be in the same room with things like computers and stuff.”
I knew where she’d read that. I bit my lip. It was to our advantage to spread a little misinformation whenever we could.
“Convenient as that explanation is,” said Jenny dryly, “I would like to know what would happen if Cantrip magically figures out what the cameras would have shown if they hadn’t … glitched. I am your lawyer; I can’t help you if I don’t know the truth.”
“Someone came in with Adam and saved my skin,” I told her. “The means that someone used would make that someone very valuable to the military or any number of other disreputable types who might resort to kidnapping to get that kind of power under their control. I’m just glad that the glitch happened when it did. That way, we can just give the credit to my husband and ensure that a Good Samaritan doesn’t suffer for saving my bacon. We’d like to leave that person out completely.”
“Okay,” she said. “If the opportunity comes up, I might remind Cantrip that there is already one video in existence showing exactly what Adam is capable of.” She wasn’t looking at me, and I was glad. Adam had, in a graphic fashion, destroyed the body of the man who’d assaulted me. The video of that had been released so that neither Adam nor I was charged with murder. It was only supposed to go to certain people, but it had been seen more widely than it should have been. “And,” she continued, “that a second example wasn’t wanted. That way, no one will be looking for another reason for the glitch. Is that acceptable?”
“Fine,” said Adam.
“You gave me a brief statement before we watched the video. Now tell me again who this is that broke into the garage and why he attacked Mercy.”
I folded my arms and put my forehead down on the desk while Adam talked. The next thing I knew, Adam had gathered my hair in one hand and tipped my head sideways. I blinked at him.
“She needs to see the burn on your face,” Adam said.
It took me a moment to process what he said, then I sat up and showed her myself. I showed her the burns on my hands and arms and the one on my ribs. I’d put Bag Balm on them, and they felt better, despite what the EMT had said.
“You shot the dog first,” Jenny said, “the one that … er … turned into a man? Then he threw some sort of fire magic at you and burned your cheek—that’s not on the disc I saw, but Adam told me that it’s on the second disc. Then you fired five times at him, three to the head, two to the chest. You jumped on the car, looking for a way out, and when it became obvious that there was nothing available, you engaged in battle with Juan Flores, who apparently is a Canary Islands volcano god named Guayota?”
She was scary good. She got out the last part of the sentence without any inflection.
“Almost,” said Adam. “First, he broke into the garage with a crowbar. We have that caught on the outside camera.”
She nodded. “Okay, I’d like to wait until I’ve had a chance to review all the discs available, but, as you’ve pointed out, there is the worry that in the meantime some poor law-enforcement officer will run into him without knowing what he is. We need to let the law-enforcement agencies know what they might be dealing with. With that in mind, and with your permission, I’ll send copies of the discs to the police immediately.”
“And,” I added because it seemed an important part of the narrative, “he admitted to me that he’d killed seven women whose bodies were discovered yesterday … no, sorry.” Just because I hadn’t slept didn’t mean that time hadn’t passed. Her assistant handed me an ice-cold bottle of water. I took it and drank a quarter of it down. “It was the day before yesterday, Thursday. The police took me out to the crime scene to see if werewolves were responsible for the massacre.”
Her right eyelid twitched. “That’s the first I’ve heard of this. When did he admit that? I didn’t see it.”
“That’s the ‘trouble in Finley’ I was talking about,” I told her.
She took in a deep breath. She made me go over all that I knew about the seven women and assorted horses and dogs that Guayota had killed near