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“I reported the missing power supply before we engaged the demon. If you’d stayed on top of it, maybe you wouldn’t be badgering frontline people over bullshit.”
“There’s more on my plate than incursions,” he said, exasperation in his tone. “I dropped everything when the 1A capture report—”
“Who classified the Piggly Wiggly demon as 1A anyway? No one asked my opinion.”
“It looked like a 1A.”
“And an alley cat looks kind of like a panther.”
He shook his head as if he was struggling to keep up. “Are you saying it’s a new breed?”
“I’ll be sure to include everything in my emailed report to Command.” I opened the Humvee door. “Are we done here?”
“No. Wait. You have to—” His phone rang with an annoying laser beam sound, and he snatched it from its holster. “Don’t go anywhere.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I muttered as he turned away to answer. I cast a furtive look at Cory’s bedroom window. Pellini would signal me if something had gone wrong—wronger—unless he was stuck like I’d been earlier. I sent a quick text.
Good deal. House security was on the ball. Now I just needed to clear Gallagher’s rigid ass out of here so we could get Cory to the nexus.
Gallagher cursed under his breath. “But she was holding her own a half hour ago,” I heard him say as I oh-so-casually eavesdropped. “I thought the techs weren’t going to—” He broke off and listened. “Jesus. How many more?” Pause. “Dammit. I’ll be there in fifteen.” He slammed the phone into its holster, but remained facing away from me for a good five seconds before turning. He rubbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger, suddenly looking as weary as I felt. “Look, Gillian. You need to come to Fed Central.”
Under normal circumstances I’d have told him where he could shove Fed Central, but the uncharacteristic hint of desperation in his voice capped my snark.
“Gallagher,” I said then took a deep breath. “Clint. If you’re like me, you haven’t had a full night’s sleep since the valve explosion. Why don’t we call this a standoff and leave it at that. Command will get their report, just not in person.”
“What if I swear you won’t be tied up for more than a half hour?”
“I’d say you were a liar.” I kept my tone light, but the worry on his face deepened. “What the hell is wrong with you, Gallagher? Is your ass on the line if you don’t get me in there?” I didn’t like that thought one little bit. “If that’s the case, put me on the phone with your boss. We’ll sort it out here and now.”
“No. I’m the only one who wants you at Fed Central.” He swept an oddly furtive glance around, as if he suspected ninjas might be hiding in the bushes.
I threw my hands up in the air. “Spit it out. I don’t have time for—”
He stepped close. “A consult,” he said, voice low. “I need an arcane consult.”
“Great. Fine.” Except that I really didn’t have time for a consult. “I’ll have DIRT expedite your request, and we’ll get it scheduled.”
“I can’t put in a request.” He did another wary check of the area. “But if you just happened to be at Fed Central . . .”
“Hold on. If you can’t put in a request, that means your bosses haven’t approved a consult.” I folded my arms over my chest. “Or you’ve sc
rewed up and need help covering your ass.”
Frustration washed over his face. “I don’t know why they won’t call in an arcane specialist, but our orders are clear. No consults.”
This kind of shit was exactly why I didn’t want the Feds knowing about Cory. “Let me get this straight,” I said with heat. “You want me to waltz into a hornet’s nest, take a big stick and start swinging it around while I sing Fuck the Feds? Half an hour, my rosy red—.”
“The task force has David Hawkins.”
I blinked, nonplussed. David was a pleasant, unassuming man who’d spent his life savings to open Grounds for Arrest, the coffee shop across from the PD. The distress in Gallagher’s tone made it sound as if David was next in line for execution.
Clearly I was missing a chunk of vital information. I counted to five in Portuguese and fought for patience. “What, pray tell, does the FBI Special Task Force want with the owner of a café?”
Gallagher scrubbed a hand over his face then blew out a breath as if resigned to being “that guy” who leaked classified information. “There’s a . . . I guess you could say it’s a plague. People are going into stasis in something like a cocoon. The CDC is all over it, but they don’t know what they’re doing. They’ve already managed to kill three plague victims. We still have two, including David, and four more were just brought in.”
Shit. A cocoon? I restrained the urge to ask if it was gooey, red, and slimy. This “plague” had to be the same thing Cory was going through, but I wasn’t convinced that a trip to Fed Central with Gallagher would be worthwhile, especially not if I ran the risk of getting detained because the higher-ups didn’t want an arcane specialist nosing around. No, my best hope for getting useful information was to assess Cory on the nexus. I’d sort out the Fed mess afterward. “Whether they chose to call me in or not, I should have at least been notified,” I said, more annoyed at being out of the loop than I’d realized. All these damn agencies were more concerned with hoarding secrets than cooperating on problem solving. “Who’s blocking channels?”
Gallagher winced as if he had the mother of all headaches. “It’s Garner’s case. He hasn’t been himself since he returned from leave. Maybe because Ryan still isn’t back to work.” His mouth pressed thin. “Or maybe power has gone to his head. He’s the hot shit Division Chief of the new Arcane Investigations expanded task force.”
