Tempting Danger (7 page)

THE
hall leading to the captain’s corner office was beige—beige walls, beige woodwork, beige carpet. No windows. Lily headed down that beige tunnel with her heartbeat still unsettled, her report in her hand, and her mind in a whirl.

Popular fiction was full of stories about the supposed sexual power of lupi, their ability to entrance helpless females. Most experts believed those were self-perpetuating myths. Wickedness has always possessed a certain glamour, and mystery casts its own spell.

Until a few moments ago, Lily had agreed with the experts.

Now . . . well, whatever had just happened between her and Turner shouldn’t have. No question about that. What’s more, it shouldn’t have been possible. Even if lupi did possess some arcane sexual power, she was supposed to be immune. Magic slid over her surface, prickling along her skin. It didn’t get inside and affect her.

Yet she couldn’t accept what had happened as normal sexual attraction—it had hit too fast, too hard. And he’d looked so shocked. As if he, too, had been blindsided . . .

Lily shook her head, trying to physically throw off confusion. None of that mattered as much as what
hadn’t
happened. She’d shaken the hand of a lupi prince—and felt not one tingle of magic. For that, she had no explanation at all.

She rapped once on the captain’s door, then opened it.

“Glad you could join us, Detective,” Captain Randall said dryly.

Lily checked on the threshold. The room held three men, not one.

Frederick Randall sat behind his desk. The captain was a short, bald man on the shady side of sixty with all of his features crowded together in the bottom half of his face. He looked like a bureaucrat—well-fed, not too bright. It was a misleading impression.

The other two men wore suits and professionally grave expressions.

Uh-oh,
Lily thought.
Feds.
“Yes, sir. Sorry I’m late.” “These are Special Agents Karonski and Croft from the FBI. They’re interested in the Fuentes case.”

Got it in one.
Lily nodded a greeting, but doubt tugged at her. Randall wouldn’t have told them about her—would he?

The two men started to stand. Randall waved. “Sit, sit.”

It was a corner office, but it wasn’t large or fancy. The only empty chair was plain wood and sat on the right of the captain’s desk, which put her sideways to him and to the men sitting across from him.

The agent closest to her had good teeth, skin several shades darker than Mech’s, and a pleasant smile. He was growing more forehead than hair these days. “I’m Martin Croft,” he said. “As I explained to your captain, we’re not claiming jurisdiction—”

“We could.” The other one didn’t smile. “Karonski,” he said to Lily.

The captain snorted. “You don’t have a leg to stand on.”

“Murder by magical means is a federal offense.”

Lily tried to be tactful. “Um . . . magical means? Fuentes was killed by teeth, not a death spell.”

“According to the captain, he was killed by a magical creature,” Karonski said. “That’s murder by magical means.”

Her eyebrows rose. Her captain’s response was more direct. “Bullshit. Even if you convinced a jury that murder done by one of the Blood constitutes murder by magic, the courts would throw out any conviction.”

“Maybe.” Karonski was eyeing Lily with disapproval. “She’s young.”

“Not as young as she looks, and she’s fully qualified. In addition, she has contacts in the, ah, paranormal community that may be useful. Is that your report you’re clutching, Yu?”

Okay, he hadn’t told them. She hadn’t really thought he would. “Yes, sir.” She leaned forward and handed it to him.

Croft said wryly, “There’s some disagreement here, obviously. Since this is the first murder purported to have been committed by a lupus in wolf form since the Supreme Court’s ruling—”

“The first?” Lily said, surprised. “In the country?”

“The first when the killer’s identity is unknown,” he amended. “There was a murder in Connecticut, but the case was, ah . . . solved by the lupus community.”

He meant that the killer had been killed by his own people. She remembered reading about it. His body—in wolf form—and a signed confession had been left at the courthouse. “And that business in Texas last year was ruled self-defense.”

His eyes widened slightly. “Yes. An interesting case, from a legal standpoint.”

She nodded. The lupus involved had been in man form when attacked by a dozen gang members. He’d Changed. Three of the gang members had survived. “The ACLU was involved.”

“It’s a landmark, the first judicial recognition that the right of self-defense can apply to a lupus in wolf form. Limited in its application, of course, because of the way the judgment was worded.”

The defense had argued that, under the circumstances, Changing was no different than loosing a trained guard dog. That the defendant’s wolf form had protected his human form, which was legally entitled to self-defense. The appeals court had agreed, but . . . “The judges waffled around about what constitutes sufficient ‘clear and present danger’ to justify turning wolf. So it’s a precedent, but not a clear one.”

He smiled. “I begin to see why your captain wanted you on this case. I don’t often encounter officers with such a good grasp of my turf. Ah . . . I don’t think Captain Randall mentioned it, but we’re MCD.”

Magical Crimes Division. Well, that made some sense, but calling this a federal case was a stretch. But they weren’t claiming it officially, were they? Just putting the captain on notice that they could make things difficult if he didn’t cooperate.

Cooperate how? What did they want? She glanced at Randall, who spoke without looking up from her report. “Your written reports will be copied to these gentlemen after I’ve seen them. Go ahead and hit the high points for them.”

“Thank you, Captain,” Croft said. “But we can wait and read the report. Between your briefing and what’s in the papers, we have the basics, I think. Except for one thing. I need to know how sure you are, Detective, that the murder was committed by a lupus.”

“For proof, you’ll have to speak with the coroner’s office. But I’m pretty sure of it.” She couldn’t tell them why she was so certain, and it would be inadmissible, anyway. But there were plenty of of other indicators.

Lily reconstructed the attack, describing the wounds, blood splatter, and severed hand. “One of the first-on-scene officers used to be X-Squad,” she finished. “Fifteen years’ service. He believes the attacker was a werewolf.”

“Lupus,” Croft corrected her absently. “It is consistent with a lupus attack.”

Karonski scowled. “Consistent isn’t conclusive. Now and then someone who wants to get away with murder tries to make it look like a lupus kill. Though most attempts are crude,” he admitted. “This isn’t.”

She studied him. Average height, bad suit, built like a barrel. A little younger than Croft, and a wedding ring on his left hand, which Croft lacked. “The killer almost certainly left saliva in the wounds. The lab may not be able to run a DNA match on it, but they can tell if it came from one of the Blood. Someone clever enough to fake those wounds—which I do not think were faked—would know that.”

“Magic can create some great fakes.”

That jolted her. “Is that possible? I mean . . . I suppose the wounds themselves could be faked, but could magic duplicate the kind of weird results typical of body fluids from a lupus?”

“I don’t know,” he said gloomily. “Do you?”

It was a disquieting thought. Magic on that level was illegal, of course—but so was murder. “If such a thing were possible, it would constitute murder by magical means. Is that why you’re here?”

Croft shrugged. “Partly. We need to confirm or deny the possibility. There’s also a concern that this will have political repercussions.”

Lily frowned. “The Species Citizenship Bill?” Congress had almost managed to duck its responsibility by losing the bill in committee, but its sponsors were pushing for a vote.

“Politics.” Randall spat out the word, putting down Lily’s report. “Not my job, thank God. When you talk about magically faking things, you’re talking sorcery.”

True. Witchcraft couldn’t change the basic nature of things, and she’d know if sorcery were involved . . . wouldn’t she?

Croft was unmoved. “It’s a possibility.”

“It’s a dead art,” the captain said impatiently. “Sure, we run across a dabbler now and then, someone who thinks he’s found a fragment of the Codex Arcanum. But no one’s been capable of transformative magic since the Purge.”

“Which was a European phenomenon,” Croft pointed out. “There are African sorcerers, and rumors of sorcerers who escaped the Communist cleansing of the sixties.”

Randall shrugged. “There are always rumors, and African sorcery is more like witchcraft than true sorcery. Or so I’ve read. You saying different?”

Croft and Karonski exchanged one of those impenetrable looks shared by longtime partners and married couples. Croft spoke. “We’re not suggesting you should doubt your laboratory results.”

“That’s good, because I don’t intend to. You two are supposed to be hoodoo experts, not stringers for the
Rational Inquirer.
”

That irritated Croft. “The only real experts in magic are its practitioners. Abel and I can advise you about investigative procedures and apprehension, and we know a few things about lupi that aren’t common knowledge. This case is likely to set precedents. The agency feels our experience could be valuable to you.”

Oh, my.
Lily’s lips twitched.

Captain Randall’s gaze swung to her. “Something funny, Yu?”

Her sense of humor was going to get her in trouble yet. “I just realized that these gentlemen are offering to be expert consultants.”

“That’s right.” Croft smiled at her.

He really did have a nice smile. “It, ah, struck me as funny. You see, I ran late because Rule Turner made me the same offer. We have a meet set up. He wants to instruct me about lupus customs.”

Croft tensed, as if he were coming to attention sitting down. “Rule Turner? The Nokolai heir?”

Could there be two people with that name?
“Yes.”

Croft and Karonski exchanged another of those looks. Captain Randall said, “Turner’s a suspect.”

“Yes, sir. It generally pays to let suspects talk as much as they like.”

Karonski looked irritated—but that seemed to be his normal expression. “Turner didn’t kill Fuentes.”

She decided to let her eyebrows do the talking for her.

“I suppose you have to consider him a suspect,” Croft conceded. “But it’s unlikely he’s guilty. First, lupi are not sexually possessive, so the motive doesn’t work. Second, if he’d killed Fuentes, you’d never have found the body.”

“You know him?”

“We have a dossier on him that you might want to look at.”

“That would be useful. Thanks.”

“You want to read it before you talk to him.” Karonski had a way of leaning his upper body toward her as if he wanted to grab her and make her agree. “You need to know what you’re dealing with.”

Randall looked at him with open dislike. “Maybe the two of you could leave that file with us and make an appointment to brief Detective Yu later. Right now, I need to talk to her about her caseload.”

They didn’t look happy about the dismissal, but there wasn’t much they could do except leave. Lily wondered what lay behind Randall’s antagonism—it seemed like more than the usual territorial wariness. Maybe he had a history with one of them, some old case where they’d clashed? Or maybe Karonski just rubbed him the wrong way. The man was intense.

Both men stood. Croft dug into a leather briefcase and pulled out a fat folder. “These are copies, so you can keep them.”

She stood, to be polite, and accepted the file. “Thanks. I’m likely to be tied up until midafternoon, I’m afraid. Three o’clock okay?”

“That works.” Croft held out his hand. “We’ll meet you here.”

They shook hands, then she held her hand out to Karonski . . . and got her next big surprise of the day. This one didn’t send her into a sexual trance, but it sure did raise questions.

A witch. Karonski was a practicing witch.

The door shut behind the two agents. “What’s your caseload?” Randall asked. “You ready to close on anything?”

She jerked her attention back. “The Meyers case. Valencia, too, I think. I’m waiting on lab results on two others. The rest,” she admitted, “are pretty cold.”

“Keep the cold cases. They won’t distract you. Pass the others on. Give the Meyers case to Lauren. She wants to make detective, so she needs the experience—and something more to complain about,” he said with the ghost of a smile.

“But . . .” But they were
her
cases.

He leaned back in his chair, folding his hands over the little potbelly that never got bigger or smaller. “You’re ambitious. That’s not a bad thing. But you’re part of a team here. You’ve got a good record. Letting someone else get the credit for closing a couple of your cases won’t hurt you. You’ll get plenty of shine if you nail Fuentes’s killer, and that’s where I want you focused. Got it?”

“Yes, sir.” But he was wrong. She didn’t want to keep the cases so she could hog the credit. Well, yes, she did want credit for her work, but . . . but that wasn’t the main reason. With the Meyers case, she wanted to be the one who clapped the cuffs on the slime who had offed his ex-wife. With the others, she wanted to finish them. To connect the dots herself.

“Good. What are you pursuing yourself? What’s Mech doing?”

“As you saw in the report, two of the five lupi at Club Hell are alibied. Mech’s checking those alibis, then he’ll talk to Fuentes’s boss and coworkers. The beat cops are handling the door-to-door near the scene. I’ll be in touch with them. This afternoon I’ll talk to the widow. She was too distraught to get much from her last night. I plan to speak with the neighbors, too. And Turner’s neighbors. The timing’s going to be important on this one.”

He nodded. “If Turner’s guilty, you’ll want to make sure he can’t wiggle out with some trumped-up alibi. The closer you can pin down Fuentes’s and Turner’s movements, the better.”