Personal Demon

LUCAS: 15

“I SUPPOSE COVERING HER UP isn’t a good idea,” Paige said.

I nodded. Cabal security would be handling this, not the Miami police, but they’d still want the scene left intact.

Paige was unable to tear her gaze from the dead woman. I knew she was wondering who she’d been, what her life had been like, now reduced to this-a naked corpse exposed to strangers who were too busy with other concerns to mourn her passing or even care about the circumstances of her death, except as it related to those larger concerns.

I struggled to see her as Paige did. As a person. But tonight all I could do was assess the facts. Though she looked college age, the amount of smeared makeup made it hard to tell. Dyed blond hair. Faded track marks on her arms. A tattoo on her ankle that might aid in identification.

I turned my attention to the articles of male clothing strewn about the bed. Socks, shoes, underwear, a shirt…No sign of pants. Whoever had been with her had likely fled half dressed. Clearly not the young man from downstairs. But had he killed her?

I bent to examine the shirt. I suspected it belonged to Carlos. The young woman hadn’t been hastily tied up by an experimenting amateur, but bound with leather straps. My brother’s sexual proclivities were no secret in the supernatural community.

“She’s been tortured.” Paige had begun examining the young woman. “There are knife wounds, but they look small and shallow, maybe from that.” She pointed to a penknife lying beside a condom wrapper, then leaned closer to the girl’s abdomen. “And I think these are…bite marks.”

While this could indeed be evidence of torture, it was not necessarily the case if Carlos had been involved. But I saw no need to enlighten her.

A shadow fell over Paige. I reacted with a knockback spell, hitting the blur of motion before I could even tell what it was.

Carlos flew back into the open closet as Griffin ran from the adjoining room. Griffin tackled him and the two men went down.

“Get the hell off me, you oaf.” A glare my way. “It’s your brother, idiot.”

It was the first time I’d heard Carlos call me that. He’d say mockingly a “little bro” or “baby bro,” but in serious reference I was always his half-brother-if he had to admit to any relationship at all.

He struggled against Griffin’s restraining hands, but he was no match for the bigger man. With one hand, Griffin tugged plastic wrist straps from his pocket and glanced at me. I nodded.

“What the hell are you doing?” Carlos said. “You’re supposed to be rescuing me!”

“We need to escort you to headquarters,” I said. “If you’ll-”

“Headquarters? The fuck you are, you traitorous son-of-a-bitch. I wouldn’t trust you to escort me across the road.”

From brother to traitor in twenty seconds. If one angle didn’t work…

“I need to take you back. Hector-Hector’s dead.”

“Hec-?” He lifted his gaze to mine. “Bullshit.”

When I didn’t answer, he searched my face.

“Ah, shit,” he said. “What was it? A car accident? Heart attack? I know his heart had been-” His expression hardened. “If it was a heart attack, you better believe I’m holding you responsible, Lucas. You traipse into the office this afternoon, with no warning-”

“He was murdered.”

His surprise seemed genuine.

“So was William.”

His look turned to shock. “No way. No fucking way.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah? I’ll bet you are. I’ll bet you’re just rubbing your hands right now. Finally got rid of them, and now the way is clear. You can take over the company and run it into the ground, screw Dad over and call it a public service. Well, I’ve got news for you, baby bro. I’m still around. And while I am, you’ve got competition.”

That was it. His shock and grief had lasted exactly thirty seconds before his true concerns took over.

Griffin made a move, as if to lead him away, but I shook my head. There was still one more test.

“They attacked our father,” I said.

“Is he dead?”

There was no hope in his voice, but no concern either. I paused, giving him time to contemplate, to react, but his expression didn’t change.

“He’s fine.”

“Oh.”

“Griffin will escort you to headquarters.”

Carlos lifted his bound hands. “Not like this.”

“If you’ll go willingly-”

“This isn’t a request, Lucas.”

My phone vibrated. It was the SWAT team. They’d already secured the area and were requesting permission to enter the building. I granted it and hung up.

“Lucas?” Paige nodded to the young woman on the bed and I realized, with no small amount of regret, that I’d forgotten all about her.

“Untie him, please,” I said.

“Taking your sweet fucking time, aren’t you? You like seeing me tied up?”

I was inclined to say I wasn’t the one who liked seeing people bound and helpless. “No, Carlos, surprisingly, I have other concerns on my mind. Our father has charged me with seeing you safely delivered into protective custody. If I need to do so with you bound hand and foot, so be it. Before you go, though, I should ask what happened here.”

“You think?”

We locked gazes.

“They came after me too,” he said finally.

“Who?”

“Well, duh. Obviously the same people who killed William and Hector.”

“You think?” Paige murmured, too low for anyone but me to hear.

“And the young woman. Is this your handiwork?”

I waited for him to object, outraged, but Carlos gave me one last unreadable look, then turned to Griffin.

“Home, Jeeves.”

“Did they kill her to find you?” I asked.

“I gave you an order, Sorenson. Take me to my father.”

“Did you see or hear what happened?”

He turned to me. “You’re the detective, little bro. Detect.”

CARLOS’S SURPRISE AT hearing of Hector and William’s deaths seemed genuine, but he’d shut down when I’d hinted he might have played even a corollary role in tonight’s events. In my experience, the innocent either proclaim their innocence or are too shocked by the allegation to intelligently respond. Carlos had done the Cabal equivalent of lawyering up-take me to my father.

I spent the next thirty minutes examining the crime scenes-the alley, the bedroom and the sniper’s roost on a building a block over-and overseeing the technicians’ work. They needed little guidance, but they indulged me, knowing I wouldn’t contaminate evidence.

I focused on the young man. Identifying him and his role would help me understand what had taken place here.

He had no identification. He wore a cargo vest and pants, both with many pockets. When they were emptied, we had two cell phones, two radios, a handheld computer and two devices we couldn’t recognize. The extra radios and cell phones seemed to be backups.

Paige took the handheld computer. “It’s a homemade job. GPS maybe? Probably more. It’s password protected and something tells me if he knows how to build it, he knows how to protect it. If I start trying to crack the password…”

“It could trigger a program to erase the contents.”

“If I can use the lab at the offices, I can do more.”

She checked one cell phone as I examined the other. All incoming and outgoing call records had been deleted. Both contained identical lists of eight contacts by initials only.

“GB,” Paige said. “The gang leader is Guy Benoit, isn’t it?”

I nodded.

“JD, SR, BS…The missing guys are Jaz and Sonny. The dead girl is Bianca. Maybe a coincidence, but something tells me if I press FE I’m going to wake up Hope.”

“I suspect so.”

With that one call we could almost certainly identify the young man. But if I woke Hope to send her pictures of a dead comrade-after the night she’d had-I could safely wipe Karl’s name off my contact list.

I’d have the team run prints, photos and DNA of the victim against Cabal records. I was certain my father would catalogue such information. The completeness of those records was another matter-the gang members were a transitory lot.

My phone rang.

“Mr. Cortez? It’s Tyson, at the hospital? Guarding Troy’s room? You saw me there earlier?”

Ah, one of the silent guards. The inflections on his sentences told me this was a call he’d rather not be making and I braced myself.

“Troy’s awake, sir.”

I let out a silent sigh of relief. “How is he?”

“He, uh, seems fine, sir. He’s, uh, asking me to-Well, I know you’re busy, and he might be…” A lowering of his voice. “A bit confused.”

The rumble of a voice came from the background.

“He, uh, wants me to ask you to…That is, if you think you should…”

The rumble grew, becoming Troy’s voice, still too distant to be intelligible.

“I’m sure you have enough to worry about, sir, but he’s concerned that-”

“Give me the fucking phone,” I heard Troy rasp.

“He thinks you-”

“Give me the fucking phone, Tyson, or I’ll be dead before you spit out the goddamned message.”

“Better give it to him.”

A hiss as the phone changed hands.

“Lucas.”

“How are-?”

“Later. We’ve got a bigger problem. It was Carlos.”

“Carlos…?”

“Who shot me. He came to the house, alone, wanting to talk to your dad, and I knew something was hinky, so I went to talk to him…” A soft grunt of discomfort. “Point is, it was Carlos. I woke up a while ago, but I’ve been playing possum, waiting for you to come back so I could tell you. I knew if I opened my eyes, the first thing your dad would ask was who shot me, and I sure as hell wasn’t telling him.”

“Good. I appreci-”

“Not so fast. He got a call that Carlos was at headquarters. I waited until he left, then asked Tyson to call you. I told him what to say, about Carlos. Then…”

His voice drifted off.

“Troy?”

“Your dad wasn’t gone. He could probably tell I was faking it and hung around outside my door waiting to hear what I was hiding.” He paused. “He knows it was Carlos, Lucas. And when he left here…” Another pause. “You need to get there before he does something he’ll regret.”

“How much of a head start does he have?”

“It took me five minutes to convince this numbskull I wasn’t delirious and to call you.”

Five minutes, and the hospital was an additional five minutes closer to headquarters, meaning my father had a ten-minute head start.

“I’m on my way.”