“How’s the Kruge investigation?”

She checked our surroundings before responding. Even when she did, she pitched her voice for my ears only. “Still haven’t found the troll Croda. She’s the only connection to Kruge we have that we haven’t been able to clear. Why, do you know something?”

I shook my head. Keeva had a habit of not asking for help. She had to be coming up really dry to ask me outright if I had heard anything.

I gestured with my glass. “And here’s the man of the hour.”

MacGoren moved in behind Keeva, wrapping his arm around her waist. Even to my doubting eye, the smile she gave him looked genuine. He tapped my glass, showing a wide smile. “Hello, Grey. Are you intercepting Briallen’s social invitations, too?”

I did my best to smile at his joke that I was sure was an unspoken dig. “Something like that. Nice turnout.”

He glanced around him, assessing the gathering. “We’ll see later in the evening. I’m gauging interest.”

I looked at the map. “Looks like you’re pretty interested. Don’t you own most of this land?”

He nodded several times, his eyes roaming the maps as though he were confirming that all his properties had been noted. “You know your neighborhood well. There are some major pieces that need to be picked up to move forward, but, yes, a lot is mine.”

I already knew that. An interesting bit of coincidence was that Dennis Farnsworth had been found on macGoren property. “A murder victim was found on some of that land.”

MacGoren turned his smile into a pensive look. “Yes, I heard. It’s sad when young people get caught up with drugs.”

I kept my face and voice nonchalant. Janey Likesmith would file her research with the Farnsworth file, but it was too early for Keeva to have received it, never mind mention it to macGoren. “Who said anything about drugs?”

The smile quirked back on his face. “I just assumed. You know that neighborhood.”

“Yes. I live there.” Running down macGoren’s holdings the previous night, I found two large parcels that were divided by a sliver of land he did not own. I brushed my fingers on the map. “Isn’t this area where Alvud Kruge had his office?”

The smile hadn’t left his face. “Alvud was interested in the project, if that’s what you’re asking.”

I pursed my lips. “Alvud,” not “Kruge.” A little more familiarity there than I would have thought. “Interesting,” I said. “A man with a reputation for social change was interested in destroying the neighborhood he was trying to save?”

I caught a chink in the smile. “Improving is the word, Grey.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Kruge was going to sell?”

MacGoren shrugged. “We talked about it. Alvud was not one to stand in the way of progress.”

I glanced back at the maps. “Well, he’s not standing in anyone’s way now.”

MacGoren threw his head back and laughed. “Now there’s black humor. Good thing I was with Keeva the night he died, or I’d be worried.”

I locked eyes with Keeva, and she stiffened in macGoren’s arms. She caught it, too. “I’d rather not talk about work,” she said.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize we were working, Keeva,” I said.

She extricated herself from macGoren’s embrace and took his hand. “We should be mingling.”

MacGoren looked curiously at us both. “Yes, well, good to see you again, Grey.”

I bowed my head. “And you.”

I watched them walk away. She had just told me she hadn’t been with macGoren in a week, and yet he lied and said they were together the night Kruge died. I half expected Keeva to turn back, give me a look that said she recognized that. But she didn’t. I decided to give her the benefit of the doubt, for now. I had a feeling that macGoren was in for some interesting pillow talk tonight.

I wandered through the reception, eavesdropping where and when I could. It’s remarkable what people will say loudly to each other in a noisy hallway as if no one else could hear their gossip. I was disappointed, though. No real gems came up, certainly nothing more interesting than my own conversation with macGoren. I had his connection to Kruge that Eagan was looking for, but it didn’t look all that interesting yet. I didn’t believe for a moment Kruge was interested in selling to him.

Alvud Kruge was the major topic of conversation. I didn’t think anyone would mention Dennis Farnsworth, and I wasn’t disappointed in that regard. Most of the people there had given to Kruge’s causes at one time or another. They were the type. They just didn’t seem to understand that his causes were about people like Farnsworth. Throw a little money around and hope it solves a problem. Kruge did more. He got his hands dirty on the street.

As I watched macGoren work the crowd with Keeva at his side, I had to wonder what dirtied his hands. Seacorp was a big project. He stood to make millions. What he probably didn’t know was that the Weird was as much a concept as a place. He could bulldoze it, but these people would just move elsewhere. And they would remember what he had done. There’s payback in that eventually. Especially if the foundations are laid on pain and rejection.

Chapter 10

I had a nice surprise outside the hotel. Murdock was waiting for me in his car, parked in the fire lane outside the hotel. I had left him a voice mail telling him where I was going, but I didn’t actually ask for a ride. For a change. Maybe he’s getting to the point where he just assumes that. At least he hasn’t bitten my head off about it like I’m sure someone else would.

One of my goals in life was to answer two questions. When did Murdock sleep? He had a habit of working long hours before I even rolled out of bed and yet somehow still had the ability to work past midnight. How did he manage to look freshly dressed? My clothes wrinkle if I think about wearing them. His shirt and pants always looked just pressed.

I opened the passenger door and removed a pizza box from the seat. I left it sitting prominently on a trash can in front of the hotel’s revolving door. Then I fell into the seat, and he pulled out.

He glanced at me with amusement. “You smell like money.”

“Yeah, I need a shower,” I said.

Murdock skipped the turn onto Old Northern Avenue that leads to my street. We continued down to Summer Street and hung the left over the channel. “Where are you taking me?”

“The gang unit came through with an address for Moke. Thought we could shake his crib a little,” he said.

“Could be fun. Speaking of trolls, I asked Cal to get us a line on where we can find C-Note. If I can get close to him, I can see if his essence matches anything I found at Kruge’s office,” I said.

Murdock drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “You mean Kruge’s office where Kruge was murdered, which is a case we are not working on? That Kruge’s office?” He had a lazy smile on his face when he said it.

“Yeah, that Kruge’s office,” I said. He just shook his head slowly with the same smile.

When Murdock and I were at Yggy’s last night, his essence had blazed around him unlike any human essence I had seen. In my natural, unfocused state, I’m aware of the essence around me like a type of peripheral vision. I sense stuff, but it’s just sort of hanging there unattended. We leave essence everywhere we go, and the essence of where we go even lingers on us as well. Murdock’s car, for instance, always has a residue of his essence because he spends so much time in it. Mine’s there, too. It doesn’t fade because it’s constantly reinforced. The champagne flute I left at the reception has my essence on it, but that will fade because I’ve had only brief contact with it.

I focused my senses on him. Murdock’s essence glowed next to me, not as brightly as at the bar, but more than it ever had before it changed. On our last big case together, he had taken a hit from a bolt of fey energy that almost killed him. Instead, it supercharged his body essence somehow. I can tell he doesn’t understand what that means yet. If the fight at Yggy’s was any indication, though, he’s faster and stronger than he ever was. It’s not easy for a human to knock out an elf, and he did it with one punch.