Unsympathetic Magic - Laura Resnick [21]
“From someone’s body.” His voice was tense.
“Oh, yuck,” I said with feeling.
“So where the hell is the rest of that person?” He sounded as if he was thinking aloud. “And who is it?”
“Was, you mean?”
“Was,” he agreed.
“Do you think some jerk raided the morgue to add a disgusting touch of reality to this whole thing?”
“That’s one of the possibilities.”
“You really think some cops did this?” I asked, appalled now.
He shook his head. “I sure hope not. Scaring a woman alone in the dark and then stealing her purse was bad enough. But snatching body parts? And leaving a severed hand lying around on the sidewalk where any neighborhood kid might have found it in the morning, if you hadn’t insisted on searching the area now?” He said grimly, “There had better not be any cops involved.”
But now it bothered him, and he had to know for sure. So he was going to go back to where we’d found the severed hand and work the crime scene, whether or not the local cops wanted him there.
Given the late (or very early) hour, we had to wait a couple of minutes on the corner of Lexington before we saw a cab. I was exhausted, and Lopez was preoccupied, so we didn’t talk. Then, in response to Lopez’s wave, a cab pulled up to take me home. The driver smirked when he saw Lopez hand me twenty dollars, which made me realize once again how I was dressed.
Lopez kissed me absently on the cheek and told me to go home and go to bed. “I’ll take care of this. And I’ll let you know if I find your purse. Okay?”
“Okay.”
I got into the cab. And he returned to the scene of the crime. Which is how he got involved.
So if I hadn’t called Lopez to come get me out of jail, then Baron Samedi, the Lord of Death, wouldn’t have come looking for him on the dark, windswept night of thunder, terror, and angry spirits that would soon follow.
5
I awoke to the pain of a stiff neck, the irritation of light in my eyes, and the revulsion of a huge canine tongue washing my face.
I opened my mouth to protest against all of these sensations—and immediately had to spit out Nelli’s tongue, which was still sweeping across my face.
“Ugh! Blegh!” I sat bolt upright, wiping my face in disgust and shoving at the dog. “Stop that!”
Nelli panted cheerfully, happy to see me awake. Her long, thick, bony tail wagged back and forth with reckless abandon. Given its size, density, and current speed, it could probably bring down a sapling. Or kill a gargoyle.
“Is she awake, Nelli?” Max called from the back of bookshop.
Nelli gave a little crooning bark, then swiped her paw at me affectionately.
“Ow!” I looked down at the broad red marks she had just made on my forearm. “Your nails need cutting.”
Nelli was Max’s mystical familiar. She had emerged from another dimension in response to his summons for assistance in fighting Evil. Max had been in dire need of help, since (brace yourself for a shock) New York City was proving to be a busy battleground between the forces of light and darkness; and Max’s previous assistant, the apprentice Hieronymus, hadn’t really worked out so well—what with being the maniacal, murderous summoner of a virgin-raping, people-eating demon and all.
I wondered if the daunting size of her mission accounted for Nelli’s own daunting size; because apart from whatever advantage her physique might give her in combating mystical forces, she was an inconveniently large animal to keep in Manhattan. Easily as big as a Shetland pony, Nelli was well-muscled beneath her short, smooth, tan fur. Her massive head was long and square-jawed, and her teeth were so big they might look terrifying if the immense size of her floppy ears wasn’t such a distraction from them. Her paws—which, like her face, were darker in color than the rest of her—were each nearly the size and density of a baseball bat, and the skin of her feet was as rough as coarse sandpaper.
Nelli’s long, pink tongue hung out of her mouth as she gazed at me with uncomplicated good cheer.
“Max?” I croaked sleepily.
“Coming!”
It was morning. I was in Max’s establishment, Zadok’s Rare and