“Yeah, me neither,” said Shay.
I stood there for a moment, my hands in my pockets, as the cool breeze pressed against my back. “Well… goodnight.”
I turned to go.
“Wait… Detective Daggers?”
I stopped and turned back. “Yes?”
Shay scratched at the back of her neck. “Look, I just wanted to say…I mean…how do I put this?”
“What is it?”
“Well… I know we got off to a bit of a rough start yesterday. Part of that was my fault. Part of it clearly was yours. Regardless of the blame, though, I went home last night feeling kind of…confused, for lack of a better word. And that feeling lasted throughout the night and into the morning. I didn’t know what today would hold. When I came to work this morning, I was apprehensive to say the least. But I have to admit—today’s events were stimulating. And more than that, I felt a lot more at ease with you today than I did yesterday.”
I wasn’t sure how to respond. “That’s…good to hear, I guess.”
“I think what I’m trying to say is…I think we can make this partnership work. We might both have to adapt a little, but between my abilities and your deductive sense, not to mention your somewhat unorthodox methodologies, I think we’ll make a good team.”
Something about what she said festered at the back of my mind—a piece of cud I’d been chewing on for a while but hadn’t yet swallowed. I scratched my head as I considered my options.
“Cons are fun, aren’t they?” I said. “Not all cases are this entertaining. Most are pretty cut and dry. Usually someone sticks a knife in somebody else and they die. And most murderers are pretty dumb. It feels like half the time we find the killer with his hand still on the hilt. At least most con artists have half a brain. Makes the chase more fun, wouldn’t you say?”
“Well, I don’t have a lot of experience,” said Shay, “but yes, this case was fun—as much fun as a murder investigation can be, I suppose.”
“When you think about it though, most cons are pretty straight forward. The con man is almost invariably after money, but some differ. Some are after love—maybe even prestige.” I paused and looked at Shay. “So, the question is…what are you after?”
My partner raised an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”
“The con you’re running. What’s the point?”
“I…don’t follow,” said Shay.
I gave Shay a smile. Not a snarky, insincere smile, but a genuine one. “Come now, Miss Steele. I know I look dumb. I swear it’s not my mother’s fault. It’s a byproduct of taking too many hits to the face. And to be fair, I act the part my face advertises for the most part. But give me some credit. I know a con when I see one.”
To Shay’s credit, she continued to play the role she’d undertaken. “Daggers, if this is some sort of weird joke, or a hazing ritual, then—”
“Am I going to have to spell it out for you?” I asked. “Very well. I’m always happy to oblige. In Wally’s apartment, you had a vision of his attractive girlfriend. Well, it was pretty obvious someone else had been living there besides Wally. The amount of food in the kitchen. The pair of glasses on the coffee table. Not to mention the mess. A guy like Wally wouldn’t have lived like that on his own. I’m guessing you saw something that gave it away. Maybe a brassiere or a pair of panties. Maybe you even guessed it belonged to Gretchen. I know I spared a few glances at her bosom. Picking out her bra from a pile wouldn’t have been that hard.
“Your vision at Reginald’s place had two components. The fire part was easy to guess. You were in his room before I was, and you’re a half-elf, so I’m willing to bet your sense of smell is better than mine. You simply sniffed out the fire in the wastebasket before I did. The part about you predicting that dangerous, tattooed short guys were involved had me stumped for a while—until we met Detective Morales, that is. When I found out you interned with him it all made sense. You must’ve spotted the calligraphed tattoo designs on the calling cards in Reginald’s room and connected the dots. Maybe you didn’t remember the exact gang that sported those tattoos, but you were clever enough to recall the designs were dwarven.
“The one vision I still can’t completely explain is the first one. I’m not sure how you knew Reggie didn’t die by magic. My best guess is you noticed there weren’t any burn marks on the walls of the corridor. If Reginald had taken a fireball to the chest—a fireball potent enough to burn right through him—it should’ve kept going and left its mark somewhere. Instead, the only burn mark was right underneath Reggie on the floor. So you must’ve surmised Reginald was already dead at the time of the murder, and why would a fire mage knock a guy out and hit him with a fireball afterward? Or maybe you noticed some pattern to the spray marks on the floor that I didn’t. That’s my best guess, anyway, but I’m all ears if you have a different explanation.”
54
Shay’s cheeks blossomed a bright red, and her eyes resembled those of a fox cornered by slobbering, baying hounds. She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. She ran her tongue across her lips, swallowed, and tried again.
“Actually,” she said, “my father’s a chemist. I recognized the silvery-gray residue on Reginald’s chest as the remains of a thermite reaction.”
“Oh,” I said. “Well, I guess that makes sense, too.”
We both stood there in silence, partaking in the deepening evening gloom. Lamplighters crawled over the streets, trying to stay ahead of the sun’s withdrawal. One of them stopped nearby and lit the lamps that flanked the police station doors with his long wick-ended pole. As he left, a stray breeze—a remnant of the afternoon’s storms—flitted past. It raised the hackles on my arms.
Shay seemed oblivious to it.
“You must think me the worst kind of fraud,” she said after what seemed like an eternity.
“No. Certainly not the worst kind,” I said. “You forget—I’ve met a lot of unsavory characters in my day. Lying about having supernatural powers doesn’t automatically place you among them. I’m just trying to figure out why you did it. Why the façade?”
Shay forced out a bitter laugh. “Really, Daggers? You may be excellent at piecing together evidence, but you’re not particularly observant, are you? The clues are right in front of your face, day in and day out, and you don’t even notice them.”
That sounded like an insult. I responded defiantly. “Huh?”
Shay shook her head, then settled her eyes on me. “Look at me, Daggers. What do you see?”
I took a good look. I saw a young half-elf woman with long, dark brown hair. A looker who downplayed her own sexuality either because she didn’t know how to use it, or because she didn’t want to. A woman who lacked a certain measure of confidence, despite the fact that she’d picked up on things even a seasoned veteran like myself had missed. And in her first two days on the job, no less.
I wasn’t entirely sure how I was supposed to respond to her question, though. I went with the literal route.
“Well, I see a woman in a cream-colored blouse and slacks. She’s got long hair, slender arms, and a pair of perky br—”
“A woman, Daggers,” said Shay. “The answer I was looking for was a woman. Honestly, look around you. What do you see? Or more accurately, what don’t you see? The answer to that question is the same as before. Women. There’s not a single woman in a position of authority in the entire precinct.
“When I showed up yesterday morning, you thought I was a secretary. Do you know why I got so mad? It’s not because you acted like a chauvinist jerk—which you did, by the way. It’s because that’s the same sort of response I’ve been getting my entire life. I’ve wanted to be a detective since I was a little girl. To be able to solve mysteries and make the world a safer place at the same time—it’s a thrilling feeling. You know how it feels. I’ve seen it in your eyes over the last two days.
“But the difference between us, I’d be willing to wager, is no one ever told you to forget about your passion and purs
ue something else—something that would be more suited to your sex. Not your skills, mind you, but your gender.
“I realized pretty early on I’d never be taken seriously in this field. Unless…I did something drastic. And so I pretended I had a gift—a gift for seeing things. Past events. Bits of crimes. Threads, I decided to call them. It seemed like as good a description as any. Certainly it convinced my teachers at school. From there, I ran with it. Created a whole routine to go along with my visions. Once I got started, it took on a life of its own. And eventually it brought me here—where I’ve always dreamed of being.”
I ran my tongue across my teeth. “What I don’t get is, how is it nobody ever noticed you were making it all up?”
Shay shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m observant. I pick up on little things other people tend to ignore. But how I was able to fool so many people for so long? Well…people see what they want to see, I guess.”
I nodded. I’d seen the truth of that statement time and time again. Part of the reason I succeeded at my job was because I often took note of what other people were perfectly willing to ignore.
Shay took a deep breath and sighed. “Well, it was good while it lasted, I suppose. Even if it only lasted two days.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked.
“This job. I’ll have to hand in my resignation now.”
“What? Why?”
My partner looked at me as if I were denser than lead. “Because I lied, that’s why.”
“So what,” I said. “Everybody lies about something or other. You lied about your abilities, but only because you craved the job. That’s not a crime.”
“But—”
“But nothing. So what if you don’t have supernatural abilities to see into the past? What you have is better. You have a keen sense of observation. In this line of work, that’s far more useful. And in a sense, it lets you see into the past as well as some psychic ability would’ve. Trust me, I’d much rather have someone with your eyes and brain at my side—somebody with the passion you exhibit—than some dope who got here simply because she was gifted with a sixth sense from the gods.”
Shay peered at me through squinting eyes, as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “So you’re serious, then? You don’t want me to resign?”
“Are you kidding?” I said. “I’m finally starting to like you. Besides, if you left, the old bulldog would probably try to convince Griggs to come out of retirement. I don’t think that’s a scenario any of us wants to endure.”
“But…what’ll we tell the captain?”
“As far as I’m concerned, we don’t have to tell him anything. It doesn’t matter how you do your job as long as you do it well. If Captain or Rodgers or Quinto is along for a case, maybe you can pretend to have one of your visions every now and then, but other than that, we’ll pretend nothing’s changed.”
Shay took a few slow breaths, then nodded. “Umm…well. Ok, then. I’m still trying to process all of this, but…thanks for the vote of confidence, Daggers.” She stuck out a hand.
I shook it. “No problem. It’s what partners do.”
Shay pulled her hand back. “So…see you tomorrow?”
“Yup,” I said. “See you tomorrow—Detective Steele.”
It was the first time I’d called her a detective to her face without anyone else around to impress. The meaning wasn’t lost on her. She smiled, her eyes twinkling with confidence, before turning to walk away.
Detectives Daggers and Steele, homicide.
A grin slowly spread across my face. I had to admit, it had a nice ring to it.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Hi. I’m Alex P. Berg, a mystery, fantasy, and science fiction author with a Ph.D. in nuclear engineering and a taste for heavy metal music. If you enjoyed this first Daggers & Steele mystery, be sure to check out the sequel, Cold Hard Steele. It’s another fantastic mystery with even more chuckles than the first.
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
About the Author
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
About the Author
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
&
nbsp; Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
About the Author