Living with the Dead - By Kelley Armstrong Page 0,93

YOU CATCH SOMEONE who is watching your every move? Let her watch.

If Adele wanted Robyn, then they’d give her Robyn. Maybe she’d realized it was a trap. Or maybe after that long night, she was sleeping. They were counting on the latter. They moved Robyn to location two: a big-box bookstore that encouraged browsing, where she wouldn’t look out of place.

As for the chance that a concerned citizen would recognize her from Friday’s paper, she’d been wandering around L.A. for three days, and no one seemed to notice. It was a big anonymous city. Robyn was young, blond and attractive. Los Angeles was full of younger, blonder and more attractive women.

Their new choice came with an even better surveillance location—a coffee shop on the second floor, overlooking the first, where Robyn sat. They’d been there just long enough to buy coffees when Karl said, “We’re being followed.”

When Hope looked up, he shook his head and touched the side of his nose, meaning he’d smelled someone, not seen him.

“Someone from the diner?” she asked.

“No, from when I was circling the block. I noticed it then because the scent seemed vaguely familiar. Now I’ve picked it up again, so it’s not likely a coincidence.”

“You said it seemed familiar . . .”

He nodded. “I’m still trying to figure out from where. It’s nobody I know—likely just a scent I’ve crossed.”

In other words, someone may have been following them for a while. Not a werewolf, though—Karl would have mentioned that. Hope put out her own feelers, presuming anyone following them would be a supernatural, but she didn’t detect anything.

“I don’t think he’s up here,” Karl said. “I just caught a note of scent. I’m going to scout downstairs.”

He left and she continued watching, her attention divided between the front doors and Robyn, who’d settled in with a history book, seated beside a sign announcing an author signing and giving the store branch name.

There was no sign of Adele. Earlier, when Robyn mentioned that Adele provided photos for True News, Hope had contacted her editor. It turned out they did have a phone number for Adele. Paige was running it now, but tracking its origins was turning out to be an ordeal. Whoever Adele was, she’d covered her tracks well.

Hope’s cell phone vibrated against the table. Probably Detective Findlay. He’d left five messages. The last one mentioned a death at the fair. She’d paid attention only long enough to hear that the victim wasn’t Gilchrist or Adele but an elderly lady. He hadn’t given any other details, telling her to look it up in the morning paper.

A threat. Hope understood that as clearly as if he’d said: “Here’s another one I can pin on your friend.” He’d known Robyn had been at the fair last night. In fact, she wouldn’t put it past the Nast Cabal to manufacture another murder, just to hammer Robyn’s coffin shut.

But when she checked the caller ID, it wasn’t the detective.

“Behind you there’s a hall,” Karl said when she answered. “Down it you’ll find bathrooms and a handicap elevator. Take that elevator to the first floor. Then head right, along the wall, into the children’s section. He’s in the stacks there. See if you can pick up any vibes.”

“Got it.” She stood. “What does he look like?”

“No idea. I can smell him, but I don’t dare get close enough for a look. From where I am, if I step out, he’ll see me.”

“It’s a man, then?”

Karl confirmed that. Hope found the elevator where he said it would be. She presumed he wanted her to take it so if their pursuer was watching her, he’d think she’d just gone to the bathroom.

At the far side of the children’s section, she thumbed through a Disney book. The vision came quickly, blurred at first, like viewing it through a greasy lens. She saw . . . someone standing at a bookshelf?

Damn it. A chaos vision. She shook her head sharply to clear it, startling a preteen girl reading beside her. It was like shaking a snow globe, though—the image obscured for only a moment, then settled back. Someone at a bookshelf. What kind of chaos event was that? She barely had time to wonder before the picture flipped like a slide show, moving to a man walking past a bank of tables. He was just as blurred as the woman, but she recognized him by his stride. Karl.

The image flipped again. The woman. She could make out a long ponytail of black curls