Thunderbird Falls

CHAPTER 8

I’d bite my own tongue off before admitting it to Morrison, but I actually sort of liked being a beat cop. Motor oil was good for the soul and all, but the truth is that as a mechanic I didn’t get out much. The only time I saw a new face was when there was a new hire, and let’s not even talk about the exercise regime I didn’t follow. I’d lost twelve pounds since I’d been stuck on patrol duty, and I felt like She Who Was Not To Be Messed With as a result.

The North Precinct covered a huge area, thirty-two square miles above and around the University of Washington. It ran the gamut of neighborhoods, from very nice to very bad, and I’d walked more of them than I’d ever dreamed possible. I had two favorite beats: the first was through some bad sections of Aurora, which was nobody’s sensible idea of a favorite beat. Still, it passed under the no-longer-guttering streetlight that had started me down the path I was on now. Given my usual bad temper about the whole shamanism business, I wasn’t sure why I was drawn back to the place that kicked it off. Moth to flame, I guessed. Either that or the less flattering “humans are stupid,” but I thought maybe I’d stick with the metaphor.

The other one I liked was University Avenue. I lived on its far north end, and working that beat always seemed like something of a reward, like I was keeping my very own personal neighborhood safe from hooligans.

I imagine every big city has at least one drag strip like the Ave. To my mind, University Bookstore was its linchpin. Spreading out from it on either side were restaurants and storefronts ranging from burger joints to tofu houses and from The Gap to bohemian, incense-filled shops filled with Indian imports. Young people—I observed them that way, like I was hitching along with a walker—spilled out of coffee shops to sit under sun-faded umbrella tables, chatting up every topic from Kant to Britney.

Police patrol was heavy along the Ave, increasing every fall when new students arrived to wreak havoc on unsuspecting Seattle. It used to be that any undercover cop could score the drug of her choice on the Ave. It was a matter of departmental pride that these days it was widely acknowledged that there was too much heat to risk turning a little illegal profit. The Ave was a battle against chaos, and for once, order was winning.

I usually got a friendly nod or two from store owners, particularly the restaurants I frequented. When I’d first begun patrol duty, I’d had to argue extensively with Mrs. Li, owner of my favorite Chinese place, who was convinced that all that walking would wear me away to a stick. She kept trying to give me “a little snack”—usually enough to feed two for a day—on the house, to keep my strength up. I finally convinced her that as a police officer I couldn’t take what she offered without compromising myself, and she retaliated by feeding me twice as much when I came in to the shop off-duty.

I waved at her through the restaurant window and grinned my way up the street. A long-nosed bicycle messenger zipped past me, illegally riding on the sidewalk. I barked, “Hey!” He shot a nasty glance over his shoulder at me and didn’t stop. At the corner, he bounced his bike off the curb and down into the street, careening across the avenue to ride on the correct, if not right, side. Rather than chase him down on foot, I punched 411 on my generally despised department-issued cell phone and got the number for the company he worked for. It took the length of waiting for one stoplight to register a request for disciplinary action. I crossed the street with the rest of the herd cheerfully. If I was lucky, I’d see his bike ahead of me and get to ticket it for vehicular misuse.

It was a sad, sad state when I was glad about carrying a cell phone and considered the opportunity to ticket a bicycle to be good luck.

Bells on a shop door behind me chimed urgently as someone pushed and held it open. “Excuse me. Officer Walker?”

I blinked over my shoulder. A girl of about twenty leaned in the door, vibrating it enough to keep the bells ringing. “Er, yeah? I mean, yes?”

Relief brightened her face. “Oh good. I had a premonition, you see, a dream about you, but I wasn’t sure if Walker was your last name or if it was just that you were a walker.” She gestured at me. “Foot patrol, see?”

I backed up a step and glanced at the name above the shop. It did not, as I half expected it to, say Lunatics “R” Us. Actually, it bore the innocuous name of East Asian Imports, although the girl whose leaning continued to jangle the bells was about as East Asian as Queen Elizabeth. She was blond and on the slightly chunky side of curvy, with brown eyes and a hopeful expression. For an unkind moment I thought of golden retrievers. “What can I do for you, miss?”

“My name’s Faye.” The door bells quivered with excitement. “I need your help.”

Fish wire tightened around my chest, making it difficult to breathe. “My help specifically, or the police in general?” Adrenaline made the tips of my fingers cold and tingly and slid the world into sharper focus. Given Faye’s opening statement about dreams, I wasn’t surprised when she said—

“Yours specifically. See, a friend of mine died yesterday, and I dreamed about you—”

Adrenaline abandoned my fingertips to turn into a festering pit of nausea in my belly. “Who was your friend?”

Tears welled in Faye’s eyes. “Her name was Cassie. Nobody even knows what happened yet.” She narrowly escaped wailing, mouth turned down in misery. “She couldn’t justdie like that, could she? She was only twenty, and she couldn’t justdie!” The bells shivered and banged and rang. I set my teeth together and stepped forward, not quite touching Faye’s elbow.

“How about if we go inside for a minute?” Because if we didn’t, I was going to shoot the bells right off the door. Faye sniffled miserably and backed into the store. It was poorly lit after the brilliant morning sunshine. I tripped over a solemn wooden monkey carved out of dark wood that sat precariously near the door. It wobbled ponderously. I slapped my hand on its flat head—maybe it was a plant stand—and left it complacently back in its place as I edged farther into the store.

“It’s okay.” Faye snuffled and wiped her hand under her nose, which would have been considerably more endearing if she’d been three. “Everybody does that.”

“Why don’t you move it, then?”

“He likes to be able to see out the door.”

I consider it a matter of great pride that I didn’t abandon the store right there. I paused, gathered up the several things I wanted to say, admired them briefly, then moved on as manfully as I could. “Ms.—” She hadn’t given me her last name. “Faye,” I said somewhat reluctantly, not wanting at all to get personal with the girl. “If you know something about Cassandra Tucker’s death, you should be talking with UW police, not with me.”

Faye’s gaze snapped to me, her big brown eyes seeming much less golden-retriever-like suddenly. “I didn’t mention Cassie’s last name.”

Crap. “No, you didn’t, but police departments do talk to one another.” I really didn’t want to confess to being the one who found her friend’s body. It seemed likely that it would get messy after that, and she was already snorfling all over the place. I made a slow circuit of the store, wedging myself between narrowly placed shelves and trying not to knock any more bric-a-brac over. I wondered if the place was up to fire code.

Faye, evidently mollified, kept pace with me on the other side of the skinny shelving unit. It, like the monkey, was carved of some kind of dark wood, and a price tag was wrapped around one of the supports. I wondered what would happen to all the stuff it held if someone saw fit to buy it. “I dreamed that you could help us,” she said.

“Us?” I picked the lid off a small pot and peered inside. Black enamel paint gleamed at me. Faye looked uncomfortable.

“Me and some friends. Friends of Cassie’s.”

I set the lid back on the pot with a distinctive click, remembered Morrison’s magnificent scowl, and said without a trace of guilt, “Cassandra’s death isn’t my jurisdiction, Faye. I’m very sorry, but my captain would hang me by my toes to dry if I got involved. The best I can do is offer to bring you down to the Udub police so you can talk to them, and I can’t really even do that until my lunch break.” I twisted my arm, peering at my watch, a big black clunker of a thing that no longer told me what time it was in Moscow. “Which is in about three hours. Want me to come back then?” Maybe a little twinge of guilt.

“I dreamed you had darkness wrapped around your heart and that light shone through it so powerfully it cracked and shattered letting goodness into the world and the goodness said to me that your name was Walker and that without you all hope was lost and that I had to wait and watch today so that I could stop you and ask you to help and I didn’t know if I would even know you because all I really saw in the dream was a woman with a walking stick but as soon as I saw you I knew you were the one from the dream because you’re confident and strong and you move like the woman in the dream and anybody with eyes tosee can tell that you’ve got power soplease won’t you help us?” Faye clutched the corner of the shelves, staring up at me as she dragged in a deep breath. I gaped at her.

Rationally, not one of the things she said should have swayed me. Hell, notall of the things she said should have swayed me, not even with the breathless, desperate delivery. I snapped, “All right,” and shoved my hand through my hair. “Dammit.”

Faye’s eyes widened. Maybe good police officers didn’t say “dammit.” I’d have to check the handbook. Meantime, I said, “Dammit,” again for good measure, and raked my hand through my hair again. “All right, look, Faye. What’s your last name?”

“Kirkland. Why?”

So I can look up your police records. “I like to know people’s names when I agree to get in over my head. Look. I will come talk to you and your friends, all right?” My speech was getting more precise, indicating to me, if not to Faye, who, after all, didn’t know me very well, that I really meant what I was saying. “However, I want you to promise me that if, after speaking with you, I believe that what you have to say might be of use to the university police department, you and your friends will come with me to talk to them. Do we have a deal?” The last words were so clipped that Faye’s eyes widened again.

“Okay. Honest, I don’t think it’ll be any help, but if we are, yes, okay, I promise.” Swear to God, if she’d had a tail she would’ve wagged it. I dropped my chin to my chest.

“All right. All right, fine. Dammit,” I added again for good measure. “Where should I meet you?”

“We’ll be at the reading room for the graduate library on campus at seven tonight. Can you come then?”

I stood up. “I don’t get off work until seven. Is it okay if I’m late?”

Faye nodded, backing up so she could abandon the narrow shelving area for the slightly roomier front counter. “It’ll be fine. Maybe you shouldn’t come in uniform.” She gave me a critical sideways glance that took the wind right out of the She Who Was Not To Be Messed With mindset.

“Maybe Ishould,” I said. “It might make people more willing to talk to the university police, if I’m not scary.”

Faye eyed me dubiously. “If you think so,” she said with such exaggerated politeness that I knew I’d be succumbing to peer pressure. I closed my eyes momentarily and scolded myself for being a weenie, then put on a fake smile.

“Or not. Okay. I’ll see you tonight, then.”

Faye beamed, tongue lolling out just like a retriever’s. Well, no, but boy, she looked happy. “Thank you, Officer Walker. We’ll see you tonight.”

“It’s Joanne,” I said, resigned, and let myself out to the jangling of bells. Morrison was going to kill me.