Not so much forgotten as left behind so I couldn’t get a call from Adam when I was out with another guy.

I checked it. Three text messages. One missed call. All from Adam, looking for that promised update. Damn.

“Just a sec,” I said to Jesse. Then I popped off a quick text, saying I was still working and I’d call in the morning.

twelve

There was no chance of finding a bar open in Columbus—I wasn’t even sure there was one. So we headed over to Battle Ground. Jesse bought the beer, then announced he had reason to celebrate. He’d found the deadbeat dad he’d been hunting.

“Bet your client is happy,” I said.

“Thrilled. I just hope it means they’ll get the guy to pay up. You should see this woman. Juggles two part-time jobs so she can be there when her four kids go to school and back when they get home. Lives in a dump and takes in typing work so she can pay for paint to spruce the place up. And the bitch of it? Once, when she was ready to crack, she admitted that she hadn’t wanted four kids. She didn’t think they could afford so many, but her husband came from a big family. He wouldn’t let her go on the pill and would keep ‘forgetting’ to use protection, knocking her around if she complained.”

“Bastard.”

“Yeah.” He took a gulp of beer. “I mean, my family life wasn’t the best. I think my dad had a suspicion I wasn’t his kid—the whole half-demon thing—so he didn’t want much to do with me, but then I see people like this family, and I realize I had it okay. Anyway, I’m really hoping this guy gives up and pays. And if not, let’s just say that my next visit won’t be so friendly.”

“If you need backup, I’m a phone call away.”

“Or closer. At least for a few days. My case is done, meaning I’m now at your disposal. I just need to head to Seattle and grab clean clothes, and I’ll be back tomorrow.”

I must not have looked as happy about that as he’d hoped, because he said, “Or not ...”

That had been the plan, right? That he’d join in as soon as he could. Only I’d been doing pretty good so far. I’d made a few mistakes, but I’d learned from them. That was the point of going solo.

I didn’t want to offend Jesse by refusing his help, though, so I fell back on my best strategy: honesty. I really wanted to do as much of this job as I could. If things got ugly, I’d call him in a heartbeat. For now, though ...

“You want to try it on your own. I think it’s a good idea, actually. Lucas should have had you running solo long ago. If it’s okay with you, though, I’d like to keep my hand in. Research, sounding board, backup, whatever you might need. That okay?”

“Definitely.”

“Good.”

JESSE DROPPED ME off at the motel. I waited until he’d left, then hopped on my bike and headed for the police station. I hadn’t told him what I was planning. There are lines you shouldn’t cross as a private investigator. Breaking into a cop shop is one of them.

After twenty minutes outside the building, I was beginning to think I wouldn’t be crossing this line tonight either. The station wasn’t empty.

Earlier that day, at the diner, I’d asked about nighttime law enforcement. It was obviously a very small department and I’d hate to need police backup at night and be unable to contact anyone. They said there hadn’t been a night dispatcher since the last budget cuts. Any calls after midnight went straight to the chief’s house. The officers did patrol sporadically, but on a schedule known only to the department. That, though, should have left the station empty, and it was—empty of cops, at least. After hours, though, was cleaning time.

Cleaning a place the size of a bachelor flat shouldn’t have taken long. But apparently Bruyn didn’t know that and paid by the hour. When I’d cast a blur spell and slipped in, the woman was lounging in Bruyn’s office, doing a crossword, her work not yet begun. I went back outside to wait.

After another twenty minutes, I began running through my repertoire of disarming spells. I had a sleep one that seemed promising. It was a “Mom spell”—one of hers I’d gotten through her contacts.

Mom had been a teacher of the dark arts, but she’d always kept me sheltered from that part of her life. Her contacts knew of me, though, and once I hit teen-hood, they’d started reaching out, hoping there was enough of my mother in me that I was chafing under the guardian-ship of two do-gooders.

That just proved they didn’t know my mother as well as they thought. She was hardly an upright citizen, but she didn’t embrace the dark side because she was evil. It simply made good economic sense. She used those contacts—as I did—with extreme caution. I gave them useless tidbits about the council and the Cabals, and in return, I could call on them with questions I couldn’t ask Lucas and Paige.

Part of the wooing process is gifts. That’s where the spells come in. They give them to me, saying stuff like “your mom would have wanted you to have this.” I collect the spells. I practice them. I store them away in my secret safe deposit box and, when they fit the bill, I use them.

As for why a sleeping spell would be a secret dark magic spell, it was—like most of the spells I kept in my box—not the result that caused concern, but either the materials needed to cast it or the spell’s potential side effects. In this case, the side effect was narcolepsy.

Like my less savory contacts, these spells have a place in my tool-box, and if inducing a few weeks of narcolepsy in an innocent woman would help me stop someone who’s killing innocent women, then I didn’t see a problem with that. Trouble was, the spell, like most dark magic, required dark ingredients. Only grave dirt in this case, but I hadn’t brought any with me.

I was debating a search for the local cemetery when the cleaning woman came out for a smoke. That didn’t give me time to ransack the station, but I had another idea.

I hid in the shadows as she pulled out her lighter. Then I launched a teeny, tiny energy bolt. The lighter exploded. The woman dropped it, shaking her hand and staring down at the remains.

Muttering, she kicked the lighter into the grass, reached into her pocket, and pulled out a matchbook. As she opened it, I launched a drizzle spell. As water trickled down, she scowled up at the rain gutter and cursed Bruyn for not fixing the apparent holes. When she went to light her cigarette, her matches were damp and useless.