Page 114 of Dead Beat

Alex felt her cheeks heating. “Works for me,” she said, when what she really wanted to do was peel down her jeans and climb into his lap. He’d said she could keep him. He’d said he was hers. But she didn’t need a Yale degree to know she’d find a way to fuck this up. It’s okay to feel this good, she told herself. It doesn’t have to last to be worth something.

“The Mercedes is back,” Turner noted as they stamped their way toward him in the cold. “I don’t suppose you brought coffee.”

“Afraid not,” said Darlington. “You didn’t give the impression you wanted us to make time for a pit stop.”

Turner lifted the collar on his coat. “Let’s get this done.”

“What are we looking at?” Alex asked.

Turner led them to the front door. His voice was grim when he said, “Something new.”

“Are we breaking and entering?” asked Darlington.

“It was open when I got here. Notice anything about the street?”

The neighborhood was sleepy, residential, mostly single-family homes, some with big lawns and porches.

“A lot of cars,” Alex said. “Maybe people haven’t left for work yet.”

But she knew that was wishful thinking.

Turner pushed open the door. The hallway was lined with cubbies decorated with construction-paper suns. They entered a dark, empty room with color-blocked mats on the floor and low tables surrounded by small chairs. Bins full of toys and games were stacked on the shelves and a mural of a rainbow covered one wall. Alex could hear the high, happy sounds of children playing in the back of the house. Maybe for once Detective Abel Turner had made a mistake.

“Outside,” he said. They passed through another door covered in pink and red hearts.

The playground looked ordinary enough—a big plastic and wood structure took up most of the space, full of slides and ladders, a tunnel to scuttle through, swings. There were seesaws and a sandbox and a little whirling merry-go-round. But something was very wrong.

The kids ran and jumped and crawled over the equipment, but most of them were crying, even as they scaled the pegs of the ladder for another trip down the slide or another go at the monkey bars. One of them lay at the base of the slide, panting. Another had vomited over his puffy jacket, but he kept swinging back and forth, pumping his legs, trying to go higher.

Parents sat on the benches that lined the playground, gripping the edges, faces caught in rictus smiles, tears running down their cheeks.

A woman in purple corduroy overalls and a cardigan was clapping her hands. “Ten more minutes of recess,” she called.

“She’s been saying that since I arrived. It was still dark. I think she’s been here since yesterday. She got the parents when they came to pick up their kids.”

“It must have started by feeding on their joy,” Darlington said. “But I don’t know what this is.”

“Get the salt box ready,” Alex said, advancing, hellfire leaping over her body. She didn’t know what would happen when they got the final artifact. She didn’t know if she would survive another fight with Golgarot. But this she could do.

Aguas! The word jumped into her thoughts, and she had to give her head a shake. Be careful.

“This looks so fun,” she said to the monster in overalls. “Can I play?”

The demon frowned. “Go away.”

“That’s not very nice. We brought a toy the whole class can play with.”

Darlington tossed the Voynich Coffin in the air.

The demon’s eyes lit, her pretty face distending, her arms growing too long as she reached for the puzzle box. The thing wailed as its clawed hands closed over the sides of the box and all the children and their parents began to wail too.

“Keep me here,” she said to Darlington and felt the warmth of his hand cupping her nape. She threw out one of her hands, pulling on the demon’s essence.

Its eyes widened and Alex felt the sludge of it pour into her. It was worse than last time, heavier. Her knees buckled and she hit the asphalt.

“Alex!”

Darlington’s voice. But it sounded so far away.