“They’re all like that,” Agent Tayler said, joining me in the street.
The female officer’s gaze didn’t lift with our words. She just continued to stare blankly at the ground. She didn’t even bother to wipe her tear-soaked cheeks, which glistened in the streetlights. She just stood there as if she were empty. The biggest response I’d received from her had been a half shrug when I’d asked where she’d been hurt.
Still, all of that was better than the two men—they were so locked away in their own heads that I hadn’t been able to talk either out of the car. I frowned, thinking about what Derrick had told me about the hospitalized victims.
“These guys are headed toward catatonic, aren’t they?”
Agent Tayler nodded in answer, and we stood in silence.
“You sensing anything, Officer Lancaster?” I asked, glancing at Russell.
His face filled with opposing lines as he scrunched his brow while frowning. I started to tell him not to hurt himself, but stopped before opening my mouth. He was a big boy. Surely he knew the limits of his abilities.
After a moment he huffed out a breath and stepped back. “It . . . I can’t explain exactly. It is kind of like they have magical . . . holes.” He shook his head and again stepped back. “Something was taken.”
Nodding, I turned on my heels and headed toward the barricade. Agent Tayler and Officer Lancaster both hurried to keep up. Tayler I expected, but it was time for the officer to go back to the other cops unless he wanted a crash course in monster hunting. He seemed to realize that as well because his steps became shorter, slower, until several yards stretched between us.
“Hey,” he said, stopping completely, “when should I expect—”
I cut him off. “If I need a sensitive, I’ve got your number.” I turned to Agent Tayler. “I’m going behind your barricade. Will you or your fellow agents be joining me?”
Tayler’s eyes narrowed, making them small and dark in the moonlight. He’d taken the question as a challenge, which, admittedly, it was. Of course, all he saw was an average-looking woman in leather—he couldn’t see that I was armed to the teeth.
He met with his partner, exchanging words too quiet for me to hear. Then he said something into a two-way radio before turning back to me.
“Ready?” I asked, already knowing the answer before his sharp nod.
It was time to go behind the safety point. Now, just to hope their little trap had caught something.
Well, as I suspected from the beginning, it was a badly constructed trap. Or maybe they were just unlucky. Either way, the ABMU guys—a third had joined us from the opposite barricaded entrance—and I searched every dark inch of that street.
I held my spell checker out in front of me, focusing on the shadows. The small bead in the center didn’t light up—neither, I noticed, did the two ABMU agents’ detectors. The irony of the situation was that the spell checkers had a range of only a foot or two and could tell me nothing more than if a spell was malicious or not, but back behind the barricade was a sensitive whose range was likely several yards and who could not only sense the nature of a spell, but also what it did, if Russell was half as good as he appeared to be. As the tool was available, I was sorely tempted to use it, but I didn’t want to put the kid in danger. It wasn’t his job to hunt monsters. It was mine.
Once it became painfully clear there was nothing to find, I put away my spell checker and said good-bye to the agents. They stayed behind, still searching. And I hoped they would find something—I didn’t actually think they would, but best of luck to them. If they made any discoveries, either Derrick or I would learn of it soon enough.
I cruised the streets of Central York for an hour or two, watching the shadows. I saw nothing unusual and no more sightings were announced by the dispatcher. As late rapidly changed to early, I turned the Hummer around. This town didn’t have a hotel, so I had a ways to go before I would reach my bed. The hunt would just have to wait until tomorrow night.
This case might take longer than I’d hoped.
I stopped in front of the connecting door between Derrick’s and my hotel rooms. Our habit was to keep the doors open when we were awake and working a case, but his was still stubbornly closed. Considering I was the one who’d spent the last three nights out on fruitless hunts, he should have been up before me. Hell, even when I wasn’t hunting through the night he was up before me. There was only one situation in which he slept in: when he had a premonition.
Using a simple spell I carried in a ring, I unlocked the door and entered Derrick’s room. The curtains were drawn tight, casting most of the room in deep shadows. The only light poured out of the doorway where I stood; it was just enough to frame Derrick’s form in the bed. At a glance I knew I hadn’t woken him, and I stole a moment to admire the toned flesh on display. We were partners, so I’d never let him see me look at him like that, but damn, the man was gorgeous. The sheets were his—sultry red—and as usual, he slept in the buff.
He’d had a rough night if the twisted and fallen sheets were any indication. Of course that left only more—as in nearly all—of him on display. My gaze stole several moments to glide over the sleek muscles of his back, down to the half-covered outline of his ass, and then onward over the sheet until his strong legs reappeared. He was a thing of beauty—and that wasn’t just my relationship-starved hunger talking. Constantly traveling for cases wasn’t conducive to finding—or keeping—a boyfriend. With a sigh I also noted the signs of distress in my partner’s sleeping form: the way one arm covered his face, the shimmer of sweat on his skin, and the clenched fists.
Walking across the room, I opened the blinds, filling the room with light. He still didn’t wake, so I headed to the bathroom next. I grabbed his bottle of painkillers from the sink and a pint glass. The first I opened and the second I filled half full of water.
“Hey, Derrick. Wake up,” I said as I reentered the room.
No response. Not even a shift in his sleep-heavy breathing.
I tried again, with the same results. While this much flesh on display made for good eye candy, it also prevented me from shaking him awake. Not that I hadn’t been in this situation before.
Setting the open pill bottle on the bedside table, I dumped a bit of the water in my palm, let it run down my fingers, and then made a flicking motion. Water droplets flung from my fingers and Derrick jerked backward with a loud inhalation.
“What—?” Derrick blinked several times before groaning and running a hand over his eyes and down to the dark stubble forming on his chin. “I had a premonition.”
“I assumed that much,” I said, moving the painkillers and glass closer.
He took both with a nod of thanks. Then he dumped several pills onto his palm, not bothering to count before tossing them back and washing them down.
I considered waiting in the room for him to tell me what he’d learned—though it may have nothing to do with our case—but he’d no doubt appreciate a chance to dress. If he had any important information, he’d hurry.
I was halfway through cleaning and reassembling my crossbow when the doors dividing our rooms opened and a now clean and dressed Derrick emerged.
“So,” I said, setting down my crossbow so I could give my partner my full attention. “Did your premonition pertain to our case?”
“Yes, but you aren’t going to like it.”
Sometimes Derrick’s visions were specific. This time? Less so. All he knew—or at least, all he shared—was that I’d find out something important at the No Bull Vegetarian Diner. He didn’t know when or how I’d learn this crucial info, but he said solving the case hinged on my presence in the diner.
The idea of more waiting, possibly a lot of waiting, didn’t appeal to me, but how could I argue? Premonitions
