Dark Magic (Harbinger P.I. Book 3) (11 page)

W
hen I got
to the office, I had a paper sack of food under my arm. Cantrell had driven back to the station in silence, lost in his own thoughts, and after he’d dropped me by the Caprice, I drove out to Darla’s Diner and got Sandra the waitress to bag up a couple of burgers and some fries. I was sure Felicity wouldn’t have eaten yet today and eating lunch together seemed like a good idea. At least it might dispel any awkwardness between us.

She looked up from her computer when I leaned in through her office door and held up the sack of food. “That smells delicious, Alec. I haven’t eaten at all today.”

“I didn’t think you had. Let’s eat in my office. I’ll open the windows so any clients we get won’t drool from the smell and leave a puddle on the floor.”

“Ewww, not a nice mental image when I’m about to eat.” She got up and followed me into my office. She had gone back to wearing her usual office attire; a white blouse and black skirt. Her hair was piled up on top of her head in the usual manner too. The look said, “business as usual” but a mental image of her in the black lacy top and jeans flashed into my head.

I opened the windows in my office to let the warm breeze inside and tipped the food out onto my desk. “A cheeseburger and fries for you,” I said, handing her the paper-wrapped packages, “and a Darla’s Double Burger and fries for me.” I slid a can of cold soda across the desk to Felicity and popped one open for myself.

There was an empty space on the bookshelf where the
Grimoire of Dark Magic
had once been. “Is anything else missing?” I asked Felicity as I took my first bite of the burger. The meat practically melted in my mouth.

“No, just that book. But if you look at all the other books, you’ll see that they’ve all been pulled out of the shelf a little bit. I didn’t move anything so you could see it exactly as I found it.”

“The thief was probably searching them for the one he wanted. Probably using a flashlight. So he may have had to pull them out to examine the titles.”

“But why would he put them back and only take the
Grimoire of Dark Magic
? If it was a normal burglary, there are books on that shelf that are worth stealing more than the
Grimoire
. Your edition of the
Grimoire
is a late edition with all of the original Latin text translated into modern English. There’s a first edition
Lesser Key of Solomon
there that’s worth much more than the
Grimoire
on the underground market.”

“Unless the thief didn’t take the book to sell,” I said.

“Yes, of course, I’ve considered that. The
Grimoire of Dark Magic
contains spells and formulas from the Middle Ages. It would be dangerous in the wrong hands, of course, but it would take a lot of magical knowledge to make those spells work. They’re complex rituals and whoever wrote the
Grimoire
was vague regarding their use. The book is more an item of historical item interest than a practical spell book.”

“Someone doesn’t think so,” I said, waving a handful of fries at the shelf. “They left all these other books behind and went for that one.”

Felicity nodded and ate some of her cheeseburger. “How did you get on with Sheriff Cantrell?” she asked.

“I got kicked off the case.”

“Oh? What did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything.” I told her about the trip to the lake, the vision of Deirdre Summers’ death, the blue-eyed man in the hoodie, and the altar on the island. I finished off the story by saying, “And then Cantrell told me he was going to take it from here and that as far as I was concerned, the case was closed.”

“That’s odd, since he’s the one who hired you in the first place. Are you sure you didn’t do something to make him angry?”

“Yes, I’m sure. That man’s default setting is angry. He was quiet all the way back from the island, though. I’m pretty sure he was thinking about his wife’s death and wondering if it’s related to the Summers case. If there’s even a chance that there’s a connection, he won’t want me looking into the Summers case because it might lead to the church massacre.”

“But we are looking into his wife’s death.”

“Yeah, but he doesn’t know that. In fact, I think hiring me to work with him was just a part of his investigation into the church case. He was fishing for information about Sherry Westlake, like I know where she’s hiding.”

“If she’s alive,” Felicity reminded me.

I finished my burger and fries and gulped the soda down. “The police evidence seems to suggest she is. Besides, she’s an investigator and we don’t kill easily.”

“You’re all so tough,” Felicity joked.

“Tough and charming.”

She looked down at her burger for a moment then back up at me. “Speaking of charming, Alec, I think we should talk about last night.”

“Okay,” I said, “You want to go first?” The truth was, I didn’t know what to say about the kiss we’d shared. It had been so damned good but the situation between us wasn’t exactly uncomplicated.

“It’s complicated,” Felicity said, her words mirroring my thoughts. “I know I’m still getting over Jason and my emotions are all over the place but last night, I got it into my head that I knew exactly what I wanted and that was you. I came over to your place wanting that kiss to happen, Alec. And maybe more. But when it did happen, I panicked.”

“There’s no need to explain,” I told her.

She threw her hands up. “I feel like there is. I don’t regret what happened. But I don’t want to ruin our working relationship or our friendship. With all that’s been happening lately, my emotions are confused.”

“Confusion isn’t a good basis for starting a relationship,” I said. I sounded like one of those calendars that has a pearl of wisdom for each day of the year.

“No, it isn’t.” Felicity let out a sigh. Then she looked worried. “I’m not saying I only kissed you because I was confused. I didn’t mean that at all. What I meant was…”

I held up my hands to stop her. “Felicity, you don’t need to explain anything. And it wasn’t your fault. I kissed you just as much as you kissed me. There’s something between us that goes beyond work and friendship and I reacted to it just as much as you did. But we don’t need to rush in to anything. We can take our time, let things settle down a bit. We see each other every day and neither of us is going anywhere.” I frowned and added, “You’re not going anywhere, are you?”

Felicity grinned. “No, not this time.”

“Okay, so let’s just take it one day at a time.” There I went again dispensing Harbinger’s thought for the day.

She nodded. “That’s fine with me.”

“Great,” I said. Hell, I was no expert on these things. My relationships were usually short and sweet because I lived in a different world from every girl I’d ever dated. Eventually, that put every relationship at breaking point and we went our separate ways.

But Felicity lived in the same world I did, a world where monsters, demons, and other creatures stalked the night. A world where magic was real and a battle between good and evil was fought every day. Life felt more precious because danger lurked around every corner.

Maybe it was possible to build something more than I’d known in the past.

A knock on the open office door made us both look up. A bearded man in a cream shirt and black pants stood there with a small cardboard box in his hand. “Alec Harbinger?” he asked.

“That’s me,” I said, getting up.

He put the box under his arm and produced a tablet from his belt, tapping away at it with a small plastic pen. He looked at the screen and then back at me. The image on his screen would be the photo that had been taken of me when I’d become an investigator.

Satisfied that I was indeed Alec Harbinger, he gave me the package and tapped at the tablet again before asking me to sign for the delivery. After he’d gone back down the stairs, I watched him through the open window as he got into a small, blue, unmarked van that was parked across the street and drove away.

“That was quick,” Felicity said. “Was he a Society courier?”

I nodded. “The Society doesn’t normally use the regular delivery companies. Its own couriers are much faster.” I opened the cardboard box and placed it contents on the desk. The crystal reader was unremarkable in appearance, just a silver box with a depression on the top in which to place a crystal and a hole on one side to project the contents onto a wall or screen. There were no dials, buttons or switches. The device was enchanted and worked by using some sort of spell that was anchored inside the box.

“Would you like to come over to my place later for a special showing of Whitefish Island: The Movie?” I asked Felicity.

She smiled and nodded. “I’ll bring the popcorn.”

I almost said, “It’s a date,” but stopped myself. Instead, I said, “I was thinking of driving over to Clara this afternoon. Want to come?”

“You’re going back to that creepy place again? What for?”

“I think I’ll try to talk to the Fairweather family, the people who own the church. Maybe they know something about what happened on Christmas Day, something they haven’t told the police. They don’t sound like the type of people who would talk to outsiders.”

Felicity looked incredulous. “So why would they talk to you?”

I shrugged. “They probably won’t but I want to meet them face to face. Maybe I can pick up some vibes from them that’ll give me a clue about what was actually being worshipped at that church.”

“You think the church was dedicated to some evil deity?” she asked.

“You saw those windows.”

“I don’t buy it, Alec. Why would Amy Cantrell’s mother get involved in something like that? And why did everyone in the church that day end up dead, including the pastor, one of the Fairweather family?”

“Black magic is dangerous.”

Felicity didn’t look convinced. “I’ll come with you to Clara but I don’t think the church was dedicated to evil. Mary Cantrell wouldn’t have had anything to do with it.”

“We never knew Mary Cantrell,” I reminded her, picking up the Caprice keys.

“Do I need to change?” Felicity asked.

“Yeah, it might be a good idea. We don’t know how nasty the Fairweather family might be to outsiders. There might be running involved.”

She went into her office to change her clothes and I closed the windows before picking up the crystal reader and sliding it back into the cardboard box it had been delivered in.

The wards on the building would activate automatically as soon as the office was empty and locked up, but someone had already gotten past them and I didn’t want to have to explain to a Society officer in Bangor why the crystal reader had gone missing while it was in my possession.

Felicity met me in the hallway, wearing a T-shirt, jeans, and sneakers. The T-shirt was blue, tight-fitting, and had Outpost #31 across the chest in white stenciled letters.

“You a fan of John Carpenter’s
The Thing
?” I said as I led the way down the stairs.

“Who isn’t?” she asked.

“Well, at least I’ve confirmed that you have good taste in movies.” I locked the office door and we walked around to where the cars were waiting.

“You’ve confirmed it, have you?” she joked. “It didn’t exactly take any investigative skill on your part. All you had to do was look at my chest.”

“Err, yeah.” I unlocked the Caprice quickly. “We’ll take my car.”

“Wait a minute,” she said. “Are you armed?”

“I’ve got an enchanted knife in a backpack.” I reached into the back seat and held it up to show her.

Felicity nodded slowly and got into the car. She didn’t say anything but I knew what she was thinking. I should be carrying the knife. I took the sheathed weapon out of the backpack and attached it to my belt. I hadn’t been kidding about the Fairweather family earlier; they could be trouble, especially if they ran some sort of monster-worshipping cult.

When we got onto the highway headed east of Dearmont, I got that feeling again that I was being watched. Checking the vehicles in the rearview mirror, I made a mental note of the colors and models. If we were being tailed, it would soon become obvious, especially once we took the road to Clara.

After almost an hour of driving along the highway and constantly checking the traffic behind us, I took the turn toward Clara. As we drove along the tree-lined road, I checked the rearview again and saw nothing but empty road behind us.

Maybe I was just being paranoid. For the rest of the journey, as I navigated the Caprice around the narrow roads that wound through the trees, we were alone.

The six ramshackle houses came into view and I pulled over and killed the engine.

“What are we going to do?” Felicity asked, peering at the houses through the windshield. “Just go and knock on one of the doors?” Her voice had lowered to barely more than a whisper.

“Seems like a good place to start,” I said. My own voice was at whisper-level too. There was an atmosphere among these quiet houses that made me think that if I spoke too loudly, I might wake up something that was sleeping in the gloomy woods. Something that would be better left asleep.

I took the crystal shard out of my pocket and slid it out of its pouch onto the dashboard. It glowed bright blue. “That creepy feeling,” I told Felicity, “I think it’s a spell. Good way to keep strangers out. Anyone who comes down here is going to just keep driving until they’re far away from this place and the creepy vibe it gives off.”

I got out of the Caprice and closed the door softly, reassuring myself that the dagger was within easy reach by letting my fingers brush over the leather sheath.

Felicity joined me and we walked over to the nearest house. The place was set back from the road a little behind an overgrown lawn that was more weed than grass. A gray stone path was losing a battle against an army of crabgrass. We walked along the path and up three rickety wooden steps onto a porch that leaned to one side at such a steep angle, I felt like I might slide off it and into the weeds.

I knocked on the front door and stepped back, taking Felicity’s arm and leading her to the edge of the porch.

“What are you doing, Alec?”

“These people might have a ‘shoot first’ policy. I’d rather we weren’t in the line of fire.”