Page 59 of Fortune's Ashes
‘Where is your crossbow, anyway?’ Kennedy frowned. ‘You should have your weapon with you at all times.’
‘Kennedy, answer the question.’
‘I mean,’ he said as if I’d never spoken, ‘just because you can’t die doesn’t mean you can’t be hurt. You can’t get complacent. You need to live above your ability, not below your capacity.’
Kennedy was certainly living above his capacity for alcohol. Lukas sucked in a breath behind me, obviously preparing to step in and shake Kennedy for answers. I gestured to him to stay quiet. I wasn’t going to be side tracked, no matter how hard Kennedy tried. ‘Did you go to the Love Nest when you were looking for Quincy?’
‘Of course I did,’ he finally replied. ‘He wasn’t there. I looked all around the little house. There was no sign of him.’
‘Did you look around the garden?’
As he met my eyes, it seemed to dawn on him why I was asking all these questions. His face fell and his bottom lip trembled. ‘You found him, then.’
I hedged my bets. ‘We found someone.’
‘In the garden?’
I nodded. ‘Down the old well at the back. Do you remember if you looked there?’
The satyr stared at me, then he sniffed loudly and several tears rolled unchecked down his cheeks. ‘Poor old Quince,’ he whispered. ‘My poor boy.’
I waited for several moments, giving him the time he needed to compose himself, but I still needed to know if Kennedy had checked the well when he was there. We’d never be able to get a wholly accurate time of death; forensics didn’t work that way, and it had been far too long since Quincy Carmichael had died. It would be helpful, though, if we could establish whether the murderer had killed the gremlin at the scene or brought his corpse to the cottage to dispose of later.
Lukas handed Kennedy a handkerchief. Buffy tapped her foot impatiently on the floor but at least she had the sense to remain quiet. We all watched while he dabbed at his tears and blew his nose before nodding slightly to indicate that he was okay to continue. There was a different light in his eyes now, grief providing the clarity that alcohol had temporarily washed away.
‘Did you—’ I started.
‘Check the damned well? Yes, I checked it. Of course I checked it. It was probably the first place I checked. I almost fell down it myself on more than one occasion. I always told Quince he ought to board it over.’
I tried to keep my voice casual. ‘Quincy didn’t board up the well? He left it uncovered?’
‘Yes.’
‘How soon after he disappeared did you visit the cottage to look for him?’
Kennedy squinted, trying to remember. ‘A couple of days at best,’ he said. ‘Everyone went crazy once that dead wolf and vamp were found, and a few people had mentioned that it seemed a strange coincidence that Quince had disappeared right after it happened. I wanted to find him and tell him to get back before mild suspicion grew into outright accusation.’
He gave me a pointed look, indicating that he knew I was a prime suspect in Cobain’s murder. ‘Once a particular name gets bandied about in relation to a crime it can be difficult to shake off the stigma no matter how innocent that person might be.’
Indeed. I hastily pushed away my discomfort at my own predicament and continued. ‘Was the well boarded over when you were at the cottage looking for him?’
His gaze was steady. ‘No. And while I may not have the nose of a werewolf, I’m reasonably certain that I’d have smelled the rot if there was a fresh dead body stuffed down it.’ Yeah, he was probably right.
Buffy cleared her throat. ‘So what does that mean?’
It was Lukas who answered her. ‘Quincy Carmichael wasn’t killed at the Love Nest. Whoever murdered him killed him elsewhere and dumped him there later. But the killer must have known that the cottage was empty, so they must have known Quincy.’
I nodded grimly. ‘What can you tell us about his business dealings, Kennedy? He’d started up a fake-blood business at the time he vanished. Did he know anyone who wouldn’t have wanted it to continue for some reason?’
‘He had some disagreements with the bloke who helped him make the products. A pixie – Birch Kale, I think.’
I could be proved wrong, but I didn’t believe that Kale was involved in Quincy’s death. He’d wanted his money back so he’d needed Quincy alive. ‘Anyone else?’
Kennedy shrugged.
I glanced at Lukas. ‘Fake blood is for the vampire market. Are there any vamps who might have taken umbrage at Quincy’s venture?’
There was a defensive flicker in Lukas’s black eyes but he took a moment to consider the question seriously. ‘I can’t think of anyone. It was only thirteen years ago, but nobody at the time believed that fake-blood products would ever be of use, or that they’d ever be lucrative. I guess nobody stopped to consider that humans might be more interested in them than vampires.’
