Chapter Twenty-Five
I hadn’t called ahead to warn Volos I was on the way. I’d found it was best to keep him off kilter in order to keep an upper hand. The man was frustratingly hard to faze, so I’d take any advantage I could get.
I parked Sybil at the curb across from the luxury apartment building. Compared with the scene there a few nights before, the place looked quiet. There was a single cop car parked down the block. No doubt the uni was posted there to keep nosy citizens and even nosier journalists away from the crime scene on the fourth floor. I didn’t bother stopping to say hi. I knew Eldritch had started pulling guys from the other Babylon precincts to pitch in on the Owens case since all the Cauldron guys were busy keeping up with the moonie freaks.
I also didn’t stop to greet the guy because I wasn’t real eager for it to get back to Eldritch I was on the scene. No doubt he’d see my presence as a threat to his jurisdiction, and that would prompt a pissing match between him and Gardner that would only result in me getting drenched.
By the time the elevator dumped me off on the fourth floor, I was wondering if I’d made a mistake going there alone. Probably I should have called Morales and asked him to come play mediator. But I wasn’t real eager to drag him into the middle of the personal shit this conversation was bound to dredge up.
I took a deep, cleansing breath. The kind they teach in meditation workshops and 12-step programs to help you find your center. I took a few more because my center was getting harder and harder to access lately. But before I could exhale the third breath, the door opened and John was staring down at me with a curious expression.
“Why are you doing deep-breathing exercises in my hallway?”
I blew out the breath. “How did you know I’m out here?”
He jerked his head. “I have a video console that lets me see who’s in the elevator.”
I froze. “Does that mean you saw who came up to Owens’s apartment?”
“As I told the cops, I was asleep and didn’t hear or see anything during the hours the event occurred.” His tone lacked the practiced cadence of a lie, so I let it go. He crossed his arms and leaned against the doorjamb. “You been talking to your favorite snitch?” He didn’t sound surprised to see me at all.
I crossed my own arms and squinted at him. “You leaked the robbery to him?”
The corner of his mouth lifted. “No one has to leak anything to Little Man. I swear that tiny bastard is psychic.” He hesitated. “But I’ll admit I was hoping he’d tell you.”
“Why not call me yourself? Or the cops?”
He stepped back in a silent invitation to come inside. I walked into the hallway and waited for him to lead the way inside. It’s not that I didn’t want to turn my back to him. More that I didn’t want to get into the habit of making myself at home in his place.
“I knew you wouldn’t take my call.” He shut the door and moved past me toward the living room. “And I didn’t call the cops because I didn’t want them involved.”
I didn’t bother asking why. Volos only used cops when he thought he could control the outcome.
He motioned toward the couch in the sunken living room. The U-shaped leather couch was the color of rich cognac and looked as expensive as everything else in the room. Through the large windows along the back wall, the sun was kissing Lake Erie. Dusk. Only two nights until the Blue Moon, and we were no closer to finding Dionysus than we’d been a week earlier.
“What happened?” I asked, praying he had something that might break the case wide open.
He pulled two glasses from the bar and poured a couple of fingers of Pappy Van Winkle bourbon in them. Only the best in the Volos house. He didn’t bother asking me if I wanted any. I didn’t bother pretending I didn’t.
“One of my labs at Volos Towers was robbed.”
I frowned. “After midnight, right?”
He nodded and handed me my glass before joining me on the couch. “My security guy called me about an hour after I got home to let me know.”
“What was taken?” I took a gulp of the bourbon and savored the smoky sweet burn on its way home.
He grimaced. “That’s where this conversation gets tricky, Detective.”
I pursed my lips. “Been cooking dirty, Johnny?”
His jaw tightened at the nickname he’d always hated. “The cook was clean, but the materials weren’t exactly sanctioned by Uncle Sam.”
Most legitimate magic labs had to use ingredients authorized by the Federal Drug and Potion Agency. The government claimed this kept clean magic pristine, but everyone knew it was so they could ensure they got every penny in tax revenue they could from Big Magic companies, like Sortilege Inc.
“All right, so you were cooking something that might not be exactly legal. You got reason to think the perp was our friend Dionysus?”
John set down his drink and rose. He retrieved a file folder from the long granite counter separating his state-of-the-art kitchen from the living area. When he came back he threw the folder on my lap. Frowning, I opened it. Two photographs fell out. The first showed overturned stainless-steel tables and broken glass and equipment littering the floor. On the wall, someone had spray-painted the phrase IN VINO VERITAS. The second shot showed a large walk-in freezer with empty and overturned shelves.
My heart kicked into overdrive. “I’d say this looks like his handiwork.” I looked up at John. “How bad is the potion he took?”
John finished off his bourbon before answering. “About six months ago, a party contacted me needing a special package.”
“Should I even bother asking who?”
He shook his head. “It’s safer if you don’t.”
“Safer for me—or you?”
He smiled but didn’t elaborate. “They wanted me to develop a truth serum.”
I frowned. “That’s what all the secrecy is about. Everyone and their brother tries to cook a truth serum at some point.”
He shook his head. “They wanted something odorless, tasteless, and totally untraceable by all scientific and magical means.”
My eye widened. “Jesus. And you said yes?”
He had the decency to at least grimace. “The price was right.”
I sighed and shook my head. All along I’d suspected John had still been cooking. But hearing him admit to being what basically amounted to a magical mercenary made me sick to my stomach. Especially when he was cooking such dangerous shit. “You’re a bigger asshole than I gave you credit for.”