Grave Memory: An Alex Craft Novel (7 page)

I sighed. I couldn’t help it. The Humans First Party members tended to be extremists, but from what I’d seen, her attitude was typical: magic and its users were dangerous and needed more regulations and restrictions, unless, of course, a party member wanted to secretly utilize that magic. Unfortunately, they were extremists who were gaining seats in Congress. Even Nekros had a Human First party governor, but then, he was actually a fae in deep hiding—and my father—so that was a different and entirely screwed up situation.

I didn’t know what to say to Mrs. Kingly. I wasn’t going to turn her down as a client simply because she was a hypocrite—I’d worked for worse. The real problem was that I doubted I could get the results she wanted. I might be able to prove her husband’s death was an accident, maybe, depending on what the shade said. But murder?

I glanced at the ghost of James Kingly. He cooed sympathetic reassurances to his wife—which she couldn’t hear and were no help to me in figuring out what had happened to him. I wished I could get him alone for a moment and ask him some questions, but I didn’t see how without alerting Mrs. Kingly to his presence, which would have probably made his day but was likely to push her over the edge of what she could accept.

“He wouldn’t have killed himself, Ms. Craft,” she said in a small voice. One that lacked the edge she’d brandished since walking through my door. “And he wouldn’t have run off. He wanted this baby.”

“Coming to the Quarter isn’t an indication he was running off. Maybe he was looking for another charm for the baby?”

She shook her head. The tears had finally won, cutting paths through her makeup and making her mascara run. Oh yeah, I definitely need to get some tissues for my desk. The ghost pushing to his feet drew my attention from my living client.

“I didn’t. I swear to you I didn’t,” he said, his shimmery hands curling into fists and then flexing again. He paced behind her. “Why would you say I ran off? I never left.”

Okay.
Now that was odd.

I looked at my client, whose bravado had completely crumpled under her grief. “When you say he ran off, what exactly do you mean?”

She scrubbed the tears from her eyes with the base of her palm, further smearing her makeup. “He…” She broke off to sniffle. “He called me after work, about four days before…before it happened. He said he had to take some clients to dinner, which wasn’t unusual except that he
hadn’t told me about it beforehand. That was the last time I heard from him. I reported him missing the next day. When the police showed up at the door”—she sniffled again—“I knew it was bad news. I couldn’t think of any reason he wouldn’t have come home if he were okay. I just didn’t expect…I didn’t expect them to tell me it had just happened. Or that they suspected he’d jumped.” Another sniffle. “You said you have a bathroom?”

I showed her to it, but grabbed the ghost’s arm before he could follow her inside.

“Hey,” he yelled, staring at my hand on his arm. “You, you can see me?”

No, I randomly grabbed at air and happened to catch the arm of a ghost.
Of course, I really didn’t expect any other response. The question was practically obligatory. Grave witches were the only people who could see ghosts, and we weren’t exactly plentiful. As far as I knew, I was the only grave witch who could also touch ghosts. Still, I wanted to avoid a scene directly outside the bathroom door. The wood wasn’t thick and me having a one-sided conversation wasn’t likely to instill much confidence in my client. So I pressed my finger over my lips and dragged the ghost back to my office.

“What really happened on that roof?”

The ghost stared at me wide-eyed for a moment before saying, “You really can see me? And hear me? You have to tell my wife I love her and that I didn’t jump.”

“Right, I got that already. Now, the roof. What happened?”

The ghost frowned. “I’m not sure.”

Seriously?
“How can you not be sure?”

“I…I don’t remember going up to that roof. One minute I was in Delaney’s, a little Irish pub between work and my house, and then I hit a car and some guy was pulling me out of my body.”

That “guy” would have been the collector, though since both Death and the gray man had been there, I wasn’t sure which one, but that wasn’t the important part of the story.

“Let’s go back to the beginning. You were with some clients at the pub and then what?”

“And then nothing. Just pain and the feeling of my head caving in and my bones snapping.” The ghost shivered with the memory of his quick but gruesome death.

That would mean he was missing a little more than three days—which could happen, I’d lost hours and days in Faerie before—but he hadn’t said he’d gone to the Eternal Bloom, Nekros’s only fae bar. “Okay, so you were at the Irish pub. Who are the clients you were with?”

The ghost swallowed. “Uh…” I could almost see the thoughts circling around in his head, trying to decide how to answer, how much to admit to. He’d never taken clients to the little Irish pub. I could see it all over his face. But he was still trying to decide if he should tell me as much.

And that was the problem with ghosts. They could lie.

B
y the time Mrs. Kingly emerged from the bathroom, her makeup was once again perfect—as was the cold chip on her shoulder. Aside from the fact he’d lied to his widow during their last conversation, I hadn’t learned anything useful from James, and of course, I went back to ignoring him as soon as the door opened and Mrs. Kingly reappeared. James didn’t want to talk about whatever had happened during those unaccounted for days. I’d have to wait until I questioned the shade to get any real answers.

“You can do the ritual tonight, right?” Mrs. Kingly asked, and I hesitated, my hand halfway across the desk with the blank contract for hire that Rianna and I had drawn up as well as several OMIH regulated forms.

Tonight?
“I don’t do nighttime rituals.”

“You don’t need darkness and moonlight and all that?”

I didn’t groan at the stereotypical—and completely incorrect—assumption but my “no” was perhaps overly terse. I ended up blind enough in broad daylight, doing rituals at night would be downright stupid.

“But you can do it today? His body will be picked up tomorrow and you need to prove it was murder before he leaves the morgue.”

Her insistence was on the side of frantic and I had the
feeling that she was one breath away from either yelling or a repeat of the earlier waterworks. Neither appealed to me, so I aimed for a placating smile and tried to keep my voice calm as I said, “I can raise the shade this afternoon, but I can’t give you any guarantees that his death will be decreed a murder. It all depends on what the shade says.”

“It’s murder.” The words were matter of fact without any room for question as she signed and dated a consent form to grant me access to her husband’s body while in the morgue.

I wished I could be half as sure.

“And find out where he was those three days he was missing. I’m assuming kidnapped by whomever killed him, but I need to know.” The smallest tinge of doubt crawled into her voice with the last, as if some small part of her believed what everyone kept telling her—that her husband’s death was a suicide.

Well, I’ll know soon enough.

I went over the contract with her but she stopped me when I reached the portion about paying a retainer fee upfront.

“How will I know you’ve really performed the ritual? What if something goes wrong? Am I just out that money?”

“You’re more than welcome to accompany me,” I said and the color drained from her face.

“You could maybe, record it? In audio I mean. I don’t want to see…”

I nodded, not making her finish the sentence. Since I’d be performing the ritual at the morgue, making a recording wouldn’t be an issue. Hell, when I consulted for the police, the ritual was always recorded. The fact that all the equipment needed was already set up for autopsies helped. I’d just record the ritual and then detach the audio file for Mrs. Kingly.

We were finishing the last of the paperwork when the chime on the door sounded. This time I did recognize the tingle of magic—Rianna. She popped into my office, Desmond at her side, but backed out again when she saw the
client at my desk. She smiled, but curiosity peeked through her expression. I wasn’t surprised when her eyes flashed with an inner light as she opened her shields. Her gaze landed on the ghost of James Kingly and that smile widened as her eyebrows raised in an expression I recognized well from our academy days. I could almost hear the unsaid
“I told you so.”
I wanted to roll my eyes—just like I would have when we were younger, but I didn’t think Mrs. Kingly would find that half as amusing as Rianna. I waved my hand, the movement more shooing motion than greeting.

Once Mrs. Kingly left, I grabbed my purse and headed across the lobby. “I’m off to the morgue.”

Rianna looked up from a paperback—a mystery novel, no doubt. “You’ll be back in time for dinner?”

She needed to be inside Faerie during sunset and sunrise as those were the times
between
, when day and night changed and Faerie’s magic was at its weakest. If she strayed in the mortal realm without Faerie’s magic supporting her, all her years would catch up with her. I’d seen it happen to another changeling and it wasn’t a pretty way to die.

“If it looks like I’m running late, go on without me. Holly and I can meet you there.” After all, Rianna didn’t need me to get into Faerie, and with signs of fall all around, the sunset was earlier each evening. Holly, on the other hand, needed an escort who was on the VIP list.

Rianna nodded, but her expression dropped slightly before her eyes returned to her book. I waved at Desmond as I passed him. The barghest ignored me, which was pretty typical.

I’d just reached the front door when I paused.

“Oh yeah, by the way,” I said, my hand hovering over the door handle. “I forgot to tell you. Roy moved into the broom closet.” And with that, I left.

“She’s roped you into this wild-goose chase too, huh?” Tamara, the lead medical examiner and one of my best friends, said as she wheeled a sheet-covered gurney out of the
morgue’s cold room. “I mean, it’s a terrible, tragic thing, and I pity her having to deal with it in her condition, but she needs to come to terms with the fact her husband jumped.”

“So you don’t think there’s a chance this is anything other than suicide?” I asked, but I was only half paying attention. Grave essence was wafting out of the now shut door of the cold room, and despite the fact I once again had my shields locked as tightly as I could possibly maintain, I could feel its cold but seductive touch. I could also feel the fact she had nine bodies in the room, and the gender and approximate age of each—way too much was getting through my shields.

Tamara didn’t notice my distraction, that or she was accustomed to me acting a little odd in the morgue. “Not a chance. This guy didn’t just jump, he dove off that building, and judging by the injures I found—and almost as important, those I didn’t find—he didn’t attempt to brace himself or break the fall.”

Then why is the ghost so insistent?
I glanced at the gurney. The lumpy form the sheet covered was too flat, the outline wrong for an adult man’s body. But it was a body, and from my interaction with his ghost, I could tell without a doubt it was Kingly’s body. I was glad that sheet wouldn’t have to be removed, but I wasn’t looking forward to seeing the condition of his shade.

“You staying for this or are you going to send in one of your interns?” Because chain of evidence demanded someone official stay with the body while I performed my ritual, but I knew Tamara had just acquired a couple of new interns and she enjoyed breaking them in by letting me freak them out.

“Oh, I’m staying,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest. “After everything that woman put my office through, I want to hear this selfish prick admit he jumped. Besides, I’ve barely seen you in a month. Holly is suddenly too busy to go to lunch, ever. And you’ve stood me up for dinner twice. I’m seriously having a case of third wheel syndrome here. Too old to hang, maybe?”

She made it sound like a joke, but I could hear something else, something hurt, in her voice. I cringed and tried to hide the reaction by focusing on digging through my purse.

I found the tube of waxy chalk I used for drawing circles for indoor rituals and started working my way around the gurney.

“You know that’s not it. The timing just hasn’t worked. Besides, you’re not that old.”

Tamara huffed. “I’m a bride in my late thirties trying to plan a wedding without the help of my two closest friends.”

I nearly dropped the chalk. “You and Ethan finally set a date?” She’d been wearing a huge diamond for at least four months now, but while Ethan had proposed, he wouldn’t commit to a date.

“Yeah.” A dreamy smile spread across Tamara’s face, her eyes going distant and a slightly dopey expression claiming her face. Then her gaze snapped back to me and the softness faded. “And you’d know that, and that I want you and Holly to be my bridesmaids, if you weren’t avoiding me.”