Dark Star (18 page)

Mom was silent. She held herself very still, her body tense. Whatever Mickey was about to say, she knew it was coming.

“The thing is, they didn’t know each other. They weren’t friends. They lived in different cities, went to different schools. They didn’t share the same hangouts or work together. There was no reason for both of them to be in that car when it crashed. In fact, the only connection between the two girls … is you. You were at both of their houses the night they died. Which is why I don’t think it will surprise you when I tell you the crash was staged. The girls were already dead.”

“If you know that much, I’m sure you also know that both their families contacted my firm, H&H Security. What are you accusing me of, Detective?” Her voice was soft.

Mickey stepped into view. His hand hovered beneath my mother’s elbow, almost touching. “I’m not accusing you. Maybe I should be—but I’m not. I’m asking for your help. You know something I don’t, and you’re holding out on me. And while you’re holding out, kids are dying.”

Mom’s tone was deathly cool. “Believe me, Detective, if I knew anything that would save lives, I’d share it. I can’t help you.”

He sighed deeply, moving away. “Two girls were attacked outside a club downtown recently. I heard one of them was yours.”

“My daughter is fine,” Mom told him. “You just saw her.”

“Why is she grounded?”

“I caught her with weed.”

I was rather offended by that, but thought it better to keep my mouth shut.

“What were you really doing in Edina tonight?”

“I work security in the area. The details are confidential. Contact my boss if you want confirmation. It’s all legal.”

Mickey’s voice went low, quiet. “Look, we both know there’s something here you’re not telling me—but that’s not what I’m after. These attacks are escalating. More kids are going to wind up dead if this isn’t stopped, and soon. All I want is information. I won’t ask how you came by it.”

“That’s generous of you.”

He sighed again. “All right, we’ll play it your way a while longer. When you’re ready to talk, you have my number.”

I shrank back against the steps as they left the kitchen. Mom was quick on Mickey’s heels, as though she thought he might start snooping if she didn’t get him safely outside.

He paused at the front door, turning back to face my mother. “The funny thing. Three of the dead kids? Are linked to Patrick Tigue. They volunteered at one of his charities. I wasn’t staking you out tonight. I was watching him. Same as you. Goodnight, Miss Whitticomb. Happy birthday.”

***

I sat on the staircase after Mickey had gone, trying to sort through what I’d heard. My hair was drying in clumps against my shoulders, and I teased my fingers through it absently, watching water pearl and drip at the ends. There was a slight chill in the air, blown in from outside, but I barely felt it.

Slashes on the ankle, I thought. Cuts, to test the blood. This was bigger than I’d realized. Five deaths, Mickey had said. Or was it six now? Or seven? Had he been counting Tricia Morrow?

The scars above my heels itched.

“If you were trying to be sneaky, you really should’ve gone back upstairs.”

I hadn’t heard Mom approach. Startled, I let out a little yelp and tried to jump to my feet, only to lose traction on the slick bit of staircase where my hair had been dripping. I sat back down with a thump, sliding down the remaining three steps until I came to a halt on the floor.

“Ow.”

“Oh, Audrey,” Mom sighed, reaching out an arm to help me back up.

Leon stood behind her. The expression on his face told me he was trying very, very hard not to laugh. Not that he presented the most dignified appearance himself. His hair had been washed clean of flour but had dried strangely, bits sticking up on one side and curling around his ear on the other.

Unlike me, he hadn’t changed into pajamas. He’d put on a clean shirt and pants, and stood holding his coat.

“I thought you weren’t going out tonight,” I told him.

“I was out. I’m back now.”

“I needed him to take care of something for me while Detective Wyle was here,” Mom said. She’d pulled her hair back into its bun and put her hoodie on. The night was still young; the streets needed watching. She’d leave again soon. But instead of heading out the door, she took a step back, looked at me, and said, “Let’s go into the kitchen.”

True to his word, Mickey had taken care of the mess. Part of it, anyway. The floor needed mopping, and bits of sugar were stuck to the walls, but the table had been wiped clean, and the mixing bowls were set neatly in the sink.

Mom motioned for me to sit. She stood across from me, near the counter, keeping her arms folded. I wondered if her injury had already healed. “Gonna try to pretend you weren’t spying on me?” she asked.

I bit my lip. “Um …”

“You don’t want to answer that.” She sighed. Closing her eyes, she lifted a hand to her forehead. “I assume you heard most of it.”

“I was in the shower part of the time,” I said.

Her eyes flicked back open. She gave me an unamused look.

“Points for honesty?” I suggested.

Mom just sighed again. “I’d really rather keep you out of this,” she said. “But it seems you’re bent on working it out. So, we’ll talk. But I need some assurances from you. I need you to understand how dangerous this is. The threat is very real, and anyone involved could get hurt. That includes you. I want you to promise me, from now on, you’ll think before you act. You won’t do anything like you did at that club.”

“Once was enough for me,” I said. I darted a glance toward Leon, who stood silent near the door. His face was unreadable.

A little worry knot appeared in Mom’s forehead. “I’m serious.”

“I promise,” I said. “Does this mean you’re going to answer my questions?”

“That depends on the question.”

“I’ve already figured out some of it.” When she lifted her eyebrows at me, I shrugged and said, “The Harrowers are searching for a Remnant. And they’ve been bleeding girls my age to find it, right? Killing them. That’s what Mickey was talking about.”

“What Detective Wyle was talking about,” she corrected.

“And they’re making the deaths look like accidents? I didn’t know Harrowers did that.”

Mom leaned back against the counter. She folded her arms, cupping her elbows with her hands. “No. They don’t, usually. Most Harrowers don’t bother with that sort of cunning. They like to kill, and they like to flaunt it. Their activity is easy to detect. But this—this is different, subtle. Well-hidden. And deliberate.”

“They don’t want us to know what they’re up to,” I guessed.

She nodded. “It began a little over a year ago, and it took us far too long to make the connection. It wasn’t until the fourth death that we realized the girls were being bled.” Pausing, she rubbed her face with her hand. “We should’ve used subtlety ourselves. Now that they know we’re aware of their goal, they’ve increased the attacks.”

“How many have there been?”

“You were the eighth,” Leon said, his mouth tightening. Mr. Alvarez had said that as well; I’d forgotten.

Mom turned toward the window and tapped her fingers against the counter. “We might have known about it sooner if the girls had associated with the Kin, but most of them didn’t have a close connection, just a trace of Kin blood. We still don’t know how the Harrowers are finding them.”

“They’re—detecting them somehow?” I swallowed. That wasn’t a comforting thought, but I did want to know.

“Somehow,” Mom agreed. “On some level, Harrowers can always sense Kin, but this is stronger than that. More specific, more sophisticated. And we never know who they’ll target next.”

I heard the frustration in her tone. My mother was powerful. She was strong, fast; she knew how to fight and how to protect. She wasn’t accustomed to being helpless. An image flashed through me: my mother, crouched near a hedge, the moonlight skimming off her hair. In the distance, a man hunkered low in a parked car. A shadow moved toward him.

She’d been watching someone. Waiting.

“Is that what you were doing tonight? Looking for one of their targets? You weren’t mugged.”

Mom looked offended at the suggestion anyone could possibly have mugged her, but it was Leon who spoke.

“We think Patrick Tigue has something to do with it.”

I turned toward him. His voice was low and controlled, his blue eyes focused. There was no hint of playfulness now, or even of the stubborn, argumentative sidekick. This was Leon the Guardian.

I frowned. Patrick Tigue again. I closed my eyes, thinking. I knew of him, peripherally. He’d moved to the Twin Cities a few years ago, among rumors that he would be financing a new stadium or trying to buy one of our sports teams. The papers had been full of tidbits about him: his wealth, his life in Los Angeles, his exploits in Europe, the time he’d dated a princess. I’d never been able to figure out why anyone who had spent time sailing islands in the Pacific would want to move to a state where it snowed half the year—but, then, I’d never been able to figure out why the rest of us stayed, either.

Patrick Tigue, a young playboy, rich and idle and apparently up to no good. But what would a human be doing with Harrowers?

A jolt ran through me. I remembered something Esther had said in one of our sessions, about how demons took the shape of humans. Took human names.

“He’s a Harrower,” I said.

“He’s old,” Leon answered. “And very powerful.”

“If you think he’s behind it, why don’t you just twist him into a pretzel?”

Mom shook her head. A lock of hair had come loose from her bun, curling near her jaw. “That’s not how it works. We suspect Tigue is involved, but we aren’t certain. He’s not doing the bleedings himself, so we can’t prove it.”

“But … he’s a demon. Isn’t that sort of the main category of Things to Smite?”

“Some Harrowers live as humans and coexist peacefully,” Leon said. “Until now, Tigue’s done his best to fit in with society. He’s a philanthropist. A model citizen.”

That was news to me. No one had bothered to mention that aspect of demons.

“And he’s high profile,” Mom said. “That lends him some protection. He’s lived as a human for a long time. He’s known. If I’m going to wind up charged with his murder, I’d rather not do it until I have concrete evidence.”

I made a pffft sort of sound. Mom had been running around as Morning Star most of her adult life, and she hadn’t been caught yet.

“But that’s not the main problem,” she was saying. “If he is involved, he’s not working alone. There’s someone else connected to this, someone with power, helping to organize other Harrowers. That’s why I’ve been watching him. I need to find his accomplice before I make my move, or the bleedings won’t stop.” She closed her eyes, letting out a long breath. “Unfortunately, he’s good. He’s got his own security—the human variety—and I always lose him when he goes Beneath.”

I looked between Mom and Leon. Their faces were somber, their bodies tense.

“What can we do?” I asked.

“Continue to watch. Wait for him to make a move, which is what I was doing tonight when Detective Wyle interrupted me.” Her tone was just a little bit sour.

I recalled her explanation. A mugging. And that image I’d had: the street dark and quiet, sudden motion in the stillness. “Detective Wyle saw you attacked?”

Mom snorted. “The Harrower went after him. I intervened and caught its attention.” She paused, growing thoughtful. “I’m not sure if the attack was a ploy to get rid of me, or if Wyle’s getting too close.”

“He doesn’t mean any harm,” I said. “I get a sense from him. He means well. He’s been after this a while.”

“I didn’t lie for my own self-preservation. We keep the Kin secret because we have to. He can’t be involved, for his own protection.”

She’d told me this before. It was the same reason she’d kept me in the dark. The same reason she insisted I never tell Gideon.

“But some humans must know,” I objected. “What about your father? He wasn’t Kin. Did he know?”

Mom hesitated, looking down at her hands. “My father was like Detective Wyle,” she began. “He was a good man with an earnest desire to help.”

She lifted her eyes to mine. For one fleeting moment, I felt in her something I’d never felt before: the buoyant, unburdened girl she’d been before Morning Star—and the sudden, staggering weight of grief.

“Yes,” she said. “He knew. That’s why he died.”

Tricia Morrow was found the first week of December.

Or rather, her body was found, somewhere in a park not far from downtown, just off 94 East, where an early snowfall glazed the metal swing sets and the empty branches of maple trees. There was no mention of cuts on her ankles, but I knew. The Harrowers had taken her, tested her, and when they discovered she wasn’t the one, they’d let her bleed.

That night, before Mom left for the evening, she paused by the front door to tell me not to worry. It wasn’t her usual, frowning evasiveness: she was trying to reassure me. She would stop the bleedings, she told me.

But I wasn’t reassured. She still hadn’t been able to find who was working with Tigue.

The following week arrived with a blizzard, eighteen inches of snow hurtling down upon the Twin Cities, closing schools and turning the roads into elaborate obstacle courses of snow plows and slush. The forecast had claimed the storm would miss us and head east into Wisconsin, but I woke to a world gone abruptly white, wind blowing drifts into the yard and burying cars along the avenue. Since my grounding had ended the previous week, I dug my winter boots out of the closet and trudged across the arctic waste to Gideon’s house. He and Tink were throwing me a belated prison-release party, and even though their idea of a party tended to include bad action movies and microwave egg rolls, I welcomed the distraction.

“Someone wake me up when it’s spring,” Tink whined when I arrived. She’d come down with a cold and was using this as an excuse to hog Gideon’s bed. She sat huddled in the middle of it with all the blankets, a small blond lump with a pink nose.

“Not happening,” I told her. “I need someone to share my misery.”