Grave Memory: An Alex Craft Novel (38 page)

Steven continued his story without notice of my momentary distraction. “I followed my body, trying to figure out how to make it stop. I mean, if I was dead, I should be properly dead, right? It headed straight for the closest cemetery, and I almost followed it inside, but the gate felt wrong, so I waited. That’s when I noticed the moon. I’m a bit of a star freak, and I’d been using my telescope the night before—only it wasn’t the night before. Somehow between breakfast and waking up under the park bench, I lost three whole days.”

Oh crap. That sounded awfully familiar. The rider’s victims always lost three days, at least before he killed them. But they weren’t ghouls—they were just corpses.

“Steven, I need you to think hard. When you were following your body, did it look hurt? I mean, claw marks, or signs that you might have killed yourself and not remember?”

The ghost shook his head. “No. I mean, I didn’t look like myself. I was thin, my skin drawn back tight, and I had scary-ass teeth and talons, but I didn’t look hurt.”

The blood drained from my face and a shiver shook me. I’d never seen a ghoul, never thought about what they looked like. Briar had mentioned something about a transition, but I hadn’t considered the physical changes. Like the sharp teeth that allowed them to rip through flesh—teeth like I’d seen in Kirkwood’s burnt body. And then there was the rapid burning of all fat and desiccation of the body, which every one of the rider’s victims displayed to some extent or another.

The rider wasn’t committing suicide just to jump to a new host—he was killing his host before his presence turned the body into a ghoul.

“L
arid,” I said again to the bored-looking secretary at the front desk of the local branch of the OMIH. “L-A-R—oh for goodness sake, I’m sure he’s the only possessed guy that came in here two days ago. I’m not trying to see Larid, I just need to talk to the official in charge of his case, or study, or whatever you guys call it.”

“And you are again?”

I sighed and passed her my identification, for the second time. “Alex Craft. I’m the person the thing inside Larid was trying to kill.”

She touched a charm on her desk and a privacy bubble enveloped her as she picked up her phone and made a call. One day I was going to have to learn to read lips. The conversation was a short one, which hopefully meant I got a pass, not a quick “no.”

“Well, Ms. Craft,” she said after she deactivated the privacy charm. “You’ll be relieved to know he won’t be a problem to you anymore.”

A cold jolt of warning shot up my spine. “Why’s that?”

“He died an hour ago.”

“He died?” I repeated, my voice lifting high enough to be just this side of panic. “Was it suicide?”
Please, please have been suicide.
If I fully understood the implications of
what Steven had told me and the physical evidence I’d seen, the rider remaining in a body caused eventual death and ghoulification. It had only been two days. The rider never discarded a body until it started to turn ghoul—which apparently took about three days—unless cornered. So Larid couldn’t have turned yet, could he?
It had to be suicide.

The secretary gave me a look that questioned my intelligence. Of course Larid hadn’t died from suicide—the OMIH would have kept him secured and possibly sedated.

“Where is the body now?”

“I’ve told you all I can, Ms. Craft.” She looked down at her computer, dismissing me.

Damn it. If he’d drained the body, I had no idea how long it took between being deemed medically dead and becoming a ghoul. Surely he was circled at the time of his death, but did they contain the rider before breaking the circle to check the body?

“I need to talk to the official in this case. I have information.”

“He isn’t in the office.”

“Then where is he? This is urgent.”

She gave me an unimpressed glare.

“You have a problem and your official needs to know,” I said, trying to keep my voice polite and avoid imagining hitting the woman with one of Briar’s triple-threat darts. “That body might have been dead an hour ago, but chances are good that it will be up, walking around, and hungry very soon. If it’s not in a circle anymore, it needs to be. So pass that along to the official or let me know who I can talk to with the authority to contain that body.”

Her expression shifted toward unsure, but not actually convinced.

I trudged on. “There is a high probability Larid will become a ghoul, so someone needs to take a couple of preventative measures to ensure that doesn’t happen.” I wasn’t sure exactly what those measures were, but I figured cutting off his head would work—cockroaches were the only thing I knew that could survive a beheading, otherwise it was a
pretty equal opportunity killing method. Briar would know for sure, but I had no idea how to contact her.

As if my thoughts summoned the woman, a black leather–clad figure walked into the lobby. “Craft, I’ve been looking for you. I don’t like it when my suspects close shop and disappear.”

The secretary’s eyes widened at the word “suspect” and I lost any ground I’d gained with her. She was never going to give me any information now.

I whirled around to face Briar and had to unclench my jaw before I could speak, but I figured if anyone would know what to do about the rider/ghoul situation, it would be her. She listened, her lips thinning as I spoke. Once I finished, Briar marched over to the secretary and flashed her badge.

“Where’s the body?”

The woman didn’t hesitate. “The two officials on the case are currently escorting the corpse to the city morgue for an autopsy.”

I turned on my heels, running for the front door as soon as the word “morgue” crossed her lips. I dug my phone out of my purse as I ran. “Call Tamara,” I yelled into the mouthpiece, holding the
VOICE COMMAND
button.

Tamara’s name flashed across the display before the phone announced it was calling. It rang once, twice. I reached the street. No taxis.

Crap, I had the worst taxi karma recently.

“You need a ride, Craft?” Briar said, two steps behind me.

The offer shocked me, but I guess the enemy of my enemy and all that, though I wouldn’t come close to saying friends. Still, she didn’t have to ask me twice. As I followed her to her vehicle, Tamara’s line rang a fifth time and then went to voice mail. I hit
REDIAL
.

Come on. Pick up your cell.

It rang twice this time before her recorded message started. She’d sent me to voice mail.

Damn it.

I didn’t have the morgue’s direct line on my voice command list, so I had to scroll for it. We reached Briar’s car as
I found the number, and I paused. She drove the biggest SUV I’d ever seen and it might as well have been an armored tank with the amount of metal I felt coming off the thing. Just standing outside it made me nauseous. I couldn’t imagine climbing inside.

I did anyway.

“Craft, you look like you’re going to retch.”

“I’ll make it. Can I open this window?” I didn’t wait for her answer but hit the window button as soon as she cranked the vehicle.

It helped only a little.

I can do this.
Then another thought hit me. Iron blocked faerie’s magic, was my perception charm working? I glanced at Briar, but she wasn’t aiming any weapons at me, so I guessed I wasn’t glowing.

I hit the
CALL
button and my phone dialed the morgue’s main line.

Tamara picked up on the first ring.

“Alex, this isn’t a good time. I have a cop’s body coming in. People are going to want answers.”

“I know. Larid, escorted by two OMIH officials. Listen, you’ve got to stay away from the body. Keep it contained if you can. If you can’t, then lock yourself in your office.”

“What are you talking about?” she asked, and in the background I heard voices. A vehicle idling. A door slamming.

“I think it will turn ghoul. Don’t go near the body.”

“It what? You’ve got to be kidding,” she muttered then yelled, “Reggie don’t—”

A masculine scream boomed in the background, then another and I heard a crashing crack. Static filled the connection.

“Tamara?”

No answer.

“Tam?”

Another scream, this one higher pitched, cut through the static.

I whirled to face Briar. “Drive faster.”

*  *  *

Briar managed the half-hour drive from the Quarter to Central Precinct in eighteen minutes. Every single one of which made the sick feeling in my stomach worse—and I wasn’t sure if that was because of the iron or the fact that Tamara’s phone had gone dead after her scream. The SUV hadn’t come to a complete stop when I jumped out of the passenger side and ran for the morgue. Briar called my name, commanding me to wait, but I didn’t stop. Visitors were required to go through one of the main entrances and a security check as well as sign in and get a pass. I didn’t have time for that. I jogged around the side of the building heading for the entrance funeral homes used when picking up bodies.

I wasn’t the only one.

A flock of police officers were at the scene. Of course, considering most had been in the building during the attack, it wasn’t surprising they were here. Between the press of uniformed and plainclothes cops, I couldn’t see much as I approached, but near the open doors of the body mover’s van I could just make out a white sheet with deep crimson stains. Another bloodstained sheet covered a body a few feet away. I ground to a halt, still a good distance away. I didn’t want to know, but I
needed
to know who was under those sheets.

Heat burned my eyes as tears threatened. I blinked them back and opened my senses. If I’d have moved closer, I wouldn’t have needed to let my awareness drift, but then, if I started crying, all the cops would see. So I reached toward the bodies.

Male. Both of them.

I let out a relieved sigh, which immediately made me feel guilty because that had to be Reggie and at least one of the OMIH officials. But I’d never met them, didn’t know them, and if it had been Tamara…I didn’t finish that thought.

A hot hand landed on my shoulder. “Craft, I told you to wait.”

I didn’t turn. “Two dead. Both males, one in his late twenties and the other late thirties to early forties.”

“Can that grave witch sense of yours tell their pants size and marital status too?”

I shot a frown at Briar, but she was already moving, hurrying the rest of the way down the steep drive. I jogged to catch up, but drew up short as we reached the back line of cops.

How the hell am I going to get through that?
Only a handful of cops were actively working the scene, the rest were stuck between transfixed terror—after all, they’d known the officer-turned-ghoul—and trying to appear helpful so they weren’t sent away.

Two police dogs were present and one officer had a law enforcement grade tracking charm, but they seemed to be having trouble finding a sample for the dogs or charm.

Briar pulled her badge and muscled her way through the crowd, flashing her credentials to anyone who gave her trouble. I followed in her wake, spotting more familiar than unfamiliar faces as I moved through the throng of officers. Some nodded grim greetings with tight lips and burdened eyes; others didn’t seem to notice me at all. Only a few officers’ features hardened as they spotted me, but no one stopped me as I followed Briar.

“I’m not your ticket onto a crime scene,” she told me when we reached the front of the blockade of officers.

“Didn’t expect you to be.” I turned on my heel, walking toward the morgue’s back entrance. I almost made it too. Then a large hand landed on my shoulder, the bear-sized palm burning against the skin my top didn’t cover.

“You shouldn’t be here,” John said, and his mustache tugged down toward his chin with his frown.

“I’m not here to interfere. I just want to check on Tamara.”

He stared at me for a long moment, the deep lines around his eyes sharper today, the crease between his brows tight. “This thing was responsible for the suicides, but what the hell happened here?”

“Ghoul,” I said and his mustache managed to pull down another notch. “I think the rider was killing the victims to prevent them from turning into ghouls.”

“How humane.” He made a sound between a snort and a grunt.

Then we both stood there, not looking at each other. What else was there to say? That I’d told him the suicides were homicides and if they were treated as such this might not have happened? That he’d told me to stay out of it, and if I had, the rider would have never decided I was a threat and a lot of good cops would still be alive?

The silence hung heavy and thick, a tension that had been building one secret and small hurt at a time so that now a wall towered between us. “I’m going to check on Tamara,” I finally said.

He gave a weary nod, but I think he was relieved the conversation ended. I hurried inside before anyone else could stop me.

While cops packed the back entrance, the morgue was as cool and quiet as ever. I found Tamara in her office, one of her new interns stitching four nasty-looking lacerations. The skin around Tamara’s eyes tightened in something not quite drastic enough to be called a wince every time the needle pierced her skin.