6 
CAUGHT BETWEEN A COP AND A HARD CASE
You know, when I was Kevin Kichida’s age, interrogation rooms didn’t mess around,” I commented. “There were drains in the concrete so that cops could hose the blood away, sweat lamps the size of miniature football field lights, and steel benches bolted to the floor.”
Molly’s voice did something weird while she talked out of the side of her mouth. “It was a hard time, with hard men and hard drinking.”
“Yeah, easy there, 1937,” Sig said, dropping my birth year.
I smiled but still indicated the Tatum Police Department interrogation room that Kevin Kichida was sitting in. “I’m not saying it was better. I’m just saying, this place is a spa.”
It was sort of true. The walls of the climate-controlled room were warm-colored, probably because some social psychologist from Berkeley had theorized that people would be more willing to open up in a nurturing environment. Kevin’s chair looked reasonably comfortable, plastic but curved to accommodate a spine, and there was even an empty chair on Kevin’s side of the table to remind interviewees that they had the right to request a lawyer. Not that Kevin was being charged with anything.
Instead, Kevin had waited in the community room while Cahill interviewed other witnesses of the truck “accident.” People were being asked to look at a composite sketch to see if it resembled the man who had climbed out of the truck. Me. It had been a pain in the ass sneaking into the station around the witnesses too, but Cahill was being crafty. Molly had been sitting right next to Kevin, and Cahill had apologized to her for the inconvenience and explained that they normally would have just interviewed people on the scene, but that they were trying to track the movements of the man who had climbed out of the truck because he might be involved in another investigation. Cahill asked if Molly would mind being interviewed in an interrogation room, half laughing and explaining that she wasn’t a suspect or anything, that it was the only clean and quiet place in the police station right then. She had agreed. Then Cahill had apologized again and said that she would have to leave any electronic devices with a clerk because there were security regulations about allowing recording devices into the area, and again, Molly had agreed.
Ten minutes later, Cahill and Molly had returned, laughing and being polite, and then Cahill had let her go and repeated the process with Choo. When Cahill and Choo came back after a short interval, Cahill had done the same with a waitress and three other customers. When Cahill finally came to Kevin Kichida with the same proposition, what was the kid going to do? Scream that he wanted a lawyer?
But as soon as Kevin and Cahill sat down, a deputy had come in as arranged and called Cahill away on some administrative matter. Cahill had apologized to Kevin saying he would be right back. Now Kevin was just sitting there, stewing in his own juice.
For our part, we—that is, Sig, Choo, Molly, and I—were with Cahill in the observation area adjacent to the interrogation room, watching Kevin Kichida through the one-way glass. Cahill’s being the sheriff really did have some advantages.
“We still have places and ways for making things uncomfortable for a perp,” Cahill said, but he didn’t take his eyes off Kevin and he didn’t get specific. “But we have to be more creative now.”
“I’ll bet,” I shifted in my chair. Ironically, our room was actually less comfortable than Kevin’s. We weren’t in New England, but we were damn close, and the furniture was that strange combination of utilitarian and ornate: polished walnut chairs with elaborate scrollwork carved into them. I would have preferred some cushions. The only decorations on the plain white walls were an intercom phone and a fire extinguisher.
Sig patted my knee. “You just don’t like being near interrogation rooms, period.”
“Got yourself a bit of an authority complex there, Charming?” Cahill asked mildly.
“I don’t know why they call it a complex,” I grumbled. “It’s more like an authority simplification. I don’t like authorities.”
“Unless you’re being one,” Cahill sniped.
“Oh kiss my ass,” I shot back. “I was trained by professional monster hunters, and I’ve been doing this kind of thing for more than half a century. How long have you known about the supernatural again?”
Cahill gave me just a bit of a warning glare. “Before I started living it? Four years.”
“Holy shit! Four years? Four whole years of not knowing what you were doing and picking shit up as you went along?” I put my coffee cup on the floor so that I could drop down on my knees and clasp my hands in front of Cahill imploringly. “Oh Great Master! Forgive this blind fool’s impertinence in even presuming that his humble self might have some paltry crumbs of knowledge worthy of passing on to one so wise and learned. Teach me! Teach me! Teach me!”
“Fuck off!” Cahill was pissed but he was also laughing. “Why do you got to be such a smartass all the time?”
Choo jumped in with his own contribution. “What I want to know is, why are you actin’ so antsy? I’m the black man in a police station. Hell, that boy in there looks more comfortable than you do.”
It was true. I was having some bad memories and couldn’t get comfortable. I had been on the other side of an interrogation the year before, and the Knights Templar don’t much care about Miranda rights. Sig was the only one in the room who knew the details. She reached over and rubbed my arm as I got back in my seat, but before I could deflect Choo’s question, Cahill decided to take control of the situation again. “Choo’s right. This Kevin Kichida isn’t acting like a normal kid.”
We all looked at Kevin. He seemed composed and self-contained.
“I’ve seen professional killers who weren’t this patient,” Cahill added. “I don’t think the waiting is getting under this kid’s skin at all.”
“He was acting kind of squirrelly after the truck crash,” Molly offered. “He got a little impatient when he couldn’t get his waitress to bring him his check quickly.”
“He didn’t volunteer anything when you showed up so fast and asked if anyone had seen John leave the truck either,” Choo told Cahill. “If I hadn’t pointed him out, I don’t think he would have said nothing.”
“He didn’t look too happy at showing me his identification before I asked him to come to the station now that I think about it,” Cahill recalled. “Has Parth broken into the kid’s cell phone yet?”
“No,” Sig said slowly. “He says it’s registered to a Terry Woods, but he hasn’t gotten any further than that. Parth also says Kevin’s normal phone is back on campus.”
“So Kevin was hanging out in a public place with an emergency phone that’s not under his own name,” I commented. “And he’s not carrying the normal phone that could be tracked easily. You know what that sounds like, right?”
“Fuck this.” Cahill stood up. “I’m just going to trance this kid. We’ll find out what we need to know, and we won’t have to wonder if he’s telling the truth either.”
And that was my real issue with Ted Cahill in a nutshell.
I mean, yeah, there was the Sig thing, but honestly, that was more Cahill’s issue with me. Sig was coming out of a seriously messed-up relationship that was all tangled up with a history of substance abuse and codependence, and one of the reasons she and I were taking things slow was that she wanted to make sure whatever we had was real and strong enough to build on. She could never be into a man who had made her feel things that weren’t true, however briefly or unintentionally. That’s just the way it was. If Cahill thought he was in a love triangle… well, that was his problem.
My problem was that Cahill didn’t seem to think what had happened between him and Sig was that big of a deal. He wanted to flex and explore his new powers, and maybe that’s understandable. Being able to get inside someone’s head must be every homicide cop’s dream. I mean, let’s be honest, what if you suddenly had the ability to make people answer any question you wanted, or forget anything you wanted, or behave any way you wanted within reason? Would you immediately say to yourself, “This power of mine to play with someone’s innermost psyche is a form of molestation or rape, and I won’t do it”?
Or would you maybe ask a few people what they really thought about you? Or ask the person you’re seeing to open up about what’s been bothering them? Would you make your best friend stop singing that annoying song that they don’t even know the right lyrics to? Just to be naughty and daring, would you ask a really hot stranger to strip and then make them forget it ever happened? Would you tell your boss to give you that promotion you deserve, or make someone quiet down in a theater, or tell your sibling’s husband or wife to treat them better? Is there anyone you would like to “help” give up cigarettes or stop drinking or lose weight? It all sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? Like the premise of a romantic comedy.
Now imagine someone else—and I don’t know which would be worse, a complete stranger or someone you love—having that kind of power over you.
Does it still sound great? Or did the movie in your head just turn into a psychological thriller with a bloody ending?
“We should try to talk to this kid first,” I objected. “Trancing him ought to be a last resort.”
Sig looked over at me curiously. “Didn’t I say we should talk to him back in the coffeehouse?”
“We know Kevin really is in danger now,” I said. “That changes things. If Kevin doesn’t know anything about it, he needs to. And if he does know something, we should give him a chance to come clean.”
“Or we could just stop dicking around and I could just ask him my way right now,” Cahill repeated. “And we’d know he was telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. It’s not like I’d hurt the kid.”
Molly intervened before Cahill and I could get into it again. “This is your town, your rules, Ted. But speaking just for me, I’d rather focus on how we’re going to protect Kevin than how we’re going to violate his rights.”
“Who even says we should protect him?” Cahill demanded, feeling defensive now. “So far, two innocent people have gotten killed because they got between Kevin and the person who’s after him—and we still don’t know anything about whoever that is or why they have a beef with the kid.”
“We know some,” Choo corrected. “We know whoever it is likes to send monsters to do their dirty work.”
We were interrupted by a hesitant knock on the door.
“Come on in, Eric,” Cahill’s spine straightened. His chin tilted downward slightly and his face assumed a professional and polite neutrality.
A thirty-some-year-old man dressed in a deputy’s uniform stuck his head in the door. He had the thinness and slightly cured skin of a longtime smoker. “Pam Williams wants to talk to you about the search we’ve organized for her daughter. I wouldn’t bother you, but she’s spiraling out of control again. She’s sent me twenty texts in the last hour.”
Cahill rubbed his forehead with the palm of his hand. “Tell Mrs. Williams that I put you in charge of it because I’m dealing with a truck accident on Main Street.”
“I did. I just… well… Her daughter is dating Ryan Arnold’s kid,” the deputy reminded him.
Cahill digested this information silently. His predecessor had left the Tatum Police Department suddenly after a mild stroke, and I found myself wondering if Cahill had used his new mental powers on the board or council that had interviewed him for his interim position. Either way, sooner or later, Cahill was going to have to run for election if he wanted to stick around, and he couldn’t hypnotize an entire town.
Cahill sighed. “Tell her I’ll update her myself as soon as I’m done interviewing witnesses.”
The man nodded, hesitated, and then indicated Kevin. “Is everything okay with that kid?”
“Witnesses saw Nate Johnson hanging around this boy right before he wandered into that truck, and Nate was on drugs,” Cahill said shortly. “The kid is also in Lindsey Williams’s horseback riding class, and she’s disappeared. It might be a coincidence, or maybe bad things are happening around this kid because he’s dealing drugs. I’m going to lean on him a tiny little bit.”
The cop still lingered and looked at us. Sig was supposed to be some kind of psychic that Cahill had discreetly contacted about Lindsey Williams’s disappearance, and I was supposed to be an expert tracker. Molly and Choo had both been witnesses at the accident. You could see him trying to make those puzzle pieces fit.
Cahill didn’t take the hint and explain. “Is there anything else, deputy?”
It was a curt dismissal hiding behind a question mark. The man mumbled a “No, sir” and closed the door.
After a moment, Sig picked up where we’d left off. “We know something else about whoever’s doing all this. If that Eek Usage spell had worked, Kevin would have just disappeared without a trace. And if the bhut had killed Kevin and then abandoned that homeless man’s body, you’d just have a case of some vagrant going crazy and killing a college student before dropping dead. Whoever we’re after doesn’t want to violate the Pax Arcana or leave any fingerprints.”
“For now.” Cahill’s expression was sour. “Another thing we don’t know is how far this unknown son of a bitch—no offense, John—is willing to escalate if we keep making things difficult.”
“We at least need to protect this kid until we know what the stakes are,” I argued. “And that includes not giving his head an enema. Kevin might know something that an evil person doesn’t want getting out. Or the kid could be part of a prophecy. Or maybe his death is the sacrifice that’s going to summon some butt-ugly fuckmunch—no offense, Ted.”
“Or maybe the kid isn’t some innocent victim at all,” Cahill shot back. “Maybe he’s in this up to his eyeballs.”
“Kevin Kichida is an essentially good person,” Sig said firmly.
“You said that about me once,” Cahill reminded her shortly, his face flint. “And that didn’t turn out so well.”
Sig didn’t blink. “I knew you had the potential to be a selfish prick. But there’s no way that you’ve become someone who will let an unknown person come into your territory and kill whoever they feel like, so stop posturing.”
“Who’s posturing?” Cahill didn’t blink, either. “You broke my main street.”
“If you want us to go home, say so,” Sig challenged.
He just stood there. It struck me as ironic that Kevin Kichida was keeping his cool, and our group was falling apart. If this was what working with Sig’s team was like, I wasn’t sure I wanted to do it. Monster hunts get messy enough without a bunch of personal drama.
Cahill stalked toward the door. “Fine. I’ll question the kid the old-fashioned way. For now.”
We sat there for a few moments after the door closed, no one saying anything until Choo said: “Huh.”
He packed a lot of meaning into that grunt.
“That got a little too intense for my tastes,” Molly confessed. I’m not sure if that was connected to her next comment or not, but she added: “I have to pee.”
“As soon as I leave, something bad will happen,” Molly explained.
“Something bad is going to happen sooner or later anyway.” It was an odd way to reassure her, but Sig and Molly understood each other. “You don’t want to have a urinary tract infection when it does.”
“Fine. But it’s on your head.” Molly left.
Cahill entered the interrogation room with a clipboard that had a sketch that vaguely looked like me on it. Kevin got up from his seat and stepped up to offer Cahill his hand. Cahill gave the hand a short pump. “Thanks for waiting, Mr. Kichida. Hey, do you mind if I record this? It would save someone else from having to read my handwriting.”
“Sure.” Kevin’s face and voice were affable, but he stiffened when he touched Cahill’s hand. What had he sensed, and how had he sensed it?
“Thanks.” Cahill sounded sincere. “Sorry I kept you so long. I had to talk with a mother whose daughter is missing. A college girl.”
When Kevin stepped back to the table, he sat down on the police side with his back to the observation window. Maybe he didn’t know better, but I kind of thought he did. “Is she all right?”
Cahill sat down across from him with no sign of disgruntlement. “No. No, she’s not. Her daughter’s missing. Maybe you know the girl. Lindsey Williams?”
The muscles between Kevin’s shoulders began to stiffen again, but it stopped there, as if his brain were reaching down and squeezing the neurons before they could travel any farther down his spine. “She’s in my equestrian studies program.”
Cahill blinked. “What, you’re in that program too? Huh.” He packed a bit of I’m sorry; I thought you were a man attitude into that huh, but Kevin didn’t rise to the bait. “Hey, since you’re here, maybe you could tell me. Did Lindsey have a wild streak? Did she seem like the kind of kid who would run off without telling anyone?”
Kevin shook his head emphatically. “If Lindsey’s missing, it’s because something happened to change her reality.”
“Philosophy classes,” Sig murmured next to me under her breath.
Cahill just stared at him blankly. “What do you mean?”
“Lindsey stayed hunched inside her bubble like a fetus.” Kevin ticked off points on his hand. “Horses. Grades. Boyfriend. If it didn’t have something to do with one of those three things, she wasn’t interested.”
Cahill gave a friendly chuckle. “You asked her out and she shot you down, huh?”
Kevin looked surprised. “I don’t even know her.”
“So, how do you know all this bubble stuff?” Cahill seemed puzzled. “It sounds like you knew her pretty well.”
“I pay attention.” There was a slight hint of That’s why I know you’re full of shit in Kevin’s tone. His intelligence and focus were palpable things, and if he’d grown up a military brat and studied aikido, he’d had practice being around authority too. But he was still young and male.
“She did keep to herself, mostly,” Cahill muttered distractedly as he put his clipboard on the table. “It’s making my job a lot harder.” He made a production out of looking for a pen.
“Did?” Kevin raised an eyebrow. “She doesn’t anymore?”
For a second, something pissed-off and menacing flickered across Cahill’s face, but he covered it by continuing to pat himself down. “I mean, before she disappeared.”
Kevin offered him a pen. “Keep it.”
Cahill took the pen with a small laugh. “Thanks. It’s probably good you don’t know Lindsey well. I have to tell you it’s not looking good.”
“Is that why I’m really here?” Kevin asked softly. “Because if it is, I would like to call my father.”
Cahill acted surprised. “Is that why you should be here?”
Kevin’s voice shook for the first time, just a bare hint of a quaver. “Do you know what it feels like when someone is staring at you?”
“No,” Cahill lied.
“I do,” Kevin said. “You’ve been watching me through that mirror. Several other people still are. I would like to call my father.”
I found myself standing up.
Cahill didn’t answer directly. “Did you feel Nate Johnson looking at you too? One of our witnesses says Nate was staring at you through the restaurant window as if he knew you. Nate’s the man who went down the street and stepped in front of a truck.”
Kevin didn’t raise his voice. “I want to call my father. Or I want a lawyer who will call him for me.”
Cahill leaned forward across the table and stared directly into Kevin’s eyes. Cahill’s body language clearly said Enough of this shit. “Hey Kevin, look at me.”
Kevin did. And maybe Molly should have held her water after all, because everything went to hell.