All Your Wishes (15 page)

“So, if there's nothing else you need until then,” he concluded, the lilt in his voice making it a question.

“Nope. I'm good.”

“Fine. Then I'll send in your associate.” Barber nodded and left.

Unsurprisingly, my “associate” was Bubba. He dropped the black nylon duffel he was carrying onto the foot of the bed before taking a seat in the visitor's chair. He was a sight for sore eyes, dressed in highly pressed khaki trousers and a red, short-sleeved dress shirt. No jacket, but he'd probably left that in the car. After all, hospital regulations meant he couldn't come in armed, and why wear a jacket in the Florida heat if you don't have to conceal a holster and gun?

The very first thing I did was bum his phone and try to call Bruno. I'd been out of touch too long and I knew he would be worrying. He must've been at the hospital, though, because he didn't answer.

I was disappointed, but not surprised. Roberto had told me Isabella was doing worse. Of course Bruno would be with his mother. I left a voice mail saying I was fine, getting out of the hospital, and how much I loved him. That done, I gave the phone back to Bubba and turned my attention to the duffel bag. Dragging it to me by its strap, I unzipped it and immediately found myself grinning.

Okay, I'd known Roberto asked Dawna to send clothes. I'd expected her to go to my place and pick up something from my closet.

But that wasn't what she'd done. Nope. She'd gone shopping—high-end shopping at that. In the bag were two suits from Isaac Levy's shop: one in black and one in charcoal gray. The blazers were my favorite of Isaac's styles, and since he had my measurements on file, I knew they and the matching pants would fit perfectly. Both suits had been made from lightweight fabrics that would keep me from roasting in the heat; there was enough spell work on them that the power of the magic buzzed against my senses—not painful, but it was definitely noticeable. Digging farther into the duffel, I found a pair of silk blouses, one royal purple, the other a vivid crimson. Dawna had also included underclothes, socks, makeup, toiletries, some jewelry, and a pair of sensible black pumps. All of it top of the line. Thanks to my partner, whatever outfit I chose, I'd be looking
good.
Then again, that was no surprise. If Dawna ever decided to be a stylist to the stars, she'd make a killing at it. In the meantime, I'd reap the benefits.

I slid off the bed, grabbed the bag, and lugged it into the bathroom to get ready, leaving the door open just a crack so that Bubba and I could talk.

It was a huge relief to get out of that flimsy cotton, backless hospital gown. I pulled on plum-colored lingerie, then the black suit with the purple blouse. An amethyst and silver necklace and matching earrings completed the outfit. Looking in the mirror, I felt pretty good about my appearance.

Bubba's voice came to me clearly as I leaned over the sink to apply just a hint of color. I have to be really careful with makeup. My vampire-pale complexion makes it really easy to overdo it and then I look like a clown.

“I'm supposed to tell you that Dawna got a text from Dom Rizzoli. He's trying to get the government to open the files on the incident at the Needle, but so far he isn't having much luck. Dawna's gotten a big fat zero trying to find any trace of any of Connor Finn's cronies—they all seem to have vanished. Meredith Stanton and Bob Davis are still at the top of the FBI's most-wanted list, but there haven't been any developments in terms of finding them, at least as far as she's been able to find.”

That last bit didn't surprise me. Davis and Stanton were smart and powerful. If the feds hadn't found them, I'd be shocked if we were able to.

“What have the Patels been up to?” I called out.

“Nothing good,” Bubba answered, clearly unhappy. “Pradeep and Rahim have been going at it pretty hard. The old man thinks Rahim should have let you die on the beach. A couple of other relatives have arrived and they've joined right in on giving Rahim a bad time. They blame him for everything. I don't know the language, so I can't tell you exactly what they're saying, but it's not hard to guess the basic thrust of the arguments, what with all the shouting and pointing of fingers.”

That was no surprise either, not after what I'd seen the morning of the ceremony. Our failure on the beach wouldn't have improved things among the family members, just made it worse. I felt a little sorry for Rahim. Family drama sucks.

“Any word from Bruno or Matty?”

“Their mom is still hanging on. It's tough. Matty did check in with the Church. He's going through channels, so it may take a couple of days, but he thinks he can get you everything they have on the demons that were involved in the incident at the Needle. He'll try to get them to rush it if he has the chance, but he said something about ‘the wheels of God.'”

I blotted my lipstick, dropping the tissue into the waste can. Zipping up the duffel, I returned to the main room. “They grind slowly, but exceedingly fine,” I said as I tossed the duffel onto the bed and slid my feet into the pumps. I actually thought the original quote referred to the wheels of justice. But Matty's version worked as well. Maybe better.

Bubba checked his watch and winced. “I've got to go relieve Kevin. Are you going to be okay?”

“It's just a meeting. Roberto will be with me.”

“Good. You need all the help you can get. This case is an even worse hairball than usual.”

He wasn't wrong.

“I'll be fine.” I tried to put as much conviction into the words as I could, but it sounded thin to my own ears. Bubba didn't call me on it. We said our good-byes. When he was gone, I sat on the edge of the bed and waited for my attorney.

As usual, Roberto was prompt. Today he wore a charcoal-gray suit, snow-white shirt, and a tie that had silver, white, charcoal, and black diagonal stripes. He was impeccably neat, and I suspected that if I were gauche enough to ask, he'd tell me that the suit had been hand-tailored on Savile Row and cost more than my first car.

Roberto was on time. The hospital wasn't. The wheels of God have nothing on those of hospital administration. It was nine forty-five when I was finally released. Roberto called to let the prosecutors know we'd be late, but I wasn't sure how much that helped reassure them.

The meeting wasn't a condition of my release—but it wasn't a request either. I knew that being late was going to piss everybody off. The authorities wanted answers. They also wanted to intimidate me. I didn't have the former, and they couldn't hold a candle to Hasan when it came to intimidation. But hey, let them take their best shot.

Roberto's driver dropped us in front of the federal building nearly an hour behind schedule. After being processed by security, we caught an elevator up and made our way to the conference room without trouble.

It was a pleasant enough space—an interior room, so there was no distracting view, but the prints on the wall, while bland, were attractive. Their frames were cherry, which matched the cherry veneer of the oval conference table, around which eight of us were seated in rolling black faux leather chairs that were actually pretty comfortable. The spells worked into the walls, floor, ceiling, and table were not. I could feel their power crawling across my skin like fire ant bites. It was unpleasant, but I've dealt with worse.

Going through with this meeting—“informal” as it was—would result in me getting my weapons back. Not the guns—the authorities weren't budging on those. Made sense, since they were part of an ongoing investigation. But I hadn't used my knives or any of my magical gear and I wanted them back.

After Special Agent Morris had heard Hasan admit that he'd killed the bad guys, he'd done some research on the ifrit. Today, he looked as good as ever, but even colder, in a gray suit the color of dirty ice with a snow-white shirt and a blue-and-gray striped tie. He introduced the others seated at the table. To his right sat the federal prosecutor, Jean Schulz. Despite the severe suit and the very obvious anti-siren charm she wore, I couldn't help but think she'd have been the perfect model for an Oktoberfest poster, or for selling schnitzel or strudel or anything else German.

Our hostess had reddish-blond hair, blue eyes, and fresh-faced good looks that probably disguised a brutal, focused ambition, given that she'd made it pretty far up in what was still, generally, a male-dominated field. Just past her sat the two local detectives assigned to the Patel cases, Erik Allbright and his partner, Joe Johnson. Johnson was new to me. He was tall, wiry, and black.

Allbright looked much as he had the other night. At his feet sat a large leather case, big and boxy, with runes worked into the leather. I could feel the power of it from clear across the room. Beyond them was the district attorney, a short, balding man with a large nose that looked as if it had been broken more than once. I tried to catch his name and somehow missed it.

I sat at the far end of the oval flanked by my attorneys, Barber having arrived before Roberto and me.

“If I could please have everyone's attention.” Schulz's voice was a soft alto, but pitched to carry. The murmured conversation around the table ended and we all looked at her.

“Ms. Graves, I want to thank you and your counsel for agreeing to be here. It is absolutely voluntary, as under the circumstances, both my office and the district attorney have declined to press charges against you.”

“How did you do that, anyway?” the DA asked.

“Do what?” I responded, although I was pretty sure I knew what he was referring to.

Within minutes of my being hauled off to the hospital from the beach, video from the morning's events was leaked to the press. Crystal-clear images showing that I was defending myself and the Patels appeared over and over again on every network newscast: locally, nationally, even on some of the international stations. Even when the stations decided to stop running it, it would still appear. The anchor would be talking about a bombing in Beirut, but instead of footage of that, my video would run. I'd seen it myself on the hospital television. Over and over … and over again.

“The video,” he answered.

“Not me.”

“I suppose you're going to tell us it was this…” Detective Allbright made a production of flipping out his notes and glancing at them, “Hasan?”

“No idea,” I admitted, “but it seems the most likely explanation.”

“Who and what is this Hasan?” the DA snarled at me. “How could he have done that? And why are you working for him?”

Special Agent Morris answered before I could. “Hasan is an ifrit. He was imprisoned in a djinn jar centuries ago by one of a special line of Guardians. I'm told that recently some humans engineered his escape, with assistance from the ghost of Connor Finn.”

“An
ifrit.
” Schulz glared at me, her voice a low hiss. “And you're
cooperating
with him.”

“No. I am not.” I said each word clearly, distinctly, and with more than a little heat.

“Then how do you explain this?” Schulz hit the button on the little recorder in front of her. It showed the familiar beach scene from a different angle, and it had been cued to the exact moment when Hasan had slipped into my body.

“Ifrits are well known to be able to inhabit the bodies of the recently dead.” Roberto's voice was calm, but his hand had moved to rest lightly on mine in a silent warning for me not to lose it. He's worked with me often enough to know that I have a temper and to recognize that Schulz was deliberately trying to provoke it—to shake me up and see what popped out. “If you rewind your recorder approximately two minutes, you'll see my client getting shot in the chest with an experimental weapon that hasn't hit the open market yet.

“The blast was intended for her client, Rahim Patel. Ms. Graves placed herself in harm's way as part of her duties as Mr. Patel's bodyguard. Until this incident, these so-called ‘heart attack' guns have been universally fatal, and, in fact, Celia Graves died. Hasan took over her body while she was helpless.”

“So, did you see the white light at the end of the tunnel? Or something else?” Allbright was sneering again. You'd almost think he didn't like me, thought I was a villainous scumbag killer or something.

“Actually, I saw Connor Finn get sucked into hell.”

That made them all blink.

“Really?” The DA asked, and I could tell he was both shocked and fascinated.

“Yep.”

The temperature in the room began to drop abruptly. I shivered as my breath misted the air in front of me.

Joe Johnson shifted in his seat and crossed his legs in a casually feminine manner. “Really.” The voice that came from his lips wasn't his—it was Abby's. Apparently she'd decided to manifest after hearing Finn's name.

Using Johnson's body, she continued, “Connor Finn's sole purpose for staying on this plane was to see Celia dead. She'd thwarted his plans, saved his enemies, and earned him the eternal displeasure of his master. When her body died, he was there to watch. He went to hell. She was revived thanks to the efforts of Rahim Patel.”

“Abby, why are you here?” I asked.

“They assume you'll lie. I can't. So I figured I could answer their questions.” She looked first at Schulz, then at the DA, with a sweet smile. “Ask away.”

“What did you have against Connor Finn? Why have you attached yourself to Graves here?” Detective Allbright asked. His voice was surprisingly steady for someone who had just seen his partner taken over by a ghost. Of course, the fact that she had taken him over meant that Johnson was a channeler. Perhaps this wasn't the first time this had happened in front of Allbright.

“Connor Finn slaughtered my extended family, tried to kill my daughter, and had me tortured to death. I'm here until the last Finn is dead—and working with Celia … well, perhaps it will give me the opportunity to work off some of my own bad karma. If not, at least it's never dull.”