Vengeance of the Demon (Kara Gillian 7)

Chapter 1

Accessory after the fact. Principal to murder in the first degree. End of life as I know it. Death row.

Those thoughts ricocheted through my mind as Detective Vincent Pellini arranged a half-dozen photos on the diner table between us. I took a sip of iced tea in an attempt to cover my shock. It didn’t matter one bit that Pellini pointed to a man front and center in one of the photos rather than the hazy figures in the background. My entire focus locked onto the distant blurry image of me, caught on camera seconds before the execution-style murder of James Macklin Farouche, as I stood shoulder to shoulder with the equally blurry killer.

My eyes slid to the other photos—all most likely taken with cell phone cameras. Watery ripples of distortion or jagged bands of color marred each one, but a few aspects were clear enough. People running. Faces full of panic and fear. Strange purple fire on rubble.

And then there were the details that only someone who’d been at the scene would be able to identify. A circle twenty feet across of charred grass. A pond steaming after being boiled away. The melted remains of a tablet computer.

Pellini tapped the man in the photo—powerfully built, with fading red hair and a ripple of photographic distortion through his face. “Angus McDunn,” he said. “He’s still at large with no sightings.”

I pushed aside my half-eaten cheesy fries and clung to the hope that Pellini couldn’t possibly recognize me in the blurry picture. “Farouche’s right-hand man,” I said, oh-so-coolly. “I’ve seen him on the news.” Up close and personal, too. Only a few weeks ago McDunn had held a MAC-10 submachine gun on me as motivation to have a conversation with his boss.

The booth seat creaked beneath Pellini’s bulk as he shifted. “Yeah, but here’s the kicker,” he said. “McDunn is Boudreaux’s stepfather.”

“

You’re shitting me.” I stared at Pellini and pushed down my selfish worries about pesky murder trials. Detective Marcel Boudreaux was Pellini’s partner, a weaselly piece of work I’d had the displeasure of knowing for years. Yet even though Boudreaux ranked right below Pellini on my asshole list, in this moment I felt for him. With his slight stature and surly attitude, he already caught more than his fair share of crap from other cops. Add in a felon stepdad in a high-profile case, and things were sure to get ugly.

“Serious as a heart attack,” Pellini said. He swiped a piece of sausage through the mustard on his plate and popped it into his mouth. A speck of yellow bobbed on his mustache as he chewed and swallowed.

“Damn. How’s he holding up?”

“Coping by concentrating on finding Farouche’s killer,” Pellini said. “He’s obsessed.”

I sucked down more iced tea. I’d never known either Pellini or Boudreaux to be obsessed with a case. Why the hell did his first obsession have to involve me? “It’s not in Beaulac PD jurisdiction,” I said. “Is he assisting the sheriff’s office?”

“He’s restricted from the official investigation because of his stepdad’s involvement, but it’s not stopping him from doing whatever he can.” Pellini picked up his napkin and, to my relief, wiped away the dab of mustard.

“Yeah, but why is he so worked up over this?” I frowned down at the photos. “I mean, the news reports say Farouche was involved in organized crime. Clearly, he wasn’t the saint everyone thought he was.”

“I guess Boudreaux thinks otherwise,” he said then exhaled. “His mom’s the head trainer out at Farouche’s horse farm and has worked with his thoroughbreds for over thirty years. Boudreaux grew up working with horses and still lives out there.” He paused to take a sip of water. I strained a few neurons in my attempt to picture scrawny, cigarette- smoking Boudreaux around horses. Nope. Couldn’t see it. Had to be an alternate universe.

“He’s always been private about his past,” Pellini continued, “but he claims Farouche saved his life and didn’t deserve to die like that. He’s pretty torn up.”

Great. It was bad enough having the FBI and sheriff’s department all over the Farouche Plantation incident, but now an unpredictable Boudreaux joined the mix. “Are these the only pictures of what happened out there?”

“The sheriff’s office has a few others, but they’re so distorted they’re useless.” His dark eyes sharpened on me beneath shaggy black eyebrows. “You have any idea why that might be?”

I could have said, “Probably because a crap load of arcane potency flies around when demonic lords battle it out over a passageway between worlds,” or, “Maybe it was from the lightning Lord Mzatal summoned in rage—right before he almost incinerated everything within a mile radius,” but instead I opted for, “No idea.”

His mouth tightened. “I get it. You can’t tell me.”

I scrambled to read his expression. Did he know I knew more or was he simply fishing for information? Neither possibility appealed to me. “I don’t have anything to tell,” I said, keeping my face composed.

“Sorry,” he said and sounded as if he actually meant it. “With Kristoff on the case, I thought it was worth a shot to ask, but I shouldn’t’ve pushed it.”

Relief flooded through me. Agents Ryan Kristoff and Zack Garner led an FBI special task force that dealt with weird stuff, and after I resigned from the Beaulac PD they brought me on as a civilian consultant. It made perfect sense that the task force would be assigned to the plantation case considering all the bizarre crap that had occurred there. It was natural for Pellini to assume I’d have more info.