Ilse was satisfied to sit passenger-side as Sawyer drover her through the city. “Rudy isn't calling back,” Sawyer said with a frown, his hands wrapped around the steering wheel.
A sudden dinging noise echoed in the car.
“Was that...,” Sawyer hesitated. “That wasn't mine.”
Ilse paused, then reached for her own phone in surprise. She pulled the device from her pocket, adjusting the seatbelt across her chest, and lowering her gaze from the windshield to look at her phone. “Oh,” she said suddenly. “I think he just texted me—I didn't know Rudy had my number.”
Sawyer snorted but didn't say anything.
Ilse winced. “Huh. Yeah... I guess that was a dumb comment.”
“Rudy has everyone's number,” Sawyer muttered. “What did he say?”
Ilse frowned at the message, clearing her throat. “Cleaning up some of the language,” she said in a clipped tone, “he says, and I quote, come on kids—you don't need me for this. Look at the dude's website, my dear! Now let daddy get his nap.”
Sawyer glanced at Ilse, his lips curving into the faintest smile which he tried to hide just as quickly. “What was that last part again?”
“The website part?”
“No, the other part. It just sounds so strange coming from your lips.”
Ilse snorted. “Guess we should check Mr. Clement's website, hmm?”
Sawyer kept one hand on the wheel, steering them through traffic as they moved towards a main road, and with his other he fished his phone from his pocket and handed it to Ilse. She accepted the device, and—with some instruction—found the internet browser and searched for the local would-be author's name.
The website came up slowly and looked like something from the nineties. Ilse tried to click on a couple of links, but they all lead to dead pages. On the front page, however, she spotted something that caught her attention.
“He does events,” she murmured.
“The author does?”
“Yes. Events—he's hosting one today. That must have been what Rudy meant.”
Sawyer frowned. “What time? Where?”
“At a booth,” Ilse replied. “At a local convention...” She clicked over to the webpage for the convention itself, a much more sleek, up-to-date site. She read the intro and then said, “It looks like a sort of fantasy convention in a conference room at the Autumn Hotel.”
“Huh.”
“What?”
“What's that?”
“A fantasy convention?”
“Mhmm.”
Ilse shrugged. “According to the website it's a place where people gather to enjoy fantasy, I guess. Some local authors will be there. Looks like some actor. I don't watch TV, but I guess she's a pretty big deal.”
“Forget about the actress. Autumn Hotel, you said? What time?”
Ilse glanced at the phone again then looked up. “There's an event every other Saturday—it's already started but goes for half the day. We still have time.”
Sawyer muttered to himself, but retrieved his phone and, eyes bouncing up and down from road to screen, programmed the GPS. He attached it to the suction on the windshield and then picked up the speed, following the thin, purple line on the device as it led them in the direction of the fantasy convention. And towards the location of the horror writer.
***
Ilse wanted to scan the conference hall, but she was having far too much fun simply watching Sawyer's expression. His eyes were wide beneath his baseball cap. His sleeves were rolled back, and his jeans—the same jeans he'd worn the previous day—had a coffee stain on the thigh. The man's calloused hands were hooked through his belt loops, and he was muttering beneath his breath. “Unbelievable.”
A fully armored knight walked past, tipping a gauntleted hand to his metal visor. “Hello,” an echoing voice said from within the costume. The knight continued on his way, clanking with the plastic and metal armor as he moved towards a table display.
More than a hundred folks had already arrived at the conference, and all of them were dressed in fairy cosplay or as knights and creatures from magical stories.
Judging by Sawyer's expression, he thought he was hallucinating.
“What was in that coffee?” he muttered. “Ilse... pinch me.”
She obliged, and he took his hat off to fan his face. “This is all... a bit much, isn't it?”
Ilse patted Sawyer on the same arm she'd playfully pinched. “You'll survive,” she said with a chuckle. “Stop staring at everyone. You're weirding them out.”
“I'm weirding them...,” Sawyer trailed off, shaking his head.
A woman wearing a tall, towering pink wig with butterfly barrettes and glitter batted her long, fake eyelashes at Sawyer as she passed, adjusting the transparent straps of her gossamer wings.
Ilse nodded politely at the conference-goer, but then began to lead Sawyer through the costumed cosplayers. If their killer was hiding among those in outfits, they'd never spot him. He'd blend right in. Perhaps this was how he'd found his previous victims—she'd have to check to see if they'd shared an interest in fantasy.
As Ilse moved through the booths, past tables with placards identifying the contents, she spotted two young men arguing behind one of the tables. Both men were pointing at each other, saying things like:
“I rented the spot last week. I didn't need to confirm.”
“Take it up with the host! My name is on the table. So it's mine.”
The two men both wore bright, bedazzled outfits. One of them had a knight's helmet, the other's face was sweaty beneath a tricorn hat with silver tassels. They were both pointing towards the table. One man stood protectively next to a box full of small, sixth-scale figurines. Another had stacks of comic books he was trying to arrange on the table. Every time he placed a comic, though, the second man grabbed it and pushed it back in the small carry-on case the first fellow was using.
“Stop touching them!” the man with the comics yelled. “You'll smudge them!”
The second man just sneered and said, “Go away. Find your own table.”
Ilse's eyes moved past the men, landing on a figure sitting at the far end of the arrangement, behind the smallest booth.
She froze.
The fellow was watching his bickering neighbors with a mild smile, as if the irritation caused him enjoyment. But at the same time, he kept glancing hopefully at passing conference-goers. None of them stopped in front of his table, however.
A small pile of books carried the same covers Ilse had seen online.
The man was bald, with bugging eyes. He wore a bowtie and a suit made of fake leaves and branches.
“There,” Ilse murmured beneath her breath to Sawyer, pointing towards the seated fellow.
The two of them made a beeline for the man, stepping past the table with the bickering patrons and coming to a halt in front of the author's booth.
“Hello!” the man said cheerfully, beaming now. “Interested in a gripping story with a clever twist?”
Ilse cleared her throat. “I'm afraid not, sir.”
The man took in their outfits, glancing at Sawyer's flannel to Ilse's sweater. His smile dimmed a few watts. “Do I know you...,” he said slowly.
“FBI,” Sawyer muttered, shooting an irritated glance to the arguing men at the second booth. “We need to ask you a few questions.
Clement's eyes bugged, even more than they had at first. “I—F—What? Shit—what's this about?”
Sawyer shook his head. “How about we go somewhere a bit more quiet, hmm?”
The author behind the table had frozen in place. His hands were flat against the table, the knuckles white. He stammered again, shaking his head faintly. “I—I don't have to go anywhere with you!” he protested. “You have no right!”
Sawyer frowned, stepping closer. “We need to speak with you, sir.”
The bug-eyed man glanced to Ilse then back, prickles of sweat on his forehead. One of his hands moved towards a book, gripping it as if preparing to use it like a club.
Just then, the comic-book owner shouted. “I said stop smudging them!” He threw a punch. A pathetic, weak, looping thing. More a slap, or a flail, really.
But he scored a blow on the other man's shoulder. This second fellow yelped as if he'd been shot and shoved the first man back. One of the fairy-women screamed.
Distracted, Sawyer glanced towards the aggressors. “Cut it out,” Sawyer snapped. “Before I come over there—ah shit. Hey, hey stop!”
But Mr. Clement had taken the opportunity presented. His chair toppled as he made good his getaway, sprinting in the opposite direction, towards a side exit door.
Sawyer was already breaking into a sprint as well, vaulting the table, and sending the books scattering. Ilse moved around the table, taking after the two men.
Her heart reached her throat, and her stomach churned. Another conference-goer screamed, someone shouted something. The two men fighting near the comic-book table were yelling back and forth as others arrived to try and separate them.
Their would-be suspect, though, reached the exit first, slamming a shoulder into the door. The fire alarm started blaring in the morning calm.
Sawyer grunted, slamming through the door a second later, his long legs carrying him rapidly forward. Ilse followed close behind, panting. She glimpsed the heel of the author disappear up a flight of stairs as Sawyer flung the exit open, and together, the two agents gave rapid pursuit.