5th Pentagram: The sequel to the #1 Hard Boiled Mystery, 9th Circle (Book 3 of the Darc Murders Trilogy) (Book 3 of the Darc Murder Series) (23 page)

Come to think of it, Pyper was also taking Janey pretty seriously right now. She was so afraid that Janey was going to disappear again that she wouldn’t let Janey out of her sight. So in a way that meant that her babysitter was treating her like a grownup.

It maybe shouldn’t have, but that made Janey feel good. She bent her head down and kept drawing her picture, one that she’d been working on all evening.

It was a picture of Mala and Trey and Janey and Maggie all inside the funny star-in-a-circle thing that Darc had been talking about. What was it called? A pentagram.

The colored lines swirled up from the drawing, showing her what it all meant. It wasn’t a good symbol. At least not the way the bad person was using it.

But Janey had a fix for it. She put a gold detective badge around them all. It was inside the star, but held everyone else inside of it.

Popeye said it was a dumb drawing, but she just ignored him. Sometimes the things he said weren’t worth the breath they took to answer them. That was something Mommy sometimes said when Janey would ask too many questions.

Caitlyn. She’d been Caitlyn then.

Janey let out a sigh, and Pyper put her book down. “What’s the matter? Did you finish another one?”

She moved around the table and stopped when she was right behind Janey. Looking down at the drawing, Pyper made a little coughing noise.

“Oh, that’s… nice. That’s a great picture, Janey.” She pulled out her bag. “How about if we pop some popcorn and maybe watch some Spongebob?”

The popcorn sounded good. Janey really liked popcorn, especially with lots of butter. And Patrick Starfish and Squidward were really funny, even if Spongebob Squarepants was a little annoying sometimes.

She nodded up at Pyper, who tried to give her a smile back, but her lips went all funny and it just looked weird. Popeye said the babysitter hated Janey’s picture and was trying not to tell her, but Janey told him to hush his mouth or he wouldn’t get any popcorn. That shut him up.

Well, mostly. Usually when Popeye really didn’t say anything for too long, it meant there was something wrong.

But this time, it was just about the popcorn.

* * *

So, this time Trey had done something and pretty much everyone had noticed. He’d called in the firefighters, and had told them to bring a helicopter. Which had ended up saving the victim in the middle circle, as well as Darc, Mala and almost everyone else.

It was pretty awesome.

Or at least it had been, until they had gotten to the hospital. They were in the intensive care unit, the look and feel of every room and hallway stark and sterile. Three cops and the victim in the center of the eye had made it out alive, but with massive burns. Nurses were working unceasingly to make sure they stayed alive.

Trey gazed around the waiting room and spotted Darc’s face. His partner was not happy, and Trey was pretty sure he knew why.

And that part was also something he had done. Was there never going to be a time where Trey could just feel good about something he’d done well, without the burden of crushing guilt to go along with it as a side?

“Darc, I’m sorry,” Trey said, walking over to the bald detective. He wanted to put a hand on his partner’s shoulder or something, but he knew that Darc wouldn’t appreciate it. Or tolerate it, for that matter.

“You have nothing for which you need to apologize.”

“Come on, man. You know that I was the one that pushed for backup. We wouldn’t have lost those cops if—” Trey began.

“I was the one who capitulated. I feared it would be a repeat of the slaughterhouse and the Underground. This was worse.”

That got Trey’s attention. “Worse? How was this worse? We didn’t lose nearly as many cops this time.”

Darc didn’t say anything, just got up and moved toward one of the rooms. There, on a bed, was a woman. There was no way to recognize her, due to the extensive burning all over her face and torso, but he was pretty sure she was one of the uniforms that had been there.

The sight of her took away any remaining part of Trey’s exuberance from Darc’s rescue tonight. He wanted to turn away, to brush it off, to joke about it. Make it less significant or painful somehow. But he couldn’t.

Not this time.

“Darc, I…” Trey heard his own voice trail off. There really wasn’t anything he could say.

And then there was a flurry of activity around the nurses’ station. An incessant beeping was heard at the desk, and Trey moved toward the area, hoping to figure out what was going on. He heard snippets of conversation as the team buzzed around, heading for the room where the one victim Darc had saved was being kept.

“Burn victim…”

“… coding…”

“Grab a crash cart!”

This was not good.

Trey rushed after them, waving at Darc and Mala to get their attention. He skittered along behind the grouping of medical professionals, hoping to escape notice.

It seemed to work right up to the point they got to the room. Not only did one of the orderlies stop him from going in, but one of the large guy’s buddies was expelling someone else from the room.

It was Carson Speer. The APA.

CHAPTER 16

One second, Mala was running after Trey in the halls of the ICU, trying to figure out what was going on. The next, she had joined in with Darc to physically restrain the shorter detective as he tried to rip out Carson Speer’s throat.

“How much proof do you need?” Trey was screaming. “He was in the room with our one link to the killer, and now the guy’s dead.”

“We don’t know that he’s dead yet,” Mala said, doing what she could to calm him down. It wouldn’t do to have one of the lead detectives on the case thrown into prison for assaulting one of the city’s prosecuting attorneys.

“Actually, we do,” put in Carson, his tone apologetic. “The man died while I was in there.”

“See? See??” Trey yelled, groping for the lawyer with an additional burst of energy. It was taking all of Mala and Darc’s strength as well as skill to keep him in check. This was getting out of control fast.

“I didn’t do anything,” Carson responded, dancing back out of the way of Trey’s grasping hands. “Really, I didn’t. I was just here to try to--”

“Kill the one witness we had to cover your tracks?” Trey finished for him. He turned to Mala and Darc. “It’s okay. I’m under control now.”

Mala could feel his body relax under her hands, so she nodded to Darc to let go. Immediately Trey sprang at the APA once more. Luckily, Darc was able to jump in front of his partner and keep him from inflicting bodily damage.

“This behavior is irrational, Trey,” Darc intoned. Mala sighed in relief. At least there was some kind of sanity coming from the tall detective. Her relief vanished with his next words. “If you were to harm him here, there would be too many witnesses.”

“What?” squeaked Carson. “You want him to attack me somewhere else? I’m the APA!”

Darc turned to the lawyer, pinning him with that intense I-will-peer-into-your-soul look that he had perfected. “You being the APA has nothing to do with whether or not you deserve punishment.”

“But… but… You said that--”

“I said that you being the next APA had no relation to your guilt,” he clarified.

“I haven’t done anything,” the attorney pled.

“You have no alibi. You have taken an inordinate interest in the case before we have apprehended any suspects. You are found leaving the room of our only witness immediately after the man’s death.” Darc listed the suspicious behavior without any change in inflection. The result was chilling. Mala found that she was glad to never have to face that kind of inquiry.

“Wait. You believe me?” Trey said, looking at his partner with surprise. “I mean… Yes! You believe me.” He turned to the APA. “You’re guilty!”

“That is not what I said,” Darc corrected Trey. “I do not know whether or not he is guilty. I only express it as a probability.”

“C’mon, Darc. Give me a number. You’re good at that kind of thing.”

Darc paused. “Currently, I would put the probability at 54.7 percent.”

Trey seemed to think about that for a moment. “Better than even. I’ll take it.” He pointed his finger at Carson. “You’re going down, ass-wipe!”

“Listen,” the APA said, stretching out his hands wide. “I don’t know how this has gotten as bad as it has…”

“Modulating.
Modulating
!” Trey barked.

“That’s it,” growled the lawyer. “I’m done. You two are certifiable.”

He began walking down the hallway, muttering to himself and shaking his head. Before the lawyer could get to the elevators, Darc called out after him.

“Mr. Speer. You may need to make yourself available for questioning.”

If the APA heard, he made no indication. Trey turned to Mala and grinned.

“This case just got fun again.”

Mala did what she could to stifle her sigh.

* * *

The fragmented rays of color tormented Darc. The interaction with Trey around calling for backup in the Greenbelt had torn apart Darc’s inner workings. The logic lines still pointed to where he needed to go, but it was almost as if he could not see them clearly. When he had pushed back against the council they had offered, it was like an internal lens had shattered.

The fire was largely contained, not without some amount of difficulty. The remaining thermite had reacted badly with almost everything the firefighters had thrown at it, but now it was burning down, leaving a stretch of forest that had been scarred.

Darc felt the echoes of that scarring in his own soul. No matter on how many occasions Trey had attempted to reassure him, his partner’s reasoning always seemed a superficial salve on an arterial bleed.

Trey was driving them back to the precinct building. Mala was on her way home to take care of Janey. Darc found that his strong instinct was to ask Trey to follow her. It was the same type of feeling that had resulted in the death and disfigurement of so many.

He did not trust this feeling.

Janey would be in bed asleep at this hour. Mala would arrive at her apartment and send the babysitter home. Then she too would sleep.

There would be no sleep for Darc.

None.

A random frayed dart of color interrupted Darc’s thoughts. They were going the wrong direction.

“Where are you going?”

Trey shrugged, glancing over at his partner. “Dude. You need a pep talk.”

“I do not understand the significance of what you are saying.”

Darc’s partner sighed. “I get that you’re bummed. I am too. And don’t think I don’t know that it’s my fault for demanding that the team join us.”

Another stray color intruded. “They were all adults, operating in the capacity for which they were trained. Taking responsibility for their choices is illogical.”

“Man, you’re all over the map tonight,” Trey responded. “Is there something broken in there?” He pointed at Darc’s forehead.

As occasionally occurred, his partner could be quite perceptive at times, although what was taking place was far more complex than his sophomoric question implied. But that was part of what made Trey… his friend.

That realization exploded upon Darc with the radiant white heat of the thermite. It was more of the grey landscape, but now it seemed illuminated in a way that was disturbing to him. Especially as the lines of logic appeared so disjointed.

He could not afford to trust this new light. It had misled him. He would not allow that to happen again.

Trey was waiting for an answer. His question about Darc being broken was not rhetorical. His seeming insight was superficial and required substantiation.

“Yes, Trey. There is something broken.”

Nodding his head, Trey took another turn. Darc now recognized where they were going. Trey’s apartment.

Trey and Maggie’s apartment.

“Okay, Darc. I know this is still a little awkward, but no one knows you better than Maggie. Well, except for me, but I’m at a loss here. You’re messed up and you need help that I can’t give you.”

Darc remained in his seat. It was not that he was incapable of understanding Trey’s point. Nor was he troubled by the thought of speaking with his ex-wife, although Trey clearly thought he was.

Something else kept him rooted. A vague sense of uneasiness that pervaded that emotional topography. He did not want to enter Trey’s apartment.

Darc was afraid.

Strangely, putting a name to his feelings caused them to dissipate somewhat. Enough that he was able to exit the car and follow Trey up to the apartment.

“Babe,” Trey called out. “Darc’s here with me.”

Maggie came out from the bedroom, taking a long look at both Trey and Darc. She walked around the couch slowly.

“You boys been in a fire?”

Trey cleared his throat. “Long story.”

Shrugging her shoulders, Maggie pinned Trey with her gaze. “I’ve got time.”

“Okay, so not so long of a story, really. The killer left a trap in the Greenbelt that ended up killing a bunch of cops and our only witness and almost got us too.”

Maggie shook her head. “Why do I ask?”

“I keep telling you not to…” Trey muttered, just loud enough that Darc could hear him. It was doubtful Maggie could.

“What do you need?” she asked.

Trey looked at his partner, then over to Maggie. “Darc’s busted.”

There was a long pause, then Maggie went over to the sofa, sat down and patted the cushion beside her. Darc felt the same fear rise up within him. What was he afraid of?

He forced himself to move, following Maggie’s path to the couch and taking a seat where she had indicated. His body sank into the cushions, finding their own space there. This couch was one that Maggie and Darc had purchased together.

“Trey,” Maggie said in a quiet voice. “This may be awkward.”

Darc’s partner turned his gaze from her to Darc and back again. There was an expression on his face that Darc had rarely seen there. What was that? Sadness? Remorse? Resignation?

“Do what you have to do,” he said finally, sitting in the easy chair opposite the sofa where Maggie and Darc were positioned side by side.

Maggie reached up with ease of familiarity, placing her hand on the back of Darc’s neck. She gently led his head down until it rested in her lap.