Fair Game

‘Heuter’s eating habits are pretty creepy,’ Leslie said. ‘But I was talking about the witch. At least she told us some things we didn’t know.’

After they’d left the morgue, Leslie had called Goldstein with an update. From what Anna could tell, he’d been pretty excited because his voice had even sped up for a word or two. When she’d finished, Heuter recommended a restaurant with good food and outdoor tables where they could talk without having to fuss about Brother Wolf.

The waiter’s eyebrows had risen when Anna ordered so much food. He’d protested when she put the plate with four burgers down for Brother Wolf, but had shut up when Leslie produced her badge and said, with a nod, ‘Werewolf.’

There had been a quick switch in waitstaff, and the new waitress had asked if she could get Brother Wolf a bowl of water (yes) – or if he’d like something else to drink (no). Anna figured that waitress had just earned a pretty big tip. From the smile on the waitress’s face, she figured so as well.

‘That was wicked fun, how you yanked the witch’s chain,’ Leslie told her. ‘Until then I hadn’t realized she was just trying to freak us out.’

‘Umm,’ answered Anna, taking a bite to give herself time to think.

Brother Wolf looked up and focused on Anna. Okay, she was here to share information. Might as well do her job.

‘She wasn’t trying to freak you out,’ Anna told them. ‘Isaac told us she wasn’t very powerful. She didn’t have the control to keep up appearances in the presence of the death magic on the boy’s body. I was trying to distract her, get her focused on me, so she’d tell us something instead of doing something dumb that was going to get her shot.’

‘Shot?’ Heuter asked.

Anna smiled at him. ‘Guns are quite easy to smell. You should see about changing up the holster in the small of your back. You have to reach too far for it; it takes you too long. Try a shoulder holster or get some more practice.’ The bun had been toasted with real butter and the meat seared on charcoal. Anna ate a few fries to put off starting on the second burger.

‘And you need to wait until you’re sure you are going to draw before you reach,’ agreed Leslie. She smiled at Anna. ‘Cantrip doesn’t require the same weapons training that we get at Quantico.’

Something cold came and went in Heuter’s face before he resumed his bland appearance. ‘Right. There’s been some talk about changing that. I’m afraid most of the shooting I’ve done is with a rifle. My folks are from Texas and we have a place in upstate New York where we go hunting every year, too – hunting is a family ritual. But that witch …’

‘Creepy,’ said Leslie with a nod. ‘I wish she had been faking it. Did either of you recognize the name she gave us? Sally Reilly?’

Anna shook her head. ‘No, but I think Charles did. I’ll talk to him when he changes back and let you know.’

Leslie frowned and started to say something, then glanced at Heuter and stuffed her mouth with salad instead.

‘According to Wiki,’ said Heuter, reading from his phone, ‘in 1967, Sally Reilly wrote a book called My Little Gray Story Book.’ He looked up and grinned. ‘Anyway, it was a play on the My Little Red Story Book series of readers in use in elementary schools. My Little Gray Story Book was an underground sensation, and when the second book, A Witch’s Primer, hit the stands three years later, it hit the New York Times bestseller list. Sally Reilly was beautiful, shocking, and funny and became an instant, if small-time, celebrity. The books were less how-to books than here-is-my-life-as-a-witch books. She did a few talk shows, including The Mike Douglas Show, where she straightened some spoons bent by Uri Geller without touching them the day after the famous Israeli psychic appeared.’

‘Witches can’t straighten spoons,’ said Anna involuntarily. Witches did things with living and once-living tissue – blood and bodies and stuff like that.

Heuter tipped his phone at her. ‘It’s on Wiki.’

‘I’ve never heard of her,’ said Leslie. ‘I know about Uri and his spoon bending. Did something happen to her? The witch seemed pretty sure that she’s dead, and Charles, according to Anna, thinks that she was a victim of our serial killer. What does Wiki say?’

‘Wiki doesn’t say,’ said Heuter. ‘Hold on.’

‘My dad talks about the sixties and seventies as a heyday of New Age thinking before the New Agers,’ Anna said. ‘Lots of free love and Wicca and magical thinking.’

Heuter, still searching the Internet, nodded. ‘The Victorian era was the only thing that came close to it. Ouija boards, séances, games that tested whether people could read minds. Then, because everyone was doing it … it became less mysterious, less shadowy, and more … ridiculous. Interests changed.’

‘So maybe our Sally Reilly just disappeared from public view as the world gave a yawn,’ suggested Leslie. ‘Is this going to help our missing girl?’

Heuter didn’t answer her question. ‘There are rumors of a third book she wrote and printed only a few copies of – Elementary Magic. When I get back to the office, I’ll check our archives, see if we have it in the library. I should also be able to find out what happened to her, or if she’s still around.’

‘The witch seemed awfully sure she was dead,’ said Anna. She hadn’t been lying.

Heuter snorted and a scowl marred his handsome face. ‘That witch was … well. I wouldn’t trust her to know which way was up.’

‘She gave us Sally Reilly,’ Anna pointed out.

‘Which was more than we’d managed to get out of any of the other witches the FBI consulted with on this case,’ agreed Leslie.

Anna finished her last cheeseburger and retrieved Brother Wolf’s empty plate, stacking them together on the table. She tried to see any way she and Charles could be of more help.

‘Maybe if we went out to where Jacob’s body was found, we might be able to find something more,’ she said slowly. ‘He was the last victim, before Lizzie?’

‘Right,’ Leslie said. ‘Was he fae or werewolf – could you tell? Dr Fuller said his parents were Baptist. That doesn’t quite go with the whole supernatural thing.’

Anna blinked at her a moment. She hadn’t thought about that. Why had their killer reverted to killing humans again?

‘Fae,’ said Heuter. ‘His father, Ian Mott, is listed in the fae database at Cantrip as full-blood fae and Jacob is clearly listed as half-fae. I ran the list of victims after we talked yesterday. Cantrip’s database is far more extensive than the official one.’

‘Is it?’ asked Anna; then she took a quick drink from her water glass to disguise any expression she might be showing. If Jacob Mott had been any sort of preternatural, she’d eat her hat. He hadn’t smelled fae – and even half-bloods smell like fae. Wasn’t it interesting he was listed as fae in Cantrip’s database? Maybe the killer was finding his victims in the same database. Even so, shouldn’t the fae who’d stolen Lizzie away be able to tell Jacob Mott hadn’t been fae? She didn’t really know if one fae could tell if another one was around, though she suspected it was so.

Charles was watching Heuter with sudden interest. How she could tell it was Charles and not Brother Wolf was … like how a mother of twins knew which one was which: less about the small details and more about instincts.

Heuter looked at Anna as if he’d forgotten she was there. ‘Oops,’ he said. ‘I don’t suppose you can forget that.’

‘Don’t want anyone filing paperwork to see if they are in that database of yours?’ Leslie asked. ‘One of the fringe benefits to working with Cantrip or one of the other, smaller enforcement agencies in the government is that no one ever thinks to file on them with the Freedom of Information Act.’

‘You’d be surprised,’ said Hueter in a voice very nearly a whine. ‘The people who use FOIA do it extensively and well. Answering those requests is the job we give newbies – and that includes Important Senators’ Sons, like yours truly, too.’ He grinned, showing that he didn’t think that made him any more deserving of privilege than the rest of the newbies. ‘But not even the powers that be could keep me there for long. Information gathering about