The boy looked tense, Edward thought. Only the thing was, he wasn't a boy, anymore, was he? The face looking back at Edward's with such studied lack of expression was covered in dark stubble. And the shoulders had filled out, the arms become knotted with muscle.
Tom was wearing a black leather jacket, ratty jeans, and heavy boots. His father could have passed him a hundred times in the street and never recognized him. Only the eyes were the same he remembered from childhood, the same that looked out of his own mirror at him, every morning. But Tom's eyes showed no expression. They allowed him to look at them, and then they slid away from contact, without revealing anything.
There was blood on him too, and a snaking scar on his forehead. Had the triad done that, or had Tom gone through worse scrapes in the last five years? There were many things Edward wanted to know. Unfortunately, they were the ones he would never dare ask.
He watched Tom for a while, watched him pull out the girl's earring and give it back to her. He wondered if the two young fools had any idea that they were giving each other sick-puppy-dog looks.
But not only wasn't it his place to interfere, he was sure if he tried to tell them, either of them would put him soundly in his place.
"Do you guys want some coffee?" he asked, "I'm making some for myself."
There were sounds that might be agreement from the bedroom, as he set up the coffee maker. Fortunately the Spurs and Lace went for normal-sized coffeemakers, not the one-cup deals that were normally the rule. And they provided enough coffee and enough cups. He set it to run and thought.
The boy needed a shower. And probably clean clothes. But Edward had a feeling that if he offered either Tom might very well fling out of the room in a fury. He got a feeling that Tom was holding something in, battling something. And that if he let it all blow, none of them would like it.
Of course, if Tom should shift to a dragon . . . Edward peered around the door at the young man and Kyrie, who were now talking to each other, while Tom had closed his eyes and appeared to be dozing.
Neither the young man nor Kyrie looked scared that Tom would shift into a dragon, so it couldn't be that frequent an occurrence.
The coffee was made, and Edward had a sudden flash of inspiration. Everything that he might offer Tom would be refused. But if he handed it to Tom as a matter of fact, there was at least the off chance that Tom wouldn't know how to refuse. He'd looked many things, none of them at ease.
So, testing his theory, Edward poured himself a cup of coffee, and then one for Tom, surprising himself with retrieving, from the mists of memory, how Tom liked his coffee. The boy had only started drinking it when he'd . . . left. But Edward remembered ribbing him about liking three spoons of sugar in it.
He now poured in three packets of sugar and then crossed the room, trying to look completely at ease. For all his appearances in uncertain cases, in courtrooms presided over by hostile judges, this was probably his greatest performance. "Coffee is ready," he told Kyrie and the other young man. "If you wish to help yourselves." Then he walked up to Tom.
The armchair the boy was sitting in was right next to a side table, and on the other side of that was the straight-backed chair normally used at the desk.
Edward put his own coffee cup down on the side table, and leaned over, touching Tom's shoulder, lightly. "Tom, coffee," he said.
Tom woke up immediately, and sat up, fully alert. Edward remembered that he used to sleep late and sometimes miss first period at school. When had he learned to wake up like this, quickly, without complaint. How had he been living that a moment's hesitation between being asleep and full alertness might make a difference?
He couldn't ask. "I put three packets of sugar in. The way you like it."
Tom looked surprised. He reached for the cup, took it to his lips without complaint. And Edward sat at the desk chair, and took a deep draught of his coffee, feeling ridiculously proud of himself. It had worked. If handed things straight off, Tom was too confused to refuse. It was the first time in years . . . No. It was the first time Tom's lifetime that Edward had set himself to learn how to get around his stubborn son without a confrontation. And it had paid off.
It was all he could do to keep himself from smiling in victory. Fortunately, at that moment, someone knocked at the door and Kyrie opened it.
"Mr. Edward Ormson, this is Rafiel Trall, a police officer of Goldport."
Officer Rafiel Trall was tall and golden haired, with the sort of demeanor one would expect from a duke or visiting royalty. He shook Edward's hand, but there was a slight hesitation, and Edward wondered what Tom had told him about his father.
But then, as the young people pulled chairs together to talk, Edward slipped out the door, quietly.
He didn't know if they were all shape changers, and he didn't know how they'd react to what he was about to do.
But he knew he had to do it.
Tom smiled at seeing Keith immediately assume the role of secretary of the organization. Sometimes people defied all categorization. He'd never expected his wild neighbor, of the late nights and the revolving girlfriends to be this . . . neat.
But Keith grabbed the pad and turned to them. "As far as I can see it," he said, "we're facing two problems. One is the beetles. Kyrie is the only one who's seen the beetles—right?"
"No," Tom said, amused. "We've seen them also. We just didn't remember. I think you thought they were aliens."
Keith looked wounded. "Whatever that powder was . . ."
"Yes," Tom agreed not particularly wanting to go there, not wanting to explain that he'd thought Kyrie's sugar was drugged. He looked at her out the corner of his eye, and realized that Rafiel was also looking at her with an intent expression. Well, if she had to go to someone else . . . But Tom very much hoped she wouldn't.
"They are blue and green and refractive," Kyrie said. "And they look somewhat like the beetles I've seen in the natural history museum in Denver. I vaguely remember they said they were made into jewelry, and I could believe it because they were so pretty. The little ones in the museum. Not the large ones."
"You don't know what their genus is, do you?" Keith asked, looking up. "Because we could look them up and figure out their habits."
Kyrie shook her head. "I never really thought knowing the name of a beetle would be essential to me," she said.
"Ah, but see, that's where you go wrong," Keith said. Scribbling furiously. "Beetles are always essential. You let them run around unnamed they start music groups and what not." He looked up. "Well, I'll call the museum later, or look it up on line. So . . . we have these huge beetles. Are we sure they're shifters?"
"They're the size of that bed," Kyrie said, pointing to the king-size bed behind them. "Or maybe the size of a double bed. Okay, maybe a single bed. But taller. Huge still. Where do you suppose their natural habitat would be? And why wouldn't it have been discovered long ago?"
Keith waved one hand. "Okay, point, point," he said. "But so, we have two shifters. How often is it that shifters get together? Same species shifters? Can you guys like . . . mate in your other form?"
Tom felt a burning heat climb to his cheeks. Without looking he could tell that Rafiel was now staring at Kyrie with a gaze set to smolder. And Kyrie was staring ahead, looking shocked, refusing to look at either of them.
It was funny. Because of course Keith had always assumed that Tom was a player like himself, that he was out there, every night, picking up girls. And of course, Tom's sexual experience, which could be written on the head of a pin, was all in very human form, and had all happened before the age of sixteen.
He threw his head back and laughed. "Keith, you've got the wrong guy, at least where I'm concerned," he said. "The dragons I've known were in the triad. So, I have no idea. Also, the legends are a little quiet on the mating habits of dragons."
"And I had never met another shifter till two days ago," Kyrie said, her voice small and embarrassed. "I suppose it's possible to mate in animal form."
Did she throw a quick look at Rafiel? Tom's heart sank.
"But I wouldn't like to do it," Kyrie said. She sat up straighter in her chair. "For the same reason I wouldn't really like to eat in the shifted form. Even if it's proper food, you know, not . . . people. I like being human. If I'm ever going to have sex, I'd like to be aware of who I'm doing it with and how."
"You've never—" Keith started, then shook his head.
Tom realized he was grinning, and forced his face to become impassive. He hoped Kyrie hadn't noticed.
Rafiel, meanwhile, was shaking his head. "Not in shifted form," he said. "Never. So, I too know nothing about sex between shifters. Though I suppose" he gave Tom a sly look—"that the sex lives of lions are far better documented than the sex lives of dragons."
But he couldn't touch Tom's self-assurance at that point. Kyrie had just as good as confessed that her experience was not superior to his own. He wondered if she'd done it on purpose.
"You guys are a waste of shifting ability," Keith said, sounding vaguely disgusted. "So, you don't know if two shifters of the same kind, different gender met, if it would lead to . . ."
"Kittens in the basket?" Rafiel said.
"Eggs in the lair," Tom immediately interposed not to be outdone.
"Actually," Keith said. "I was thinking more than some species have truly bizarre mating habits. And if we're dealing with a mating pair, which . . . could we be?"
Kyrie leaned forward, holding her coffee cup in both hands, over her knees. "I think we could be, yes," she said. "I think . . . I got a feeling that was the case."
"So, if we're dealing with a mating couple, you know that insects can get really kinky, right? Like all the biting off of heads of males after mating, or while mating, and all that stuff. Is it possible that the killings are part of a mating ritual? Like where the male has to give the female a gift or something."
"Yes, that's quite possible," Tom said, feeling slightly dumb that this hadn't occurred to him. Possibly because in all he'd read of the mating rituals of beautiful jungle cats, there had never been anything about their requiring the gift of a corpse.
"It might be pertinent," Rafiel said. "That I suspect there have been about two dozen people killed, and that they were all or almost all shifters."
"How could you know that?" Kyrie asked.
"I don't know. I suspect. If you remember, I told you I wanted to wait a little before I came here, because I wanted to find out if there could have been more people who disappeared in that area and whose bodies haven't been found yet?" He took a sip of coffee. "Well, I figured it out. At least partway. There are at least fifteen other people who have been missing, all over the last month or so. And they all disappeared from around the Athens. They were all young and therefore we didn't pay too much attention. Otherwise the pattern would have become obvious. But most of them, the families didn't seem sure they hadn't run away, so we thought we'd give it a little longer . . ." He took another sip of coffee. "We're a small police department. Oh, and most people were either passing through or had just decided to move here. Some interesting things—they all seemed to really like the Athens and had been there more than once. And they all had, the sort of relationship with their families and people around them that . . ." He looked at Tom.
"Say no more," Tom said, and for the first time realized his father was nowhere around. Was he hiding in the bathroom to be out of their hair? Tom didn't think it likely, but then neither had he thought it likely that his father would still remember how Tom took his coffee.
"Well, here's the thing," Keith said. "If these are gifts perhaps they have to be shifters. Do you guys know when someone else is a shifter?"
"Sometimes," Kyrie said. "If you get close enough. There is a definite tang, but I'm not very good at smelling it."
"I can't smell it at all," Tom said.
"I smell it very well, but I have to be near the person and sort of away from everything else."
"And all shifters smell alike?" Keith asked. "Regardless of species?"
Rafiel nodded.
"So, perhaps the gift of the dead corpse has to smell like a shifter?"
"It's possible," Rafiel said. "We don't have enough to go on, but there are definite possibilities. Just the fact that it's a shifter couple is interesting. I'd imagine the odds against it are enormous, and I wonder how long they've been a couple.
"Probably about a month," Tom said. "Since that's when you started noticing the pattern."
"Good job, Mr. Ormson. You might have a future in law enforcement," Rafiel said.
The Mr. Ormson was clearly intended to be a teasing remark, and Tom was about to answer in kind, but he thought of his father. If he was in the bathroom, trying to stay out of their way, Tom didn't want to call the others' attention to his absence. Because if he did, and it was nothing, he was just going to sound totally paranoid. On the other hand . . . On the other hand . . . If he didn't call their attention, and his father had gone to the triad . . .
Tom got up, carrying his cup of coffee, as if he were going to get a refill.
"So I think on the matter of the beetles, the best thing really would be to look them up in the Natural History Museum," Keith said. "See if they have stuff about those beetles habits, then see what helps. And then we have the matter of the Pearl of Heaven."
But Tom had reached the little alcove before the bathroom, the area with the sink and the coffeemaker and cups. Tom frowned at it, because it had no articles of personal hygiene, only one of those kits of horrible toothbrush with toothpaste already on that hotels gave guests who forgot their toiletries. And Tom couldn't believe that his father—of all people—would have forgotten his toiletries.
The door to the bathroom was closed, but not enough for the latch to catch. Tom reached over, and slid it open with his foot, slowly. No one.
There could be a perfectly natural explanation. There should be a perfectly natural explanation. Tom was sure of it. But his heart was beating up near his throat, his mouth felt dry, and his hands shook. He put the coffee cup on the counter, very carefully, and then walked out, feeling light-headed.
Had he really believed his father cared? Had the thing with remembering how Tom liked his coffee been enough to make Tom believe his father gave a damn? He must really be starved for affection, if he'd believe his father could be more than a cold and calculating bastard.
He walked outside to the bedroom, feeling as if his legs would give out under him. His father had gone to the triad. Was probably, even now, making some plan to deliver Tom to the triad. And Tom didn't want to be tortured again. Plus, they would probably be even more upset now, considering he'd just been the cause of death of a number of their affiliates.
"We should just leave it on some public place," Keith said. "Like we left the car. And get the hell out of dodge. Let the triad feel it and go get it."
Tom tried to shape his mouth to explain that his father had left, that he'd gone to denounce them—to denounce Tom—to the triad. But the betrayal was so monstrous that he couldn't find the words.
And then he heard the key slide into the lock, and he turned, barely staying human, poised at the verge of shifting . . .
And his father came in, alone, carrying two very large bags with the name and the logo of one of the stores in the lobby. And another smaller bag, with the name of another of the lobby stores. One that specialized in candy and snacks.
They faced each other, silently, and his father looked so startled, so shocked, that Tom wondered if he'd started to shift already.
"I'm sorry," his father said. "Was I needed? You guys seemed to be talking about things I didn't understand and I thought I'd get some clothes and a comb, since I left without any of that." He put the larger bags on the bed, then opened the small bag and fished out a red box tied with a gold ribbon. "I thought you might like these, Tom."
Nuts with chocolate and his favorite brand. Okay, this was becoming ridiculous. His father might have kicked him out of the house at sixteen, and he might know next to nothing about Tom's life since then, but, apparently, it was a point of pride that he remembered what Tom liked to eat and drink.
There was really no response for it, though, and Tom, no longer ravenousle hungry, still felt peckish of sorts. Besides, this was a hideously expensive brand of chocolates and he hadn't been able to afford it in years.
While he was tearing the ribbon, he saw his father open a bigger assortment of different types and set it on the side table. "For you guys, since none of you look like you've slept enough."
Tom noticed that Kyrie's eyes widened and that her hand went out for a dark chocolate truffle. He would have to remember that. Forget dead bodies. Any female with even a bit of Homo sapiens in her was going to go for the chocolates.
To change subject, and disguise his attention to her every action—and also how scared he'd been at his father's absence—Tom looked at his father and managed to say in a voice almost devoid of hostility, "I wonder if you could talk to us about the triad," he said. "How you came to be here, I mean. And how they got you to come here."
"The Great Sky Dragon kidnaped me from my office," Tom's father said. He dipped into the common box, too, and got a nut chocolate also. It was one of the tastes they shared. "He picked me up and told me that my son was my responsibility and he was going to bring me here, and I could find you and the Pearl, after which he'd take me back to New York. He made it clear I wasn't to return until I'd found them their Pearl. Tom, why did you take it?"
Tom shrugged. He'd tried to explain this before, and was getting tired of explaining. Particularly because the idea seemed really stupid now, and also because he was starting to realize what he'd searched for in the Pearl was what he'd found with Kyrie and even with the guys—acceptance, caring for him, giving a damn if he lived or died.
Instead, he said, "Because hard drugs weren't working for me." And seeing his father look shocked, Tom smiled. "Because the Pearl made me feel loved and accepted and I hadn't felt that since . . . In a long time."
His father had gone slightly red, and was looking at Tom as though evaluating something. "So," he said, "do you still need it?"
Tom shook his head. "No. I told the . . . them." He gestured toward Keith and Rafiel. "I told them that I would give it back, if I could just figure out how to do it. I haven't really been able to do that. Not recently."
"What do you mean?" Edward asked.
"I mean that if I gave it back to them, they'd kill me. They made it very clear they didn't take kindly that I'd stolen it. It's their . . . cultic object or something. They don't like the idea that a stranger grabbed it. I think they'll feel the stranger must be killed. Considering what they did to me when they captured me . . ."
"Okay," Edward said, very calmly. "So, how about I take the Pearl back?"
Rafiel choked on his chocolate. "Not a good thing," he said. "Because if you do that, then I suspect they'll kill you. The whole thing they said about you being responsible for Tom?"
"Okay," Keith said. "I've already said it, but you guys were out of the room. I think the easiest thing is for us to take it somewhere public and leave it. Yeah, they might still come after Tom in search of revenge, but there is at least a chance that after the massive ass-whooping of last night, they would leave him alone as being way too much trouble to discipline."
"Well . . ." Tom said. "Yes, it's possible." It wasn't probable. And it wasn't the plan he would have picked, if he had any other semisane choice. But he didn't think he did, and leaving the Pearl somewhere public and running beat his plan to keep hiding it and running from the triad.
"You could leave it in front of the triad center here in town," Edward Ormson said. "You could put it at the door, in a bucket of water. Wait till the bucket dries. By the time the water dries and they feel it—if we hide it a little—we'll all be out of town."
Tom looked up. "Out of town?"
"You could come back home," his father said, suddenly animated. "Maybe go to college." He looked around at the rest of them. "And I'd arrange for the other two here to go wherever they want to go. College? Move and a business? Just say it. I assume Officer Trall would be safe, by virtue of his position?"
Tom could feel his jaw set. "The only home I've ever known . . ." he said. There was the thought that Kyrie might want to go to college, but he didn't think she wanted to go at his father's charity. He didn't want his father's charity. "The only home I've ever known burned a few days ago. I'll have to find some other place to live."
His father looked away and there was a silence from everyone else for a moment. "Anyway," Tom said, "leaving the Pearl somewhere and letting them know later is the best plan I've heard, Keith. Perhaps leave it in a bucket of water and call them though, instead of leaving it in the open and letting them sense it. We don't know if there are other dragons like me around and getting it stolen again would be a pain. They'd only come after me again."
"Yeah," Rafiel said. "So . . . where did you hide the Pearl and how much trouble do we need to go through to retrieve it?"
Tom did a fast calculation in his head. He wasn't sure of Rafiel or his father yet. Though, sadly, he was more sure of Rafiel than his father. Rafiel had at least fought against the triad dragons.
But he'd misjudged his father once. He looked sidelong at his father, and read discomfort and understanding in his eyes, as if he were completely sure Tom wouldn't trust him, and understood it too. As well he should. And yet . . . Tom was going to have to take the risk at some point. Might as well start.
"It's in the toilet tank at the Athens," Tom said. "The ladies' room. It has a huge toilet tank, the old-fashioned kind, so I just put it in there."
Kyrie's eyes grew huge. "What if the tank had stopped?" she asked. "What if . . ."
He shrugged. "It seemed fairly sturdy. Besides, I wrapped the Pearl in dark cloth, before I put it in. You know the light isn't very good there. If someone looked in there, as ancient as the tank is, they'd just think there was some type of old-fashioned flushing mechanism that they didn't understand."
"And it's been there?" Rafiel asked. "These six months?"
Tom nodded.
"Have you considered," Rafiel said, "that maybe it's the Pearl that's attracting people to the Athens and making them feel at home there?"
"I don't think so," Tom said. "If I can't feel it when it's submerged, if the triad dragons can't feel it while it's submerged, then how should strangers?"
"Besides," Kyrie said, "that feeling was there before. It was there a good six months before that. I felt . . . I know this is going to sound very strange, but I felt almost called to Goldport. Like I had to come here. And once I got here, I had to go to the Athens. Then I saw the wanted sign and I applied."
Rafiel fidgeted. "I developed the habit of going to the Athens for breakfast about a year ago too. And it's not near my house. I just felt . . . called to go there. And I felt okay once I was there."
Tom sighed. "I came to the Athens a few times for meals, before Frank noticed me. He asked if I wanted a job. I didn't want to take job under false pretenses, so I told him the truth. That I was homeless, that I hadn't had a fixed address for a long time, that I'd never had a full-time job and that I had a drug habit I was working on kicking. He told me as long as I kept clean once he'd hired me, he didn't mind any of those. . . . What's weird is that I'd already stopped in Goldport, and I had no idea why. It was like something in my subconscious had called me here, and to the Athens."
"Aha," Keith said. "Beetles. Mr. Ormson, is your computer connected to the Internet, and can I use it?"
Tom's father nodded. "Sure. Why?"
"I want to search the Natural History Museum. They have a lot of their collections online now. And they have a bunch of links to other scientific institutions."
"What do you mean by aha beetles?" Tom asked.
"Well . . ." Keith blushed. "You see, I like reading weird things."
"You told us," Kyrie said. "Comics and SF."
"Eh. Those are actually the sanest things I read. I also read science books. For fun. As I said, biology is fascinating, particularly insects. I seem to remember that certain beetles can put down pheromones that attract other beetles and their particular type of prey to their environment." He shrugged, blushing to the eyes. "So I think we should find out if the beetle Kyrie says looks like the shifter beetles is one of those."
"Makes sense," Rafiel said.
"Let me help you navigate the computer," Tom's father said, "in just a moment. Meanwhile . . . Tom, I don't mean . . . Well, you have blood on your face and your hair, and I thought . . ." He'd walked to the bed and pulled up one of bags. "I don't think you've changed pants size, and I just got you XL shirts and that. I grabbed you some socks and underwear too. The store here only has designer clothing, but I didn't want to go outside and look for another store."
Clothes? His father had got him clothes? Tom's first impulse was to say no and scowl. But if he was trying to keep his purity from his father's gifts, he was a little late. While the others talked, he'd been happily munching away on his chocolate with nuts. And the box was empty. Besides, he hated wearing jeans without underwear; the leather boots, without socks, were rubbing his feet raw; and if he was to have to go out soon, then he would have to shower.
So instead of his planned heated denial, he said, "Fine. I'll only be a minute. If anyone needs my opinion on anything, call me."
He grabbed the bag from the bed and took it with him to the little alcove before the bedroom. It weighed far more than it should for a pair of jeans and a couple of T-shirts. Opening it, he found it had at least as many clothes as he had owned back in his apartment. Better quality though. And more variety. There were a few pairs of jeans, and chinos, T-shirts, and a couple of polos. And, yes, underwear and socks.
He wasn't sure if he was ready to forgive his father, yet, but he was sure that his feet would thank him.
He went into the bathroom and turned on the shower. Water poured out in torrents. Oh. He might have to take more than a few minutes.
Much to Kyrie's surprise, the museum did have information on its insect collection online. It wasn't complete. All they had was pictures of the insects and their names.
"Is it this one, Kyrie?" Keith asked. And because the three men remaining—while judging from the sounds from the bathroom Tom was doing his best to deplete Colorado's natural water reserves today rather than in the next fifty years—had all crowded together around the computer, behind Keith who was sitting at the desk, they had to part now, to allow her near enough to see.
The picture was very small, and clicking on it didn't make it bigger. But Kyrie was fairly sure it was the same creature. "Yes. I'm almost positive," she said.
"Cryptosarcodermestus halucigens," Keith read. "Now a quick Google search."
The sounds from the bathroom had become positively strange. Kyrie had known Tom for six months. She would have sworn he was the last person to ever sing in the shower. And if he had ever sang in the shower, she was sure—absolutely sure—it wouldn't be "The Lion Sleeps Tonight." Although—and she grinned—there was always the possibility that he was trying to tweak Rafiel. And tweaking was definitely in Tom's personality.
She wasn't so stupid that she didn't realize that though the men seemed to get along with each other—fighting triad dragons must have done it—they seemed to have a rivalry going over her. Right now it was composed of mostly stupid things—like how she reacted to something each of them said.
Kyrie wasn't sure she could deal with any of it. She was sure she didn't wish Rafiel to kiss her again. Well, maybe a little. But not if it was going to hurt Tom.
"Aha," Keith said, from the computer. He'd brought up a colorful screen, surmounted by a picture of the beetle.
"Yes, it's that one," Kyrie said. "It definitely is."
"Well, it's our old friend Sarcodermestus," Keith said. "And listen to this, guys . . ." He stopped, as they heard the door to the bathroom open and close. "Might as well wait for Tom," he said, under his breath.
Tom, Kyrie thought, as he came toward them, barefoot, walking silently across the carpeted floor, was definitely worth waiting for. At least the man cleaned up well. He'd shaved and tied his hair back. The new clothes, jeans and a white T-shirt, seemed to have been spray painted on his body. They underlined his broad shoulders, defined his musculature, and made quite a fetching display of his just-rounded-enough-but-clearly-muscular behind. He looked far more indecently naked than he'd been when she'd found him with the corpse in the parking lot. And, as he pressed in close, he smelled of vanilla. Vanilla soap and vanilla shampoo, probably some designer brand used by the Spurs and Lace.
Kyrie swallowed. She wasn't drooling either. And besides, if she were, it would be because it was vanilla. She was almost positive.
He pushed in close, between her and Rafiel—he would—and said, "Listen to what? What have you found, Keith?"
"On the beetles," Keith said. "They rub their wings together to produce clouds of hallucinogenic powder to disable their victims. And the male puts down some sort of hormonal scent. It attracts the victim as well as the prey they need to reproduce."
"Prey?" Kyrie said. It was very hard to think next to a vanilla factory. Up till today, she'd always have said she was a chocolate type of girl. But apparently vanilla would to the trick. Provided it was good vanilla.
"They lay eggs in the bodies of freshly killed victims, which have to be of a certain species of beetle. By the time the victims have reached a certain point in the decomposition, the eggs are ready to emerge as larvae." Keith said. "They bury the corpses in shallow graves, so that the larvae can crawl out on their own."
"So, if I were a beetle, which I am not," Tom said, "where would I hide the corpses with the eggs in them?"
"Somewhere safe," Kyrie said.
"The parking lot of the Athens?" Tom said.
"Impossible," Kyrie said, aware of the fact that she might sound more antagonistic than she meant to. "Impossible. After all, it's asphalt. And besides . . ."
"It's public," Rafiel said from Tom's side.
"So, the male lays down a scent to attract the female, does he?" Tom said.
Definitely, Kyrie thought. And it's vanilla. Then stopped her thought forcefully.
"Why lay a scent at the Athens?" Tom asked.
"Easy," Rafiel said. "It's a diner. This means they get not only tourists passing through and the workers and students from around there, but also a large transient population. If it's true that shifters aren't all that usual, then it increases their odds of getting shifters—supposing, of course, shifters are the intended population."
"Well, since all the shifters here seem to have some form of the warm fuzzies toward the Athens, I must ask the nonshifters. Keith? Mr. Ormson?"
"It's a dive," Keith said.
"It . . . I only went there because Tom worked there," Edward said. "I wouldn't . . . I don't see any reason to go again."
"So," Rafiel said. "There is a good chance whatever the substance—if there is one—that the male slathered around the Athens attracts shifters only. Which would mean the eggs would need to be laid in shifters. Where around the Athens can one bury freshly killed bodies in shallow graves and not be immediately discovered? It's all parking lots and warehouses around there."
Kyrie had something—some thought making its way up from the back of her subconscious. At least she hoped it was thought, because otherwise it would mean that stories of corpses and weird shifters who lay eggs in corpses turned her on.
"This means that the male has to be a regular at the Athens," Rafiel said. "Or an employee."
"Don't look at me," Tom said. "I already turn into a dragon. Turning into a weird beetle too, that would require overtime. When would I sleep?"
"No," Rafiel said. "I don't think that we can turn into more than one thing. At least I can't and none of the legends mention it. No. But you know, it might be someone on day shift. In fact," he said, warming up to his theory, "someone on day shift or who only works nights very occasionally, would fit the bill. Because then when he's not serving, he could be tripping the light fantastic with his lady . . . er . . . beetle."
Whatever thought had been forming in Kyrie's mind disappeared, replaced with the image of Anthony turning into a beetle but retaining his frilly shirt, his vest. "Anthony," she said. "Perhaps he dresses that way to attract the beetle in human form."
Tom grinned at what he thought was a joke. "He's a member of a bolero group. They meet every night," he said. "He only works nights when Frank twists his arm, poor Anthony."
Okay, so maybe it was a joke, but still . . . "Are we sure he really does dance with this bolero group?" she asked.
Tom grinned wider. "Quite. He gave me tickets once. You wouldn't believe our Anthony was the star of the show, would you? But he was."
"So . . . what can we do?" Rafiel asked. "I can go in and make a note of all the regulars. Or you can point out to me the ones you thought started coming around about a year ago."
"Hard to say," Kyrie said. "I mean, I can easily eliminate those who haven't been there that long. But I can't really tell you if they've been coming for longer than a year, since I've only been there a year."
"It's a start," Rafiel said. "I'll come in tonight. You can point them out to me, and then I can run quick background checks on the computer. Mind you, we don't get the stuff the CSI shows get. I keep thinking that they're going to claim to know when the person was conceived. But we get where they live and such."
"There's the poet," Kyrie said.
Tom nodded, then explained to the other's blank looks. "Guy who comes and scribbles on a journal most of the night, every night. Maybe he's writing down 'Plump and tasty. Looks soft enough for grubs.' "
"Or 'perfectly salvageable with some marinade,' " Rafiel said, looking over Kyrie's head at Tom.
Without looking, Kyrie was sure that the guys had exchanged grins that were part friendly and part simian warning of another male off his territory.
"So, I go into work as normal," Kyrie said.
"And me too," Tom put in. "Well, yeah, I know Frank should have fired me, but I don't think he will. I know how hard it is for him to find help at night."
"Yeah," Kyrie said. "Particularly since he's been weirdly absent-minded." She didn't want to explain about Frank's romance heating up in front of everyone. It was funny, yes, but it was a joke employees could share. Bringing it out in front of strangers just seemed like gratuitous meanness. "Poor Anthony ended up having to cook for most of the night yesterday."
"Which means you were alone at the tables?" Tom said. "I'm sorry."
And this was the type of moment that made Kyrie want to think of things she hated about Tom. Because when he looked at her like this, all soft and nice, it was very hard to resist, unless she could think of something bad he had done. Which, right now, was failing her, because the only bad thing she could think of was stealing the Pearl of Heaven. And he was ready to give it back, wasn't he? "Yeah, well," she said, lamely. "For some reason I'm sure you'd rather be attending to tables than being held prisoner by a triad of dragon shifters. So you're forgiven."
"Thank you," Tom said, and smiled. "So I'll come in tonight, with you, at the normal hour, and I'll . . . we'll watch and see if anyone looks suspicious." The smile became impish and the dimple appeared. "Besides, really, Anthony will thank me. His fiancé is in the bolero group too and by now she probably thinks he's found another one."
"So, that's what we do about the beetles," Keith said. "But what do we do about the triad dragons and the Pearl of Heaven?"
"I'm very glad we made Keith an honorary shifter," Rafiel said. "This guy has a talent for keeping us on target."
"Honorary shifter?" Kyrie asked.
"He wanted to help us. He's jealous of our abilities. So he said we could make him an honorary shifter," Tom said. "I don't think he told us what specifically he would shift into though. I say a bunny."
"A blood-sucking bunny with big sharp teeth," Keith said. "Seriously, how are you going to get the Pearl, Tom, and shouldn't we at least have a tentative plan in place for how to return it?"
"I need to find a container large enough for it," Tom said, showing the approximate size with his hands. It looked to Kyrie like about six inches circumference. "A plastic bucket, maybe. With a lid. Then I can put it in there, in water and carry it without its giving me away. A backpack to carry it in would be good. Not this backpack." He nodded to the thing he'd carried and which he'd let drop in a corner of the room. "Because if I go in with a kid's backpack, Frank will notice and ask questions."
"Right," Rafiel said. "I have a couple of backpacks from army surplus that I use when I'm hiking. I'll go grab one of them before you go in to work."
"Well, this just brings up one question," Keith said, turning his chair around to face them. "And that's how are we going to sleep. Because we all need to be fresh for tonight. Unlikely as it is, we might be able to pinpoint someone and follow them and find the bodies, but we don't want to be stumbling into walls."
"You can stay here," Tom's father said. "There's a few extra pillows and blankets in the closet and I'm sure the bed fits five."
But Tom's father should have known better, Kyrie thought a few minutes later. With Tom and Rafiel in full-blown competition for her attention, chivalry was thick enough in the air that one needed a knife to spread it.
So, despite her heated protests, it ended up with her on the bed, Tom—universally believed to have had the roughest few hours—stretched out on the love seat by the window, Keith curled up on the floor in a corner and Rafiel and Mr. Ormson staking out the floor on either side of the bed. Rafiel lay down between her and the love seat, of course—probably trying to prevent Tom from attempting a stealth move.
Kyrie would have liked to fall asleep immediately, and she thought she was tired enough for it. But she wasn't used to sharing a house—much less a room—with anyone.
She lay there, with her eyes closed, in the semidark caused by closing the curtains almost all the way—leaving only enough light so that they could each maneuver to the bathroom without tripping on other sleepers.
Tom's dad showered. She heard that and the rustle of the paper bag as he fished for clothes. She grinned at the way the older man had neatly outflanked Tom's stubbornness.
Tom was still suspicious of his father, and perhaps he had reason, but Kyrie heard the man lie down on the floor, next to the bed and seconds later, she heard his breath become regular and deep.
She was the only one still awake. She turned and opened her eyes a little. Tom was in the love seat, directly facing the bed. In the half-light, with his eyes closed and something very much resembling a smile on his lips, the sleeping Tom looked ten years younger and very innocent.
A tumble of dark hair had come loose from whatever he'd tied it with, and fell across his forehead. His leg was slightly bent at the knee, and he'd flung his arm above his head, looking like he was about to invoke some superpower and take off flying.
It was all Kyrie could do not to get up and pull the hair off from in front of his face. Forget special hormones laid down by male beetles to attract the females. The way some human males looked while sleeping was the most effective trap nature had ever devised.