Defender (The Witches of Cleopatra Hill Book 11) Read online

  He turned onto Cactus Circle. About halfway down the block, he saw a swirl of police lights, flashing a raucous blue and red. Three patrol cars, a fire truck, an ambulance, and a van from the medical examiner’s office. About what he’d expected, but still, he couldn’t help being impressed by the turnout. All those personnel, just for one body.

  A body of a man who’d been murdered, Jack reminded himself.

  He pulled up behind one of the squad cars and got out. Immediately, a uniformed officer came over to him. “I’m Officer Lopez. Detective Sandoval? ”

  “That’s right,” Jack replied, moving the lapel of his jacket slightly so the officer could see the badge clipped to his shirt pocket. “What do we have?”

  “Deceased male Caucasian, twenty-nine years old.”

  Jack could feel his jaw tighten. Damn. Somehow it always felt worse to him when the victim was under thirty. All that potential…gone. “Go on.”

  “No sign of forced entry. Nothing taken, as far as we can tell.” Lopez didn’t look like much more than a kid himself, twenty-five, if even that. His dark eyes were strained, but he sounded composed enough as he continued, “I’m no expert, but this killing…it looks like something ritual to me.”

  God, Jack hoped not. His clan had had enough of that sort of thing to deal with — and sweep under the rug — when Matías Escobar and his thug cousins kidnapped those young witches from up north and tortured them, killing one of the girls. Yes, Escobar had been dealt with, but the last thing Jack wanted on his plate right now was another crime with evidence that pointed toward witch-kind. “Witnesses?”

  “Not really. The immediate neighbors either weren’t home or didn’t see or hear anything. We’re talking to people in some of the other buildings, just in case they might have noticed any suspicious activity earlier in the evening. The wife came on the scene afterward…or so she claims.”

  Jack frowned. “What makes you think she was involved?”

  “Oh, nothing in particular.” Lopez stood up a little straighter and lifted his chin. “It just seems to me that the timing is a little suspicious.”

  Sounded like someone wanted a promotion. Jack wouldn’t exactly brush off the other man’s words, but, on the other hand, he also intended to take them with a very large grain of salt. He’d wait for input from his team, who should already be up in the condo, gathering evidence. “Where’s the wife?”

  “Over there, with my partner.” Lopez pointed toward a low wall of stacked stone that bordered the pathway next to the building. A woman sat there, but because she was partially obscured by the uniformed officer standing in front of her, Jack couldn’t really see what she looked like.

  Well, he supposed he’d get a good look at her soon enough, take her measure. “Thanks,” he told Lopez.

  Jack walked over toward the wall Lopez had pointed out. As he approached, the patrol officer who’d been blocking her turned and gave him a brisk nod. “Detective Sandoval?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m Officer Manning. This is Ms. Campbell, the victim’s wife.”

  The woman stood as the patrolman said her name. Seeing her clearly for the first time, Jack almost started, then told himself the last thing he should be doing right then was paying any attention to her appearance.

  But…she was beautiful. Late twenties, with long sandy brown hair streaked with gold. He couldn’t be sure of her eye color because the lighting out here wasn’t very good, but he could tell that she had the kind of graceful bone structure that didn’t require much makeup, even though right then she was stricken and wan, her eyes shadowed and reddened from shock and grief.

  Somehow Jack managed to gather himself. “Ms. Campbell, I’m Jack Sandoval. I’ll be the lead detective on this case. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?”

  She shook her head. “No,” she replied. Her voice was somewhat low-pitched and husky, but he couldn’t know for sure if she always sounded like that, or whether the word had come out that way because she’d been crying. “I’m not sure how much I can tell you, though. I didn’t see anything.”

  “That’s fine,” he said. He gave the patrol officer a slight nod, indicating that he wanted to continue the interview alone. Luckily, Officer Manning didn’t seem inclined to argue, because he nodded in return and headed off toward the spot where the team from the medical examiner’s office was beginning to set up its own field operations. Jack returned his attention to the woman in front of him. “Just tell me what happened.”

  She pressed her lips together, then let out a breath. “I — I was coming over to bring Jeff our divorce papers so he could sign them.”

  How completely ridiculous was it that Jack experienced a slight sensation of relief at hearing she really had been separated from the victim? As if it mattered. “What time was that?”

  “A-around seven-thirty, I think. I got here a little earlier than that, though. I parked on the street and went over the papers a few more times, and — ” A small chuckle, and she sent a nervous look up at Jack. “Really, I was just sitting there and trying to work up the nerve to go see him.”

  Voice neutral, Jack inquired, “Were you worried he would react badly?”

  “Oh, no,” she said at once, her tone so emphatic that he knew she must be telling the truth. “I mean, he’d pretty much reconciled himself to the divorce happening. He wasn’t happy about it, but he wasn’t going to fight it, either.”

  Her reply relieved him somewhat. It probably meant that, whatever had happened, it hadn’t resulted from a struggle between the two. Besides, this Ms. Campbell didn’t look as if she’d been involved in any kind of an altercation. Her face was strained and pale, but the clothes she wore — a silk blouse with elbow-length sleeves and a dark pencil skirt — appeared relatively unmussed, except for a few wrinkles she’d probably picked up while sitting in her car. “Did anyone see you when you were in the car?”

  “I don’t know. I think a few people went past — walking their dogs or whatever — but I couldn’t really tell if they were paying any attention to me.”

  Well, that wasn’t so good. He’d have to wait for the exact time of death from the medical examiner, but it did sound as if there was an unspecified period where Ms. Campbell had been by herself, with no one to back up her claim that she’d been sitting alone in her car. “Ms. Campbell — ” he began, and she shook her head.

  “Kate…please. And actually, legally it’s still Kate Nichols. I’ve just been using my maiden name lately, trying to get used to it again.”

  “All right, Kate.” Jack paused, trying to think of the best way to phrase the question without sounding too accusatory. “Do you have any way of proving your whereabouts in the time immediately before seven-thirty?”

  “I — ” She broke off there, worry entering her eyes, as if she’d just realized for the first time that the police might regard her as a possible suspect. Then she hitched in a little breath and said, sounding relieved, “I was texting with my brother right before I went up to Jeff’s place. You know, for encouragement.”

  “May I see those texts?”

  “Of course.” She began rummaging through a large brown leather purse that sat on the wall behind her. No doubt the patrol officers had already inspected its contents, including the phone, although they probably wouldn’t have asked her to unlock it. She pulled out a rose gold iPhone and entered the code, then went to the messaging app. “Here.”

  Jack took the phone from her and looked down at the exchange displayed on the screen. Sure enough, there was a convo between her and someone named Colin, with time stamps between seven-nineteen and seven twenty-three. That still didn’t cover the entire time she’d supposedly sat in her car, but it did prove she really had been texting. “Colin is your brother?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Colin Campbell. He lives up in Jerome.”

  That particular revelation made Jack look at Kate more sharply. All right, just as many civilians lived in Jerome as did McAllister witches, bu
t….

  And then it clicked. Colin Campbell had married a McAllister witch — Jenny, whose sister Roslyn had died at Matías Escobar’s hands. Jack hadn’t recognized Colin’s name right away because, after all, the McAllisters weren’t his clan, although his niece Zoe had married one of them a little more than a year ago. The de la Pazes and the McAllisters had always gotten along well enough, and under normal circumstances, Jack would have been happy to meet someone who was connected to the Jerome witches, if only peripherally.

  Now, though…..

  The night air was pleasant enough, but he couldn’t prevent a thrill of cold from moving down his spine. This had to be a horrible coincidence. This woman’s brother might have married into the McAllisters, but clearly she was living a normal civilian life down here in Scottsdale. It shouldn’t make any difference that Colin Campbell’s wife had a sister who was murdered by a dark warlock.

  But Lopez had said it looked like a ritual killing….

  “Thank you, Kate,” Jack said as he handed the phone back to her. “I’ll need you to wait with Officers Manning and Lopez while I go take a look at the crime scene.”

  “All — all right.” Something about her expression seemed even more stricken as he made the request, but he wouldn’t flatter himself that it was because he was about to leave her with someone else.

  She was quiet as he guided her over to the officers’ patrol car. Lopez still appeared to be giving her the side-eye, but Manning was much friendlier, telling her to sit down on the back seat, asking her if she’d like some bottled water. Kate murmured a “yes, please” in response to the offer and then took a seat as directed, sitting sideways so her feet touched the ground outside the open car door.

  Jack did his best not to look at her long legs, or at the pretty feet in the high-heeled sandals. It was really insane for him to be paying any attention to those sorts of distractions, considering the circumstances. He’d be the first to admit that he was a devotee of the female form, but there was a time and a place for everything, and a crime scene where a woman’s estranged husband had just been murdered was definitely not it.

  After excusing himself, he headed back to the building where the victim’s condo was located. As he paused at the bottom of the steps, taking in the layout of the place, a young woman in a deputy’s uniform approached. Lisa Peters — that was her name. Her face was pale, but her tone precise and level as she said, “We’ve done our preliminary inspection of the scene. It’s all yours.”

  “Thanks,” Jack replied. He wouldn’t ask any questions of her now; he always liked to go into a crime scene with his mind fresh, no preconceived notions to possibly fog his perception of the site. Later they’d go over every single piece of evidence in excruciating detail, but that was for later, in the days and possibly weeks ahead. “I’m going up.”

  Peters nodded and headed off toward one of the squad cars parked on the street. Jack didn’t even bother to take in a breath, but headed up the stairs to what had once been Jeff Nichols’ condo.

  The door stood open, the entrance barred with yellow crime scene tape, even as light glared from the unit. Jack ducked under the tape and paused just inside the door. His heart gave a heavy, disapproving thud. Yes, he’d seen his fair share of homicide investigations, had witnessed more ugliness than he ever wanted to consciously recall, but none of that had prepared him for the scene that confronted him now.

  The blood spatter wasn’t exactly spatter. Its coppery stink assailed his nose, but he realized right away that the bloody markings on the walls and the floor weren’t there by random chance, that there were distinct patterns to those markings. Nothing as crude as an upside-down pentacle or the horned symbols used by today’s Satan worshippers, true, but Jack thought he recognized some of them, sigils old as civilization, signs used to invoke the dark powers, to summon the forces of the underworld to the spell-caster’s aid. Some were sharp and spiky in shape, others intricate circles with arcane lettering surrounding them, but all of them were evil.

  Again that icy trickle of dread traced its way down his spine. He knew he would have to tread carefully here, because of course none of his coworkers had any idea that he was in fact a warlock, and therefore in possession of knowledge no ordinary homicide detective should have.

  Grace Pedersen came up to him as he made himself take a step forward. Her blue eyes, usually cheerful as a summer sky, were shadowed, and the lines around them seemed far more pronounced than they normally were. Even so, she tried to summon a watery smile. “Hey, Jack. Just another night in Scottsdale, huh?”

  “Something like that,” he responded. His gaze tracked to the huddled form on the floor, now mercifully covered by a rubber sheet. Even with the sheet concealing the worst of the damage, however, he could tell there was something wrong about the shape of the body under that sheet. “Time of death?”

  “A little after seven, near as we can determine without an autopsy,” she said.

  Steeling himself, he knelt and pulled a pair of latex gloves from his jacket pocket and slipped them on, then reached out with a thumb and forefinger to pull back one corner of the rubber sheet.

  Holy Mary, Mother of God.

  It took all his effort not to murmur a spell of protection under his breath right then, a barrier of white light against the darkness. Surely he was in need of such a thing, as were Grace, who looked on worriedly, and Ian, who methodically moved along the bloodstained walls and took picture after picture of the various symbols painted there.

  Even half-obscured by the sheet, Jeff Nichols’ face was a mask of terror, eyes staring white-ringed, mouth open in a silent scream. A fine mist of red coated his features, residue from arterial spray. Fighting back a sick feeling, Jack looked down and realized the victim’s hands had been severed and now lay neatly on either side of his head. The fingertips were coated with blood, almost as if….

  His gaze moved to the sigils on the walls. They were precise enough, and yet the streakiness of the outlines made him realize that they hadn’t been painted on with any kind of brush. No, it seemed that….

  He let go of the rubber sheet and stood. “The perpetrator used the victim’s fingertips to paint those signs on the walls?”

  Grace nodded, then swallowed. She’d always seemed the soul of competence to him, tough and almost impossible to rattle after twenty-five years investigating crime scenes, but right then she looked as if she was doing everything in her power to prevent herself from throwing up. “That’s what Ian and I think. Of course, it’ll take further analysis to be absolutely sure.” A pause, and then she asked, her voice nearly a whisper, “Jack, who the hell would do something like this?”

  “No one sane,” he replied. Normally he didn’t make those sorts of armchair diagnoses — after all, he was no psychiatrist — but he didn’t see how anyone in their right mind could do this sort of thing. “So we need to find them, and fast.”

  “Understood.” She hesitated before saying, “Unfortunately, so far we haven’t found anything here except the victim’s blood.”

  “No tracks?” Jack inquired. With the amount of blood spilled, you’d think the killer would have stepped in some of it.

  “None that we can find.” Her gaze moved down to the plastic covers she wore on her shoes. Jack hadn’t bothered with them, since the bloodstained carpet had already been protected by more plastic, but Grace had taken the precaution since she was one of the first people on the scene. “Maybe the killer had made sure he was protected, and wore gloves and plastic covers on his shoes. The cuts that removed the hands from the victim’s body were done with surgical precision, as far as I’ve been able to tell. Whoever killed Jeff Nichols, he — or she — was very careful about it.”

  “And no one saw anything.”

  Her shoulders lifted, even as Ian paused in snapping pictures and walked over to them, then said, “No one on this side of the building. The patrol officers also questioned the people in the four units on the north side, but one of those c
ondos is empty — apparently it’s used as a vacation rental — and of the remaining three, only one person was actually home. Lily Perez, fifty-two. She said she was watching Netflix and didn’t hear anything.”

  Of course. Right then, Jack wished the public was a little more the way it tended to be portrayed in books and movies, hyper-vigilant and noticing everything. Unfortunately, his experience told him that most people tended to ignore anything that wasn’t directly under their noses.

  “What about the surrounding buildings?”

  “One of the other uniforms on-scene is going door to door, but I doubt he’s going to turn up anything. Whoever did this was in and out without anyone noticing.”

  Jack nodded. Sometimes you got your clues handed to you, and sometimes you had to pry them out of the minutest traces of evidence. So far, it sounded like the killer had taken care not to leave anything behind to identify him — somehow, Jack doubted the murderer was a her — but it was far too early to declare defeat.

  Besides, he had all those symbols painted on the walls. Dark magic, the blackest possible…which meant there were few warlocks in the world who would have risked their very souls to perform that kind of conjuring. Certainly no one in the de la Paz clan, and none of the McAllisters, either. A few years ago, he might have suspected Damon Wilcox, but Damon had been dead for nearly four years now, and none of the other Wilcoxes appeared inclined to take over his more dubious experiments.

  Which left Jack with…what? The Santiagos? Certainly they had several bad eggs among their clan, but with Matías Escobar and his two cousins stripped of their powers and sentenced to life in three separate civilian prisons, that didn’t leave many other suspects.

  Also, there were the Castillos, the witch clan in New Mexico. They kept to themselves, although they’d long been friendly with the Wilcoxes, which made them somewhat suspect in Jack’s eyes. Still, he’d never heard of any Castillos coming anywhere near de la Paz territory. Surely Luz Trujillo, his clan’s prima, should have been able to sense any interlopers trespassing on their land.