The return ride to our rental room at Henry's resembled a mime convention…no talking. Jane maneuvered the aerocycle as it zipped so that it dipped and skipped across other lanes and wautos. In her wake, drivers honked, cursed and tried to cut her off in road rage protests and life endangering retaliation.

I held on for dear life, tightly gripping Jane's black leather bomber.

But she seemed oblivious to all the chaos that sprang up in her wake as she raced across town. Lost in thoughts and no doubt memories of her cousin, her driving made me wonder if Jane wasn’t eager to join Amanda in the morgue.

If there would even be enough of us left to scoop up and put into a jar. Mid-air collisions were often fatal and pieces of humans, wautos and whatever else floated down to the earth with such speed and force that very little remained of the individual or people in the crafts.

Have I mentioned I hated aerocycles?

Enclosed in a shell of reinforced fiberglass and metal, I feel safer. Although a collision at this height either in a wauto or aerocycle would probably kill me, I still liked being in a wauto.

Jane jetted along.

Not all cases ended with a happily ever after.

All right. None of my cases end up with a happily ever after.

Honesty. My best policy.

Yeah right.

The elevated lanes were miles up in the air. Down below us rested a quiet, rain-drenched Memphis. The afternoon sun, cutting through a tiny section of sky, spotlighted a section of the partially wet city as we zoomed above in lighted lanes. We passed over a small pond and from this distance it resembled a sullen gray coin.

The air whipped across my throat where my helmet stopped. So cold that I envisioned it stripping away flesh and forcing my eyes to tear up. It made my wounds itch and beg to be scratched.

I knew we were in for a little more rain. The air was damp with promise that a downpour was on tap for later. In the distance, the lowering sun turned the clouds a mustard color. Thick with moisture, the air smelled like rain.

And I thought of Buffy, the VSI girl.

“Looks like rain is coming,” Jane said into her microphone.

The aerocycle’s X blasters roared so loud that there was no way for me to hear her speak. So we both wore helmets with little microphones so we could talk to each other.

“It may turn into snow,” I said. "Or ice if the temperature dips down enough tonight."

“Yeah,” she said. Her voice had that quietness that came with immense sadness.

As if hearing our conversation, icy rain leaked from the sky, spraying us with tiny ice pebbles. The sun still peeked out from rends in the clouds.

It wasn't the first time today that I'd been caught out in the rain. Despite that knowledge, it still didn't put me in a better mood.

Finding Amanda dead didn't help either.

After Marsha’s death, Jane continued to work. As did I. We were smack in the middle of a case that wouldn’t, no, let me correct that, couldn’t be dropped. Some people wanted us, and the rest of humanity that wasn’t a hatchling, dead.

Jane took the left lane and we headed downward toward the city. Overhead clouds rippled as if a giant finger poked the sky creating a mass of crinkles.

Fate was like that too.

A huge finger that jerked everybody’s chain.