Calling All Angels (The Shadow Council Case Files Book 1) Read online

  “Are you sure you want to know? Wouldn’t want to mess up your plausible deniability.” She grinned into the darkness, her face illuminated by the amber lights of the dash and the flickering white of oncoming headlights. Jo put on her blinker and slowed as she exited off I-17 and turned left back under the highway, headed toward the Prosperity Park neighborhood.

  “I think being two thousand miles away gives me an excuse for not stopping you. Besides, if you end up in jail, I’ll need to fabricate a plan for your extrication, and having all the information will give me what I need to make that happen.” Jack sounded tired, Jo thought. Of course, New York made her tired just thinking about it, much less being there hunting angels. The Londoner was probably fighting subways as often as he was fighting demons or magical impediments to his search.

  “I really just want to talk to the guy,” Jo said. “I want to let him know that it’s not cool to hit people, and he really shouldn’t be using his girlfriend for a punching bag.”

  “You can appreciate the irony in that statement, given your current nocturnal employment, can’t you?”

  “Piss off, Watson. Don’t you have back episodes of Sherlock to catch up on?”

  “Not since I realized Moffat was involved,” Jack replied. “I hated what that prat did to Doctor Who.”

  “God forbid I get into a conversation on Doctor Who with a Brit,” Jo said with a laugh. She turned left down a side street where “Prosperity” was certainly nothing more than a name, any decent jobs or concept of home maintenance having left these run-down houses years ago.

  “That seems somehow racist, or at the very least, nationalist, Joanna,” Jack said, chuckling. “How goes the battle on your other front? You know, the one the Council actually assigned?”

  Jo sighed. “I found him. But he doesn’t know I found him. Or rather, he doesn’t know who he is.”

  “Well, just—”

  “I gave him the sword. It burst into holy fire and everything.”

  “What happened then?”

  “He dropped it. Scared the crap out of the dude. He has no idea he’s an angel, and I have no idea how to unlock that part of him. And there are demons in Phoenix, chasing us both. Because of course there are. I think I’m here.” She saw the rusted-out Pontiac Fiero sitting in front of the small tract home, painted black with Bondo highlights. Sparkles had given her the make and model of Marla’s boyfriend’s car, and her address. Looked like Captain Butthead was home.

  “Good luck,” Jack said. “Try not to get arrested.”

  “If I do, I know exactly who to call.”

  “Yes,” he agreed. “Someone else.” He laughed and disconnected the call.

  “Jerk,” Jo muttered at the phone. She turned right at the next street and parked her car. Jo got out and slipped on her black biker jacket. It wasn’t cold, but the thick leather provided a little padding in case things did get heated with her target.

  She stepped onto the sidewalk, and a young white man immediately stood up from the steps of a nearby house. “Hey baby, you looking for me?” he catcalled.

  Jo ignored him, walking without turning around. She heard footsteps get closer as the man, more a boy than anything, jogged up to her.

  “Hey baby, I’m talking to you,” the kid repeated.

  Jo ignored him again, not speeding up, not slowing down. She just kept her eyes front, kept walking. She didn’t know how many of his friends might be watching, and she didn’t need to cause a ruckus before she got to Marla’s place.

  Then he grabbed her elbow. Jo stopped, and the man pulled her arm to turn her back to him. He was tall, maybe twenty years old, with a cursive neck tattoo and acne spilling across his narrow features. His red hair was close-cropped, barely peeking out from under the brim of a San Jose Sharks cap.

  “Bitch, I’m talking to you!” he snarled at her.

  “You must not be because I don’t see any bitch here,” Jo said. She looked the boy right in the eye, refusing to show fear. She’d stared down demons—one little suburban shithead wasn’t going to scare her. As long as it wasn’t half a dozen suburban shitheads, she was probably okay.

  “Now why don’t you go back to your porch and sit there like a good dog until your master gets home because I don’t feel like playing tonight.” Jo’s words were soft, her voice even, but the look on her face was hard.

  “I see a bitch, alright. I see one big stuck-up black bitch walking through my ‘hood all alone. I reckon you goin’ to meet a trick, ho?” He pushed up on her, walking her backward by pressing his chest against her. Jo steered herself away from the chain link fence behind her, then spun to the right. She put on hand on the boy’s left shoulder and stepped on the back of his left knee, pushing him forward. He staggered forward into a parked Toyota, catching himself on the front fender of the car with his hands.

  “Oh, you done done it now, bitch. I was just gonna fuck with you a little bit. Now I’m gonna fuck you up.” He pulled a butterfly knife from his back pocket and flipped it open.

  “What is this, 1987?” Jo asked. She shook her head at the boy, then stepped forward and kicked him between the legs. The toe of her hiking boot impacted his testicles, and the force of her kick stood the young man up on his tiptoes. He dropped to his knees as Jo pulled her foot back, then she put her hands on the side of his head and rammed her knee into his face. His nose broke with a wet crack, and blood poured out, covering his mouth and chin.

  Jo took a step back, then leveled her would-be attacker with a snap kick to his temple that spun him around and slammed his face into the Toyota’s tire before he bounced face-first to the sidewalk. He lay there motionless as Jo turned to see if he had any friends looking to join the fight.

  Nobody approached, or even seemed to have taken notice of the fight. Jo left him lying on the concrete, blood seeping from his broken nose to pool under the car tire by his head. She turned and walked back to the address Sparkles had given her, taking note of the flickering light in the front room. Marla’s boy-thing must be watching television.

  Jo stepped up on the porch and knocked on the door.

  “Fuck off!” came from inside, accompanied by the muffled sounds of gunfire and explosions.

  Jo knocked again, louder and longer this time.

  “I said, fuck off!” The sound of the TV got louder as the man inside turned the volume up to drown out her knocking.

  Jo shook her head, then knocked again. She wasn’t against kicking the door in on principle, but getting shot as a burglar was not part of the evening’s plans.

  “Goddammit, what does a man have to do—Well, hello there, what can I do for you?” The man almost tripped over himself changing gears as he answered the door and saw an attractive woman standing on his porch.

  Jo could definitely see the attraction for Marla. Brian Krill was a good-looking man of about thirty. Tall, blond, with a strong jaw and patrician nose, he definitely had the body of a man who spent a lot of time in the gym. And Jo could see most of that body in front of her, since he answered the door in nothing but a pair of boxer briefs and a black tank top. His heavily muscled arms ended in a pair of thick hands with scarred up knuckles that spoke of many fights survived and many punches thrown.

  “Are you Brian?” Jo asked.

  “Who wants to know, pretty lady?” He pasted on a smile that made the hair on Jo’s arms stand up, and not in a good way.

  “I’m a friend of Marla’s. I’m here to pick up a few of her things.” The smile fell from his face like a stone.

  “Is she with you? Where is she? I need to talk to her.” He seemed nervous, like he was afraid of something. He peered around Joanna, looking up and down the street. Jo felt good about her decision to park a couple of blocks away. At least he wouldn’t see her car and show up at her house when nobody was home but Ginny and Cassandra.

  “She’s not with me. I’m just here to pick up the rest of her things and to tell you she won’t be coming back. Now where are her clothes?” She step
ped forward, trying to get into the house, but Brian blocked her path.

  “She doesn’t have anything here. Everything in this house is mine. You tell that bitch that I don’t want her back. No, tell you what, I’ll tell her myself. Where is she?” His face got redder with every sentence, and Jo started to see the veins bulging on the side of his neck.

  Jo stepped back onto the porch, but Brian grabbed her arm. “No, come on in.” He pulled her into the living room and kicked the door shut behind her. “Who are you? Are you the bitch that told her to leave me? Is this all your fault? Are you a dyke? Is that it? You want to fuck my girl, so you stole her from me? That makes sense, you ni—”

  Jo slapped him across the face. “Stop right there. You don’t call me that word. Nobody calls me that word. As a matter of fact, you don’t call me anything. You don’t think about me. You don’t think about me, and you don’t think about Marla, either. She’s out of your life, and she doesn’t ever have to put up with your mouth or your abuse ever again. Now get out of my way. I’m leaving.”

  “The fuck you say, you dyke cunt. I’ll beat you so black and blue my girl won’t even look at you when I’m done.” Brian threw a punch, a big, lazy right that had about as much chance of connecting as John Belushi running a marathon.

  Jo ducked under the punch and stuck out three quick left jabs, tagging the larger man right in the mouth and nose with her fist. She drew back a bloody hand, her knuckle laid open on his front teeth. Brian staggered back, then lowered his head and charged her. He caught Jo right around the middle and slammed her into a far wall. Her back cracked the drywall, and she felt dust fall into her hair as his shoulder drove the air from her.

  Jo lashed out, nailing Brian with three sharp elbow strikes to the back of the neck. He quickly retreated, then kicked at her head. Jo dropped down and wrapped her hands around his other ankle. She stood up sharply, pulling Brian down to flop on his back with a whoof! She held his ankle, then stepped forward to drive her heel into his lower abdomen. He covered up the best he could with his hands, but Jo had the advantage of position and holding his leg.

  She stomped his stomach and chest mercilessly, hearing at least two ribs crack under her foot. After six or seven vicious stomps, she let his foot drop and knelt on the floor beside his head. Brian curled up in a fetal position on his side as Jo said to him in a low voice, “You will not come after Marla. You will forget you ever knew her. If I ever hear of you laying a finger on her again, I will be back. And that night I won’t go so easy on you.”

  Then she drove her fist into the side of his skull, sandwiching his head between her strike and the floor. His eyes rolled back in his head, and Brian passed out cold. Jo thought for about half a second about the permanent brain injury she may have caused, then chalked it up to just desserts and stood up. She looked around the living room, saw a framed photo of Marla and a smiling older woman on the mantle. Jo took the picture, slipped it into her jacket pocket, and walked out the door, whistling into the night.

  She got back to her car and pressed the speed dial for Sparkles. “One monster down, at least one to go. Anything new?”

  Dennis’s human face appeared on her phone’s screen, his unicorn head uncharacteristically absent. “Jo, you need to get home. Now. There’s a police escort waiting for you at the on-ramp to the 17. There’s been an attack at your place. Get home now.”

  8

  Jo burst through her front door, then drew up short as the burly police officer took hold of her arms and steered her to the kitchen table. “You don’t need to go in there,” he said, motioning with his head to the hallway. “Just come here and sit down. Let’s talk for a minute, and we’ll tell you what we know.”

  “Who’s hurt? Where’s Ginny? Where’s Mama? What about Marla? Who was here? What happened?” The words tumbled from her pell-mell, almost on top of each other in her panic. She looked up, noticed that she knew the cop, and her shoulders released a fraction of the tension there.

  Randall Currence was a beat cop who patrolled the neighborhood. His partner this year was another rookie; Jo thought she remembered his name was Freddy or something like that. Randall got a lot of rookies to be their first partner out of the Academy. He’d been on the Phoenix PD for almost twenty years, and he was a calming influence in a tense situation. Freddy was nowhere to be seen tonight. Maybe got sent home for puking at a crime scene. Again. Jo thought.

  His good looks and easy smile made the women trust him, and his broad shoulders and strong jaw made the men respect him. Randall was a big man, over six foot and a bit over two hundred pounds, but his uniform shirt had no bulge in the middle, and he moved like a man much younger than the thirty-nine years he’d only admit to if pushed.

  Jo looked in his face. His normally sparkling blue eyes were somber. She took a deep breath. “Randall, I need you to tell me what happened here.”

  Her eyes scanned the living room from the seat where she’s eaten just a few hours earlier. One of Ginny’s socks peeked out from under the sofa, the pink one with blue trolls that she couldn’t find when she did laundry on Saturday. Cassandra had left her sewing needles sticking in the arm of the rocker/recliner again, just waiting for Jo to put her hand down there all unsuspecting.

  Those little Norman Rockwell snapshots felt so incongruous with the red and blue flashing lights strobing across the wall, the coppery scent of blood laying over a deeper, harsher smell of pain and death coming from somewhere. The smiling snapshots hanging on the refrigerator door with magnets cast in sharp relief by the snap of crime scene photographer flashes.

  Joanna turned her attention back to Randall, to the policeman sitting in front of her. She tuned in halfway through his sentence. “...we don’t know everything yet, Jo. It seems there was a home invasion. There was a young woman here...”

  Jo shook off her shock and stupor enough to reply. “That’s Marla, we met at work.”

  “Work?” Randall knew Jo usually made her living as a freelance editor, working from home.

  “I’ve been picking up some side gigs here and there. I met Marla at one of those. She was having boyfriend problems, so I let her crash here.”

  “What do you know about her boyfriend? Is he the type to hold a grudge?” Randall pulled a small cop’s notepad from the chest pocket of his uniform and flipped it open.

  “It wasn’t the boyfriend,” Jo said with a shake of her head.

  “How do you know?”

  “Because I was just at his place beating the crap out of him and letting him know he wasn’t ever to contact Marla again. Whoever broke into my place did it while I was there, so it wasn’t him.” Her words were flat, lifeless, like she was recounting something that happened to someone else, not something she’d done. That’s how it felt, like her life was happening to someone else, like it wasn’t real. It had felt like this the first time she saw a monster, the night she learned there were more wicked things in the world than even the stories could explain. The night she lost Darren. She shook her head, trying to focus on the policeman—Randall—staring at her.

  “You know you just confessed to assault, right?” Randall asked, his brows knit.

  “I also know you’ll never find a jury without at least two women on it, and no woman will ever convict me for kicking that abusive jerk’s behind. Now what happened here? Where is my mother? Where is Ginny?”

  Randall didn’t answer for a long moment. When he looked up at Jo again, his eyes told a deeper story. “We don’t know. They aren’t here.”

  “Then whose blood is splattered all over my...oh no.” Jo stood, knocking Randall’s hands aside as he tried to push her gently back into the chair. Jo walked past him, following the trail of blood down the hall. It arced along the walls like the start of a demented Jackson Pollack painting, the splatter going high then low as it traced the path of a fight. A fight that one player was destined to lose, and badly.

  Jo stopped at the doorway to her bedroom, where the trail of blood on the walls ended a
nd ran down to become a pool on the floor. Too much blood to soak into the carpet, it stood in a puddle running from under the door out into the hall.

  “Randall, is my daughter in there?” Jo reached out, but couldn’t bring herself to touch the door.

  “We haven’t seen any sign of Ginny. We don’t know where she is, but she’s not in there.”

  Jo pushed the door open. The lake of blood ran from just past the doorway all the way to her bed, where it seeped into the carpet and ran under the furniture out of sight. There was a void of lighter blood, an amorphous outline where a body had lain. Jo saw a few strands of blonde hair stuck in the blood, along with chips of bone, and other organic bits that marked the spot where Marla had died.

  “Where is she?” Jo asked. She didn’t turn around. She didn’t need to, she could feel Randall right behind her.

  “She’s in the ambulance. They’re going to take her to the morgue where the ME can do a more thorough exam.”

  “Who did this? Did anyone see anything?”

  “We’re canvassing neighbors now, but so far we’ve come up empty. Do you have any idea who would do something like this?”

  Jo did, but she couldn’t tell the police about it. Not only would that put her mother and daughter in more danger, but it would almost certainly get Randall killed, along with anyone else who tried to bring the demon into custody.

  Her phone buzzed in her pocket. Jo ignored it, but it buzzed again.

  “You should get that,” Randall said. “It might be important.” Jo knew that was code for “it might be ransom,” but she hoped it wasn’t. She didn’t want the police to know anything about all this, but it seemed a little late for that now.

  Jo pulled her phone out and looked at the screen. She had one new text message. She opened the text and saw an image of her mother’s face. Cassandra had a bruise on her cheek and a split lip, but a defiant look on her face. Below her image was a caption that said Midnight. School. Bring the Sword. Bring the Angel.