Black Wings, Gray Skies (Black Hat Bureau 4)

Given how hot and heavy Asa and I had been minutes earlier, I couldn’t fault his other half for asking for an equal share of my affection. In his preferred currency, of course. But dang it. The promise of an apple had only bought me about ten minutes with Asa. I was hoping for more.

Kisses.

Touches.

Defective clothing…

Without missing a beat, the daemon aimed straight for a steel wood-and-charcoal-fired pit. One of Clay’s cooking shows might have called the flat top a fire table. The oven, or fire box, was tucked to the side. There were baskets for smoking vegetables too.

A rig like this cost a fortune. It must have been custom, probably built by a local craftsman. Either the previous owners hoped it would enjoy a second life with the next people to lease the space, or they simply couldn’t afford to pull it out and take it with them.

“Eerie.” I touched the grate. “Everything else is gone, but this is pristine with all its attachments.”

“No.” He caught my wrist. “Look.” He lifted the metal. “See?”

“Charred bone shards.” I curled my fingers into my palms. “Jilo didn’t mention hags like barbeque.”

Indelicate as it might be to say so, human flesh was mild, not gamey. It might not pass for chicken, it was a bit dry, but turkey? Smoked turkey? Yeah. I could buy that. Only once decomposition set in did human remains distinguish themselves from other rotting meats. No wonder we hadn’t picked up on it sooner.

Pretty sure our killer had been incinerating the remains of their victims, with magical help, to avoid tweaking our noses, which left me lost as to why we had one set of physical remains.

Had the body sighting and the leg been a wild-goose chase? Had Marah been daunted to work alone? Had she panicked and dumped it before securing this place?

Most importantly, how in the heck did we end up staying above her new killing grounds?

Something smelled fishy, and it wasn’t the harbor.

What had Clay told us? That a cashier at the biscuit shop gave him the tip to rent this place? A cashier whose father happened to own prime real estate in the heart of downtown? A cashier he met after the desk clerk at the hotel we ditched passed on a coupon for that very shop?

Dollars to donuts, the desk clerk was a boo hag. The cashier at the biscuit shop too. The father? He may or may not exist. For all we knew, the person who owned the property was killed for it. That might have been last week or last year. We had no way to know without more information. The rest? It was likely backstory to fit the boo hag agenda.

One thing was for certain.

Boo hags had tracked our every step in this city. Easy to do when a motley crew of well-dressed creatures descending upon downtown would have heralded Black Hat’s arrival to anyone watching.

Using their victims as camouflage, they had led us around by the nose, and we never even noticed.

“No scent left.” His forehead creased. “Think it human.”

“Yeah.” I sifted his hair through my fingers in a nervous gesture. “Me too.”

With my free hand, I snapped pictures and recorded a video for our records.

Then, to keep him in the loop, I texted Clay.

>Pretty sure we’ve got human remains in the fire pit.

>>Want me to bring down the hot sauce?

Gallows humor used to fly over my head. I was too literal with it. Now it made me roll my eyes.

>Have you touched base with your biscuit shop girlfriend?

>>I meant to ask her out, but then the witches happened, and I swore off women for all eternity.

Eternity, in that context, might last six months. Last time, it stretched maybe six weeks.

>I think she was ridden by a boo hag to maneuver us into position.