Crowbones

CHAPTER 43

Grimshaw

Watersday, Novembros 3

Grimshaw turned on his flashing lights and stepped on the gas.

“Message from Julian Farrow,” Ilya said. “Don’t come in hot. A car is blocking the access road, and he is backing up to put distance between his vehicle and the other one.”

“You get that from one of your boys?”

Ilya nodded. “From Viktor, who also reports that the other car does not have its lights on.”

Grimshaw’s mobile phone rang. “Answer that.”

Ilya picked up the phone. “This is Ilya. Yes, I’ll tell him. Are you hurt? That’s good. We’ll be there soon.”

“What?” Grimshaw snapped when Ilya ended the call and didn’t say anything.

“Victoria isn’t hurt, but she says we should call the EMTs or Dr. Wallace to tend to the guest that Conan Beargard swatted.”

Crap. “That’s not why she made the first call, and I’m not bringing the EMTs or Doc up here until I know what we’re facing.”

People were still sitting down to the evening meal, so it wasn’t that late despite the darkening sky. Asking the EMTs to make a call wouldn’t be as risky now as it would be in a few hours. Still, he didn’t want those men walking into a dangerous situation without good reason.

Spotting vehicle flashers at the turnoff for The Jumble, Grimshaw pulled onto the shoulder of the road, leaving The Jumble’s access road clear in case Julian needed to make a hasty retreat. Before getting out of the cruiser, he called the EMTs and Doc Wallace to put them on alert so they would be ready to roll the moment they got his second call—if they got a call. Considering what Vicki had said during that first phone call, he expected to be calling Ames Funeral Home and requesting a body pickup.

Grimshaw and Ilya left the cruiser and walked toward Julian’s car. Julian looked upset, but he said nothing when he stepped out of his car. Which was understandable. Right now they had no idea who was watching them—and listening.

“The other car is about halfway up the access road,” Julian said. “It’s facing this way, so I’m guessing the driver backed up that far in order to make a fast getaway after . . . The driver’s door is open, but the interior light isn’t working, so I couldn’t see . . . But I saw enough.” He scrubbed his hands over his face. “Gods above and below, Wayne. I didn’t think . . .”

Grimshaw held up a hand, stopping his friend. Better for all of them if Julian didn’t voice any regrets about his special customers. “Let’s find out what’s going on first. Then we’ll know what comes next.”

“Besides the EMTs and the doctor?” Ilya asked dryly.

“What?” Julian yelped.

Seeing Julian’s hands shake was confirmation enough that they would need help from the funeral home more than the EMTs or Doc Wallace, but he didn’t say that. Instead he said, “What about the boys? Can’t leave them in the car on their own.” It wasn’t that they weren’t old enough to be left in the car. It was just too damn dangerous—although maybe not for them.

“They’ll come with us,” Ilya said.

Car doors opened and closed. Viktor and Karol joined them. Karol held a flashlight and Viktor had the first aid kit that Julian usually carried in the trunk of his car.

“I put it on the back seat before we left the store,” Julian said. “Just wanted it within reach.”

Grimshaw went back to the cruiser, opened the trunk, and removed his big flashlight, a couple of road flares, the first aid kit he carried, and a roll of yellow crime scene tape.

“Everyone is at the main house, and they’re okay except for the guest who got swatted,” Viktor said.

“Do you know which guest?” Grimshaw asked.

A moment’s silence before Viktor shook his head. “Aggie told Eddie, who told Kira, who told me, but Aggie didn’t say which guest—or Eddie didn’t tell Kira that part.”

Grimshaw gave the Sanguinati teenagers a hard look. He felt the seconds ticking by, but caution was better than dying. “In stories, there’s always a baby cop who forgets his training because he wants to be a hero and rushes into danger, ignoring the orders of his commanding officer. Because they’re stories, half the time his actions save the day and he gets out of it with just a flesh wound. In the real world, most of the time that baby cop ends up in the morgue. Hear me. I don’t care that you’re Sanguinati and think you’re invincible. You don’t go dashing off, no matter what you think you see. You stay with us and you follow orders, or your internship with Julian and me ends tonight. Understood?”

“Yes, sir,” Viktor said.

Karol looked at Ilya before saying, “Yes, sir.”

We’ll have to watch that one, Grimshaw thought. He’s got the vibe that he has something to prove to someone.

After giving each boy a road flare, Grimshaw took the lead, with Julian a step behind so that their flashlights covered most of the road. The boys walked behind them, and Ilya came last—defense and warning in case something followed them.

As they approached the vehicle, Julian blew out a breath and whispered, “Was that easier than puncturing a couple of tires to make sure he couldn’t get away?”

Grimshaw looked at the tires and understood what Julian meant. That car wasn’t going anywhere, because the tires were sunk halfway into the road. No possibility of rocking the car out of those tire-size holes.

Car door open. No interior light on. When he shined the flashlight on the driver’s side of the car, he expected to find a body. But seeing what the Others could do to a human body was always a mental and emotional blow.

Grimshaw swallowed hard. The boys crowded close to him and Julian, and he wondered if they would be safer in their smoke form or if that wouldn’t matter to the terra indigene who had savaged that body.

“They were angry,” Ilya said quietly.

“Broke the promise,” a voice sang out of the dark.

“Vicki wouldn’t have—” Julian protested.

“Not the Reader,” another voice sang. “This one did—and someone else.”

“The police and the Sanguinati will find out who broke the promise,” Grimshaw said.

“Victoria asked for assistance from other humans to fix a wounded human up at the house,” Ilya said. “Will you allow it?”

“The Reader asked?” A third voice.

“Yes,” Ilya replied.

A pause. Then: “Humans should listen when the Reader yells at them.”

Grimshaw didn’t know what had prompted that remark, but he heard the threat under the words.

“In The Jumble, the Reader decides,” a fourth voice sang.

He didn’t hear anything—not the snap of a twig or the rustle of crisp leaves on the ground—but he felt the danger move away. That was when he realized he hadn’t even considered shining his light toward those voices, that he—and Julian—had known on some instinctive level what would happen to all of them if he had seen the Five in their present form.

“That’s Peter Lynchfield in the car,” Julian said. “He’s one of the professors staying at the Mill Creek Cabins.”

“Then what is he doing here tonight?” Ilya asked coldly.

Grimshaw looked at the Sanguinati leader. “And who told him there might be something to see?”

Taking the road flares from the boys, he lit them and placed one in front of and one behind the car. Then he moved on. Nothing he could do for Lynchfield. What he needed was a better idea of what was going on at the main house—and who was Lynchfield’s accomplice.