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“Your secret identity,” I said.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Fine, I’ll fly into Santa Fe this afternoon, or early evening.”

“Fly into Albuquerque instead. I’ll meet you at the airport. Just call me and give me the time.”

“I can rent a car,” I said.

“I’ll be in Albuquerque on other business. It’s not a problem.”

“What aren’t you telling me?” I asked.

“Me, keeping secrets?” There was a thread of amusement in his voice again.

“You’re the original mystery man, Edward. You love keeping secrets. It gives you a sense of power.”

“Does it?” he made it a question.

“Yeah, it does.”

He laughed softly. “Maybe it does. Make the ticket reservations and call me with the flight times. I’ve got to go.” His voice went low as if someone else had come into the room.

I hadn’t asked what the urgency was. Ten missing, twelve confirmed dead. It was urgent. I hadn’t asked if he’d be waiting for my call. Edward, who never spooked, was scared. He’d be waiting for my call.

2

IT TURNED OUT that the only flight I could get that wasn’t full was a noon flight, which meant I got about five hours of sleep before I had to get up and run for the airport. I also missed Kenpo class, a type of karate that I’d just started a few weeks ago. I’d have much rather been in class than on a plane. I hate to fly. I’d driven to as many of the out of town appointments as possible, but I’d been doing a lot of flying lately. It had lessened the actual terror, but I was still phobic. I hated to be in a plane being flown by someone I didn’t know, who I had not personally drug tested. I just wasn’t the trusting sort.

Neither are the airlines. Carrying a concealed weapon on a plane was a pain in the ass. I’d had to take the two-hour FAA course on carrying concealed on a plane. I had a certificate to prove I’d taken the course. I could not get on the plane without the certificate. I also had a letter stating that I was on official business that required me to carry a gun. Sergeant Rudolf (Dolf) Storr, head of the Regional Preternatural Investigation Team, had faxed me the letter on taskforce letterhead, always impressive. Someone who was a real policeperson had to give me something to legitimize my status. If it were real police business, even if Dolf weren’t directly involved, he’d usually give me what I needed. If Edward had called me in to help in an unofficial case, i.e., illegal, I would have avoided Dolf. Mr. Law and Order wasn’t real fond of Edward, a.k.a. Ted Forrester. “Ted” was around a lot when there were bodies on the ground. It made Dolf not trust him.

I did not look out the window. I read and tried to pretend I was on a very cramped bus. I’d finally figured out that one of the reasons I didn’t like to fly was that I also have claustrophobia. A 727 full of people was close enough to make it hard to breathe. I turned the little fan above my seat on high and read. I was reading Sharon Shinn. She was an author that I trusted to hold my attention even hundreds of feet above the ground with a thin metal sheet between me and eternity.

So I can’t tell you what Albuquerque looks like from the air, and the little walkway that led into the airport was like every other one I’d ever walked through. Even in the tunnel you could feel the heat pressing like a giant hand hovering over the thin plastic. It may have been spring in St. Louis, but it was summer in Albuquerque. I scanned the crowd for Edward and actually looked past him once before realizing it was him. Part of it was the fact that he was wearing a hat, a cowboy hat. There was a fan of feathers tucked into the front of the hat band, but it had the look of a hat that had been worn well. The brim was curved back on both sides as if he’d worked at the stiff material until the brim had formed a new shape under the constant run of his hands. His shirt was white and short-sleeved like something you’d get at any department store. It was matched with dark blue jeans that looked new and a pair of hiking boots that weren’t.

Hiking boots? Edward? He’d never impressed me as a country boy. No, definitely