watching him get lost within an inferno while speaking of capturing the devil.
Fully intrigued with this new mystery, I leaned across the table. If there were a large number of missing women, we might have finally located a connection to our crimes. Maybe the Ripper was involved. Perhaps either his tactics had changed—as we’d feared earlier—or he was getting better at hiding the bodies. “Would you mind if I took a look at that?”
“Not at all,” Noah said, sounding relieved. “Any help or ideas you can offer will be greatly useful. I can’t, for the life of me, figure out where to search next.”
I rummaged through the leather satchel, which contained page after page of reports of missing women. My blood chilled. There were nearly a dozen families begging Chicago to help find their daughters and wives.
“The police haven’t investigated any of these?” I asked, flipping through more documents.
“Not a one of them.” Noah shook his head. “Mr. Cigrande, mad as he may seem, marched himself into our agency, demanding we find his daughter. Then he started in with the demon-snatching nonsense, but with a little poking around, it doesn’t seem so far-fetched.”
A demon might not be truly stalking the Chicago streets for prey, but a different sort of monster was.
“Radu.” Thomas abruptly faced us, his jaw set.
Noah and I exchanged worried glances. Perhaps Thomas needed to get some rest—he’d been under severe stress and it was obviously affecting his senses.
“He was an interesting man,” I said. It was a kindness, really. Professor Radu had been our folklore instructor back at the forensics academy in Romania. He’d filled our heads with stories of vampires and werewolves—legends and myths he claimed weren’t strictly fantasy. Why in the name of the queen Thomas was thinking of him at a time such as this was beyond me. Though, knowing him, he had his reasons. “I thought you were considering the missing women. How does Radu fit in?”
“Fantastical stories about horrific events take a person out of their terror—they’re removed from it—therefore, we must pay close attention to the monsters he describes. They aren’t fantasy at all.” Thomas picked his cloak up from the back of his chair and addressed Noah. “I need to speak with Mr. Cigrande myself. Will you take us to him?”
Mr. Cigrande was hunched against the wind, his ungloved hands raw and cracked as he shook his bell at young women exiting the train depot. “Go back to your homes, heathens! The devil is coming for you! Run! Run while you’re still able!”
The constant clanging of the bell was bringing on a massive headache and the icy wind whipping down the avenue wasn’t helping to alleviate my growing discomfort. I held on to Thomas with one hand and my cane with the other while Noah walked along beside us.
“Let’s inquire about a demon, shall we?” I asked.
Thomas’s mouth quirked, but he didn’t entertain me or Noah with any of his usual wit. His mind was now fully engaged in solving this new mystery. I could only hope it would unlock another clue for us as well. There had to be a connection to these cases.
Noah made his way to Mr. Cigrande first, waving as we all gathered around him. “Mr. Cigrande, I’d like to introduce you to—”
“Heathens!” The poor man shivered in place. “I won’t talk to wicked souls.”
“These wicked souls are good with locating impossible clues. If you’d like a better shot at finding your daughter, you’ll reconsider,” Noah said, his tone sharpening. “It might behoove you to speak with them.”
Mr. Cigrande cast a suspicious look our way. I mentally counted to five; poking him with my cane wouldn’t solve my problem of being deemed a heathen. I looked about for a way to get us all off the street, away from distractions. A sign fashioned to look like a teapot hung from the awning of one business. I pulled my shoulders back, adopting my best posture for my best attempt at soothing him.
“Would you like to speak someplace warm? There’s a little tearoom just over there.” I nodded two doors down, saying prayers of thanks for the establishment being so close. “They advertise melted chocolate and milk. Might be fortifying if you’ve planned a long afternoon of…”
I bit my lip, at a loss for how to describe his screaming at young women. Blessedly, Mother Nature aided our endeavor by opening up the skies, shaking snow and bits of ice out of the clouds. Cold, miserable, and now wet,