Linda Welch - A conspiracy of Demons (18 page)

He eyed Royal’s outfit. “Cute, Roy.”

“That’s what I said,” I chimed in.

“Tiff.” He nodded at me. “How you guys feeling?”

“We are okay,” Royal replied.

Tony lifted a hand toward the other guy, a
bespectacled
blond
probably in his
early thirties
.
“My partner, George Lendle.”

Lendle’s
wispy goatee made me want to ask,
do you know you have goose down stuck to your chin?

Friendly hazel eyes crinkled behind square—
framed
glasses as
Lendle
smiled. “Heard good things about you, Mortensen. Sorry we meet in these circumstance
s
.”

“Shall we get down to it?” Tony asked, taking his little notepad
and a pen
from his jacket pocket.

Royal shifted on his pillow. “We were in the kitchen. The first shot blew out the backdoor window and . . . you can see where it hit. The second shot came about
five
seconds later and hit the corner of the table where Tiff
sat
.”

Tony scribbled in his notebook. “And?”

“I fell down. Tiff went to the floor. We crawled to the cabinets where we
hoped to
be out of the line of fire.”

“You have no idea who’d take a shot at you?” Lendle asked.

“We are private investigators.
Some
of our investigations have led to convictions.”
Royal
’s gaze slid to me.
A knot formed between his eyebrows.
“We could have enemies.”

“You know what I think, Roy?” Mike Warren said as he strode into the room. He
rubbed his chin. “This ties in with Miss Summers’ murder. She was coming to see Tiff, now you and Tiff are targeted.”

“Captain,” Tony acknowledged. “This isn’t a homicide investigation.
”

“It is if there’s a connection to the Summers case. I’m in the loop, Tony, whether you like it or not.” Mike glowered at Tony, red face a little redder.

Lendle took over. “How long
were
you
in the house?” he asked Royal.

“I
got
t
here at
one
-twenty
.”

“And where were you before?”

“In Cache, Unit Two, Slideout Canyon area.”

“Hunting man, eh
?”

To the uninitiated, Royal
said
he was in the Monte
Cristo Range in Cache County
in the area designated Unit Two
for this year’s deer hunt
.
Deer hunting season
for rifles
opened next week and a
ny red-blooded Utahan would
jump to the conclusion Royal went
up there
to check
the terrain prior to the hunt, planning where he’d set up camp and
t
he best place to hide in wait
for an unsuspecting Bambi so he could
shoot
it
.

Royal
made a noncommittal sound which
could
be interpreted as
agreement.

Tony and Mike went o
ut
to the hall. Their conversation, in low tones, n
onetheless sounded heated. They ha
d best keep their voices down or Nurse Sadist would be along to throw them out.

“Were you h
ome all day, Miss Ban
k
s
?” asked Lendle.

“First thing in the morning, then I hiked Mount Lomond with Mac. Officer Mann can verify I was there, and the approximate time.”

He looked at me over his glasses.

I scowled. “Ask Mann.”

“I’d rather you tell me.”

My
slit
ted eyes
only produced another questioning look from him.

“Okay. I had a minor confrontation with another hiker. He spoke to Mann about it.” I slumped and gave him a winsome smile. “I’m tired and sore. Can’t you get the details from him?”

My pitiful act must have convinced him. “I’
ll do that. One more question:
what time did you get home?”

“
Close to
two
.”

He looked at his notebook. “And the report came in at tw
o
-oh-seven.”

Nurse arrived then and I decided she was
no
t all bad when she told Lendle he had to leave and let us rest.

Mike stuck his head
in
. “
Get some rest. You can give your statements at the precinct
.”

Oh joy. Boy,
did I look forward to that.
“When can I get
in
my house?”

He looked at his wristwatch. “We’ll be through in
another hour
, but
think about
check
ing
into a motel if you’re discharged tonight.
The shooter is still out there.
”

“Mike, if someone wants to kill me, I’ll be no safer in a motel than at home.” My shoulders
slumped
. “I’ll stay away from the windows and lock the doors.”

“We’ll have a car outside.”

Sure, like that’s gonna help if someone shoots from the mountainside
. “
Don’t bother
.
You don’t have so many men you can spare a unit to babysit me.
”

The nurse fiddled with Royal’s drip system. “Miss Banks, Mr. Mortensen needs to r
est. Please return to your room
.”

“Can we have a few minutes in private?” Royal asked as he smiled at her. “We have not had a chance to talk.”

She relaxed, and I swear she glowed. Royal has that effect on women. “Two minutes.”

She
straightened
his sheets along the edge of the mattress, then left with obvious reluctance.

“
He
hid
up at the canal, on the Indian Trail,” Royal said quickly.

I stifled a gasp. “You got him!”

“No, I found his nest
. He was long gone.”

“So he was Gelpha.” Royal would have caught up to a human
being
. I toothed my lower lip. “Did you recognize him?” That may sound like an odd question, but Gelpha sense one another.

“I did not get anything, nothing at all.
He was too far away by then.
He must have taken off seconds after he fired at you.”

He reached for my hand. “Tiff,
please be on
your
guard when the hospital releases you
.”

I squeezed his hand, wishing I could reassure him.
Going to a motel when the hospital kicked me out wo
uld be no safer than my house. If a Gelpha wanted me, he coul
d find me wherever I hid, and considering how fast they can move, a cop outside my home
worked
little better than nothing in the way of protection.
K
eeping my eyes sharp and a hand on my
gu
n wa
s the only protection
.

“
Tell you what, I’ll put Jack and Mel on guard.”

He snorted. “I want to laugh, but it will hurt.”

They were keeping Royal until tomorrow.
The doctor discharged me at nine in the evening w
ith instructions to avoid anything strenuous or
energetic for twenty-four hours
. I sat on the edge of the seat
in the taxi and the cabbie, mindful he ha
d collected me from the hospital, took the
bends
slowly
.
I
told
him
to
let me out at Wanda’s house.
I did not
look forward to speaking to her
.

Mac
sat in a shaft of
moonlight
in the backyard
. He looked my way, then back at the fence. Something interesting must be in the vicinity, maybe a cat or raccoon.

Wanda, her husband and teen son sat
at
t
he table in their dining room. T
he backyard spotlight came on
when I got within range
and all three looked my way
. I grabbed Mac, waved at Wanda, mouthed
thank you
, and skedaddled out of there.

Whew.

I jogged to the house and let myself in.
Jack and Mel hovered
in the hall
, anxiety in their postures.

“Hi, guys.”

Mel tented her hands beneath her chin.
“We were worried.”

I smiled weakly. “I know.”

I
looked
in the kitchen. Someone had nailed plywood over the backdoor window. The wood chips
from the table were gone. The floor
had been mopped
.

“Well?” Jack asked.

“Can we talk about it tomorrow? I’m worn out.”

As if that worked.

“We’ll be up all night, fretting,” Mel said.

I told them as much as I knew as I went
around the house closing blinds and drapes. Mac waited
in the kitchen
, pos
itive I woul
d get around to feeding
him
,
irritated
it was not my first objective.

I wen
t in the kitchen and fed my boy
. A faint stain remained on the floor where Royal fell.
A visitor
would not
notice, but I did. The
bucket and scrubbing brush
were in the cabinet under the sink
. Squirting liquid detergent and bleach in the bucket, I half-filled it with hot water, then got down on hands and knees.

As
I knelt, looking at the barely
there tinge, the front
I
put up for Royal, hospital staff and the police
,
crumbled. My eyes pooled and t
ears fell from
them
to plop on the floor.

“Oh, Tiff,” Mel crooned.

I
swiped at my cheeks, dunked the brush in the water and scoured the floor.
“I’m okay.”

Mac whined, and pushed his head between my arm and body. My boy knew I felt bad. Dropping the brush in the water, I rubbed my h
ands partly dry on my jeans, not caring if the bleach made the color fade,
hugged his sturdy body to me
and buried my face in his hair. He suffered my attentions for half a minute, th
en struggled free, confident he ha
d made everything better.

And confident he deserved a reward.

I joined him where he stood at the pantry. I should be firm, but those sparkling brown eyes could not be denied. “All right, you win.” I got a handful of liver treats and knelt to feed them to him one by one.

Quietly whispering,
Mel and Jack
drif
ted to the far side of the room
.
I opened the backdoor for Mac.

The floor looked fine.
As
I
emptied the bucket in the sink
a s
mall voice inside my head said
,
that’s Royal’s blood
as it swirled down the drain. How many times had I seen him hurt? How many times would I see it again?
Images flooded my mind:
the shock on his face as he fell, th
e crimson on his shirt; h
is body discolored by bruises as he burst from the
tunnels in Cicero’s lair;
lying in his own blood in
the bowels of the High House; f
lames and smoke boiling from his apartment as I stood in the street below, my world falling apart.

How do cops’ wives cope with seeing their men off in the morning,
knowing a confrontation or
a stray bullet c
an
end it all?

Stop it, stop it, stop it.
I clasped my head in my hands.

I should be
directing
my mind to what this was all about.
The shooter waited up on the mountainside until Royal got here. He wanted us
both. And Mike was right,
Lynn had to be the connection. But for the life of me, I could not figure out why a demon killed Lynn.