Page 34 of Booked for Murder

“That is what I’m saying.”

“But why?” No matter what angle I considered the problem, I couldn’t figure out why the government would murder its own citizens to make certain only the magically inclined survive.

“I don’t understand it, either. But there’s enough support for the plan within the government that it could come to pass if a better way isn’t found. Pure mundanes and those with low magical aptitude will be targeted. The mundanes might be spared—assuming they don’t add to the numbers of low ratings.”

“What rating is the threshold?”

“40.5%.”

Over the years, magic had strengthened, but if the government eliminated everyone with a magical aptitude rating below 40.5%, a staggering number of people would die. “That’s twenty percent of the population, Ren.”

“I’m aware.”

“But why? Why would anyone want to kill so many people and use a damned war to cover it up?”

“I don’t know. Mr. Hampton doesn’t know, either, but he wants you to find out.”

Nine

A vigilante magical librarian, Janette?

Before I could begin dealing with the problems Bradley brought to my door, I needed to verify the truth of Ren’s claims. Just yesterday, I would have done my research at the library, but my new phone offered me the tools I needed to determine if there was a prejudiced group of assholes out to eliminate the mundane. Within ten minutes, I had my answer.

The staggering number of websites calling for the removal of mundanes, even the pures, shocked me into silence. Beatrice searched with me, and what she found disturbed us both. The extremists wanted people like her gone, too—people who hadn’t shown any significant increase of abilities between generations.

Under the new system, I would be a prize, someone other adepts would want to use as a mother to bear strong children to further establish adept populations. Worse, they revered abilities like mine, the lethal ones the wise feared.

Not only did they value my reproductive system, they wanted me as a weapon of war, a tool of fear meant to keep the weaker in line.

It made me want to throw up.

“With this knowledge, I have a much better understanding of why they want to disband investigator cells. If these radical groups actually succeed at their goals, investigators would be needed. In high numbers.” I scowled and tapped at the screen of my phone to bring up the list of politicians supporting the cause—and the list of politicians their cause loathed.

Sure enough, Senator Godrin, along with the other victims of brutal exsanguination, counted as the movement’s enemy. They viewed him as too moderate to do the work they believed they needed done in society.

“I have never wanted to become a vigilante more than right now,” I grumbled.

“A vigilante magical librarian, Janette?” Beatrice asked with a hint of laughter in her voice. “I could see you being quite good at that job. I’m of a mind to join you, too, except I wouldn’t be quite as good at the vigilante justice as you. You can exsanguinate people and shoot them. You could exsanguinate them and then shoot them.”

“Why would I waste a perfectly good bullet on a corpse?”

“I don’t know. It seems somehow satisfying.”

“Gunfire is loud, the thump is pretty awful, but corpses can’t scream, so you have a decent point,” I conceded.

Ren, who joined us on our quest for knowledge on his phone, glanced up from his screen. “This specific hate group began gaining momentum after the first murder. What I don’t understand is why use the method they picked if their goal is to eradicate lesser magical abilities. It doesn’t make any sense to me.”

“Red herring, Ren. It draws attention to the wrong party. Senator Godrin’s general attitude would have made him a target for a lot of people, so it’s not unreasonable to believe an adept took offense to his behavior and wanted to get rid of him. It’s just smoke and mirrors. Six murders done in the same way for supporters of the same bill is not a coincidence. Modeling after a serial killer would also serve as another potential red herring. Senator Godrin’s general behavior makes it easy to pin the blame on the wrong people. There are adepts who are against his policies, and they’d have the range of abilities needed to pull off his murder. I’m one of the adepts with a known dislike of his policies, and I’d be an excellent target for such a scheme. As I fit the exact profile of those this hate group likes, it would draw attention away from their activities. Those who know me would understand I would be against their organization’s beliefs. All of that said, it doesn’t change the fact that someone with strong abilities killed Senator Godrin, but it would turn the blame away from this group’s general activities. And if they’re part of the group trying to prevent private investigator cells from forming and maintaining their licenses, then it makes sense to me. Investigators would look into their activities, as they’re the first logical choice of groups who’d want Senator Godrin to permanently disappear.”

“The police might look into them, too,” Beatrice commented. “There doesn’t need to be private investigators for the police to look into their activities.”

“But will the police really look into them closely?” I challenged. “New York City has hundreds of crimes a day. We’re pretty safe in terms of being murdered, with only a murder or so a day throughout the entirety of Manhattan Island, but muggings and other crimes? You’re at pretty high odds of having someone picking your pocket on the street. Thefts are the most common crime here, but assaults and other violent crimes do happen with frightening frequency. All that said, if you want to live somewhere with an expectation of basic survival, here’s a good place. The police will want the case closed, and they’ll be pressured by the FBI to close it faster and cooperate with their investigation. That leads to mistakes. That leads to innocent people doing time for a crime they didn’t commit. They might even be intending to frame a specific person for it, too.”

Like me. I’d be a pretty damned good target to frame, as I had a known dislike for Senator Godrin’s policies. If the hate group had any sense among them, they’d realize I would hate them far more than I had ever hated Senator Godrin.

In so many ways, I made the perfect sponsor for the investigator cell, as I had damned good reason to want to clear my name of the senator’s death. I had even better reason to go after the assholes wanting to kill so many people only because they hadn’t been born with the right amount of magic to satisfy their prejudiced ways.

Interfering with an FBI case would land us all in deep water, but now that I had a better understanding of what was going on and why, I couldn’t let it go.