Blood and Apples: An Annora Park Novel: Book One

Chapter Four: Murder served Cold

Back in the "old days," The Paladin had been one of the fanciest hotels in our fair city, now it housed the fanciest whores the city had to offer.
I pull up, to flashing lights and bustling activity—seems Walker had been right after all.  Exiting my vehicle I flash my badge and begin my trek...the trek which will lead me one step closer to my death.
   "Annora..." Garrett comes rushing over.  His hair is perfectly coiffed, shirt wrinkle free, pants clearly pressed...Jesus, he looks perfect, like he stepped out of some stupid Mens catalogue and me...I'm pretty sure I'm wearing the same clothes I'd worn yesterday.  Plus I hadn't had a chance to shower, so I probably stank to high heaven.  Oh what the hell.  It wasn't like I was trying to impress him anyway.  Maybe my smell and unkept appearance would so completely turn him off that he'd leave me alone.  Then again, I probably couldn't be that lucky.
   "Hey Garrett."  I offer him a weak smile and jerk my head toward the building.  "Soooooo...fun stuff, right?  Early morning murder, always such a great way to greet the day." I say sarcastically.
   "It's..." Garrett swallows, "It's really bad, Annora."
   "It's always bad, Garrett."
   "No, Annora...this...this...I've never seen anything like this before.  Heck, I don't think anyone has ever seen anything like this before."
   Wanna bet?  I dealt in the currency of death, all manners of it.  If I was a betting girl, I'd say I'd probably come across this a time or two.  There isn't much I haven't seen in the tediously long years I've Treaded.
   "Garrett listen..." Okay, okay, so here was where I told him about the new addition to our rather already awkward partnership.  "I needed...well...so you see...I went..." Oh God, I sounded like an imbecile. 
   "Darling!"
   Oh shoot me sideways!! I slap my hand to my face and shake my head resignedly.  Of course...of course he'd just have to come at this very minute, this very second, the very second I was getting ready to break the news as gently as I possibly could to my partner.  "Walker..." I finally say, dryly.  "How very NOT surprising to see you here."
   "Annora?" Garrett's body has stiffened so much he looks like a wooden board, and his usually handsome jovial face is set in a fierce frown.  "Annora...what's going on here.  And who the fuck is this?"
   Oh great, Garrett was swearing, what a fucking terrific start this was.  Where was a bottle of bourbon when I needed it? Okay, Okay, it was like pulling off a bandaid, nice and quick. "Garrett, Walker, Walker Garrett...great so now the introductions have been made." I begin to turn when a hand grabs my upper arm.
"Boy, you're going to want to let go of her arm before I tear off yours and beat you with it," Walker's voice is ice cold, and the look in his eyes is murderous. To Garrett's credit he instantly releases me.
I rub the spot where he grabbed me. Wow. That grip had been hard. However, I HAD sprung Walker on Garrett unexpectedly, I could cut him a little slack...even if Walker couldn't seem to be able to.
"Annora, what the ever loving hell is going on."
Oh...we were still using "bad" words. Yup. He was pissed all right. "Garrett," I sigh, "We don't really have time right now. The scene is getting cold and..."
"...Oh yes," Walker claps his hands, and then clasps them together. His face is positively glowing with happiness or is it excitement...maybe it's both. Like I said. Crazy motherfucker. "...Cold scenes are the worst. Blood is best served warm you know."
OH. MY. GOD! "Walker just shut the fuck up. Garrett, I swear I'll explain everything to you after we've seen the scene okay."
"No, it's not all right Annora. I've been your partner for three years now, hell, almost four! I think I'm owed a damned explanation, like NOW! I've said it before, and I'll say it again. The dead aren't going anywhere. The scene will still be there in five, ten minutes, or however long it takes you to explain who the fuck this idiot standing way too close to you is, and what he's doing at our scene acting like he knows what the hell is going on."
Okaaay then, it appears as if we're hashing this out right now. It's going to be the shortest explanation in the history of explanations though. I cast a quick look sideways over at Walker...Garrett's right about one thing, he sure the fuck is standing too close to me. "A little space would be nice, you know," I tell him.
"It would, wouldn't it." He says with a smile, not moving an inch.
Ugh! I turn my attention to Garrett then. "Okay, remember last year, the Jacobson murder?" I wait for Garrett to nod before continuing. "I needed a little extra help—"
"—You could have asked me, Annora I would—"
"Garrett please, just please shut up for a minute and listen to me, okay?" I so rarely use the word please I think I've shocked him silly, because his mouth opens and closes like a cod fish. Blessedly he goes silent and remains that way. "I would have asked you but if you remember correctly it was out of state, which you could not have gotten clearance for the jurisdiction...and...it was magical in nature. You remember I told you all of this. I also told you that I had a contact, someone that I could take with me." I jerk my thumb in Walker's direction, "...This is Walker, the someone I could I take with me."
"I remember the Jacobson murder...it was...pretty bad if I'm remembering correctly," Garrett murmurs, "...You nearly had your shoulder torn completely apart."
I stiffen. It's always lovely revisiting that particularly horrific memory. Jacobson had been killed by a rogue shifter, and I'd nearly lost my shoulder and my arm to the same said shifter. Only the near immediate attention of one of the very best magical healers out there had saved my limb and repaired the damage—most of it.  Leanore, Walker's mom was the healer who'd worked on me.  He had her teleport to our location the second he realized how bad off I was.  It was only with her magical medical intervention that I'd kept the use of my arm...hell kept my arm at all.  Of course, considering Walker had been supposed to have my back at the time, and kinda dropped the ball, he owed me...he'd owed me big.  Having his mommy fix me up was the least he could do after very nearly getting me killed in the first place.  After Leanore had healed me I'd told Walker it would rain snowballs in hell before I came back to see him, and that yes, not even the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse would be enough to drag me to his doorstep again.
And yet, here we are...the three of us...one small dysfunctional group, where one member could very well be certifiably insane—strike that—he's definitely insane, oh yeah, definitely, definitely insane.  The question of the hour was going to be whether or not that insane was going to help or hinder us in the murder investigation.  There was no doubt that Walker had connections.  I mean, hell, he was connected to the largest damn Coven in the whole of the New United States.  His mother was the freaking leader of that said Coven, and had more magic in her pinky finger than most witches or warlocks in the world combined.  There was no doubt in my mind that she'd use her considerable resources to help us out, it was no secret that she completely doted on her son, crazy as he was.  And I'm pretty sure she liked me, bitchy as I was.  She HAD saved me after all.
"Annora..."
Oh right, explanation to Garrett. "Basically Walker's going to be working with us from now on, on these murders."
"Wait, WHAT?" Garrett shrieks, he literally shrieks and my eyes go wide. I don't actually think I've ever heard that sound come out of his mouth before in the entire four years I've known him.
"Isn't is just all so delightful, boy? We're going to have such fun, trust me." Walker says, smirking.
I roll my eyes and jab Walker in his side. "Not helping...you're really not helping here. Are you incapable of just well, talking like a normal human being...that or just keeping your mouth closed all together?"
"But darling, if I kept my mouth closed how would I stick my tongue in your mouth when we're kissing."
Oh Jesus. Just kill me now. Seriously, just fucking kill me now. Garrett looks positively murderous.
"This!" Garrett points at Walker, "...This...this crazy thing is why you've been holding me at bay, Annora?"
   "Garrett this is neither the time nor place to have this conversation.  And not that it's any of your business, but no, Walker has NOTHING, absolutely nothing to do with why you and I aren't...uh...together."
   "I call bullshit" Garrett spits out, practically foaming at the mouth. 
   Hell.  This was getting ugly, and it was getting ugly with an audience.  This was stopping now.  I see Walker begin to open his mouth and I point at him giving him a glare for good measure.  "You, you just keep your trap closed! I mean it.  If you say anything, anything right now I swear, binding or not I'll cut the freaking thing off of me and burn it, hell, I'll go to your mother tell her what you did and have her remove the fucking thing myself!" I know I've shocked him because he thankfully, blessedly shuts his mouth.  I then turn to Garrett.  "And you! You are going to shelve all of this shit.  I don't give two flying fucks frankly at this moment about how you feel about this situation, about Walker, about us, about anything of a personal nature...which by the way should not be aired out on the fucking street in front of oh, about thirty officers!  If you want to have a drawn out knock out fight AFTER...later...I'll be more than happy to meet you at the gym and I can beat some freaking sense into you," cause well, the thought that Garrett could take me in hand to hand combat was laughable at best...yeah, I was more than just a pretty face.  "...Right now, we have a scene to  access, I have a job to do, we ALL have jobs to do, and not one of those jobs is to give our colleagues a free show of total crazy."  With those words I leave them standing on the sidewalk as I walk quickly and purposefully into the building.