Page 30 of The Vampire and the Case of the Hellacious Hag

I shoved a bite of steak into my mouth covered with potatoes and white gravy. Yum. I waved my fork. ‘She should be careful of me. I’m a force of nature, too.’

He grinned. ‘That you are. You’ll figure it out. You must be happy – you love a good mystery.’

‘I do,’ I agreed. ‘But I feel for his family. He had a human wife and mixed kids and apparently their relationship was a bit of a no-no in dwarven culture. I’m not sure how much support they’ll get.’ We ate in silence for a fewmoments. ‘Do you think Liv or Calliope would know anything about hags? That they’d share with me, I mean?’

‘Maybe. Are they speaking to you yet?’ Connor grinned.

‘No, not really. But this is work so they have to, right?’

He snorted. ‘Calliope still holds a grudge against Homer who’s been dead for what – nearly three thousand years!’

I groaned. ‘I never thought I’d say this, but I actually think Liv might be the more reasonable of the two.’

‘Well, she did come through for you at the mine.’

‘Yeah, whereas Calliope just looked bored and annoyed. I’ll call Liv when I get back to work. I don’t think the Queen of the Dead ever sleeps.’

‘I dare you to call her that to her face!’

‘Not a chance in hell.’

Connor snickered. ‘Wise.’

We finished our meal about the time my lunch hour ended. Connor insisted on walking me back to work, not that I resisted in the slightest. He came in for a minute to check on Fluffy and Shadow and give them both some affection. Shadow pretended to ignore him but then, when Fluffy was getting all the attention, he wound himself around Connor’s ankles: he hated to be ignored.

Connor kissed me goodbye, another heated kiss that warmed me in all the right places. ‘I’ll see you later,’ he murmured. ‘No matter what timeyou finish work, you call me.’

‘You got something planned for later?’ I teased.

‘Team-building exercises. We’re going to play a communication game.’

‘Oh?’ I asked, a little breathlessly. ‘How’s that going to work?’

He kissed me again. ‘I’ll explain later but just know that you’re going to need phrases like, “harder” and “just like that” in your repertoire.’

‘I like the sound of the game already.’

‘Me too,’ he groaned. With one last kiss he left, taking his entourage with him.

‘How am I supposed to concentrate now?’ I complained to my animal friends.

Once Connor had left, I bit the bullet and called Liv. ‘Bunny,’ she answered flatly. ‘Haven’t I done enough for you tonight?’

I ignored that. ‘I didn’t get a chance to ask you earlier in earshot of the dwarves, but do you know anything about hags?’

‘Quite a bit, actually.’ She paused for a moment. ‘But I’m tired. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.’ She hung up.

Typical Liv: it was a total power move. She’d work with me – eventually – but it would always be on her terms.

Chapter 19

It was a quiet night, which happened once in a while. After I’d completed all my work, I started doodling on my sticky notes and that triggered an itch in my brain. Two deaths at the mine: what could be the motivation forbothdeaths? They didn’t seem linked at first blush. The first victim –ifhe was a victim and that still hadn’t been established – was a human, an inspector, not a miner. He’d kept his head. The second victim was a dwarf, a miner and had been found headless. The only thing they had in common was the mine itself. Something was going on there and I needed to work out what.

I decided to check the evidence locker and look through Helmud’s belongings. Predictably there was a phone that we didn’t know the code for, but there was also a paper diary. I opened it up and flipped to the dates around the murder. There in red pen wasInspection of Chrome Mineand a red arrow across several pages, making it clear he would be in the mine for a week.

I frowned. Hayleigh had said he’d arrived a day early, but according to this he’d been aware of the correct date. Why had he come a day earlier than planned. Had he been hoping for some kind of unofficial access? If he suspected something was going on at the mine, there was no note of it.

I flicked through the long book but only one other entry gave me pause.Wedding Day!was written in a feminine hand with numerous hearts drawn round it. So hedidhave a fiancée!

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