Giving Him Hell: A Saturn's Daughter Novel (Saturn's Daughters Book 3) (6 page)

Andre just watched, arms crossed and smirking. He knew about the frogs.

“I may have told a few of the DGs that I’d help the homeless, even if it meant closing Edgewater.” Which was a lie of such convoluted proportions that even I didn’t know what it meant. “Since the utility company is working down there, maybe Bellamy was afraid he’d lose his job again if the street closed.”

I might be more likely to believe in Daddy Saturn if he’d slap me for lying.

Schwartz drilled me with a look that said I’d better come up with a better one.

“He’s one of the same goons who stalked me a few months ago,” I protested helplessly. “Maybe they’re fixated.”

Ned rode to the rescue, posing in my office doorway with one hand against the jamb and his hip cocked. “They’re all obsessed,” he confirmed. “They kept calling me for a while, trying to find out Miss Clancy’s schedule. After she got Andre off on the murder rap, they think she’s jinxed them. They blame her for their divorces, for losing their jobs, for some weird stuff that’s happening in their heads. I blame Acme. There’s no telling what was in the air over there.”

“Divorces?” I asked with interest, happy to have the subject diverted.

“Yeah, both George and Harry vanished for weeks after that chemist . . . Bergdorff? . . . killed himself,” Ned said with a wave of disgust. “Their wives figured they were out playing around. So when they finally went home, their families booted them. They’ve been griping ever since.”

Bergdorff had been the head chemist at Acme until I’d sent him to hell. Harry and George had
vanished
, as in hopped around my office eating flies until Papa Saturn poofed them back to human. I’d never had the opportunity to watch. The frogs had just drifted away. I’d quit worrying about them once Ned showed up. I assumed they had the power to fix themselves as Ned had, but apparently Ned in his froggy state had lapped up the pink particles from Acme’s last gas blast and the others hadn’t. Acme’s cancer-curing, coma-causing mystery element had good and bad sides. Ned had been fortunate. The other two—not so much, apparently.

So, yeah, maybe I was guilty of something.

“Besides George and Harry, how many more of them are there?” I asked warily.

Ned shrugged. “I don’t talk to them much anymore, so I don’t know how many are still griping. There were several squads of us. Besides George and Harry, Ben and Arnold were also there the night Bergdorff took a flying leap. They were single, so they didn’t lose wives, at least. Maybe they found better jobs. Shall I go for coffee? And tea?”

I reached for my tote, but Andre pulled out his wallet first, handing over a wad of cash. “Buy a coffeemaker and donuts. I have a feeling this place will be needing them regularly. Schwartz, would you be a good guy and see if Sarah left clothes in the back office?”

I couldn’t even look at the blood-spattered back hall much less crawl over a corpse to look for Sarah’s clothes. I really wanted a wall between me and the gore. My office would have to suffice. It was in the front, off to one side of the lobby, so the door overlooked Ned’s desk, the front door, and nothing else.

The sirens screamed to a halt outside, and I retreated to my inner sanctum.

Sarah had wrapped her arms around her knees and was rocking my rickety office chair back and forth. She cast me a nervous glance, then went back to staring at her bare feet.

No tears. Classic sociopath. She was probably calculating if she could earn longer legs by offing a policeman.

I rummaged in my tote and found my faithful compact. I’d bought a new one since beaning a senator with the old one. Never knew when I might need to kill another politician.

I opened to the mirror and handed it to her.

She barely looked at it, at first. Then apparently catching a glimpse of the Godiva tresses, she snatched the mirror and tried to study herself in the limited view. Her eyes widened, and she began tugging her curls in front of her face so she could see them.

“I thought Papa waited until after midnight to bless us,” I said with sarcasm. That’s how it had worked for me. Sarah must be special.

“That creep must have been really bad,” she whispered uncertainly. “I never get anything pretty like this when I kill people. And my ex deserved to die a whole lot more than most people.”

So did her serial killer mother, but that was probably one of those things best not said aloud. I usually just damned people and they died in some freak manner and I got my wishes. Sarah simply killed them outright, but I had to assume the result was still damnation if she was rewarded. It’s not as if I meant to descend to hell to find out. I was still telling myself that Saturn was a good guy, but it made more sense that the devil rewarded us for sending him more souls. Ambivalence is me.

Maybe creative marketing over the eons had turned Satan’s Daughters into Saturn’s Daughters.
That
almost made sense.

“You killed your ex for yourself,” I reminded Sarah. “Maybe it’s because you killed the goon out there to protect me that you got prettier hair.” I’m a lawyer. I’m pretty imaginative at coming up with theories without proof.

She dangled a silken curl in front of her nose until her eyes crossed. “I should kill for others?” she asked blankly. “How do I do that?”

“Become a police woman,” I said cheerily, listening to the cops in the other room.
“Join the army. I bet there are a whole lot of justice-makers there.”

“Not ones who turn to chimps,” she reminded me.

Well, yeah, there was that. A Zone occupation was the only one that would suit her—one of the many reasons I couldn’t let the bad guys take it down.

Schwartz arrived with a handful of clothes, threw them on the desk and hastily departed. I turned my back as Sarah began to strip.

My phone rang—saved by the bell. I groped through my tote and checked ID but didn’t immediately recognize the name.

“Clancy here,” I answered in my clipped business tone.

“Miss Clancy?” a vaguely familiar voice said. “This is Rob Hanks. You said you’d help us with the vagrants if we found them a healthy place to stay.”

I kneaded my brow as a uniformed police officer loomed in the doorway, notebook in hand. He was straining to see over my shoulder. I hoped Sarah had dressed quickly. “Yes, Mr. Hanks, but this isn’t a good time. Have you found a building?”

“There’s an old insurance office on the corner across from Chesty’s that’s in pretty good condition. Some of them stayed there last night.”

I had a feeling he wasn’t calling me to brag. I held up a finger at the officer, who scowled impatiently. “And?”

“And there’s a man out here with a ton of security guards claiming it’s his property and he wants us out. They’ve got guns.”

Seven

“Andre, we have a situation,” I shouted past the cop blocking my office.

With his great sense of timing, Ned chose that moment to enter the front door bearing a spaceship-sized coffee urn. It looked like he’d just bought out the entire coffee stand at the mini-mart down the block.

The delicious aroma of fresh-fried donuts permeated the air, and all gazes followed his shopping bag. Not a plastic grocery bag, mind you. He’d apparently used Andre’s funds to purchase an environmentally friendly sparkly tote to carry all the donuts and coffee makings. In the
Zone
. He wanted to save the Zone’s environment?

“I’ll have this ready in a trice, gentlemen,” he sing-songed, well aware he was the current center of attention. My ex-jock assistant was finally releasing his inner rainbow.

Andre appropriated one of the donut bags from the tote and approached my personal dragon, offering up the contents and slipping past when the cop was distracted choosing a fritter.

After seeing splattered brain decorating my lobby, I figured I’d never eat again. I was suffering flashbacks to the time I’d seen Max crisped. Lawyers shouldn’t puke in front of clients. I shook my head at the greasy sack. Sarah had no queasy stomach problem. She took two fritters. At least she was half way decently garbed now in jeans and long-sleeved shirt.

“The DGs have occupied the old Morgan building,” I told Andre as the others ate. “That’s one of yours, isn’t it?”

“Do-Gooders are
occupying
my building?” he asked, narrowing his gaze. “Why?”

“Housing the vagrants,” I said without mentioning my part in the suggestion. “That’s not the situation. Someone is down there with security guards and guns, trying to heave them out.”

“Out of
my
building? Not on my request!” He already had his phone out, punching buttons. “Hurry up here. I’ll have your partner pull deeds on that property and have their sorry asses thrown out for trespassing.”

My partner—his brilliant father. He was protecting his parents’ privacy.

“Better find out whose sorry asses you’re tossing.” I glanced at the donut-eater’s nametag. “We may need your help down the hill, Officer Tallent. Could you take my statement on the way down there?”

“I need to talk to Miss . . .” He glanced at his notebook. “Miss Jones, first. I’ll get you next, Miss Clancy, if you’ll wait outside.” He gestured at the brain-spattered lobby I didn’t want to see.

I’d wait outside, all right. Way outside. I glanced at Sarah, who was eyeing the officer with curiosity.
Sarah is not my client,
I told myself. Conflict of interest.

I just had to hope she didn’t have any more energy to unleash if she didn’t like the tone of Tallent’s questions. As I’d just proved, it’s not as if I could stop her from killing or damning anyone. It was depressing developing the maturity to know I couldn’t save the world.

Andre escorted me to the lobby as if obeying the cop’s wishes. We were out the front door before anyone looked up from playing with our fancy new coffeepot.

The fog hadn’t lifted much. Luckily it wasn’t cold, because all I had was my second-hand wool blazer.

But through the gray wisps of moisture, we could distinguish a mob gathering in the center of Edgewater. Traffic up to the chemical plants had to perform U-turns and attempt alleys. The Dumpsters didn’t like their alleys disturbed. If they weren’t already rattled and blockading them, they would be soon. Wouldn’t the tourists love that?

“How did the DGs get into the building?” Andre asked, studying the situation as we hurried down the hill.

“That’s not as important as the identity of armed storm troopers,” I pointed out. A ring of khaki uniforms was holding back the crowd with what appeared to be automatic weapons. Automatic weapons in the Zone! I shuddered to think what could happen.

“I’ve paid the taxes on that place for years. It’s mine,” he said grimly. “If anyone is doing the throwing out, it’s me. And I don’t need Nazis or Uzis.”

Cora hurried up the street to meet us. Bill, the bartender for the Biker Bar, lumbered after her. Bill was a quiet bear of a man, usually peaceable, but he wasn’t smiling now.

“What’s with the goon squad?” Cora demanded as soon as she reached us. “And why are the police up here instead of down there?” She lifted her chin to indicate the black-and-whites all around my office.

“Sarah killed an intruder,” Andre snapped bluntly. “And since the cops want Clancy for questioning, they’ll follow us down soon enough.”

Thanks, Andre
, I thought grimly.
Pin it all on me
.

Before Cora could question, we’d reached the outskirts of the crowd. I recognized some Zone residents, but the majority of the mob was young and outraged and probably part of the DGs that Max/Dane was supposed to call off. Saving the world apparently meant ignoring United States senators.

My rebellious student self would have pumped my fist in solidarity. Lawyer Tina only saw trouble. What a drag it is, getting old.

The Morgan insurance building was a boring three-story brick edifice much like my office. The windows had been boarded for as long as I’d known it. Most of the businesses down here had closed after the chemical flood.
Sensible
people feared a contaminated harbor and fled.

Did no one have any common sense anymore?

A couple of tourists in the crowd were pointing out the grinning gargoyles on the building’s roof. One of the stone carvings waved a ribbed wing, and the tourists gasped, then laughed and took a picture as if they were seeing a Disney special effect.

Nope. No common sense here.

Until recently, Acme had scared off the tourists, often with goons like Ned had been. Only the locals had learned that the weirdnesses were real. These last weeks since Gloria’s demise had been . . . interesting, in a creepy sort of way.

I waded into the fray after Andre. People stepped aside for us until we reached the armed guards with ugly automatic weapons across their chests. You see this kind of thing on the news in photos of third world countries. It’s not the kind of sight you want in your own front yard.

“You’re trespassing and causing a disturbance of the peace,” I announced loudly to the uniform in front of me. I might not be the tallest person around, but I have an excellent courtroom voice.

The crowd grew silent as if watching their favorite cop show.

The security guards didn’t even acknowledge my existence. Like the royal guards, they glared straight over my head.

Andre strode up, picked a uniform taller and wider than he was, and swung his fist at the guard’s nose. In the same motion, he yanked the automatic from the jerkwad’s arms, and slammed the stock into his groin.

The guard bent in half with a groan, holding his nose and his man parts at the same time. Before the other guards could find someone to tell them what to do, we’d broke past the circle and sprinted for the door.

“Assault and battery,” I murmured in Andre’s ear. I couldn’t let him know his lawyer approved of his behavior.

Cora and Bill were right behind us, protecting our backs. The Do-Gooder crowd spilled through the break in the ranks faster than the armed guards could react.

Sometimes, it just took one person to bring down fascists.

Of course, I had enough experience to know we had about ten minutes before men in riot gear arrived, but triumph felt good as we surged past the bewildered creeps.