Hardboiled: Not Your Average Detective Story (The Lillim Callina Chronicles Book 5) (7 page)

I looked up, glancing around the class. Most of them had gone back to ignoring me, but I still felt the need to let them know I wasn’t some kind of freak, as though knowing the answer to a question in class was freakish.

“That is exactly why the financial markets are rigged,” Matthers said, raising one arm in the air as he spoke. “See—“ he was cut off by the phone. Its shrill cry echoing from the room, and for a moment, he stood there dumbfounded, like he was trying to figure out just what was making the noise. He turned woodenly toward the wall phone in the corner, staring at it wide eyed.

Very slowly, he walked over to it and picked it up, staring at the receiver like it was a snake about to bite him. “Hello?” he asked cautiously.

“Oh?” he said, glancing over at me a moment later, his lips twisting into a grim line. “Okay, I’ll send her right up.”

He hung up and sighed. “Lillim, can you please get your stuff and head to the front office?”

“Um… why?” I asked as the entire class turned to stare at me again. If this kept up, I was going to get a reputation and not one that was going to get me invited to sit at the cool kids table during lunch.

Matthers lips softened into a tiny, annoyed smile. “Evidently, you missed some classes this morning.”

Chapter 6

Matthers had been lying. I knew that the second I got to the office because, instead of seeing a truant officer, or some other kind of disciplinarian, Detective Lang was standing there looking as bedraggled as always. In retrospect, I guess I was glad that he’d lied instead of telling me the cops were here to see me. No good could have come from that.

Either way, when I saw Lang, he narrowed his eyes at me, glaring at me like a suspect, which maybe I was, but I was reasonably sure I hadn’t done anything.

“Hello, Lillim,” he said, voice clipped. He swiveled his body, glancing at the dowdy office lady with long blonde hair and smiling in a way that reminded me of an annoyed hyena. When she didn’t look up, he leaned over the front of her desk, one hand pressed on the edge. “I need to speak to Miss Callina,” he said, before covering his hand with his mouth conspiratorially. “Privately,” he added in a hushed whisper.

The office lady looked up, staring at his face for a long time, her face completely blank. She nodded just the barest fraction of an inch at him. “Okay,” she said a moment later and swiveled her chair so she could point at a closed door. There was a small silver placard embedded in the door that read “counselor.”

Lang stood, running his hand through his greasy black hair. “Thanks,” he added, turning back toward me and motioning toward the closed door with his head.

A moment later, I found myself alone with Lang in a room filled with unicorns. The walls were plastered with the mystical beasts. There was a little wooden shelf to my left covered in ceramic figurines. One in particular featured a musclebound He-man clutching a flaming trident astride a black scaled unicorn with a flaming serpentine tail.

“Lillim,” Lang said as he flopped down in the chair across the desk from me and steepled his hands at me in a way that reminded me of an angry parent crossed with a cartoon villain.

“Excellent,” I said, steepling my own fingers and smiling maniacally at him.

Lang stared at me for a long time, lips compressed into a hard line. “Are you mocking me?” he asked finally.

“A little,” I admitted, smiling sweetly at him. “What’s up?” I asked, deciding against asking him the obvious question of why the hell was he pulling me out of class because, honestly, I was slightly glad he had. Why? It was a welcome distraction from the cyclops and Caleb, both of which I wasn’t going to be doing anything about until I was out of class.

“You know I’m a police officer, right?” he asked, quirking one dark eyebrow up at me.

“Yeah, I know,” I replied. “It’s very impressive.”

“Uh… huh” he said before shaking his head at me and sighing. “Anyway,” he added before smacking the flats of his hands down on the table with a loud thwack that nearly made me jump. “I have a problem.”

“What’s your problem?” I asked, but before I could say more, he began to unbutton his shirt. I stood, not sure what to do as a blush spread across my face. Was he going to try and… No, surely not…

He pulled off the shirt in one fluid motion and dropped it on the desk. My eyes went wide as I followed the movement. “Please… please don’t try anything,” I squeaked, spinning away so my back was to him.

“Lillim, look at me,” he said, putting one hand on my shoulder and my stomach fell to my toes. This… this was too much. I spun, about to give him a piece of my mind when my eyes fell on his now shirtless upper body. A giant blue octopus tattoo spread out across his smooth chest… only… only it was moving.

“This,” he said, voice so quiet that I almost didn’t hear him while tapping the octopus with one finger. “This is my problem.”

“That’s some wicked ink,” I said, swallowing. “Why are you showing it to me?” I asked, barely resisting the urge to reach out and run my hand over his chest. I didn’t because while I wanted to feel the tattoo writhe beneath my hand, I didn’t want him to get the wrong idea. Besides, it would be bad if someone walked in now. I didn’t want to imagine what would happen if they caught me running my fingers along his bare, well-muscled chest.

“That’s what I want to know. It appeared just after you called me about the warlock or whatever. At first, it was just a small bruise. I assumed I had just walked into something, but as you can see, it isn’t exactly going away.” Lang’s voice was strangely calm, which was odd because he should have been freaking out. “It’s growing bigger by the hour.”

“What’d your doctor say?” I asked, standing up and leaning forward over the desk so I could get a better look. The octopus was so lifelike that it looked real.

“That’s the thing,” he said, a thread of fear thrumming just under the surface of his makeshift calm.

“What’s the thing?” I asked as the octopus turned one bulbous yellow eye at me, and its pupil got as big as dinner plate.

“The doctor can’t see it. In fact, you’re the first person who could see it.” He swallowed and I watched the motion transfer down his body like a wriggling worm. The octopus narrowed its eye at me.

“That’s crazy. How can I see it if no one else can?” I asked, already wondering if maybe it was a supernatural tattoo, or worse, some kind of mystical parasite. Please just let it be a weird tattoo.

“Because you’re a witch?” he offered, biting his lip.

“Excuse me?” I said, crossing my arms over my chest and glaring at him. “Did you just call me a witch?”

“Um… aren’t you?” he asked, grabbing his wrinkled blue shirt off the back of the chair and holding it in his hands in a way that reminded me of a child with a favorite blanket.

“Do I have a cauldron? Is it bubbling and toiling?” I asked, stepping around the desk and shoving him hard with one hand. He fell backward into the chair, and it slid against the wall with a loud clack, clack. There had been a time when I cared about people seeing us, you know when I thought it might not look good for a half-naked cop to be found in a room with a female minor. That time was gone, now, thanks to him calling me a witch. I mean, have you seen a witch? Ugh.

“What are you doing?” he asked, eyes going wide as I pressed my hand to his tattoo covered flesh. The coldness of it surprised me. It was like touching a handful of snow. The thing writhed beneath my hand, and what was worse, I felt it writhing.

I opened my senses, letting the magic in the air flow around me as I shut my eyes, concentrating. Behind my closed eyes, a vision of the octopus filled my mind. It stood there looking at me with its enormous yellow eyes before tentatively reaching one tentacle toward me. Then, very slowly, it wrapped the gooseberry red appendage around my wrist.

Its suction cups clapped onto my skin with a loud slurp that made my stomach slosh as it pulled me closer. My eyes snapped open to reveal Lang sitting there, slack-jawed and unconscious. My hand was still pressed against his chest, only I couldn’t feel the tattoo anymore.

I yanked my hand backward and saw that the tattoo was gone. I glanced at my own flesh for one horrified second, worried it had transferred itself to me somehow, but immediate inspection revealed nothing. That’s when I realized the impossible. The tattoo had moved so that its horrible, bulbous head was latched onto Lang’s face like a sub-dermal mask.

Lang’s body lurched up from the chair like some kind of demented zombie. His eyes, milky and opaque, stared at me uncomprehending. His right hand seized my wrist. I tried to pull away as he stepped forward with his foot and whirled, flinging me over the desk like a sack of potatoes.

My breath whooshed out of me as I slammed into the wall and collapsed to the ground amid a rain of porcelain unicorns that shattered on the white linoleum all around. Stars exploded across my vision as I struggled to get to my feet. Lang stepped out from around the desk, hands curled into meaty fists. His mouth was clenched into a snarl, lips peeled back to reveal his not-so-pearly whites in all their glory. A low guttural snarl emanated from his throat as he took another step toward me, so loud in the tiny space that it very nearly echoed.

I hauled myself to my feet, one hand against the wall behind me and shook my hazy vision back into place. “Lang,” I wheezed as his fist came flying at me. I dodged, barely, and the sound of the bones in his hand cracking against the drywall made my stomach clench.

“Focus, Lang! You’ve got to fight it!” I cried, darting past him. He stared at me with blank, opaque eyes. “Something is trying to control you. Have some damn mental fortitude and kick it the hell out.”

He pulled his bloody, misshapen hand free from the hole in the wall and began walking toward me like a cold, uncaring machine. A chill ran down my back and my heart started pounding. He was going to try and kill me, and I wasn’t sure how to stop him without badly injuring him. I wasn’t even sure how he was being controlled… if I had a week to study what was going on, maybe, just maybe, I could find a cure, but right now? My options were limited to fleeing or trying to beat the snot out of someone who didn’t feel pain.

Lang’s eyes narrowed as blue tentacles stretched out along the surface of his skin, rippling beneath the flesh of his arms like writhing serpents. His head cocked to the side, and he smiled at me, teeth bared in a sinister grin. That’s when I realized the octopus was watching me. Its eyes had an ominous gleam to them as Lang lifted his broken hand and licked it.

“Mmm…” Lang cooed in a voice that sounded nothing like his own. Instead, it was headier, almost incomprehensibly deep and rich sounding. It rippled out between us as Lang licked his lips. The feeling of saliva running along my face was so tangible that I actually touched my face to see if it was real. It wasn’t.

“Lillim Callina, how are you?” he asked, hand dropping to his side as the air conditioner came on, blasting him with a wave of cool air that made his hair billow.

“I’ve been better,” I squawked, wishing not for the first time today, I had my swords. Then again, I wasn’t sure I could use them on Lang. At least, I wanted to believe I wouldn’t use them on Lang because he was an innocent. I wanted to believe I wouldn’t cut him down in half a heartbeat. I wanted to believe that lie… desperately.

“Have you now?” Lang said, head still cocked to the side as laughter glistened in the octopus’ eyes.

“Yes,” I said, sucking in a deep breath. Was this the warlock who had blown up the shambler? If so, why was he possessing Lang to hurt me instead of coming at me himself? “You know, someone is going to show up soon, and while they might not find you, they’ll stop Lang.”

“No they won’t,” he replied. “I’ve sealed off this room from prying eyes.” His face twisted into a horrific grin as he gestured around the room. “In this space, no one can hear you scream.”

I narrowed my eyes as my hand curled around a rather large unicorn. He watched me, uncaring as I fought the urge to step forward and smash his stupid skull in with the statue. I wanted to do it. I wanted to brain him with the statue even though I knew,
I knew
, it wouldn’t stop whoever was possessing the detective. It would just hurt Lang, but part of me didn’t care.

I screamed in frustration as I let go of the statue. It hit the floor with a heavy thud. “Get out of Lang,” I snapped. “Or so help me, I’ll…”

“Lillim, I need you to do something for me,” Lang said, sitting down on the desk and peering at me. “If you do, I’ll let this one go.” He paused for a moment before adding, “savvy?”

With that word I knew he was the one who had blown up the shambler. It was either that, or I was mixed up in some serious coincidences. I resisted the urge to say, “we meet at last.” Instead, I glared at him hard enough to make the air between us shimmer.

“Glare all you like, it won’t help your friend,” he declared, holding his hands wide. “But there’s still time for you to save him.”

The space between us blurred until it looked like I was watching a movie projected in the space between us. My heart skipped a beat as I watched the cyclops grab Connor by the throat and hoist him into the air like a ragdoll, suspending him over the edge of the huge tower that overlooked the football stadium. Then the creature looked right at me and made a ‘come at me’ gesture.

“You son of a bitch!” I snarled as I darted past Lang and grabbed hold of the door knob, ripping it open with a surge of accidental magic that actually tore it free of the frame.

“Oh and Lillim, try not to forget your swords this time,” Lang called behind me as the sound of hideous laughter followed me down the hallway.

Chapter 7

It was cold as hell when I threw open the door and stepped out on the rain soaked balcony at the top of the tower. It was one of those old stone cathedrals that reminded me of something you’d expect to see housing a crazed, bell-tolling hunchback. The grey stone was all dark and soot-stained as though no one had been up here to clean in years. A safety fence of black wrought-iron jutted out from the edges, but it was only tall enough to reach to my shoulders. I glanced up, staring at the huge stone clock face that had been carved into the surface of the tower. Why they had gone for that instead of a real clock was beyond me, but then again, judging by how most of the deck was covered in bird poop, I wasn’t sure a real clock would still work.