Hammer of Darkness (Veil Knights Book 8) Read online

  “I didn’t plan on all of this!” she hissed. There were points of color on her high cheekbones now, but she wasn’t blushing anymore. “I’m not even sure you asked, or that I actually said yes.”

  “That what you’re going to tell Fallows?”

  Angry, she got up and walked back over to my side table and jerked open the drawer. Remembering the gun, I tensed a little, but she took the cigarettes and ashtray and brought them back over. I relaxed back into my seat and she lit her cigarette. Her hands were not trembling. I marveled, the way I always had, at the almost sable coloring of her skin.

  The old timers in Corps, the ones who had been China Marines, always used a word to describe how beautiful the women there had been; ‘exotic.’ I’d always felt Erica was the only woman I’d ever known who truly fit that description. She wasn’t just beautiful, or sexy, she was exotic, and that dusky hinted skin went a long way toward the feeling.

  “No,” she said, finally. “That’s not what I’m going to tell Fallows.” A long ribbon of smoke eased from her mouth and hovered above her head in a dirty halo. “But, damn it, Berk, I am in trouble. It’s not just Fallows.”

  “Tell me.”

  “There’s a girl missing.”

  I was already shaking my head. “Now you really should get one of Fallows’ plainclothes boys. I’m not some kind of detective.” This was spinning in strange directions. I needed to use her to find what Fallows knew about the Basket, hopefully to find what happened to Kay, but she came in here wearing a perfume of ‘mission creep’ and I felt everyone’s’ plans sliding hard toward chaos. Classic Erica.

  “You’re a lawyer. You take money to solve problems.”

  “It’s a little more like being a mercenary than a P.I., and I’m sure as hell not fighting with Fallows’ army in any war he’s a part of. I have business of my own to conduct here.”

  “I can help you with that. Besides, you only kill when Grimm says so? Working for Fallows is beneath your principles?” She was smiling, almost mocking.

  I looked at her steadily. “Grimm’s not the one who stole my girl.”

  “You let her go,” she shot back.

  “I have trust issues. You betrayed me.”

  “I betrayed Grimm, and, before you say it, no, it’s not the same thing!”

  “You set me up.”

  “You shot me!”

  “We’re not speaking of this in the third person anymore,” I noted.

  “The thing that broke us apart was that you couldn’t handle being with anyone. When I realized I couldn’t handle fighting with you over a ghost, I did what I had to do.”

  At the mention of my wife I went cold. I would have expected to run hot at the accusation, but instead I just went very calm, like when I pull a trigger. Suddenly, I didn’t want to fight anymore. I couldn’t see the point, maybe more importantly I couldn’t feel the point anymore. I set my beer carefully down on the table.

  “Maybe you’re right,” I admitted.

  Erica looked like she’d been slapped. “What?” she sounded confused, almost vulnerable. A lot like how she’d sounded when she first came through the door.

  I looked up, tried to smile, found it didn’t work on my face and just shrugged. “I think,” I said slowly, “that I’m just going to stay broken.”

  She reached across the little table and put her hand on mine. “You aren’t broken.”

  I looked up and, this time, maybe because I didn’t actually find it funny, I could smile. “Aren’t I?” I gently pulled my hand out from under hers and took a drink. The fucking bottle was empty again, somehow. “It wasn’t your fault. I should have known what I was feeling.”

  “Why couldn’t you’ve handled it?” she asked. “We were good together.”

  “Don’t let yourself off the hook so quick,” I replied. “You’re a hot mess on wheels, darling.”

  “You’re a bastard,” she said.

  “Ouch?”

  “But that’s why I’m here, when you get right down to it. That’s why Fallows’ pretending he doesn’t know I’ve come to you for help. He needs, I need, a bastard.”

  “I’m not a detective,” I repeated. Which while technically true, was a shade less than honest.

  “You’re stubborn and capable. This requires leg work, not Sherlock Holmes’ level deduction.”

  “Gee, thanks.”

  “I’m serious, Berk. We think she’s somewhere in the Narrows between Tenderloin and Hunter’s Point. Down where SFPD can’t navigate. They sure as hell can’t enter New Saigon like you can.”

  “I think you’re overestimating my appeal as an ambassador.”

  “It’s the motherfucking Narrows, Berk. Sooner rather than later, someone or something is going to need their head split.”

  I remained silent. I wasn’t playing hard to get. This wasn’t an act to fool her into thinking I hadn’t wanted her to find me in the first place. With her finally sitting in front of me again after all these years, I didn’t know if I could do it. I simply didn’t know if I could do it.

  “If you help me I can give you Kay,” Erica added, voice soft.

  There it was, all but a flat out confession that she knew why I was here. For Kay I would do anything. But as I looked at Erica, I still didn’t know if I could really do it.

  I thought about her getting up and walking out and never seeing her again. Thought about getting up, lying back down on the bed and watching the light bulb burn itself out. Spotify would play on my iPhone; the rain would keep falling on the window the way it always did this time of year. I’d have to tell Grimm.

  “Where is she?” I asked, finally.

  “You have to swear you that won’t hurt Fallows,” she said

  “I couldn’t promise you that on a good day.” I looked into her eyes. “In case you’re unsure, today is not a good day.”

  “Berk, promise me. Swear it.”

  “No.”

  “Then I don’t tell you and Kay dies.”

  “No one wants to find out how many people will die if Kay does. No one.” My teeth ground together. “I mean it, my little sorceress. I will go full Wild Hunt across this city.”

  “Wouldn’t you rather rescue her than avenge her?”

  I opened my mouth, then closed it again. She was right. “I promise,” I said. “but you promise me you’re not mixing the left hand path in here.” I said.

  She tapped ash off the end of her cigarette then looked up and met my eyes. “I’m afraid I can’t do that.”

  Chapter 7

  It was winter and the sun went down early, dragging the light along with it. It was a weak, cold light anyway, and left long shadows as it slid below the rooftops and behind the buildings. Twilight settled on the city.

  I leaned against the wall and eyed the street. Though I stood a little far back in the alley, I wasn’t hidden. I was, unobtrusive. I wasn’t sneaking, but I might have been (and I smiled at the thought) lurking, however. I kept a ball cap tucked down low on my forehead and wore the Carhart jacket, heavy work trousers, and worn work boots. Just a guy on a street; any guy, any street.

  This wasn’t my safe house neighborhood, but it might as well have been. This was Soma, or South of Market, so the traffic was a little heavier, there were more pedestrians milling around, bundled up tight against the damp and chill. Steam rose in dirty white plumes from grates in the street and occasional gusts of wind picked litter up and kicked it around the pavement.

  Here and there, in the mouths of alleys, in the shadowed jurisdictions of doorways, from behind the blinds of grimy windows in rundown, second story walk ups, the night tribes began stirring. I took note of them, they took note of me. SoMa is different than Tenderloin or Hunter’s Point. In SoMa a good block could sit right next to a bad one. Go down one street you’re fine, turn in another direction and you’re suddenly in badlands. Residents do okay, but for tourists the abrupt changes could invite a world of trouble.

  I saw girls in faux fur, skinny legs
wobbling on heels they’d never been properly taught to walk in, gradually congregate on street corners. This wasn’t like Union Square neighborhoods to the north, but it had its own clientele.

  My predator eye caught the silver BMW pull in down the block and park in front of a fire hydrant. The driver had the same thick neck and broken nose I did, we were of a type. The same type as Erica’s driver from earlier. It turns out that, in certain circles, my type isn’t all that uncommon. I couldn’t see the guy in the backseat, but I knew he was watching the girls.

  The hollow eyed teenagers in too much makeup perked up their act. The coats fell open, despite the chill, letting potential customers see the cheap dresses inside and the bodies beneath them. I looked away. Instinctively I wanted to comfort them, but there was no comfort to be had. I didn’t like how seeing the girls made me feel. So I…looked. Away.

  For now.

  A lean beauty technician working the hair and nail salon, all decked out in a hipster uniform of spiked hair, skinny jeans and pointed leather shoes, closed up shop. He joined the last knot of retail workers at the bus stop and left his darkened window front behind. Across the street a diner made out of an old cable car served the last of the early supper crowd. Its gaudy neon sign flicked on, bright enough to signal the moon. GOOD EATS.

  A lean black kid in tired shoes and dirty, low rent clothes rounded the building up the street and ducked under the storefront awning of a corner market. He stuffed his hands in his pocket and eyed the street suspiciously. The driver of the BMW made eye contact and the kid, sullen look in place, nodded once before looking away.

  I directed my gaze in another direction. Two cops in thick blue police overcoats strolled down the street from the opposite direction. One was older, heavier, the requisite red blossom of an alcoholic’s nose firmly on his face. Davis.

  I knew this one.

  He wasn’t one to cross, he liked cracking skulls, but he was reasonable and a little baksheesh could usually even him out. At least five years ago it could. I didn’t know the kid, which I didn’t like because that made him an unknown factor for now. What if he was a hothead? Dear Christ, what if he were an idealist?

  I turned my head and spat as the two approached. If the kid was an idealist Davis would rub the shine off into an acceptable tarnish. This was probably the whole reason the Precinct assigned him to Davis in the first place.

  I watched Davis flirt with the girls. Listened to the brittle laughter, like glass shattering, as the hookers pretended to be amused by the big man’s jokes. The young cop wasn’t smiling; he wasn’t even looking at the girls. Maybe he was still young enough to be uncomfortable with the knowledge that some beat cops took favors from the girls as a street tax for working their beat.

  If so, I thought, that’ll tarnish, too.

  I watched the young cop run his gaze over the street. Saw him take in the kid, notice the BMW and the unimpressed driver staring back at him. I saw him look up to the rooftops, scan the windows, and I recognized the search. He was a man who’d been taught to look for snipers. Old habits die hard.

  I grunted softly to myself. Maybe they two of us had something in common after all.

  Before I could start planning our picnic and impending nuptials, the cop’s gaze landed on me. We sized each other up like two prizefighters in the ring. The kid was tall, broad shouldered but lean, clean cut, and handsome in the uniform. This was in contrast to how I looked. I’m built like a fireplug, like a pitbull, not a wolf, like a wrestler, not a fencer. But our eyes—mine green, the cops faded blue—those were the same.

  Casually, I looked away first.

  Let the cop think it was a sign of weakness if he wanted to make that mistake. Cops had authority and, ultimately, numbers on their side. Provoking an unknown SFPD harness bull was an amateur play.

  If anything, if it came down to it, I would shoved my hands into my pockets, turn slowly, and then disappear down the alley. Turn tail and run. But for the moment the job was here, so here I stood.

  But when I looked away I saw something that chilled my blood. I hadn’t noticed it before, probably because I’d been preoccupied scanning for snipers that weren’t there, but something was scratched into the wall on the mouth of the alley. The hair lifted off the back of my neck and my jaw clenched.

  The sigil was fresh. It was a very specific rune and, now that I saw it, I felt the greasy, cold magick potential leaking out of it. I wasn’t psych sensitive, I wasn’t a practitioner, and I wasn’t a damn cat, for that matter, either. I didn’t just sense eldritch energies intuitively, but you didn’t need to be a proctologist to know an asshole when you saw one. Recognizing and reacting to Veil scratches and scribbles were what the tattoos were for.

  I moved to the other side of the alley. Sticking my hands in my pockets, I assumed my casual lean. As I shook off the miasma, Davis stopped flirting with the 15-year-old street walkers and noticed his partner glaring at me. The old cop slapped the back of his hand into the flat plane of the younger man’s chest and said something. He was smiling. It didn’t reach his eyes, and probably never would, unless he was kicking puppies, but he was smiling.

  The two crossed the street, ignoring the intermittent traffic, and came up to me. I ignored the challenge in the young cop’s face, and the way he sort of squared off when they stopped and stood in front of me.

  I know how I look. My face alone is enough to piss off a certain kind of man. It was also enough to make some men feel compelled to try and befriend me out of apprehension. But big dogs liked to bite other dogs, so sometimes I don’t need to say a word for someone to hate me.

  Screw ‘em.

  I nodded at Davis. Up close the cop had squinty, bloodshot eyes the color of soil. Red hair, thinning, poked out under his cap and over his ears. He needed a haircut to get back into regulation. The kid’s hair was short, even, and jet black.

  Davis gave me the same empty smile as before. “Berk,” he nodded. “Long time.”

  “Officer Davis,” I acknowledged.

  “Everything going okay tonight?”

  “Well as can be expected,” I allowed. “New partner?” It’d been five years since we’d seen each other.

  I didn’t shift from my position leaning against the wall, I didn’t pull my hands from my pockets, didn’t make any sudden moves of any kind. Davis moved like a snake for a such a fat guy, and the kid looked agile as a matador.

  “Would you please take your hands out of your pockets, sir?” The young cop asked. It wasn’t a question. His name tag read Hennessy.

  I looked at Davis, cocked an eyebrow. I’d once delivered twenty thousand dollars of worn bills, twenties mostly, in a plain brown business envelope to the man. Grimm and Erica and I had needed a delayed police response in New Saigon. Officer Davis and I had an understanding.

  “Easy, son,” Davis said.

  From the way he said, all amicable and sort of general, it wasn’t clear to which one of us he was speaking. I nodded and shrugged, but Davis put a restraining hand on the younger cop’s arm.

  “This is Hautdesert,” Davis continued. He added with a smirk, “Esquire. He is a reasonable denizen of the Narrows. As you’ll come to learn, we deal reasonably with reasonable citizens. We deal obstreperously with skells.” He looked at me. “You’re not a skell today, are you, Berk?”

  I lifted the corner of his mouth. For Davis skell didn’t mean criminal, it meant one unable to bribe his way free from crime.

  “Not today,” I said.

  Hennessy didn’t relax. He leaned in close and I smelled aftershave. He glared at me and spoke through clenched teeth.

  “My name is Officer Hennessy. When you speak to me, I am Officer Hennessy. When you refer to me, I am Officer Hennessy. When you even think of me, I am Officer Hennessy.” His finger came up and poked me twice in the chest. “Understand?”

  I put on a neutral face. This time I didn’t break the eye contact. “What about when I’m in the shower, you know, having private time? Do
I think of you as ‘Officer Hennessy’ then? Because, I can’t lie, it kind of makes it more exciting.”

  “Sonofabitch!”

  He took half a step forward and put his hand on his nightstick. I didn’t move, didn’t flinch, and didn’t break eye contact. Davis spun and caught Hennessy’s arm. He put his bulk in between us and used it to ease him back.

  “Easy,” he snapped. “Easy, stand down.” Hennessy looked like he was about to argue but I heard the timbre of Davis’s voice change. “Stand down. This isn’t the place or time.”

  Begrudgingly, Hennessy allowed himself to be pushed back. I looked around to see how the scene was playing out on the street. The pedestrians gave quick, furtive glances then hurried on their way. The hookers watched openly, looking like deer in the meadow trying to decide which way to bolt.

  Up the street the BMW driver smoked a cigarette and smirked, enjoying the show. It was typical 11th Avenue bullshit to him. He saw me see him watching, and he dropped the cigarette in a puddle before leaning back against the hood of the beamer and crossing his thick arms. In the window of GOOD EATS diner, the waitress, hair worn straight up with curls on the weave, and a soft, waved fringe, watched through the plate glass window, ignoring her customers.

  So much for lurking, I thought. I said to Davis, “We’re in a goddamn Broadway production here. It’s like Book of Mormon, or freakin’ Hamilton.”

  The older cop looked around, took in the witnesses and straightened his coat. He nodded in agreement, but more to himself. He turned and looked at me. I silently swore. Now Davis was going to feel like he needed to save face, and I’d have to play along. Dealing with Erica had put me in a foul mood, I realized. I’d initiated this problem before I’d thought anything through. Stupid.

  “Okay,” Davis said to me. The fake smile was gone. “What are you doing here?”

  Inspiration came in a flash and I seized it. It wasn’t a lie, it was a misdirection, but it was a bold, hard to disprove misdirection. I took my hand out of my pocket, noticed Hennessy stiffen, and pointed at the sigil scratched into the grimy brick.