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Colleen nodded. “Thank you. I appreciate your mercy.”
Barbara leaned forward and snapped the recorder off. “It’s not mercy. It’s practicality. I’ve got enough to deal with right now without any more paperwork.”
—
Ten minutes later, Barbara and Tucker stood at the door and watched the pair walk back down the street. The wind was whipping up a frenzy and the clouds didn’t seem to be running out of snow anytime soon. Yet Colleen and Grace swept through the drifts in their long coats and dresses, seemingly oblivious to the weather.
“Something not right with those two,” Tucker muttered.
“Yeah,” Barbara agreed. “Maybe I need to get me some of that Godly glow…” She slammed the door shut. “Or thermal underwear.”
They retreated to the relative warmth of the office.
“How did your meeting at the church go?” Tucker asked, easing his frame into a chair.
“Well, I’m still here to tell the tale,” Barbara said, plonking herself down at her desk.
“How come you ended up back at Beau’s house?”
“I drove him home after he burst into the meeting. Didn’t seem well. Claimed he could hear the Colony talking to him.”
Tucker frowned. “That doesn’t sound like Beau.”
“Yeah, well, maybe living with stuffed vampyr heads on your wall affects you after a while.” She gave him a look.
He sighed. “Okay. Point taken.”
“Did you find out anything at the Lame Horse?”
“Nathan wasn’t there on the night Marcus was killed. Even though he paid the bar’s owner to say he was.”
“Really? So, either he’s guilty or paranoid.”
She thought about the tattoos again. Prison tattoos. Maybe he’d done time and wasn’t keen to do more.
“I also found out he’s been hooking up with someone,” Tucker continued. “A young male.”
“So, Nathan is gay or bi. Maybe that’s why his marriage broke up.”
“Looks that way. That’s not all. The male he was meeting, he’s Colony.”
“Any idea who he is?”
Tucker hesitated. “From the description, I think he’s a vampyr named Michael…and he’s Athelinda’s son.”
“He’s what now?” Barbara’s eyebrows shot up. “Athelinda has a son? But…”
Athelinda is a child, she was going to say. But of course she wasn’t. She only looked like one. But still…
“Who’s his father?” she asked.
“I don’t know. But I do know that Michael is a halfling.”
“His father is human? I thought Athelinda hated humans.” She paused, something suddenly slotting into place in her head. “The Bone House,” she muttered.
Tucker gave her an odd look. “What’s that place got to do with anything?”
“You know about it?”
