“Shoot.”
“You know any goblins name Dirk, Hagen, or Berg? I think they’re brothers, probably hiring themselves out as a team.”
Silence hung over the line for what seemed like forever, and I was starting to wonder if he’d hung up on me when Janssen finally answered. “Do you know every human in the country, Walker?” he growled, almost too low for me to hear.
Okay, obviously I’d crossed some sort of line.Oops. “Of course not.”
“Yet you think I should know every goblin in Memphis, just because my Y chromosome was donated by one?” Janssen’s human mother had no idea her son wasn’t completely human, but he’d found out the hard way, when a local band of goblins discovered him walking home from school one afternoon and beat the living shit out of him for “being a part of the problem.” He’d been sixteen years old.
“I donotthink that, nor did I mean to imply any such thing. I was just hoping, against all odds, that you might know the names.”
Janssen snorted into my ear.
“Is that a no?” I snatched a pen from the jar on my desk and began doodling on the margins of one of the printouts as I spoke. I wasn’t surprised to see the lines and sharp angles take the shape of a pistol, but I wasastonishedto recognize the gun as Cale Murphy’s Desert Eagle. Which was nowmyDesert Eagle.
“Yes, that’s a no.” Janssen paused, and several more silent seconds escaped while I drew circles next to the sketch of a gun. Finally, he sighed into my ear. “If you have pictures, I could show them to a few people.”
Damn. When was I gonna learn to take pictures of the people I beat half to death? “Nope, no pics. But if you could ask around about the names, I’ll owe you one.”
Another snort. “You already owe me several.”
On the calendar, three of the doodle-circles morphed into a cartoon snowman with fangs and horns. “So, you’re in for a big payoff. Will you do it?”
Another hesitation. Then, “Give me a couple of days, and I’ll see what I can find out.”
“Thanks, Janssen. You’re the best.”
“Don’t forget it.” He hung up, and I dropped my phone on my desk.
“You ‘bout ready?” Lacey called from across the room. “Your flight leaves in an hour and a half.”
I looked up to find him wiping his hands on a clean towel, Ms. Crow’s television fully assembled on the counter in front of him. On the other side of the glass front wall, the moon rode high, and the parking lot was deserted. One glance at the clock over the door told me Lacey was right: it was six-thirty.
Damn. I’d forgotten to eat lunch again.
“Yeah, give me just a minute to get all this packed up.” I shoved the Oak Island papers into a manila folder, which went into the duffle next to my sneakers and the information Devich had given me from his plane’s flight data recorder. From my bottom desk drawer, I withdrew a small portable gun box made of heavy-duty grey HPX resin and equipped with a three-digit combination padlock. After entering the combination—my age on the day I’d bought it—I removed the lock and flipped up the lid. Inside were two custom-made foam inserts, one in each half of the box, with cutouts in the shape of my two favorite pistols, two spare magazines, and two silencers.
From the middle drawer, I took two empty nine-millimeter magazines and fitted them into the proper cut-outs. I would rather carry full magazines, but the airline won’t allow ammunition except in its original packaging. None in the weapon, and none in the spare magazines.
After the magazines came the silencers, from the same drawer. Then the guns themselves—the Ruger from my shoulder holster and a nine-millimeter Glock from the duffle. I closed and re-locked the box, then set it on the floor beside the duffle.
Next, I shrugged out of the shoulder holster and dropped it into the bag, which would serve as my carry-on. My blade was already packed—sheathed and locked into a metal case in my compact leather travel bag, along with two changes of clothes. Knives, like guns, had to be declared and checked, as did the two unopened boxes of nine-millimeter shells, in the interior zipper compartment of the bag.
Finally ready, I tossed the bag over my shoulder and glanced around the office to make sure I wasn’t forgetting anything important.
Oops. I was. Paperwork for the weapons.
From a hanging file in the bottom right-hand drawer, I pulled a Non-Resident Firearm Declaration Form and my Authorization to Transport permit, both of which were required to bring weapons into Canada. Keeping the paperwork up to date was a pain in the ass, but not nearly so bothersome or expensive as trying to buy new guns quickly once I got there. And sneaking them aboard undeclared was basically begging for a prison sentence.
I was shoving the documents into my inside jacket pocket when Lacey called my name. His uneasy tone caught my attention instantly; something was wrong.
“What?” I glanced up to find him staring out at the parking lot.
“Something’s out there.”
SEVEN
Istared out the front wall of windows at the strip mall parking lot beyond. I saw nothing but darkness, broken up by distinct bright circles beneath the security lights, islands of safety in a sea of the black unknown.
