I took a quick peek, then let out a low curse. At the bottom of the stairs lay Adam Taylor, head twisted at an unnatural angle.

Chapter 19

The angle of Adam Taylor’s neck had me fairly convinced that he was dead, but I still stooped and put my fingers to his throat to check for a pulse, while Ryan remained standing with his gun at the ready. I didn’t think that the golem was still around, but best to play it safe. The body was faintly cool to the touch, which led me to the unscientific conclusion that he’d been lying there for a couple of hours at least.

I straightened and Ryan gave me a questioning look. I stood still for a moment, sensing. Ryan remained quiet, watching and waiting.

“The resonance feels stronger in that direction,” I said softly, indicating the door at the end of the hall.

“That leads outside, to the rear of the building,” he replied in a low voice. We moved to the door and opened it cautiously. A light drizzle fell on an empty parking lot. I stepped outside, but the trail of resonance ended at the edge of the lot, and I couldn’t see any mundane clues such as tire marks or a conveniently dropped wallet.

“Whoever’s controlling the thing must have driven it here,” I said, returning inside and holstering my gun. “I doubt it’s sophisticated enough to drive itself.”

“Does it feel as if the golem was anywhere else in the building?”

I shook my head. “I can’t really explain how it feels ... but it’s almost like a slime trail. I can sense it from a few feet away, and it’s really obvious where the golem has been.” I carefully stepped around Adam’s body, then ascended the stairs. I paused when I reached the top. “It came up here,” I called down to Ryan. Adam’s office door stood open. I peered in and could see that the chair behind the desk was on its side. I stood silent and still for a dozen more heartbeats, assessing, then returned downstairs.

“As far as I can tell,” I told him, “the golem came in that door, went upstairs, grabbed Adam out of his chair, and tossed him down the stairs. It might have given Adam’s neck an extra twist to be sure he was dead, and then it walked right back out that door, where someone picked it up and took it away.”

Ryan’s gaze raked over the body and the stairs. “This certainly complicates things.”

I crouched again, worrying my lower lip as I took in the feel of the resonance. After a moment Ryan crouched beside me.

“Any luck pinning down what it is?” he asked quietly.

I twitched a shoulder up in a shrug. “I have some theories. But I’m not sure it matters. It doesn’t point to who might be controlling it, or how to stop it.”

He laid a hand on my shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Well, then we’ll simply have to resort to over-the-top violence.”

I laughed and gave him a grateful smile for pulling me free of the funk before I could get into it.

He stood and I followed suit. “I’d better call Zack and fill him in,” he said.

“And I need to call my rank.” And how was I going to justify to Crawford that I knew this was connected to Vic Kerry’s murder? I fought back a sigh. Deal with that later. For now, follow procedure.

Fortunately, there was no one else left in the building, which made it easy to secure the scene. Zack arrived about ten minutes later, with Jill pulling up in the crime scene van right behind him.

“You know what I love about working your scenes?” she asked after I filled her in on what I had. “The fact that I do all sorts of work and collect all sorts of evidence, and then I never have to actually process any of it since you then go off and solve the case using your spooooky demon powers.” She wiggled her fingers at me and made an absurd face.

I had to laugh. “That’s so not true, but I will say that I highly doubt that the perp in this one left behind any fingerprints.”

She wrinkled her nose as she readied her camera. “Well, unfortunately I still have to check for prints, since it’ll look pretty bad if I don’t.”

“And it’s always possible that I’m wrong,” I added.

“Well, I’m still not gonna waste my time hunting down matches for fingerprints on AFIS until you tell me to.” She stepped past me and began photographing the scene. I grinned and stayed out of her way.

Crawford showed up as Jill was finishing up her pictures. He peered down at the crumpled body and then looked back up at me. He opened his mouth to say something then closed it again, clearly conflicted. He flicked a glance around, taking in the people present.

Finally he cleared his throat and returned his focus to me. “I take it you have some reason to believe this wasn’t an accident?”

I nodded. Shit. How was I supposed to explain? This one wasn’t as easy as saying a dog had been chasing me. “There are some, er, similarities to the Victor Kerry scene, as well as to the attack on Lida Moran in New Orleans.”

His inner turmoil was painfully obvious. Even Ryan and Zack seemed to be aware of it as they stood silently by, carefully pretending to be paying no attention to our conversation.

“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath. Then he swept his gaze over the agents. “This is some kind of supernatural-type bullshit, isn’t it?”

Ryan gave Crawford a grave nod. “In a way, yes. Our task force often handles cases that fall outside the commonly accepted norm.”

Crawford gave a snort. “ ‘Commonly accepted norm.’ I don’t fucking believe this.” He looked almost relieved, though, as if the fact that Ryan had admitted it helped to prove he hadn’t lost his mind.

“Sarge,” I began, but he held up his hand to stop me.

“Kara. It ... it’s okay.” He still had a pained expression, but he didn’t look miserably conflicted anymore. “So, are you some kind of psychic or witch or something?”

I fought the urge to smile. “Not exactly. I ... um ... have the ability to see arcane power and can shape it for certain purposes.”

He blew out his breath. “Fucking shit, but that explains a lot about you.”

I burst out laughing. He looked at me sharply, then joined in a second later. After a few seconds he regained control of himself and looked over at Jill. “And you’re part of this X-Files crap too?”

She made a rude noise. “Look, just because I hang out with these weird peeps doesn’t mean I’m one of them!”

That seemed to relieve Crawford more than anything. “All right. So, what do you really have here, Kara?”

“I have reason to believe that an inanimate creature controlled by supernatural means was involved in the attack on Lida Moran and in the two murders.”

I could see him visible struggling to accept the otherworldly aspect to all of this. “Okay,” he said slowly, voice perhaps a tiny bit shaky. “What do you do now?”

I spread my hands. “For now, treat it like any other investigation.”

Relief filled his eyes. He knew how to handle “any other investigation.”

“We have three victims,” I continued. “Even though Lida survived going into the river, I’m still counting her as a victim.”

“But how is Vic Kerry connected?” Crawford asked.

“Not sure yet,” I said. “One theory is that it’s possible Roger Peeler was the intended victim of Kerry’s murder, since Roger was in the habit of using the workout equipment in Kerry’s office.” I chewed my lower lip in thought for a few heartbeats.

“That would imply that the band is being targeted,” Crawford said, eyes narrowed. He was in his element now that we were talking about more mundane things.

“Yes, but I also found a copy of three NSF checks from Adam Taylor in Kerry’s desk. And I also found this.” I tugged the paper with the initials out of my notebook and passed it to him. “Roger Peeler confirmed that Kerry loaned him fifteen thousand dollars.” I paused. “Or rather, Kerry loaned it to him, and then was nice enough to invest it for him. Plus, Kerry was a real sweet guy and approached Roger with the offer of the loan.”