Kat

“Okay, so here.” Elanius texted Ezra a picture. “That’s for you.”

He looked at his phone, frowning in confusion when he saw the picture of a cute little dog, probably some type of spaniel. “Um…okay? Thanks?”

They laughed at Ezra’s expression. “It’s for Goose! A friend for Goose. You can call her Duck. Or something. I don’t know.” They got a little more serious. “My parents’ neighbor passed away unexpectedly. That’s her dog. She’s three, so a little younger than Goose, but she needs a home, and having a dog friend is probably good for Goose. Goose is home alone a lot, right? Between you at work and then Kat at work. I’m glad you have a dog, but given how much you both are out because of the nature of, uh, being you, getting Goose a friend is probably a good idea.”

Ezra looked at the picture more closely, and I could tell he liked it, but he was more responsible than I was, so he had questions to ask as he and Elanius headed down the sidewalk towards our townhouse. “Anything we’d need to know?”

“She steals chairs and refuses not to sit on furniture. She’ll probably need a ramp or stairs to get up on the bed if you let her sleep on it, but she might whine if you don’t. Um, otherwise, no? She seems pretty well-behaved. My parents were thinking of taking her in, but I remembered Goose and decided I’d check with you first. Our neighbor’s family is hoping to find a good home for her soon since they can’t take her in and they are trying to deal with the house and all.”

Kat? Thoughts?

I again was feeling bad that we hadn’t thought of something Goose might need and grateful to Elanius for thinking of it for us and looking out for Goose. Eh, El makes a good point about company for Goose. Why not?

Ezra seemed to be making some mental calculations. We should be able to afford it, we have two incomes and not a lot of extra expenses. And Lani has a point about Goose being lonely. I turned on the TV for him today but I bet another dog would be even better.

“Okay!” He agreed out loud. “We’ll take her. Does she not have a name?”

Elanius seemed happy with the decision, but shrugged at the question. “She does, her name is Fluffy. It’s a silly name so I’m going to suggest you change it.”

I started laughing hysterically at the name, and Ezra ignored that, nodding serenely as if he didn’t have a maniac laughing in his head. “Maybe we’ll meet her first and see what we think fits, but it might be cute to have Duck and Goose.”

We reached our townhouse and Ezra greeted Goose, then let me take over so I could get ready. Elanius, who knew where the dog food was by now, went to feed Goose and take him out while I fixed my hair and makeup and picked something nice to wear to meet Elanius’s family. Technically, we’d already met them a couple times as Ezra, but this was my first time meeting them as Kat.

“Should we take Goose?” Elanius asked out loud. “He could meet my parents’ dogs and maybe even Duck. You might even be able to take her home tonight if they do well meeting and the neighbor’s family is cool with it. I think they will be, they want a good home for her and I can vouch for you, plus seeing Goose will help. They’ll be able to tell you love him and will take good care of her, too.”

I had no idea whether bringing a dog with me to a dinner was a good idea, but Elanius knew their family better than I did, and Ezra seemed to think Goose might enjoy something new, so before long we all loaded up into my car and I drove to Elanius’s parents’ house, trying to ignore the dog nose that kept sticking itself in my ear.

We arrived at the house and Elanius went ahead to get their parents’ dog, Michael, to introduce to Goose outside so there wouldn’t be territorial issues. I got out and convinced Goose to come out, too, letting him sniff around the yard while Elanius’s parents showed up.

I’d met Lois and Eugene before, kind of. Ezra had, so I already knew them, they just hadn’t met me. It was always kind of interesting to meet people I already knew and try to pretend like I didn’t know them.

They introduced themselves, and I introduced me and Goose, and then Elanius showed up with Michael and introduced him to me and Goose, and then Goose and Michael did the whole dogs-circling-sniffing-each-other thing, and eventually we decided the dogs were good together and headed back inside.

We were getting through the normal meeting stuff, talking about jobs – Eugene owned a toy store and Lois made custom toys and clothes designed for children with texture sensitivity that she sold at the store and online. Well, when they weren’t participating in the family side business of sitting on rooftops pretending to be stone statues, anyway.

I was actually enjoying getting to talk to them, because it was nice to get to just chat as myself. Ezra was good about asking them anything I thought of and asked him to relay, but sometimes the extra step of translating was a bit frustrating.

“Oh, Penrose is coming,” Elanius announced abruptly. They’d just frozen for a bit, so I’d assumed they were receiving some kind of telepathic communication. “My sister! You haven’t met her yet.”

Ooh, they’ve talked about her! She’s the baby of the family and they all dote on her, but Lani said she’s a big tease. She likes to pull pranks on their older brothers. They sometimes call her a puca because they said she acts like one more than a gargoyle.

I nearly reminded him that I knew, because I’d heard their conversations, but he seemed so excited I decided to just let it go.

The front door opened soon after and we all looked over, but it wasn’t Elanius’s sister, but their aunt. Carmen. She looked stern and business-like and sometimes I wondered if she ever smiled, but we’d barely seen her in person, just in pictures and once when Ezra came over for Thanksgiving.

“Aunt Carmen!” Elanius hurried forward. “This is my friend, Kat. She lives with Ezra, my coworker.” That was the cover story we used, to explain why we lived at the same place and all. “That’s their dog, Goose,” they added.

They seemed a little nervous, or maybe that was just me. Oh, right, it was me. I was used to dealing with a lot of people, but police were usually not a great friend of nightclubs and unlike Ezra, I wasn’t a super rule-follower. I inherently got more tense and shut-off around police if I knew they were present, but in this case, despite the woman being a relative of Elanius, I was worried that she wouldn’t be willing to tell me what I wanted to know.

“Right, Kat.” Carmen’s eyes narrowed in on me, for a moment seeming to judge me for my choice in colors – my clothes and my car parked outside – but that was probably my imagination. “You’re the girl who wants to stick her nose into this whole serial killer business because you’re, what, curious?”

For a moment, it was so quiet I didn’t think even the dogs were breathing. Lois looked like she was ready to bustle forward and try to smooth over some ruffled feathers; Eugene was shaking his head at Carmen; and Elanius seemed stressed, looking between us nervously. Oh, and the dogs were working on digging all the toys out of the toy chest and spreading them out over the living room.

I took a deep breath. I could do this.

“Actually, it’s not just curiosity. I’d rather explain this over dinner, but if you’d rather, I can go into it now.” I waited for her to make the call of whether we’d stand here in the hallway, everyone on edge, or try to sit down and have some food as a potential buffer zone or distraction.

She was still looking at me suspiciously when the door blew open again and a very petite woman breezed into the room.

“Hello everyone, what’d I miss? Hi Aunt Carmen! Mom and Dad! Elanius! Oh who’s this?” Towards Goose, then towards me, “hi, I’m Penrose! You must be Elanius’s friend!”

“I’m Kat, the dog is Goose,” I responded automatically.

“Oh cool, a dog named Goose!” She seemed to find this hilarious, hanging up her coat as she kept going. “I’m sick of sitting on the roof by the way. It’s busy 20 minutes of the day and the rest of the time it’s boring. Couldn’t you at least have posted me by a high school instead of preschool? High schoolers have drama. Preschoolers take naps.”

She completely ignored the apparent tension in the hallway, practically pushing us all towards the dining room/kitchen. Next thing I knew, Lois was setting out the dishes and ordering us all into chairs, and I found myself sitting next to Elanius and across from Carmen.

Well, that was probably good. Some space between us, but I could talk to her directly.

Penrose, who was across from Elanius, chattered along to their dad, who was at that end of the table with them, while Lois was at this end with me and Carmen. I hoped that if things got too bad, maybe Lois could help. Or Ezra, who was being very quiet. He wasn’t as confident about getting involved in this to begin with, so he wasn’t sure about explaining things to Carmen, but I knew he’d do his best to help me if it became necessary.

“All right,” Carmen interrupted my thoughts, her gaze piercing. “Get to the point.”

Penrose paused to watch us, a little puzzled, while I tried to rally my confidence and pretend like I wasn’t intimidated by Elanius’s aunt.

“I know Elanius through Ezra, my roommate, who works with them. Elanius told us – both of us – about the potential serial killer in town. Well, I manage a nightclub, Ethereal Nights. Members of the Gallo family come there from time to time.” I saw the recognition of the family name in her eyes, telling me I was right about that guess, at least. I’d sort of assumed the family they referenced were the Gallos, but she’d unintentionally just confirmed that.

“I know you’ve got your family stationed out in town, especially near the Gallo family, to see if you can find any details on what’s going on. But I got to thinking about what I know about the Gallo family, and I don’t think you’ll find much just watching like that. This has been subtle enough a naturally suspicious family didn’t catch wind of it. The chances of seeing something from the roofs seems small enough, especially when you’re dealing with a family like this, because if they realize there’s a police presence, even indirectly, keeping an eye on them, they’re going to feel like it’s a declaration of war and respond accordingly.” There was, actually, a threat of that based on conversations I’d had with Croc. I wasn’t actually 100% sure they’d react to gargoyles watching them as if it was a declaration of war by the police, but it seemed like a pretty good guess.

“I think there’s a simpler solution,” I informed her while she processed that, her frown growing. “I have connections that’ll let me talk to someone close to the family head. Not the head himself, but close enough I can get information to him.” Again, a bit of an exaggeration, but she didn’t need to know that. “I want to tell them about what’s going on and give them details about what the necromancer saw and whether there are any other deaths that might connect.”

Carmen sat back in her chair, her face filled with both realization and disapproval. “You want to tell them so they’ll handle it. If they know there’s someone targeting them, they’ll handle it within ranks.”

I shrugged a bit. “That’s the general idea, yes.”

“What you’re suggesting is looking the other way while they murder someone,” she pointed out. “I can’t condone that.”

“You don’t actually know that they’d kill anyone,” I reasoned, taking my time to take a bite of food so she saw I wasn’t flustered. Maybe I was, but I wouldn’t let her see it. “Yes, they’d deal with it internally, if appropriate, or if it’s another family, deal with it diplomatically.”

“What’s to say they wouldn’t declare war on the other family instead?” She demanded. “That seems just as likely.”

I shook my head, remembering what Croc had told me. “They had a lengthy and very costly war with the other main family in town not long ago, followed by an internal succession fight. They’ll avoid going to war against the other family if they can. Police,” I gave her a bit of a shrug, “that’s a different story. But they’ll try to avoid war against the other family if possible.”

“Still potential murder,” Carmen grunted. “I can’t go along with that. You’re claiming they might do something else as punishment, but you’ve got to be naive if you genuinely think that’s going to be something other than death for deaths. And you don’t read that naïve.” She eyed me, her eyes still piercing.

I wasn’t naïve, that was true, but I also wasn’t as opposed to letting someone handle something outside the boundaries of law. Obviously, I didn’t think she’d agree, but on the other hand, supernaturals often had to cross lines like that.

“So one potential death to stop a serial killer,” I stated calmly, hoping I was coming across as confident and not cocky. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference. “This person has already killed at least four people, three of which are supernatural. They probably have some amount of Hunter training and know they’re dealing with supernaturals, meaning this isn’t a normal killer. If you’re able to identify them without them killing anyone else first – which is unlikely since the whole idea of the gargoyles watching is to potentially catch another murder, right? – then you still have to send the patrol after them and hope that they’re able to deal with a clearly dangerous killer. Maybe no one else would die. Maybe. On the other hand, if the Gallo family handles it, they’ll figure it out faster, because they don’t have to sit on the rooftops waiting – they can go directly to the family members and get information that the family just won’t share with police, even if you drag them in for questioning.”

She opened her mouth to object, then shut it, conceding that point. Some people just weren’t willing to talk to police, and an organized crime family – allegedly – was going to top that list.

“So you’re talking about days or weeks or who knows how long to investigate the official way, and likely involving at least one more death in the process just to find out who it is, while if the Gallo family knows, they’ll likely sniff it out within days at most. Maybe hours. And yeah, maybe they’ll kill the person,” I conceded. “But if it was a Hunter, you wouldn’t care. You wouldn’t charge them with murder. Just because there’s a potential that it might not officially be a Hunter and be someone using Hunter training and weapons instead, you want to charge them? That seems like a bit of a double standard,” I told her bluntly.

Elanius, Eugene, and Lois all caught their breaths waiting for Carmen to respond, while Penrose clapped her hand over her mouth, trying to hide her huge smile, but she gave me a thumbs-up behind her aunt’s back.

Well, I seemed to have made another ally in this argument.