Suzanne Johnson - Elysian Fields

“You should have stayed next door.” Rand stood in the doorway between the back parlor and the kitchen. I heard Alex’s footsteps—at least I hoped they were Alex’s—going up the stairs to the second floor.

“Who did this?” My first instinct was to blame Rand, but after a second’s thought I knew it wasn’t him. He’d been trying too hard to get in my good graces for some reason, and he also was too much of a tree hugger to risk broken glass and overturned furniture ruining my antique hardwood floor.

“Come here and you can see who did it.” He stepped aside and I edged past him into the kitchen. “Look by the door.”

I had no desire to touch the ax embedded blade-first in the wall next to my back door. It was covered with crusty red and black gunk that I had no doubt was from the Times-Pic reporter still clinging to life in a local hospital. “He came for me last night and I wasn’t here,” I whispered, looking around. The kitchen was intact. “He just tore up the living room to make sure I knew he’d been here.”

What might have happened if I hadn’t gone to Alex’s last night? Could I have fought him off? Gotten to the elven staff in time? Been trapped in my second-floor bedroom? I’d been in such a hormonal frenzy when I went to Alex’s I’d forgotten to set my security wards. They’d probably have kept him out.

“Where’s Sebastian?” I looked under the kitchen table and atop the cabinets, and finally spotted him on the fridge, glaring at me from between two cookbooks. As soon as I spotted him, he yowled at me and ran out of the room. At least I knew he was safe.

Rubbing my arms to try and smooth out the chill bumps that had taken up residence, I approached the ax. The handle was smooth, light-colored wood, and a wide black stripe around the base matched the ones from the other crime scenes.

Ken had discovered that both of the big-box homeimprovement stores had sold out of axes—about two dozen total. I doubted the Axeman had been shopping, so I’m betting it was the necromancer. He’d paid cash, however, so there was no way to trace the sales until the NOPD studied the security- camera footage—and hoped the ax sales were made recently.

I reached out to touch the ax, then drew my hand back.

“You might as well go ahead,” Rand said, making me jump. He’d moved close behind me. “We all know the fingerprints on that ax handle aren’t going to match anything the police have.”

Sticking my hands in my pockets to keep from touching anything, just on principle, I turned to face him. “And how would you know that?”

Rand’s expression was serious. “You know damned well he isn’t human, and he’s targeting you for some reason. Do you know why?”

I stared at him. “What are you?”

He reached out with his right hand and twirled a lock of my hair around his index finger. I grabbed his wrist and tried to push it away, but he was strong—and an emotional void, as usual. “I’m somebody who doesn’t want to see you hurt.”

“Not good enough.” I grabbed his wrist again and fully opened my mind to his. A big freaking empty hole.

He frowned, morphing his pretty face into a picture of concern. “You’re really worried about the loup-garou change. You’re healing too fast and it’s taking hold. I can help you.”

A chill washed over me. He’d known the Axeman wasn’t human and he knew about the loup-garou exposure. What the hell was he? What did he want? Quince Randolph could read me like my thoughts were running across my forehead on a tickertape, and I could get nothing from him.

“Get out of here.” My voice rasped. “Until you’re ready to tell me the truth about being an elf, get out.” He had to be an elf.

“We’ll talk later, when you’re not so upset.” Rand gave me a final, almost tentative smile before opening the back door.

“I’m not your enemy, Dru.”

I spent the rest of Wednesday trying to clean my living room— thankfully, the only place the Axeman had left his calling card. I’d felt his residual energy in the room when I first went into the house, but it had dissipated quickly. I’d also driven to the Quarter to talk to the new age shop owner and necromancer, but his store was closed until tomorrow morning. Because he’d been busy directing the Axeman to kill me?

Why me? Why would I be a target for a necromancer? Alex and Ken were running background checks on all the victims and trying to find a link between them and me. I thought they were wasting their energy. The necromancer hadn’t been in charge of any attacks before the numbers of my house appeared— just a taunt, apparently. They should focus on the wizard with the target on her back. The killer had missed me once but he’d be back—unless I could summon him first.

I also had downloaded hours’ worth of jazz and had it playing in a nonstop loop on my iPod, with speakers attached so it could be heard in every room.

My sixth construction-size trash bag overflowed with white, cottony stuffing that had been ripped out of my living room furniture before the Axeman chopped off the arms and legs. Probably what he’d planned to do to me, which should scare the crap out of me but I was too pissed. It wasn’t like I could call my homeowner’s insurance company and file a claim, and I didn’t make the money Alex and Jake did since they had the “high-risk” jobs and I didn’t. Yet, exactly who was being stalked by a psychotic ax murderer? Oh yeah. That would be the girl with the low-risk job. The high-risk guys were noodling through computer data files.

“Son of a bitch.” The bottom of my trash bag caught on the wrought-iron railing that ran along my back steps, spilling broken glass and furniture stuffing all over the sidewalk.

I fetched a new bag and squatted beside the mess, picking up glass shards and setting them aside.

“Rand told me someone broke in and wrecked your house.” Eugenie knelt next to me and began picking up trash. “I’m sorry. Not just about this. About everything.”

I stopped her hand halfway toward the trash bag and squeezed it with mine. “I’m sorry too. Nothing is going on with Rand and me, I swear to God. I care about you too much, and I care about Alex too much.”

I didn’t add that I thought Rand was a slimeball of undetermined preternatural parentage. She was definitely not ready for that conversation.

“I believe you. And I’m glad you finally realize what all the rest of us knew about you and Alex.” She sat on the stoop above the trash while I swept the last bit of furniture fluff into the bag and nudged a broken candelabra off the stoop with her tie-dyed sneaker.

I set the bag aside and took the seat on the step below hers. “Do you ever wish we could go back three years, before the storm, and just have things the way they were?” Life had been so simple then, in retrospect, and the things I thought were life or death were nothing of the kind. My biggest concern had been how I could prove myself to Gerry so I could get bigger assignments. Well, now I had them.

“It wasn’t so much better,” Eugenie said. “My shop is doing more business now than before Katrina. And I met Rand.”

That was a subject best avoided. “Yeah, I guess. Life just seemed easier then.”

She reached down and hugged me. “It might help if you’d talk to me, DJ. You think I don’t know there’s a lot of stuff going on in your life that you’re keeping to yourself? That you aren’t able to do things with me anymore? That you’re always stressed out? Especially the last couple of months. You lost Gerry and Tish both. I wish you’d let me help you—by listening, if nothing else.”

I swallowed a lump of guilt. I had been so consumed with my own post- hurricane dramas that I hadn’t given a lot of thought to how it might look from the viewpoint of the woman who was supposed to be my best friend. When was the last time we’d gone shopping or seen a movie?