a phone call? This is a little more important!” What she wasn’t saying was that I had made her look bad in front of the police who were closely watching us.
“My girlfriend is pregnant. I just needed to check on her,” I said loudly so that anyone listening in on our conversation heard me.
“Oh,” Serah said, instantly deflating. “Sorry. I—I . . . we need to get back there.”
I forced a little smile, trying to show that I appreciated her concern. I didn’t want to think about Trixie while I was dealing with this mess. Shoving my hands into the pockets of my coat, I started toward the alley with the intention of trying to find some way to stall being kicked out of the crime scene by the cops, but I didn’t even get that far. Detective Curtis stepped in front of the alley, an ugly grin splitting his face.
“Time’s up,” he announced.
“It hasn’t been ten minutes,” I growled, resisting the urge to shove the man out of my way. Yeah, the Towers were having a very bad effect on my people skills and how I handled confrontation. At least I hadn’t reached for my wand, but I figured that it was only a matter of time.
“You walked away. We thought you were done with your little investigation,” the man continued in a condescending manner that had me grinding my teeth. “Now why don’t you run along back to your tattoo parlor and let the big boys deal with this.”
“Cut the crap, Curtis,” Serah snapped, shoving past me to get in the man’s face. It wasn’t the easiest of tasks since the tub of goo in the rumpled clothes had a good twelve inches in height on her, but she got an “A” for effort. “We’ve got work to do. I’d hate for my boss to call your boss. You know how fucking grumpy vamps are when you wake them in the day.”
Curtis flushed bright red and opened his mouth to start railing at her, but the sound remained trapped in his throat when a loud bang of thunder broke across the city. Everyone froze, their eyes jumping to the clear blue sky overhead.
“Shit,” the detective hissed, his face going from tomato red to snow white in a heartbeat. It was lucky that an ambulance was sitting nearby because this man was going to have a heart attack any second.
A second crack of thunder tore the sky and Gideon appeared in the center of the street, looking dark and sinister. Even I gave a little shiver at the sight of him, but then I knew he was pissed at me for dragging him from his nice warm bed where he had probably been wrapped around the soft body of his wife.
The warlock didn’t look directly at anyone as he strode wordlessly across the street toward the alley. Everyone scrambled to back away from him, while those standing by the police tape ran for the safety of their homes. As Gideon entered the alley, the cops that had been left with the body ran out the other end of the alley, probably heading down the street to circle around. That or they were just going to run back to the police station several miles away.
From where I stood near the mouth of the alley, I could see Gideon looking over the corpse before turning back. He looked significantly paler than when he’d first appeared, but I doubted that any other bystanders noticed it. They were too busy being scared shitless. Standing at the edge of the sidewalk, he finally looked over the surrounding people as if suddenly noticing that he wasn’t alone. Using all his imposing height, the warlock stepped close to Curtis so that the man was nearly curled into a ball of quivering fear while still standing.
“Leave,” Gideon said in a cold emotionless voice.
“B-b-but . . .” Curtis started to say as if he meant to argue with the warlock. Gideon only had to arch one eyebrow in question. “S-sorry. Yes-s-sir.” And then Curtis was running as fast as his legs would carry him back to his car.
It was like an official’s starter pistol had been fired into the air. Anyone who had lingered was now running toward their cars and fighting to get them started. Even I took an unconscious step backward but Gideon’s hand snaked out in a vicious flash and he grabbed the front of my coat before slamming me against the nearest wall.
“You’re with