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I studied the fence. It wasn’t electrified from the looks of it, no wires attached, so I could simply go over. I glanced at Iggy. “Can you go through it?”
He looked affronted at the thought. “I am dead, Hexen, not a ghost.”
“You materialized in my home. That’s ghost stuff.”
“Magic, girl. Not ghost traits. And afterward, I had to repair my magical depletion.” Iggy glared at me in a way that made me feel like I’d failed a pop quiz.
I started snapping bolts and chains.Trespassing. Destruction of property. Breaking and entering.I skirted more than a few laws in my job, but today—with a pending appointment with the NOPD—I was acutely aware of it.
Iggy walked behind me, looking like an elegant reveler dressed for another era. Honestly, a small part of me wanted to be sure he wasactuallydead because he looked as lifelike as anyone in the city. He stepped around the thorny branches of a rose bush grown wild, pushing hip-high weeds aside with his walking stick.
“Serpents,” Iggy said, pointing at the rattling tail of an impressively sized rattlesnake. “Mind where you step.”
He moved in front of me then and started whacking at the grass. Startling the venomous creatures wasn’t my preferred tactic, but I made note that even when one struck his leg, Iggy was fine. If anything, the snake looked injured. It fell limp and shuddered. Apparently, whatever manner of dead Ignatius was, he wasn’t good to bite.
“I have spelled boots, Iggy,” I mentioned as I took the lead again. “This is nowhere near my first encounter with fanged things.”
Iggy chuckled and followed me to the front door. Despite the ruinous state of the yard, the porch was intact. It looked like it had been carefully kept up. No sagging planks here—and that was a challenge in the humidity of the bayou.
“Monkey nuts.” I glared at the door. There, beside the front knob was a security panel. The house was wired with an alarm, and while I could argue that my B&E was justified, I hated having to deal with police officers more than absolutely necessary.
“Monkey . . .” Iggy scowled at me. “What kind of thing isthatto say?”
“I’m trying to cuss less often.” I spared him a glance. “I need to go in and see why the house is locked up. I’m hoping to find clues on SAFARI and the late Mr. Hebert—”
“SAFARI is still around?” Iggy grimaced. “As bad as the KKK, they are. ‘Course back in my day, most folks didn’t know about thedraugror the fae so—”
“Can we catch up on history lessons later? Maybe when we aren’t breaking and entering? Unless you have a solution to get me inside . . .” I said.
My dead helper was unable to function like a proper ghost. Just my luck! A proper ghost could go inside and have a look-see . . .
“Solution proffered.” Iggy murmured unfamiliar words and a zing of energy built at my side. The dead man put his hand over the box, and in the next instant, it began sizzling and smoking.
“No!” I clutched his hand, getting a jolt through my arm as thanks.
Whatever chance we had of stealth was gone now that the alarm was shorted out. That, undoubtedly, sent an alert wherever it was routed. Police? A security company?
“Fuck a duck!” I slammed into the door. Whatever time we still had, I was going to use it. “Office. Office. Where’s the twice cursed office?”
Iggy went another direction as I prowled the house, hoping to find an office with information. The house was supposed to be empty, un-used, but it was dust free and none of the furniture was under sheets. Someone had been here recently.
“Crowe!” Iggy called from wherever he was within the house. “You need to see this.”
“I need to find answers!” I yelled back, hoping that the security system didn’t include a video or audio recording set-up.
“Geneviève Crowe, comehere!”
Something in Iggy’s voice made me want to know what had the dead Victorian ruffled. Terrible décor? Rats in the larder? I went toward the sound of his voice and found myself not in the kitchens, but in a sitting room. It was, admittedly, terrible decor. Dusty doilies and a sort of excess that spoke of no personal sense of style. And arranged on the chairs in various macabre postures were six formally dressed, dead people who were seemingly playing cards. Three women. Two men. And one person with no clear answer. They’d all been beheaded.
“What the fuck . . .”
Iggy shot me a look.
“Some situations require cussing,” I said.
“Indeed.” Iggy stood beside a corpse in a ball gown. Her hair was blood-crusted, and the bodice of her gown had been soaked with it. “Dry.”
“So at least a day? Maybe two?” I circled the corpses, studying them. I’d seen dead bodies before, but nothing quite like this. “Why are they arranged like this?”
