To Die Fur (A Whiskey Tango Foxtrot Mystery) (11 page)

I brought the light around slowly, knowing what I was going to see but still dreading it. It fell on Augustus, and the liger’s whole body fluoresced—not as strongly as the water, but there just the same. I knew why the glow was weaker, and so did Caroline. “Oh, God,” she whispered.

Augustus had gone for a late-night swim. And then he’d cleaned his wet fur off the same way all cats do—with his tongue.

When Caroline spoke her voice sounded detached, like it had broken under the load of emotion and had stopped trying to convey it. “It’s even worse than it looks. Ethylene glycol is also absorbed through the skin. If he was in the pool for any length of time, he would have received a fatal dose without ingesting a single drop.”

And that’s when I noticed Augustus’s chest wasn’t moving anymore.

C
HAPTER
S
EVEN

I guess I should have expected what happened next.

Augustus’s spirit rose from his body. It wasn’t transparent and it didn’t drift up like smoke; it was as if a more vibrant, focused version of Augustus suddenly got to his feet, while a dull imitation remained motionless on the ground.

I gasped. I’ve seen a lot of animal spirits, so I should be used to the incredible colors and internal illumination they give off—the ghost of a peacock has to be seen to be believed—but this was different. He was a white so pure it brought me to tears. He radiated strength and nobility and something deep and powerful I couldn’t define—not until I met his eyes.

Sadness.

And then he bounded away.

Toward the graveyard, of course.

I looked down at where Caroline was doing her best to get his heart going again. “Don’t,” I said. “He’s gone.”

She stopped what she was doing, then let out a scream of pure frustration and pounded on Augustus’s body. She did it a few more times, then broke down in tears. I was crying, too.

And then somebody else joined in.

Ever hear a cat cry? It’s the saddest, most heart-wrenching sound in the world. It’s pure misery and loneliness and suffering, and you’ll do just about anything to make it stop. That’s what Tango sounded like; she must have been nearby. I couldn’t tell if Caroline heard it, too, or if it was just in my head.

When I had myself under control, I pulled out my phone and called ZZ.

And then I took the blacklight and began a slow, methodical search of every inch of ground in the enclosure and around it, because I intended to catch whoever had done this and make them pay.

Whiskey paced around the outside of the fence, sniffing the ground. Tango’s keening hadn’t lasted long; I thought she might have chased after Augustus’s ghost.

Neither Whiskey nor I found anything—no tracks, no spots in the fence where someone might have cut their way in. I stopped and stared at the black, rocky peak of the artificial mountain crag the waterfall flowed out of, set into a tall concrete wall, and tried to figure out how someone could have approached the enclosure without being seen by either Shondra’s cameras or Tango.

[I’m not picking up any scents other than guests, staff, or residents,] Whiskey reported. [I suppose any of them could have put the antifreeze in the pool.]

“How? It would have taken a fair amount to contaminate a pool this size, and that’s not exactly easy to do without being noticed. Before the cameras were installed, none of the guests was alone with Augustus; either Caroline or I was always present. And afterward, the cameras would have spotted someone dumping chemicals into the pool.”

[Perhaps they gained access to the plumbing?]

I shook my head. “It’s a self-contained system, like a big version of those little water fountains that sit on your desk. Pumps are inside the crag. If the water starts to run low, you top it up with a hose.”

[Maybe we should check the hose.]

We did, but found nothing. If someone had filled the hose with antifreeze, though, I was pretty sure at least a little would have dribbled out near the tap or elsewhere, and I couldn’t find any trace of antifreeze anywhere but inside the enclosure.

ZZ arrived while I was still looking around. She went to talk to Caroline first, then knelt briefly and touched Augustus’s mane. I knew ZZ well enough to leave her alone until she was ready.

“Foxtrot,” ZZ said after a minute. “Come here, please.”

I came over. Whiskey, as always, came with me.

“Caroline says the poison was in the pool,” ZZ said. She used the brisk, business-like tone that meant she was very, very, upset and struggling to keep it in check.

“Yes,” I said. “I have no idea how it got there. Yet.”

She nodded. “All right. I need you to inform the guests as to what has occurred. I expect that some, if not all, will want to view the body. Please arrange a tasteful way to do this that satisfies everyone. I expect there’s going to be a lot of finger-pointing, and I don’t want this situation getting any worse. I’ve already told Shondra.”

“I’ll take care of it.”

“And please—keep everyone away from me, will you? I need a little time alone.”

“I will.”

Then she turned around and left. I knew how badly she must be hurting; ZZ felt things very deeply. But this is why she kept me around, to handle crises when they popped up. It wasn’t the first time, and I knew it wouldn’t be the last.

Time to earn my paycheck.

*   *   *

Telling the guests was going to be tricky.

If I told them simultaneously, there would be chaos. If I told them separately, the order they were informed in would cause speculation and raise suspicions.

In the end I decided the only person’s opinion I had to worry about was Navarro’s. He was my biggest and therefore most immediate problem.

I didn’t bother trying to track him down—I just called his phone. He answered on the second ring. “Foxtrot? Nice to hear from you. How’s our supersized kitty-cat?”

“You should come down and see for yourself. But don’t tell anyone else where you’re going, all right?”

He chuckled. “But I’ve grown so close to all of them. I guess I’ll just have to live with the guilt … I’ll see you in a few minutes.”

I disconnected without saying good-bye. Smarmy bastard.

He strolled up five minutes later, looking entirely unconcerned. Caroline had rigged up a large blue tarp as a tent over Augustus’s body, concealing it from anyone outside the enclosure. When Navarro saw it he said, “Hey, look at this—a private room. Nice to see my boy is getting nothing but the best.”

Caroline wasn’t there. She had living animals to worry about, too, and it was feeding time. I stood just outside the enclosure’s gate, Whiskey beside me. I motioned him over.

“You wanted to see how he’s doing?” I asked. I kept my voice neutral. “Let’s go take a look.” I opened the gate and stepped inside.

He hesitated, but his ego wouldn’t let him decline. He stepped in after me, closing the gate behind him.

I walked up to the improvised tent and crouched down on my haunches, looking inside. Navarro joined me.

“What’s wrong with him?” he asked quietly. I guess he thought the big cat was asleep and didn’t want to wake him up.

“What’s wrong with him? He’s
dead,
Mr. Navarro. That’s what’s wrong with him.”

“What?”

I turned to face him. He wore an expression of genuine surprise—an expression that quickly changed to one of realization. “Oh. Dead, huh? How tragic. How
conveniently
tragic.”

“You think I’m lying? That this is some kind of trick? Go see for yourself.”

“How stupid do you think I am? You really expect me to go up and
poke
him?”

“Oh, for God’s sake—”

“This is the plan, huh? Use him to get rid of me, maybe convince my boss that owning a liger isn’t such a good idea—”

Which was when I lost my temper.

It wasn’t his arrogance. It wasn’t his paranoia. It wasn’t the fact that I’d just witnessed the murder of a unique, amazing creature by a member of my own species. It was some unholy combination of all those factors, plus the memory of Tango’s heartbroken wail still ringing inside my skull.

I ducked inside the tent, strode over to the body. “You see that chest? Does it look like it’s moving?”

“Maybe you drugged him.”

“Yeah? To do what? Fake his death, or get him to attack you? Can’t be both, genius.”

I grabbed a handful of Augustus’s mane. Used it to lift that massive, still head and shake it. “Hey! Wake up!” I shouted. “Somebody here wants to talk to you!” I shook it again, then slammed it down into the dirt. His mouth opened and his tongue lolled out.

“Hey, take it easy—”

“Wake up! WAKE UP!” I was screaming at the top of my lungs now, and a distant part of my mind could hear Whiskey’s voice, trying to calm me down. I ignored him. “There’s a very
scary,
important guy here, and if you’re faking he’s going to be really upset! You want to wind up in a
rug
?”

“Hey,” said Navarro. “Take it easy.”

“I don’t take orders from you.” I glared at him through blurry eyes. Yeah, I’m one of those people who cry when they’re really, really angry.

“You mind if I take a closer look?” Navarro asked.

“Go right ahead.” I stepped back and tried to get myself under control.

He got closer, then knelt down. He touched Augustus’s tongue with the tip of his index finger and left it there for a long minute. “Okay,” he said, straightening up. “He’s dead. Just had to check for myself—my boss is going to ask.”

“So you’ve checked. Is there anything else we can do for you? Maybe more threats you’d like to make?” I kept my voice cold, but I was still seething.

“What are you going to do with the body?”

“What?”

“The body. I hate to offend your sensibilities, but arrangements are going to have to be made. My boss was more interested in a live liger than a dead one, but stuffed and mounted is better than nothing. I can probably get him to agree to a third of the amount we offered—that’s still a lot of money.”

I deal with oversized egos on a regular basis, but arrogance and insensitivity on this level could still make my brain lock up for a second. I blinked—and then my diplomacy gland kicked in. “I’ll take that up with ZZ and see what she says.”

“Thank you. What killed him?”

“We don’t know.” A lie, but a necessary one. I didn’t want Navarro extracting some kind of violent revenge against one of the guests because he thought they’d taken his prize away from him.

“Kind of suspicious, though. Very sudden.”

“We’re just as surprised as you are.”

“Mm. Well, no one here would be stupid enough to kill him, I’m sure. Would they?”

“No, Mr. Navarro, they would not. None of them would kill him just to spite your boss—for one thing, they’re all terrified of you. For another, none of them stands to gain in any way from his death. And unlike you, they all saw him as living being, not a possession to be acquired.”

He stared down at Augustus’s body, his face impassive. “Really. Mr. Gunturu wanted to display him in a casino; that sounds pretty profit-based to me. Karst’s game park would trumpet the fact that they had a white liger far and wide, and see all that advertising pay off in sold-out bookings for years to come. Ms. Yao’s zoo stood to make a few bucks in attendance and marketing spin-offs, too.”

“All true. Which means none of them has any reason to want him dead.”

“No? Yao said her zoo wanted him for their breeding program, which means they already have ligers. Maybe even another white one. Two would be better, of course—but having the only white liger in existence is pretty good, too.”

I hated to admit it, but he had a point. “I notice you haven’t mentioned Abazu. Is he not on your list of possible killers?”

Navarro smiled. “He’s at the top, actually. It’s the true believers you have to watch out for—they’ll defy all reasoning. And Abazu is definitely one of those.”

“How can you tell?”

“The same way I can tell for sure that the liger is dead. I looked into his eyes.”

He turned around and left the tent. I followed him. “And how about me? Are ZZ and I on your list, too?”

“No.”

That wasn’t an answer I’d expected. “Why not?” I asked despite myself.

“Because you’re too smart and too determined. You would have tried something else—like moving him off-site—first.”

In other words, he’d ruled me out for the same reason I’d ruled him out. “Maybe we would have—but we never got the chance. That’s very suspicious, too, wouldn’t you say?”

He raised an eyebrow. “Is that an accusation? Out of all the people here, I’m the guy who wanted the liger alive more than anyone. Disappointing my boss is not something
anyone
does, not even me. Not twice, anyway.”

“If you say so.” But I doubted that; good seconds-in-command are hard to come by, and—despite what TV tries to tell us—even hardened drug barons don’t kill them on a whim. You can be born into greatness, attain it on your own, or have it thrust upon you; but if you want to
keep
it, you better have a damn good right-hand man, woman, or other backing you up. The power behind the throne is usually an overworked assistant with an addiction to caffeine and no social life, and a smart boss knows that. I guessed Navarro would have to screw up big-time—and more than once—before his boss threw him under a truck. Or, you know, whatever large vehicle meth kingpins preferred throwing their employees under.

“You told me first, right?” Navarro said as he pulled open the gate and left the enclosure.

“Yes,” I admitted.

“But not because you’re afraid of me. You just didn’t want it to look like some kind of conspiracy, which is what would happen if you told me last.” He turned and smiled, pulling a pair of very expensive-looking sunglasses from his pocket. “Maybe you should have stuck me somewhere in the middle.”

“You don’t strike me as a middle kind of guy.”

“You’d be surprised. I like the middle. The middle is off the radar. The middle is safe. And for somebody in my business,
safe
is a very important word.”

He slipped the sunglasses on. “I’ll be around until ZZ makes her decision. The sooner you let me know, the sooner you can tell me good-bye.”