“What is it?” Nick asked.
Parker’s head was tilted, as though he could hear more than the sobs that echoed through the trees, their branches rising and falling like the shoulders of funeral mourners. He scanned around them, but couldn’t see the source.
“They said that someone killed one of them. Each time they try to attack, he kills another.” Parker’s expression was growing angry, his lips pulling back from his teeth, his ears and nose and chin seeming to sharpen.
If Nick took a picture of Parker now and a picture of when he was calm, he was sure they would look identical. The photo would show him with normal ears and a normal chin. But, as though his anger shaped him into a weapon, right now, with the height of his fury burning under his skin, Parker looked dangerous.
“This way,” Parker said.
They moved as quietly as they could through the forest. None of them spoke, although Nick kept scanning, checking around them for danger. He wondered for a moment if he should have brought his gun, but discharging his service weapon while he was on leave was an action that might turn that leave permanent.
The leaves on the ground crunched under their feet and the trees whispered as they passed. Whatever they said to Parker, his anger grew so thick that it was like a cloud, snuffing out light around them.
Parker whispered, murmuring under his breath, and the shadows thickened, coalescing around them, hiding them from easy view. The hum of a generator cut through the whispers of the trees and Nick squinted, bright light visible through the trees.
The thick trees darkened the forest floor, most of the time, letting only scraps of light down to the ground. But someone had dragged a generator out into the forest along with a concert-level lighting rig. It was so bright that even Parker’s magic couldn’t fully hide them anymore.
Someone was shouting, their voice muffled by the loud buzz of the generator.
“Where is it! Where is mymoney?”
Nick tugged hard on Parker’s sleeve and pulled him down to a crouch behind one of the trees. Laurel tucked herself by another and then the three of them peeked around the trunks. The lighting was set up in a circle, and it was impossible to see the person pacing around the outside of it, impossible to see his face when he was backlit by a stadium’s worth of lumens.
“You said you gave them a ticking clock! Blow someone else up! Make them listen! Iwant my money!”
Parker stiffened and Nick grabbed his shoulder, mouthing, “What?”
Parker leaned close, whispering in Nick’s ear. “I know that voice.”
“Who?” Nick asked.
“Cayo Durkavic.” Then Parker leaned back and frowned. His eyebrows twitched and he looked as though the math suddenly made sense in his head. Nick tried to follow Parker’s thoughts, but it was like following in the wake of a speedboat. He could put together some of it, but too much would need to be explained later.
The thing was, though, it alwayswasexplained later. Parker was always able to weave together the complex threads of the cases he worked. Butthis, how did this fit in?
Cayo Durkavic was dead, only he wasn’t. He was standing right in front of them, meaning that all those blood and bone fragments belonged to someone else. The answer came to Nick quickly: the missing smoke shop employee.
Durkavic had faked his own death and then… hidden here?
Nick turned to ask Parker, but his husband raised his hand. He leaned over, his breath tickling Nick’s ear, but Nick refused to flinch. “There’s a circle in the center of the lights, it’s fae like Woolworth’s. Can you break it?”
Then he looked at Nick and Nick felt the missing pieces fall into place. Durkavic had received lessons in fae magic from a member of the Spring court. He had used that magic and caught something much larger than a rich widow from the San Amaro hills.
He’d caught Shadow. And he’d used her to try to force the SAPD to pay five million dollars. Shadow, desperate and alone, had asked for help fromhim, her father’s killer, the only person in the world who might recognize her.
Nick wasn’t going to let her plea go unanswered. “Yes.”
“But… uh, not in a me way, right? Not in the way where you blow up like you and Zahide are always telling me about?” Parker narrowed his eyes. “Because I have feelings about that, Nick.”
“Parker, I can do this. I need to do this.” He could save Darkness’s daughter. He needed to save her. “You’re going to distract Durkavic.”
Parker nodded. “Yeah.”
He glanced over his shoulder at Laurel, whose eyes narrowed then widened. She nodded. Then Parker was up, shouting over the noise of the generator and Durkavic’s yelling.
“Cayo Durkavic. You and I need to have a conversation.” As Parker walked toward him, Cayo turned and Nick and Laurel crept around the circle, keeping themselves low. Parker was still talking, his banter background noise as he laid out what he knew.
Nick waited until they were blocked by the lighting rigs, and then moved forward. He turned to Laurel. “Can you turn off the lights? There has to be a reason they’re running.”
