Monsters Under the Bed (12 page)

The picture of Mo I got from it all was someone who knew himself well and could make light of himself if needed. That didn’t seem like the personality of someone likely to commit suicide. These were the words of a survivor.

Now more than ever I wished I had met Mo when he was still alive. Having to follow in the footsteps of a ghost was daunting at best.

I did, however, witness firsthand his fascination with tea. Whole workbenches were dedicated to tea, and their scents mingled wonderfully, creating a cloud of aromas that tickled my nose. He had boxes and cans of tea, a variety of flavors from all over the world, all neatly organized and catalogued. Next to these sample pouches were mortars and pestles, microscopes and test tubes, and other lab equipment. So, Mo made his own teas. That wasn’t news to me, but I sort of wished he had coined his own tea brand, just so I could feel a connection with him since I could no longer do that for real on account of his death.

I moved on, with a smile on my face.

Then I came across another notebook stashed in a workstation where several boxes of geological samples, from stones and what looked like gems to sand and other ground particles, were placed. I read through the notebook carefully since this was what I had been looking for.

At the end, I sighed when my hypothesis was confirmed.

Mo had been refining cadmium. The silvery blue-gray metal silently mocked me from the box where a tiny piece of it lay, clearly labeled.

I looked around with a cautious eye. This was the laboratory of a scientist who would not have made the mistake of accidentally inhaling something toxic or poisonous—not with the level of precautions he had undertaken to convert this space into a laboratory. The only two possibilities were that either someone had poisoned him with cadmium vapors, or Mo himself had purposely inhaled the noxious fumes.

What did it all mean? I had several possible suspects and motives but no proof.

The only evidence of foul play I had at this point belonged to other unrelated crimes or to Mo’s apparent suicide.

And I refused to believe it was suicide. Mo had challenged me with his letter, insisting he would not have killed himself.

Was I clinging to a false hope of finding something criminal in a place where there was only tragedy, loss, and heartache from a boy haunted by the past? Were his nightmares just that, bad dreams with monsters taking the lives of those he had loved?

I rubbed my forehead, which felt a little hot and sweaty, wondering if I was coming down with something. I could hear the ventilation hissing and the computers humming low. If there was a spill here…. I checked around but there was nothing. The lab was immaculate.

I took the notebook, vowing to myself to return it in proper course.

It was time to revisit a fire god and a lovely lady.

A
FTER
a quick sandwich on the road for a late lunch, I returned to Sea Cliff and to Giulia Capello’s luxurious garden palace as the afternoon sun moved slowly across the sky.

Was I surprised to find Luther Lovell in the courtyard with Giulia as I was shown in by Eryt, the redheaded maiden? What do you think?

“Mr. Garrett,” Lovell said calmly in his deep voice as he stood up to shake my hand.

Giulia didn’t shake my hand, but lay there in her lounge chair at leisure, twirling her fingers around the stem of a cocktail glass. “Mr. Garrett.” Her voice was not welcoming, and she averted her gaze, as if bored or dismayed.

I sat down opposite the two of them. “This may or may not be relevant to Mo’s death, but I thought it best to clear the air between us. Do I think or know either of you killed Mo? No, I do not. However, you have not been forthright with me.”

“I have not lied to you, Mr. Garrett,” Lovell said, cool as a cucumber.

“Omissions of truth could be construed as lies,” I countered, and he nodded his head in acceptance of my interpretation. “Mr. Lovell, you being Kōjin makes little difference to me, unless you murdered Mo. Did you?”

“No, Mr. Garrett. I did not kill Mo. He was like a son to me.” I noticed Lovell didn’t deny being a Japanese fire god, which was a positive development in my book.

“And Mo was like a son to you as well, Ms. Capello.” She looked at me then, and I saw sorrow in her eyes. “The mythical being you had a relationship with was Mr. Lovell here, isn’t that so?”

Giulia nodded, slightly prickly still. “Yes, it was.” She had told me she would never disclose the identity of her mythical lover, but I was glad she did nonetheless.

“I wish to tell you two about a dream I had last night.” Lovell and Giulia exchanged weird glances before turning their full attentions back on me. “I dreamt of a giant with fiery hair and three faces forging a cloak of night to give to Mo’s mother.”

No sooner had my words rung out when I saw both members of my audience rear back in shock. They looked at each other, conveying with gazes and expressions what words lacked. I let them carry on in their silent communion while the gears in my head turned, faster and faster.

Finally, Lovell turned back to me, frowning, and licked his lips, concerned. “And what meaning did you take from your dream?”

“The mere fact you take me so seriously is revealing,” I said, feeling more like myself than ever before. It was indeed a strange experience to be so in tune with one’s own subconscious, to give rationality a voice amid images that should not have made any sense, since they were only synapses firing randomly. Or were they?

“You mean to keep us in suspense much longer?” Giulia asked, her tone reserved.

“I know you’re not Mo’s mother, Ms. Capello. That would be ridiculous. You’re not old enough for that. And I know you didn’t sleep with Haydn.” I had my doubts about all that had gone down with the family, but the time to hash them out wasn’t now. “Myths have been obscured by time. If there was ever any truth in them to begin with, what is real today in a post-Veiled world doesn’t really compare.” I looked straight into Giulia’s eyes. “You and Kōjin having an affair is one thing. The fact that you
both
are mythical beings is another.”

Giulia’s eyes flashed midnight blue, intently, but she said nothing, her lips a thin white line.

I turned to Lovell, who was watching me with rapt attention, waiting silently. “When I figured out that what happened between you and Cecil was embezzlement versus a secret kept, I started thinking about your character, Mr. Lovell. Your Japanese style, your meditation practices, the candle flames flickering. I did some googling, and combined with my dream, I knew who you were even before Cecil confirmed it for me.”

Lovell bowed his head slightly, a small serene smile gracing his lips. “It seems you have us pegged, Mr. Garrett.”

“As a fire god, a kami, you have a great deal of power. When I thought about that, and what Cecil did, I was forced to reach the conclusion that you were shielding someone else, someone who wasn’t out to the world as a mythical being. And when Ms. Capello here confirmed the rumor she had indeed had an affair with a mythical being, well, it wasn’t hard connecting the dots.” I gave him a smile of my own in return. “It was brave of you to let Cecil blackmail you into silence. It must not have been easy to bury all those instincts to purge his impurities with fire.”

“Violence begets violence, Mr. Garrett,” Lovell replied peacefully. “It is not my way. Never was. I am fire controlled, for a productive purpose, for home and hearth. Never to destroy.”

“Yes, I know. I’m glad to hear that.” I faced Giulia, whose expression had not softened to me in the slightest. “Your fascination with all things Japanese gave away who your lover is. But it was the dream and this lush garden palace, the golden apple tree of Bliss, and all the young ladies here—the Hesperides, if I’m not mistaken—that told me who
you
are.”

“And who might that be, pray tell?” Giulia asked sweetly.

“As soon as I let go of the Italian heritage, thought about Adriana Marinos, and then looked a bit further east, to Greece, I got my answer. You’re Nyx, the goddess of night. The midnight cloak Kōjin made for you in my dream, the dark cave in the heavens where you resided, death at your door. Google doesn’t always work in your favor, Ms. Capello.”

Giulia was silent for a moment, studying me icily, but I recognized it as just wariness. “Well, this has been most interesting, but I must renew my earlier question: What does any of this have to do with Mo’s death? Or have you given up on finding his murderer?”

“No, I have not. I came to you today because I wanted to clear the air between us, to show you that the truth of your identities will be safe with me. I don’t care who you are, as long as you’re not behind Mo’s death. And I will find out who is responsible.”

My words made Giulia blink hard, and her lips quivered just a little. Swiftly, she got up and disappeared into the house.

Lovell looked at me apologetically. “Giulia is not mean on purpose, you understand, Mr. Garrett. She’s protective of her charges.”

“I get it. A divine mother figure, tending to a whole host of mythical beings. Perhaps she’s not the mother of them all in reality—if that’s even a word that applies here—but her maternal instinct is strong. It must’ve been a blow when Haydn vanished.”

Lovell nodded, forlorn. “It was. It’s the not knowing that gets to her.”

“Doesn’t it always?”

I got up with Lovell, shook his hand, and said my farewells for the time being. Again I was escorted to the front door by Eryt, who I now knew was Erytheia, one of the Hesperides, nymphs of the evening. According to the myths, these maidens were ladies-in-waiting for the goddess of night, and they guarded a fabled garden in the west where magical golden apples grew. The truth was definitely close. I bid Eryt adieu, thanked her, and walked off.

Did I still think Lovell or Giulia had been involved in Mo’s death? Considering my reply was going to be no, that left me two suspects short. And dammit, they had been good suspects with distinct motives. But Giulia with her maternal instinct and Lovell with his serenity, neither of them carried that sense of deadly danger that came with the presence of evil. And with that, I meant the kind of evil that allowed a person to murder another human being, to plan it, to execute it, to relish in the spoils of victory without shame.

My list of possible suspects was growing thinner by the minute.

Some questions had been answered—by me mostly—but I still had a ways to go.

To be precise, there was one person I had overlooked in my investigation, and I knew the longer I procrastinated, the harder it would be. How could I believe my perfect love could have anything to with the death of a child?

It was time to face Ford.

I
T
WAS
late afternoon, just before five, when I made my way home.

As usual, I found Ford in the backyard, planting. He was humming a popular tune from gay clubs as he dug, the simple pleasure of working with the earth written on his face.

“Hi, babe,” I said.

Caught off guard, Ford lifted his little garden shovel in a gesture of self-defense, but lowered it when he saw it was me. “You really need to stop doing that, Sam. One of these days I’m gonna throw something at you, and it could be anything from dirt to a rake. So be forewarned.”

I chuckled. “Message received and understood, sir.” He shook his head with mock reproach, but his smile was as radiant as ever. “Listen. Can we talk for a bit?”

Ford nodded, got up, and swiped dirt off his raggedy work jeans. With just them and a white T-shirt on, he looked edible. My own pants grew a little tighter. “I was going to start dinner in a minute. Now you can help me.”

“Fine. But you can’t blame me if I burn down something irreplaceable, and we have to order pizza. Again.”

Ford laughed. “Oh, I won’t blame you, honey. I’ll find other ways to punish you.” He winked wickedly as he passed me, and the familiar flutter of butterflies in my belly increased. God, he always knew how to get me all hot and bothered.

And his swat on my behind as he walked by just made my blood boil all the more.

I loved him so much it hurt.

Please, God, don’t let him be the murderer
.

Although, to be fair, it was looking likely Mo had inhaled the cadmium himself in his lab, either purposely or accidentally. If it had been a murderous intent, then that person required easy access to the mansion. I didn’t see Ford having that kind of access, not even with the contacts he seemed to possess all over the place.

I followed him into our house and straight to the kitchen. The aromas of spices and fresh herbs filled the air, and by the time I reached it, the water was already boiling.

I sniffed, though there was no scent yet. “What are you making?”

He glanced at me over his muscular shoulder, smiling happily. “Lasagna with steamed vegetables. I was going to make something more complicated but then didn’t feel like it.”

I went to him, plastered my front to his back, and wrapped my arms around him. He smelled of grass and dirt, sweat and deodorant, and I took a deep breath, savoring it in my lungs for a moment.

“Yuck, I’m all gross,” he whined playfully, wiggling in my arms.

“Nuh-uh, you’re perfect.” I kissed his exposed nape where his blond strands were damp. “Perfect for me.”

“Why do I have a feeling this conversation’s gonna lead us into the bedroom?” he said teasingly. I chuckled and kissed his skin again, stealing a lick as well. My taste buds exploded into life at the salty flavor of him. He leaned back against me and sighed. “I thought you came home so early to talk about me being in Mo Chance’s will.”

I froze.
Shit
. Niedermayer must have notified those mentioned in the will. That was standard once probate was finished and the will’s legality had been verified; for example, that all signatures were authentic and that the heirs were explicitly named. That meant the reading of the will was close at hand, and if the murderer was a financial beneficiary of the will, my time was running out.