Read Online The Love-Haight Case Files by Donald J. Bingle Jean Rabe - Free Book Online

Val.”
    He rose higher and impatiently and soundlessly thrummed his insubstantial fingers across Gretchen’s desk blotter.
    “I think there was someone with the fey.” Evelyn should have realized that when the detective dropped the hint. She hadn’t caught it then.
    “I was mostly paying attention to the checkerboard. The fey was awesomely high.”
    “But you said that you didn’t get here right away.”
    “No. Just basically in time for the shredding.”
    Evelyn gritted her teeth. “The detective asked me if I noticed anything missing.”
    “Guts are missing from the computer, looks like.”
    “They’re called circuit boards.”
    The ghost looked disinterested.
    “Val, Detective Reese asked if I noticed anything missing.”
    The ghost cocked his insubstantial head. “You’re pulling a Gretchen, repeating yourself.”
    “Don’t you get it? They took the fey into custody. I saw him in the back of a police car.”
    “Yeah.” A gauzy finger reached up and twirled into the beard.
    “So they’d know if the fey had taken anything, ’cause they carted off the fey from right inside the office. They would’ve grabbed whatever he had on him … like money from the cashbox, the backup hard drive. They wouldn’t have asked me what was missing, would they? And the detective said he didn’t have money on him. She let that slip.”
    “I don’t think he was wearing any clothes, nothing with pockets anyway, nothing he could have stuck money in. He had this Tarzan look going on.”
    Evelyn abruptly stood, the chair on rollers shooting back from the momentum. “So there was someone else. If they thought money and other things were missing, someone else had to have taken them and got out before the cops showed. Someone else was here with the fey.”
    “Well, duh. There was a second guy. I just didn’t pay a world of attention to him.”
    “Val, why didn’t you—”
    “I don’t talk to pigs. But I like talking to you.”
    “Thanks.”
    “The second dude was in a hooded sweatshirt, but he wasn’t interesting. Wasn’t on anything, and hadn’t been high for quite a while. Didn’t give him any of my time. The fey, that was the interesting one. Besides, the hooded dude left before the pigs showed up.”
    “But the fey didn’t get out.”
    “No. He was woozy, and after he’d picked himself up after all that ripping and—”
    “Val!”
    “Sorry. But you’re right, the fey didn’t get out. He was standing at the back of the office, just picked himself up after tearing Tom up, starting to come down from his high, when the pigs barged in.”
    “So the police somehow knew there was someone else here.” She started pacing in a tight circle. “And who called the cops? Someone passing by with a cell phone? The building next door is vacant. Someone from one of the bars across the street? Someone driving by? The guy in the apartment above the deli?” She could find that out from the police report. “Maybe the caller mentioned there was more than one.”
    “We done here? Gotta go, you know.” Val shimmered and melted into the desk, and the air around her warmed again.
    Evelyn wondered where Val went when he wasn’t in the office or on the street. Maybe he hung out in the sewers with other ghosts or other OTs, or maybe … she shook off the notion—it wasn’t her concern anyway—and wrapped her arms around herself, the chill returning. Maybe Val had forgotten to relate an especially gruesome detail and had come back to tell her.
    She blew out a breath, seeing that it fanned away from her face like lace. Really cold in here.
    “Evelyn.”
    Her throat grew tight and she fought for air.
    “Evelyn?”
    Her lips quivered, from the cold and fear and the realization of something both wonderful and wretched. She turned, slowly, looking toward the back of the office, keeping her gaze high so she couldn’t see the blood. Mist coalesced into a man’s form.
    “Thomas?”
    “Evelyn, I came back.” There was