Wolf's Deal: A Nick Lupo Novella (The Nick Lupo Series) (13 page)

It was kind
of fun, actually, wasn’t it? Well, it
was
.
Surprisingly, she thought.

She walked
away from this machine and wondered again if she should try a new one. They
were all intriguing in a strange way with their themes and bright pictures and
electronic jingles. Lights flashing, cartoon and movie voices reaching out to
her as she walked past.

While
thinking about picking a new machine, she saw the same shuffling guy cross the
aisle that she thought was a cop. He looked tired, like DiSanto, and she
figured he’d been there all night. As he neared, he dug into his pocket and
pulled a badge in a wallet.

She sighed.
Maybe something had happened…

She reached
for her phone and realized just as her hand brushed her pocket that she didn’t
have it.

Shit, must have left it in the car.

THE ARCHER

He crossed
the aisle quickly and saw his destined target. He didn’t have time to waste, so
he made up his mind and pulled the stolen wallet from his pocket. He approached
her and when she turned to face him he realized that she was lovely, after all.
He felt better about it – this one would grab the city’s attention for
sure.

He showed
her the badge without flashing it to the whole world, a secret between them and
no one else.

“Are you,
uh, available?” he asked in a just loud enough whisper.

“Yes?” she
said uncertainly, swiveling all the way around to meet him. She might have been
staring at the high-stakes progressive slot machine in front of which she was
sitting, but maybe not. Momentarily she seemed annoyed at the interruption.
“What is it?”

But then he
saw the widening of her eyes:
Trouble?
Another killing? A story?

He saw the
questions in her eyes. They were very nice eyes, indeed.

“Ah, you’re
needed at the crime scene,” he said as he figured the young cop would have said
it. “Outside, I mean.”

He knew he
was a little shaggy, but what could she expect after his long shift? Maybe he’d
been called in from off-time. Going on no sleep after a long night’s policing.

“Did
Detective Nick Lupo ask you to find me?”

“Yeah, Nick
said he wanted to talk to you.” He noted the corners of her lips turning up,
and he knew he had her hooked.

She asked,
“What about…?” But she was already shifting her weight, ready to go.

The ‘cop’
lowered his head and interrupted, whispering, “I can’t give you details here in
public, but there’s – well, look, we just found another victim and
Nick
said to tell you he needs to get ahead
of it. I’m not sure what he meant, but you know, when he says
jump
you gotta say
how high
.”

“Another
victim? Oh no, that’s terrible. Okay, I’ll follow you.” She hopped off the
stool and fell in behind him as he made his way toward the far wall. She seemed
eager to see this Nick fellow. The big hard-ass cop with the long hair?

The Archer
felt the excitement of yet another kill flooding his veins like an infusion of
new blood. He sensed her presence right behind him, matching his stride, and
her own excitement.

You have no idea!

LUPO

He walked
around more or less aimlessly, staring at people who fit his fleeting
description of the guy he’d followed. He also tried to make his way back to the
crime scene outside, but it took him a half hour to locate the correct
direction and find the lobby again. The place was cavernous. He’d never even
know if DiSanto had already gotten back here, unless they connected by text or
phone. He figured he’d try once he found his way back to the parking lot and
its taped-off perimeter. Chances were that was where he would find his sleepy
partner, anyway.

When he
squeezed past an elderly woman with a rolling walker trying to get inside the
same doorway, he felt almost as if those tentacles he had imagined were trying
to keep him from escaping. The two of them clogged the doorway, and then he was
suddenly free with a
whoosh
of air
vacuum. Outside it was a chilly morning, but that had nothing to do with the
shiver that worked its way through him.

As he
skirted more elderly people on their way inside, he heard a familiar chuckling
voice.

“There you
go again, Nick, passing judgment on those who don’t have the means to defend
themselves.”

“That’s not
true—” he started to retort. Then he stopped and whirled, looking for the
speaker who still seemed to be chuckling across the field of his hearing. At
first he’d thought it was DiSanto joking around, making a different voice. But
now…

“Sam...?”

He heard the
chuckling again, but he couldn’t
see
anyone. But it
did
sound like…

It was
impossible. It couldn’t
be
his friend
Sam Waters. Sam had killed himself rather than face the prospect of life as a
werewolf. One of the elders on the tribal council who had opposed his tribe’s
casino project, like so many others he had run afoul of those former mercenaries
who were rather more than mere hired guns. Sam had brashly chosen to end his
life with a shotgun blast that night, on a beach near the reservation, but who
knew what had really gone through his mind before the savage end he sought so
brashly? After all, he’d been forced to put down his only son, the same
werewolf who had infected young Nick’s neighbor, who had in turn infected Nick…
Sam Waters had had good reason to despise the thought of preying on others.
Their friendship had developed against all odds, as the saying went – Sam
and Nick should have been sworn enemies, and had been, briefly. But then Sam
had killed himself and Nick had felt his loss as much as anyone’s in his
tortured life.

So now what
was going on? Was DiSanto playing with him? Was he hearing things? Someone else
who sounded just like Sam?

Yeah, someone talking to a ‘Nick’?
What were the odds?

But then,
what were the odds of it actually
being
Sam? Sam was dead. Damn it, they’d seen him flip the short shotgun, lodge the
barrel under his chin, and push the trigger rather than pull it.

It hadn’t
been pretty, not at all.

He was
definitely dead. They’d buried him in a tribal ceremony. He and Jessie had been
there, and DiSanto, and the surviving elders.

But now he
seemed to be here, talking to Lupo. It wasn’t possible, no matter how you tried
to play it.

Lupo played
it cool. He tried to approach the whole thing with logic. He stepped out of the
traffic flow and surveyed the area more carefully. There were various people in
the large lobby, some not moving, maybe waiting for other people. Maybe one of
them sounded like Sam..? Maybe…

The voice
again: “Look, Nick, I know this is a little out of the blue, but you’ve got to
go back in there.”

“Goddamn
it,” Lupo growled, whirling again to survey his surroundings.

There was no
one nearby.

He didn’t
like being toyed with, and that was what it felt like.

“I’m not
trying to toy with you, Nicky, but I’m just getting the hang of this…”

Lupo turned,
his lips forming a curse, and now something did catch his eye. There was a
figure nearby, hugging a slightly curved wall, who seemed to be fading in and
out of sight. One second Lupo could see it clearly, and then the next he could
see through it right to the painted wall. He could see some chips in the paint.
And then the figure was obscuring the view.

It
looked
like Sam Waters, wearing his
faded jeans and white cotton shirt with a beaded vest over it, his frequent
sartorial concession to his heritage. But it
couldn’t
be Sam…

Lupo blinked
rapidly and found himself rubbing his eyes. He was tired, but he wasn’t
that
tired. He shouldn’t have been
seeing things.

He
approached the figure, who appeared mostly solid at the moment. The chipped
paint was invisible.

“Sam?”

The elderly
man turned and looked at him with a sad smile. “Well, who’d you think I was,
Hamlet’s father? Would that make you Hamlet?”

“Shit,” Lupo
muttered. “I hallucinate a ghost and it thinks it’s a comedian.”

“Indeed,
there’s no time for comedy,” said the ghost of Sam, if that was what it was. “There’s
trouble happening, and if you leave this establishment now you’ll be too late.”

“Fuck,” Lupo
growled. A passerby stared at him and pointedly turned away.

Lupo shook
his head. Then he put a hand to his own forehead, expecting to feel heat and
sweat, but he was cool and dry.

“If you wait
longer, it will also be too late.”

It
was
a sort of smoother version of Sam’s
voice.

But it had
to be in his head. Lupo tapped his right temple.
Had to be
.

Or it was
some sort of trick, a prank.

“Whatever
works, Nick, but how many voices in your head know you have a soft spot for
progressive rock, keyboard instruments, and James Bond films? That we share the
Bond fan thing? Well, we did before I… just
before
.”

“Technically,”
Lupo muttered, “I think
all
the
voices in my head, any that might be there, would know all those things.”

A fat guy in
a too-tight t-shirt went by, staring at Lupo with unconcealed disgust.

“Well,
that’s a point,” said the voice, ghost, whatever it was. “I didn’t think that
through very well, did I?”

Lupo stared
back at the fat one. He sounded like he was talking to himself, didn’t he?
Acting crazy. He tapped his ear. “Talk to you later,” he said loudly enough for
the guy to think he was wearing some sort of Bluetooth comm device. Too late,
though. He shrugged.
So what?

He turned
and there was the Sam-figure again, and he was kind of grinning, wasn’t he?

“Never
thought I’d see the day,” he said.

Lupo
wondered whether mental illness ran in his family.

“Look,
Nick,” the ghostly Indian said, no longer grinning, “work out whether or not
you think I’m real later, after you’ve checked on Jessie. I’m telling you she’s
here and she might in trouble. I lost track of her and she might have run afoul
of this bastard you’re hunting. She might need your help. Stop worrying about
your sanity.”

And then he
added: “Think of this as one of your hunches or gut feelings. You’d never
ignore that, would you?”

As Lupo
watched, the Sam-figure that was clear as day started to fade and he could see
through it again, and then it was gone.

Fuck!

 
Their exchange had taken less than a
minute, but now it had indeed become a gut feeling, and he turned and headed
back into the casino proper. He dialed Jessie’s phone again and grimaced when
it went straight to voicemail.

THE ARCHER

His
breathing was fast and he hoped she couldn’t tell from behind him, where she
was trying to keep up with him as she followed. He made sure to stay ahead of
her, giving her a sense of urgency, trying to keep her from thinking.

Clearly, his
mention of a
story
had intrigued her
enough and she’d agreed to follow him without trying to ask too many questions.
If this Nick guy was the cop who had caught his eye outside… but maybe Nick was
the other one, the thinner cop she’d talked to along with that other hot reporter
chick. Christ, were they
all
hot? Then
he felt his hands and feet go cold and he realized, it
had
to be that guy from outside. He just knew it.

Jesus
Christ, that guy looked scary as hell. He’d stared right through The Archer’s
soul for a second, there, only he hadn’t realized it. But if he stopped and
thought about it…

The Archer
decided he didn’t have that much time to make his big statement.

He led the
woman through the circular maze of the casino, which he’d memorized and which
he knew would only confuse her. As long as they didn’t stumble onto this Nick
asshole, he’d get her right where he wanted.

He only
wished he could be behind her, because her ass was spectacular.

The side
lobby was in sight now, and he headed there. He could hear her steps, following
quickly, maybe excited about what ‘Nick’ wanted to tell her.

He smiled,
glad she couldn’t see his face.

LUPO

He dialed
Jessie’s phone yet again and it went to voicemail. Maybe she was on the phone,
but it didn’t seem likely. Then he dialed his home phone and heard his own
outgoing message. He’d stubbornly clung to the land-line, just to be an old
fogey, and he’d really hoped she was there. She probably hadn’t left to drive
up north yet, unless there’d been an emergency, but he couldn’t be sure. He
dialed her tiny hospital, which was the center of the rez health-care system.
He spoke to Jessie’s second in command, Lizz Something-or-other (how was he
supposed to remember?) who told him no, they hadn’t called Jessie and asked her
to return, was everything all right?