Fantasy Adrift by Dean Wesley Smith & Kristine Kathryn Rusch

Author:Dean Wesley Smith & Kristine Kathryn Rusch [Smith, Dean Wesley & Rusch, Kristine Kathryn]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Sci Fi & Fantasy, Fantasy, Fiction & Literature, Anthologies, Fiction
Publisher: WMG Publishing Incorporated
Published: 2014-04-29T23:00:00+00:00

***

I knew I was screwed, but I didn’t know how screwed until Johnson bypassed the local precinct, instead driving me to a beautiful Evanston mansion six blocks from the Baha’i temple. The grand house was flanked by century-old elms, a path of flat stones wending its way past a koi pond and through a lawn of Kentucky bluegrass that was golf-course perfect.

Of course I knew who lived there.

Half a dozen police cruisers were parked up on that beautiful lawn, their lights flashing blue-red, blue-red in the early morning dark. The street was blocked off on both sides by red sawhorses and there was a black coroner’s van in the driveway. Oh, and the fibbies were there, lantern-jawed men and women in smart-fitting suits and dark blue windbreakers that said “FBI” on the back in giant yellow letters.

Better and better.

Johnson got me out of the car and unlocked the cuffs. “Be cool, man,” he said softly.

“Why should I?” I said angrily. If this was what I thought it was, was last place in world I wanted to be. Just being here could get me killed.

“Because if you’re cool and help me out maybe we don’t have to tell the feebs about the trafficking charge.”

I kept my mouth shut. Not because of the FBI. SuperMax didn’t scare me. But if I was charged with trafficking my Chinese friends might wonder things like, Where did his H come from? and Why isn’t he selling it in Chicago? Those kinds of questions could get me killed in a thousand ugly ways.

The victim was on the front walk. He’d been turned into a terracotta soldier, one of those figures from the crypt of China’s first emperor, Qin Shi Huang. After that he’d been smashed into million pieces. Chicago PD’s magicians could transform him back, of course.

But it wouldn’t be pretty.

I was hoping it was just soldier or underboss or maybe newspaper boy.

But as soon as I saw that handsome clay face (the chin cleaved clean off) I knew who it was.

Zhang Shaoming, Chicago overlord of Black Dragon Triad.

After the heroin thing, I’d worked hard to head off full-scale war with Chinese. So much for that. Especially since Johnson was kind enough to show my face at the crime scene.

I looked over at him. He was peering at me intently.

“Didn’t do this,” I said.

“I believe you,” he said.

My eyebrows lifted in surprise. “Really?”

“Any idea who went Humpty Dumpty all over his ass?”

I opened my mouth to answer, but someone cut me off.

“Just what in the name of all that’s good and holy do you think you’re doing, Detective Johnson? This man’s a suspect.”

I turned and saw the Chicago Office’s ASAC, Special Agent Leonard Percival. Percival was tall and slender and pale, his eyes a watery blue, his hair the color of straw. At least that’s what I saw. Behind the glamour he was really something else.

A unicorn.

I don’t like unicorns. They’re prissy and self-righteous and usually have creepy love lives. You’ll only sleep with unspoiled maidens? That comes uncomfortably close to pedophilia.

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