Wicked Business (Lizzy and Diesel 2)

“Am I at the park? Or is it on television?”

“Television.”

Diesel tipped his head back and looked up at a shattered slider, leading to a postage-stamp-size balcony on the fourth floor. I looked up, too.

“I know of only one person who can channel enough energy to leave a burn mark like that on someone’s neck,” Diesel said.

“Wulf?”

“Yes.”

“So you think Wulf pitched Reedy through the window and off the balcony?”

“Everything points to that, but it would be out of character for Wulf. Wulf likes things neat. And this is messy. I can’t see Wulf throwing a guy out a window . . . especially in the rain.”

“That would be more you,” I said.

“Yeah. That would be more me.”

I scanned the crowd on the other side of the crime scene and spotted Wulf. He was standing alone, and he was impeccably dressed in black slacks and sweater. He didn’t look like a man who not so long ago threw someone out a window. His hair was swept back, and his dark eyes were focused on me with an intensity that made my skin prickle.

I felt Diesel move closer, his body touching mine, his hand at my neck. A protective posture. Wulf nodded in acknowledgment. There was a flash of light, some smoke, and when the smoke cleared, Wulf was gone.

“He’s been doing the smoke thing ever since he went to magic camp in the third grade,” Diesel said. “It’s getting old. He really needs to get some new parlor tricks.”

Diesel and Wulf are cousins. They’re related by blood, but separated by temperament and ideology. Diesel works as a kind of bounty hunter for the regulatory agency that keeps watch over humans with exceptional abilities. Wulf is just Wulf. And from what I’m told, that’s almost never good.

“Now what?” I asked Diesel. “Are you going to tell the police?”

“No. That’s not the way we do things. Wulf is my responsibility.”

“Whoops.”

“Yeah, I’m behind the curve on this one.”

I saw a flash of brown fur scuttle past me, and Carl crawled under the tarp that screened the body.

“I thought you locked him in the car,” I said to Diesel.

“I did.”

“What the heck?” someone yelled from the other side of the tarp. “Where’d the monkey come from? He’s contaminating the crime scene. Somebody call animal control.”

Diesel slipped under the tarp and returned with Carl. We hustled back to the car, we all got in, and Diesel took off down the street.

“He’s holding something in his hand,” I said to Diesel. “It looks like a key.”

Carl put it in his mouth and bit down. “Eeee!”

I traded him a mint, and I took the key. It was sized to fit a diary or journal, and it was intricately engraved with tiny vines and leaves.

“Is this yours?” I asked Diesel.

“No. He must have picked it up off the ground.”

“Maybe he got it off Reedy. Maybe he snatched it out of his pocket.”

“I took a look at Reedy, and he didn’t have pockets. He was only wearing boxers and one sock. I guess he could have had the key stuck up his nose or inserted south of the border.”