Death Bringer

table and he jumped.

“Yes, after some discussion, Ms. Walsh and I came to the conclusion that magic was involved in some way. It would be easier if Mr. Dailey had left his face alone, so that we could’ve seen what he looked like.”

“You mean we’d know if he’d been surgically interfered with rather than bespelled?” Feehan asked, his pen poised over the whiteboard.

“It’s a faint possibility. Brad is a medical student, after all, so he and his friends have access to surgical equipment.”

“But unlikely.” Feehan noted Ella’s nod. “So we’re fairly sure this is Otherworld.”

“Yes.” She tried to catch Vadim’s eye, but he was sipping his coffee and reading through Liz’s report. Why was he so reluctant to agree that the perp was from his old stomping ground? “What is interesting is that none of the people who met Adam can describe him very well, so it’s not as if he switches his identity with his victims.”

Sam raised his hand. “It says here that last year, three people in the Bay Area were taken into medical care claiming to have lost their identities. All three of them committed suicide.”

“That’s terrible,” Ella said.

“Maybe it’s one of those legendary hunters from Otherworld—you know, like their dark-angel dude who brings justice and death to the wicked.”

“In Otherworld, Sam, not here.”

“But what if he was here?” Sam looked around, his eyes wide. “What if that bloodthirsty dude was in our world?”

“We have no way of knowing whether such a creature exists, or why he would murder innocent humans.” Vadim cut across what Ella had been about to say, his tone cold. “I suggest we at least try and ground this discussion in reality.”

“Sorry, Vad.” Sam closed his mouth and hunched down in his seat. “I just thought I’d throw it out there. Otherworld has the scariest shit around.”

“Then let’s do our best to make sure we keep Brad Dailey alive and able to answer our questions.” Feehan surveyed the team. “What can we do to find this man ‘Adam’?”

“I’m going to check local conference records and hotels and see if anyone called Adam did register and attend anything in the city this week.” Ella leaned back in her chair. “It’s highly likely he used a false name when he met Brad, but you never know. If he’s been successfully stealing faces for years, he might not be that careful.”

“Okay, what else can we do?”

“I can liaise with Liz and work on extracting more information from the Fae-Web.” Vadim appeared to have come out of his trance.

“That would be great.” Liz smiled at him. “We can also extend our search criteria to the rest of the U.S.A. and the world, and see if there are any other cases to consider.”

Feehan wrote busily on the board and then turned back. “Anything else? Do we need to contact anyone directly in Otherworld for help yet?”

Vadim shook his head. “It’s too early. We need to have some idea what we’re dealing with before we go charging in with our demands.”

“And what do you think we’re dealing with?”

“A killer with exceptional magical powers he can use in the human world as well as his own. That is quite rare.”

“That’s true,” Liz agreed. “A lot of Fae magical powers are weakened when transferred to this realm. Only certain families have the ability to function fully here.”

“Maybe Morosov can come up with a list of those families,” Ella said. “He probably knows the bloodlines better than anyone. It would at least narrow the field.”

“I’d appreciate that.” Feehan smiled at her hapless partner and then turned to Andrew. “Maybe you and Rich can check with the shape-shifting communities as to whether this Adam could come from them. It’s unlikely, I know, but stealing a face could be a facet of shifting we just haven’t come across before.”

Feehan rambled on for a minute and then started gathering up his papers. His idea to involve the shape- shifters was an excellent one. Maybe he was growing into his job after all. It was about time. The look Vadim shot her wasn’t entirely friendly. What the hell was chafing his ass? She’d promised to meet him later, and to have sex, so why wasn’t he smiling?

She waited until everyone exited the room and then put her hand on Vadim’s arm as he started to rise.

“Wait a sec.” He subsided back into his seat. “What’s up?”

“Nothing.” Under her hand his biceps flexed and hardened as if he was considering fleeing. “I’m just thinking about the case.”

“Morosov, as a woman, I already know that the answer ‘nothing’ means ‘everything.’ What are you worried about, and why are you so reluctant to get involved in this?”

“I am involved in it.” His smile was distant.

“Then why won’t you share your knowledge?”

“It’s not that simple.”

“It never is, with you. What’s the problem?”

He turned to face her, his expression far too serious for her liking. “I suspect the man who calls himself Adam is involved with an ancient Otherworld sect.”

“A sect? Like a cult or something?”

“I suppose that is as good a word as any. They...collect trophies.”

“Like a serial killer.”

“Yes, but this is for their amusement. They make bets with each other to see who can collect something that is hard to find like, say, a mermaid’s tail or a unicorn’s horn.”

“Both of which don’t exist, right?”

“They did before the Otherworld sect started hunting them.” His smile was wry. “They don’t care about the consequences of their actions. It’s all about the hunt and the winning.”

“And you think Adam is involved with them?”

“The magic he left behind held a certain signature I recognized.” He met her gaze. “I’ve come across it before in Otherworld.”

“When you were doing what?”

“Fulfilling tasks for the queen.”

“Oh, damn. Why didn’t you share this with Feehan and the rest of the team?”

He looked away. “Because I’m worried that if I bring this up, Feehan will immediately go to Otherworld and make this all aboveboard and public. If he does that, he and the rest of us will probably be killed fairly swiftly. The membership of the sect holds considerable power.”

“Then why did you tell me?”

His eyebrows rose. “Because you’re my mate.”

Sometimes his honesty confounded her. Now she was the one to look away. “So, what can we do?”

“If we track down Adam and execute him ourselves, he will simply be out of the game. No one will care.”

“That makes sense, but what kind of game is he playing? And if we kill him, won’t someone else take his place?”

“The members don’t compete directly against each other. It’s more about how an individual chooses to interpret a challenge. His choice of prey, the way he kills and the way he displays his trophies count toward the eventual winner’s score.”

“That’s macabre.”

“That’s Otherworld.”

“So you’re saying that a challenge could be, to find an interesting use for a human, and our guy could’ve interpreted it to mean let’s steal their faces and make them into, I dunno, carnival masks?”

“Exactly.”

“Gross.” Ella shivered. “So how can we nail him?”