I began to put the deck away in its fancy metal case. The paint on the tin felt slickery, like the paint on the Major Arcana cards had, and the tin vibrated with the same magic as the deck. Occam returned and began to fill out paperwork. While he worked, I took pictures of the parlor, every nook and cranny. When I found a small book on tarot readings, I opened it andtook pics of each page. The book was really old, and hard to read, withf’s ands’s looking alike, but it might be helpful.
Cai didn’t return. We never got our coffee or tea.
An hour after we had entered the clan home of Ming of Glass, Master of the City of Knoxville, Occam placed the paper authorizing us to retrieve property improperly removed from a crime scene on the center of the coffee table. We walked out with the Blood Tarot.
* * *
Mud leaped up the porch stairs like a gazelle. His eyes glancing back at me, Occam followed her, graceful as a house cat at the end of a lazy day of watching birds at a window. I trudged along behind, stiff as a tree trunk, tired, and a mite grumpy.
From out of the dark, Yummy popped up beside me, and I cussed, “Dang it, Yummy!” My gear bobbled and I nearly dropped the tree. Occam didn’t flinch except to reach back and steady my tree. Probably smelled her coming on the night air. He’d spent twenty years in his leopard form, locked in a cage, and he’d retained some heightened senses.
“Give me your keys,” she demanded of him.
“Take your own car,” Occam said.
Yummy slapped his hand, snatched the keys out of the air, and popped away. A fraction of a second later, she dove into Occam’s fancy car.
He dropped his gear and raced toward it, but Occam had only the speed of a cat, not the preternatural speed of a vampire.
Engine roaring, Yummy skidded out of the driveway and spun the car to point down the mountain, shooting gravel into the air. She floored it, Occam’s car going into a sidewise skid before it found traction. Occam stood in the dark, his arms to the sides. “What the ever-lovin’ hell?” he yelled. “Her car is right there!” He pointed at Yummy’s even fancier car.
I knew it wasn’t funny. Not at all. But I still had to hold in a laugh.
Mud didn’t hold it in. She gurgled with mirth.
Occam looked back at the road and the fast-moving vehicle lights bouncing down the hill, disappearing into the night. “She’s not willing to tear out the undercarriage on her own car,but she’s willing to rip out somebody else’s? Why didn’t she take yours?” he asked, irritation making his voice catty-rough.
“Mine isn’t built for street speed?” I suggested. There were benefits to driving a regular car, one that couldn’t hit one-twenty on Knoxville’s pikes.
“She could have at least left meherkeys.” Hissing under his breath like the cat he was, he returned and climbed to the porch.
Mud was the only one of us with keys out. She unlocked the door and Cherry bounced out, sniffed everyone’s crotch, and tore into the dark. Mud squeaked, grumbled what sounded like “Stupid dog,” and went into the house, where she turned on a light. One light. Her abstemious upbringing made sure she didn’t waste anything, especially power.
Occam paused to allow me to enter before him and our cells rang, at the same moment. We had a conference call from FireWind. Occam gave a cat hiss. “He isn’t calling to invite us to coffee.”
I glared in the general direction of the cell tower I had allowed to be erected on the highest point in my land. It provided good rent money monthly, but it meant I was never off the grid anymore. We stood on the porch in the dark as the rings echoed into the trees, the cold wind blowing over us, now with a promise of ice in its touch.
I pulled the door closed and we tapped our phones, said our names.
“FireWind in HQ with Jones,” our boss-boss replied. “Jones?”
JoJo said, “It took some time, but I tracked down Soul’s cells, including four burners, one of which pinged in Richmond, Virginia, at PsyLED national HQ; one in Seattle; and one in New Orleans. The fourth one is at her apartment here in town.”
No one asked JoJo how she got the contact numbers of burners purchased by the assistant director of PsyLED. Not a peep. Not even from FireWind.
“I called all of them. They all went directly to voice mail,” Jo said. “According to her log, Soul went on personal leave three weeks ago, and none of the cells have been used except the one here in town, five days ago.”
FireWind said, “I requested uniformed officers do a safetycheck. No one is at home. They looked in the windows, all of which were left with the blinds turned open, not something Soul would normally do. There is no sign of Soul or indications the house was the location of a struggle, but there are two pieces of luggage on the bed, open, with clothing inside. I’ll send one of our people there soon, but first we have two videos.”
Occam and I still stood in the dark, on the porch, and the chill had already crawled through my work clothing. This didn’t sound confidential or classified, and I didn’t think a call from our boss meant we had to stand in the dropping temperature, so I pushed through the door.
The cats all twined around Occam’s feet,yowringin welcome, halting us in the doorway. Cherry bounded back inside with a high-pitched yelp of happiness, welcoming her people and her cat-man. She nearly tripped us both and leaped from the doorway toward the sofa, missing by enough to send her flopping with a thud to the hooked rug on the floor.
Mud giggled from the kitchen and called the dog to her, the sound of dog food rattling into a bowl.
“The first is security camera video from thirty minutes past, just after you left her clan home. The video was provided by Alex Younger,” FireWind said as we dumped our things on the couch and the dining room table. “We’ll discuss the importance of the Dark Queen’s IT people having access to the security cameras at Ming’s later.”
On the small screen was external security cam video of Ming of Glass and Cai standing ten feet or so from the front entrance. Both were wearing fighting armor and carried swords.
