One Grave at a Time (Night Huntress 6)

We were heading home tomorrow, so that Don would be able to reach us if he needed to. He didn't know where Spade and Denise lived when they were in the States, but he'd know to try my house if something came up. I expected Madigan to keep a low profile while attempting to undo the damage he'd inflicted on himself with the cave incident, so we probably could've waited longer before going home; but Denise was starting to sneeze. Being branded with shapeshifting, demonic essence might have made her practically immortal, but apparently it couldn't cure her allergies to cats.

"I'm getting a slice of cake. Tyler, you want any?" Denise asked, him being the only other person here who didn't feed primarily from a liquid diet. The six of us had been relaxing in the living room after dinner, one of my first normal evenings in weeks.

Tyler gave her a droll look. "I'm begging you to tell me your secret. If I ate half as much as you, I'd lose these fierce hips in a week."

Her smile held a hint of grimness. "I'd tell you, but then I'd have to kill you."

And if she didn't, Spade would, I mentally finished. Shapeshifting, limitless healing ability, and a metabolism that burned off calories faster than Denise could consume them weren't the only effects of the demon brands. Her blood was now a literal drug to vampires, and if word of that got out, every undead scumbag looking to make a buck selling it would come crawling out of their coffins after her.

"I'll have a piece of cake," I called out. I might be a vampire, but that didn't mean I was about to let moist devil's food cake go to waste.

"But, um, I'll eat it in my room, if that's okay," I amended, getting an idea about that fudgy icing. "I'm heading to bed."

Bones rose at those words, his eyes glinting as he met my gaze. Guess he'd figured out another use for that cake, too.

"Everyone, I'll see you on the morrow," he said. Then he went into the kitchen, took the plate Denise had just put a heaping slice of cake on, and started up the stairs.

"Retiring already, Crispin? Isn't it quite early?" Ian asked with a wicked little grin.

"Piss off, mate," Bones replied, sparing me the trouble of saying something similar.

We were halfway up the stairs when Dexter let out a sharp bark. I tensed, but then Elisabeth's voice followed, letting me know which ghost had suddenly appeared in the house.

"I know where Kramer is!"

I turned toward the sound of her voice. Elisabeth stood in the foyer with Fabian at her side. Bones set the cake plate down on the steps with a sigh.

Ian laughed. "Wretched timing you have, poppet," he told Elisabeth, and I'd be lying if I didn't admit that a small, selfish part of me also wished she'd poofed up with this good news a few hours later.

Some of her smile faded. "Is something amiss?"

"Nothing," I told her while flashing Bones a rueful smile as I started back down the stairs. "Where is he?"

"Sioux City, Iowa," she replied. "I've seen him there four times now. Far too many to be mere coincidence. This must be where he'll select his victims."

"He picks all of his victims from the same area? I thought you said Kramer made sure never to utilize the same place twice."

"He chooses a new location every All Hallows' Eve, very far from any of the places where the previous burnings occurred. Last year, he was in Hong Kong. Often he will hide the bodies to prevent the authorities from realizing the same type of murders occur every year. But the accomplice and the three victims are always chosen from same place."

He hid the bodies? "Why would he care if the police were onto him? It's not like they could put him in handcuffs."

"Because of his accomplices," Elisabeth replied. "If they learned the pattern of the previous murderers through periodicals or modern news, they would realize that once they've concluded their usefulness, Kramer will kill them, too."

"He eliminates every tie to his crimes, even ones from whoever's assisting him?" Ian whistled. "Starting to admire this bloke's resourcefulness."

"You would," I countered.

Elisabeth said nothing, but a spasm crossed her face that I picked up on even with her being partially transparent. Fabian floated over to her, resting his hands on her shoulders.

"You must tell them."

Bones's brows went up. "Tell us what?" Denise asked, beating him or me to it.

Elisabeth closed her eyes, seeming to gather herself together. If she'd been solid, I'd have asked her to sit down, because she looked downright, well, ghostly.

"Kramer does not kill his accomplices merely to eliminate ties to his crimes," she said, her voice barely audible. "He always picks those who are fanatical in their belief that they are doing God's work by assisting him in the elimination of witches. But many of them, when they see what he . . . does when he is flesh, realize it is all a lie."

Bones's expression became grim. Even Ian looked like he'd swallowed something distasteful. Denise seemed as clueless as I felt over Elisabeth's oblique statement, but then her meaning hit me, and my stomach clenched in a way that made me think I was about to spew up my liquid dinner all over the coffee table.

"He rapes them," I stated, a deep loathing spreading through me.

Elisabeth's bowed head came up. She looked right at me as she spoke the next words.

"They weren't the first."

This time, I knew right away what she meant, and more of that same fury rose in me. It should come as no surprise that this wasn't a new pattern for Kramer. I'd read enough of the Malleus Maleficarum to know that second only to his hatred of women was Kramer's deviant obsession with female sexuality. Rape would be yet another tool he'd use in his quest to physically and emotionally destroy women before he had them killed, and in Elisabeth's time, Inquisitors were given absolute power over the accused-and unsupervised access.

Elisabeth had endured this hellish nightmare, then watched Kramer continue on in the same despicable pattern as a ghost. Yet here she was-unbroken, uncowed, and unwilling to give up her quest for justice no matter which side of eternity she had to fight for it on.

"You're amazing, you know that?" I said, awed by her strength.

That made her bow her head again. "No, but out of everyone Kramer murdered, I alone still exist. I owe it to the lost not to give up."

Silence met her statement. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my mother swipe at her face as if chasing away tears. It brought back an awful memory: her, covered in dirt and blood, begging me to kill her because she couldn't live with what she'd done during her first few, blood-crazed days as a new vampire. All my arguments of how the vampire who'd thrown those humans in with her-knowing what would happen and doing it just to torment her-was the real murderer had fallen on deaf ears. Only Bones sternly telling my mother she wasn't allowed to die because it would dishonor the sacrifice Rodney made when he gave his life during her rescue had reached her.