worse shape than the other room. The drawers had been removed from the desk, the contents dumped on the floor. The reading chair had been overturned, the underside ripped open.

"Let's make this fast," he said, moving to the desk. "Someone else may decide to stop by tonight."

"We're looking for anything that has to do with Amber Hills Dairy." Lydia studied the floor. "I wonder if he had a hidden safe."

"If whoever was here ahead of us didn't find it, I doubt that we'll get lucky," he warned. "The intruders obviously spent a lot of time taking this place apart."

"You know what your problem is, Emmett? You're a worst-case scenario type of guy." She pushed aside some tumbled books to take a closer look at a seam in the floorboards. "You've got to learn to think positive."

"The beauty of planning for the worst-case scenario is that I'm rarely disappointed." He picked up a heavy textbook and flipped through it. There were hand-scribbled notes on every page. "Looks like Maltby never lost his interest in his old profession, in spite of the drugs."

"I told you, once upon a time, he was considered an expert in his field."

Ten minutes later Lydia gave up on the bookcase and stood looking around, her hands on her hips. "I hate to say it, but you may be right. Whoever got here ahead of us had a chance to search this room very thoroughly."

He resisted the temptation to say I told you so . "I agree."

"But they were still here when we arrived," she added thoughtfully. "Starting in on the living room, from the looks of it. Which implies that they did not find whatever it was they were looking for."

"Maybe there were no drugs left to find."

"Okay, let's say that the intruders were looking for Chartreuse." She folded her arms. "If that was the case, they wouldn't have had any interest in whatever it was that Maltby wanted to tell me. Which means his secrets are still here."

"Honey, there is nothing here that has anything to do with a dairy," he said as gently as possible.

"A milk carton," she whispered.

"What?"

"The poor man was dying. Maybe he wasn't trying to write a cryptic note in code. Maybe he was simply attempting to get an obvious message across to me." She unfolded her arms and rushed back out into the short hall.

"Now what?" he said to Fuzz.

They followed her into the small kitchen. She opened the door of the refrigerator. The interior light illuminated her face. He saw her eyes widen with excitement.

Moving closer he looked over her shoulder. There was half of a sandwich covered in mold and some unidentifiable sliced meat that had turned fuzzy and gray.

A carton of Amber Hills Dairy milk stood on the top shelf.

Lydia picked it up with great care. "Empty, I think." She hesitated and smiled slowly. "No, not quite."

He picked up a tiny tingle of psi energy.

"Trapped?" he asked.

She nodded. "Yes." Gingerly she opened the top of the carton and peered inside. "No milk, just a very nasty little illusion trap. Well, well, well. Wonder what it's hiding?"

"Don't try to de-rez it now. Let's get out of here."

"Fine by me." She closed the top of the carton with satisfaction. "I've got what I came here for."

He switched off his flashlight, went to the front door, and checked the corridor through the cloudy peephole. No one stood in the hall.