Hidden Crimes (19 page)

“Bye,” Nate said as the little tiger paused
to glance back. “See you in a bit.”

Perhaps this at last made the tiger shy.
Evina’s son streaked off in a sudden bound.

“Mmph,” Evina said, burrowing her face into
the pillow. Though she was two-legged, Nate reached to scratch her
behind the ear as well. Still drowsing, she hunched her shoulder
and smiled.

“Better get up,” he murmured. His mood was
oddly elated, considering this wasn’t his usual morning after—alone
in his own home. “I promised your son I would make breakfast.”

That bolted her up wide awake. “Rafi was
here?”

“Rafi was sitting in his tiger form on the
foot of your bed. I’m not sure how long he was there.”

Evina pressed both hands to her mouth.

“We were covered up,” Nate assured her. “And
he didn’t seem upset.”

“Crap.”

Nate rubbed her bare shoulder. “He’ll be
okay. He must have been curious who was in here with his mother. I
don’t think it’s possible to hide everything from kids.”

“No,” she admitted ruefully.

“I’ll make you breakfast too,” he coaxed.
“Assuming you have eggs.”

That pulled a small catlike smile from her.
“I have eggs
and
sausage.”

“Well,” he said, “good thing I know what to
do with both.”

~

The weather had cleared overnight. The bright
cloudless sky matched Nate’s mood perfectly. He sang opera to
himself on his drive into work. His Italian sucked, so it was just
as well he didn’t have company. Breakfast at Evina’s had gone
swimmingly. Every scrap he’d prepared had been eaten, including two
rounds of toast. Rafi was quiet but smiled more than once at Nate’s
silly jokes. Quicker to relax with a stranger, his more outgoing
sister Abby insisted Nate watch her operate the little hydraulic
lift for Elf Barbie’s Dream Garage.

When he asked why she didn’t have Tiger
Barbie, she primly informed him Tiger Barbies didn’t look any
different from human ones. “They only wear stripey clothes,” she
said. “Elf Barbies have pointy ears at least, and they come in blue
and gold. The toymakers should figure out how to make shifter
Barbies change.”

“They could give them tails,” Rafi piped up
to say.

His sister considered this. “Yes,” she
agreed. “That would be better.”

Privately, Nate found both six-year-olds
hilarious.

Once the twins had been walked out to their
yellow school bus and kissed before clambering in, Nate told Evina
about the arrests they’d made at the bogus adoption agency. She’d
been glad to hear the news, but understood why he was concerned.
Though she saw some aspects of the case differently, that sat okay
with him.

It was funny, since she was alpha, but she
never made him feel he wasn’t her absolute equal.

By contrast, the first words out of Adam’s
mouth when Nate arrived at work were, “You’re back on the Galina
case. No more monkeying around.” Due to the magical removal of
evidence linking Ivan the Terrible to the murdered accountant’s
corpse, the investigation had stalled out.

“We need to find the girlfriend,” Adam said,
his feet stacked on Tony’s desk. He had his hands laced behind his
head and his elbows stretched. Because they were powwowing in the
squad room and not his office, Adam had commandeered their lowest
ranking pack member’s chair. Tony sat backwards in a guest chair,
which he didn’t seem to mind. “Supposedly, Ellen Owen is the reason
Ivan and Vasili fell out in the first place. Where has she been
since we started full-court pressing her new boyfriend?”

“Hiding,” Rick suggested, his pose behind his
desk nearly identical to Adam’s. “Waiting for the dust to
settle.”

“Sure,” Carmine said. “But where? And why
doesn’t she care enough about Vasili to check on him?”

“Too smart?” Rick said. “Maybe she’s not the
brainless bimbo she’s been painted.”

Nate was resting his hips on the front of
Rick’s desk, which faced Tony’s across five feet of dull brown
tile. He had to admit tracking down the girlfriend was an angle
worth following.

“I’ll go back to the smoke shop,” he
volunteered, then smiled at the blank looks he got. “You know, the
store we spotted Vasili coming out of before we dragged him in for
questioning? Didn’t surveillance say Ellen Owen’s cousins ran it?
Maybe they’ll let something slip about where she is.”

Adam dropped his hands from behind his head.
“Convenient that the smoke shop is in the same area as the factory
used by those doctors we arrested.”

Nate shrugged. “Doesn’t mean the owners
aren’t worth questioning.” He grabbed his leather jacket, prepared
to go then and there.

“Take Tony,” Adam said.

“Two cops will put their guard up. Besides
which, I don’t need a babysitter. I said I’d go to the smoke shop,
and that’s what I’m intending. No hidden agenda.”

Adam met his stare with thinned lips. Nate
ordered his body language to remain calm and non-rebellious.
Challenging Adam would only make him dig in.

“Fine,” Adam relented. “Take an earpiece and
stay in touch through Dana.”

Nate hid his resentment as well as he was
able.

~

He took the earpiece. In fact, he wore it all
the way to Quince Street.

“I’m here,” he murmured to Dana before
pulling out the bud and shoving it in his glove compartment.

That counted as checking in, didn’t it?

He’d stopped at his place after leaving
Evina’s so he could dress. As a result, he was now too crisp for
the neighborhood. He tugged his tie down, opened his collar, and
rolled up his shirtsleeves.

You’re a stockbroker
, he told his
reflection in the rear view mirror.
You’re here on your morning
coffee break
.

He stashed his police ID behind the visor and
got out of the low-slung car. He didn’t like leaving the Goblinati,
but it fit who he planned to be. He sent a prayer to St. Michael to
look out for it, then did his best yuppie jog across the steep
warehouse district street.

One reason he hadn’t wanted Tony around was
that he was far more apt than Nate to be pegged as a cop. Today’s
strategy depended on being seen as a civilian.

The River Smokes Tobacco Shop was a narrow
storefront next to a nondescript factory. No other businesses were
nearby, giving it plenty of privacy. The inventory on its shadowy
shelves was legal, but maybe not everything it sold. A bell jangled
as he entered. Nate didn’t go looking straight for service. Taking
his time, he studied the water pipes in the window display. A
prickling between his shoulders assured him he was being watched.
The hookahs were beautiful, handcrafted with colorful braiding on
the hoses. He lifted a smaller double-stemmed example in what
looked like real silver. A quick glance at the eyebrow-raising
price told him, yes, it was. He held onto it anyway, browsing his
way toward the back and the register.

Whatever their actual trade, shop owners
tended to warm up to people who bought things.

Judging a few more items would add
authenticity; he grabbed a pack of clove cigarettes and an herbal
cure for allergies. Shifters rarely suffered from them, but he
thought a stockbroker might. That took him to the rear of the
store. Behind the slightly grubby counter, with a camera peering
over their heads, stood a pair of men so androgynously gorgeous
Nate wondered if they were part fae. One clerk had long hair and
the other short. Both sets of locks gleamed the pinky-red of a
young sunset. Their eyes were a glacial green, their shoulders
disproportionately broad for their slender frames. Their matching
T-shirts, which bore the River Smokes store logo, seemed cut
purposefully to show them off.

Now Nate was really glad Tony wasn’t here.
He’d have been drooling, and these two—despite their unimpressive
profession and apparent youth—gave off the vibe that they could eat
nice guys like Tony for breakfast.

Their close resemblance to photos of Vasili’s
girlfriend didn’t escape his notice. Nate set the cigarettes, the
herbal cure, and the expensive silver hookah on the counter.

“Nice,” said the longhaired guy. “We don’t
sell a lot of these.”

His voice was California surfer lazy, his
eyes cool and sharp.

Nate pulled out his electrum ResEx card. “Got
a vacay coming up with my girl. We could do with some
unwinding.”

“I hear you,” said the longhaired guy.

Nate put one forearm on the counter and
rested his weight on it. The cashier was part fae, all right. This
close, the air hummed with his magic. “Actually,” Nate said, “I was
hoping you might sell me something more under-the-counter, if you
know what I mean.”

Nate cast a significant glance toward the
security camera. He didn’t see the cashier press any buttons, but
the camera’s recording light suddenly flicked off. Possibly he’d
worked it telekinetically.

“Damn things,” said Long Hair. “Always
cutting out on us.”

“You got cash?” Short Hair asked, speaking
for the first time. His voice was the aural equivalent of
butterscotch. Nate didn’t bat leftie, but it made him think of hot
seduction poured over cool ice cream.

“I do,” he said, straightening.

Short Hair pinned him with his green gaze.
Like most RPD detectives, Nate was charmed twice a year to prevent
him from being identified as a wolf, which too frequently equaled
“cop” to criminals. He prayed Short Hair didn’t have enough fae
magic to see through it.

“We’ve got faerie dust-laced Marlboros,”
Short Hair said.

“Mm,” Nate responded unsurely, because this
might have been a test. Dealing faerie dust carried a hefty
mandatory sentence. Most Vice detectives wouldn’t have been able to
resist grabbing for that collar. “That’s a bit more
oomph
than I’m looking for. My girl’s kind of a lightweight. I was hoping
you had some of the Outsider weed I’ve heard about. You know, that
Royal whatsis from Canada.”

“That’s special order,” Short Hair said, “but
we’ve got a decent strain on hand from Virginia.”

He quoted a price that Nate accepted, which
led to Short Hair disappearing into the back.

“You know,” Nate said, leaning on the counter
again, “you guys look really familiar. My cousin used to go to high
school with this serious babe, Ellen Something. Man, you should
hear him talk about her still.”

Long Hair shot him a sharp look Nate
pretended not to see. “Where did your cousin go to school?’

“St. Dunstan’s in Little Jersey.” Nate knew
this was the school Ellen Owen had attended from reading up on her
in the Galina file. “I doubt she noticed my cousin. He was a big
ole nerd. He’s a chemist at Killburn-Waring these days. Heads some
development whatsis or other.”

Long Hair was as aware as Nate how useful a
highly placed employee at a pharmaceuticals firm could
be—especially to a pair of enterprising drug dealers.

“One of my cousins is named Ellen,” Long Hair
admitted, “though I couldn’t swear it’s the same girl.”

“Really.” Nate pretended to be amazed. Short
Hair came out with a small neatly wrapped package. Nate sniffed it
appreciatively. If the smell could be trusted, the weed was more
than decent. Surer than ever he’d chosen the right approach, he
counted out the requested bills and passed them over. “I don’t
suppose your cousin would want to meet mine for coffee. Tad would
so owe me if I hooked that up for him.”

“I couldn’t answer for her,” Long Hair
said.

“I understand.” Nate pulled a seemingly
genuine brokerage card from his wallet, one he kept for this sort
of situation. The front listed a generic-sounding firm and a fake
personal line. On the back, he scribbled
Tad Montoya
and
another of the numbers the RPD kept to shore up aliases. “Maybe you
could give her Tad’s number, in case she’s feeling curious. He
looks better than he did in high school, and he’s a steady guy.
Maybe they’d hit it off if they actually talked.”

Long Hair took the card without promising
anything. His perfect face could have been carved from ivory.

“Well, okay,” Nate said, putting on a hint of
embarrassment. “Thanks for, uh, selling me the stuff.”

He took his brown paper bag and left, unsure
he’d hooked his fish but hopeful. He’d give it a day or two. See if
they decided their cousin Ellen could spin some pharmaceutical gold
out of seducing the fictional Tad. If they did, it’d pull her out
of hiding. If it didn’t, the buy Nate had made was sufficient cause
to get the pair in for questioning. They probably wouldn’t nark on
family, but that too would be worth a shot.

He looked up at the blue sky outside. Those
two for certain weren’t amateurs, what with the faerie dust and the
special order ganja. The average street dealer couldn’t supply
either. He wondered if they worked for Ivan the Terrible. Galina
business included drugs, but part fae could be as elitist as
purebloods, and they wouldn’t like answering to shifters. He
decided he’d mull this over with Adam—as a peace offering.

A contrary impulse led his feet around the
corner to the old blanket factory. Seeing the building in daylight
did it no favors. The crime scene tape remained on the door but was
badly sagging, as sad and abandoned as the rest of the place. Was
it really coincidence these seemingly disparate cases had ties to
the same two-block stretch? The River Smokes dealers were part fae.
Did they know who’d spun the stay-away spell around the metal room?
Could the same individual have erased the trace from the
accountant’s corpse? Carmine and the uniforms had probably
questioned the smoke shop owners during their canvas, but they’d
have gone as cops. Two sharp tacks like Long Hair and Short would
be careful not to send up red flags.

Nate shook his head and forced himself to
walk away. For the time being, until something happened or he knew
more, he’d have to drop the mystery.