A Furnace Sealed Read online

  That got her to frown for a second. “I guess it is business for you, isn’t it?”

  “Very literally. I’m gonna get some coffee.”

  “Okay.” She smiled again and sat back down with her tablet.

  I ordered a regular coffee, paid, and brought it straight to the table.

  Katie had been watching me, and when I sat down across from her she shook her head. “Wow. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that before.”

  I blinked. “Seen what?”

  “Someone just get a black coffee in a café without putting anything in it. No latte, no macchiato, no espresso, just a straight up black coffee with no dairy, no sweetener. That’s so—so—”

  “Boring?”

  She chuckled. “I was gonna say old-fashioned.”

  “Thank you. In both my professions, it’s best to keep the caffeine no-frills. Just pour into the mug and then pour down your throat, no fuss, no muss.”

  “Both professions?” She squinted in confusion. “You’re not just a Courser?”

  That threw me for a loop. I thought everyone knew that I was a doctor. “Nope, I’m also an MD I work two days a week at Montefiore’s ER.”

  “Wow. I had no idea.”

  “It pays a few extra bills, and keeps my shingle polished, as it were. Besides, it’s handy to help give first aid to other Coursers under the table, y’know?”

  “Makes sense.” She sipped her latte. “Thank you so much for coming. I’ve actually been thinking about asking you out for a while now. Miriam and Anna Maria kept telling me to just ask. I was hoping you might ask me, but they told me that was a lost cause.”

  I sighed. “Yeah, well, I’m not good at flirting. Or being flirted at, apparently. There was this woman in med school, Sara Mankiewicz, who apparently had the hots for me the whole time, and I completely missed it.”

  “When did you find out?”

  “At her wedding.”

  Katie almost snarfed her latte. “Oh my God, really?”

  “Yeah. She just took her vows with some putz from her neighborhood, and she was dancing with all her med school friends, and when she got to me she told me right there on the dance floor that if I’d just asked her out, I’d probably be the one marrying her instead of the putz.”

  With a small smirk, Katie asked, “Why didn’t she ask you out?”

  I pointed at her. “The exact question I asked!” I laughed. “Did she not get the memo that it’s the twenty-first century? I mean, you did.”

  “I did, yes. And boy, was it not easy.”

  I sipped my coffee. “Because I’m so oblivious?”

  “Well, no, because of my anxiety. Honestly, for a long time, I only left the house on the nights of the full moon.”

  “Oh.” I couldn’t think of anything intelligent to say to that.

  “I’m lucky—I inherited the house I live in from my parents, and it’s all paid off. I make enough money from freelance work I can do from home to pay the taxes on the house and for food and stuff.”

  Wow. I had no idea of any of this. Luckily, I had the presence of mind not to say that out loud. I felt like enough of a schmuck as it was. “What do you do?”

  “Transcriptions, translations, editing, some production and design work. For a long time, I’d go weeks without ever going outside and only opening the door for deliveries of groceries and mail and things—at least until full moon time. Miriam was the one who convinced me to start seeing a therapist. It’s because of her—the therapist, not Miriam—that I’ve been doing the fish pictures and the live videos and things. It helps me engage with other people, even if it’s only online. I’ve even met a few people that way.”

  “That’s great.” I smiled. “I gotta admit, there are days when those fish pics make a crappy day better.”

  “Aw, thank you, Bram, that’s sweet.”

  “If you don’t mind me going all doctor on you, are you on any meds for the anxiety?”

  “I have Xanax, but I only take it when things get really bad.”

  I nodded. “Good. That means it’s not as bad as it could be, if you don’t have to take something every day. And Xanax generally works, as long as you don’t drink any alcohol.”

  She shook her head. “I never do anyhow. I don’t like the taste of alcohol, and I’ve always been able to taste it in anything I drink. Back in college, before the anxiety got so awful, I was always the designated driver. Now I can’t even drive—gave up my license about a year after my parents were killed.”

  “Killed?” Recalling that lycanthropy was sometimes inherited, I added, “Please tell me it wasn’t a Courser.”

  “No, but they were killed on the night of a full moon. They used to go out into the backwoods of Van Cortlandt Park or Pelham Bay Park and run around all night. One night, someone found them and shot them.”

  “Damn, I’m sorry.”

  “Thanks. I’ve been kind of a mess ever since.” She finished off her latte, then said, “Enough about me, tell me some more about you. Why’d you become a doctor? And how’d you become a Courser?”

  “The two are kinda related, actually.” And then I told her all about growing up the child of two doctors and the golem and my aunt and Hugues.

  By the time I was done, I had finished my coffee. “Want another?” I asked her.

  Katie hesitated. “I want to, but—I need to get back home. This is way too much people-ing. First the sushi restaurant yesterday, now this—I need to get back home where it’s quiet and safe.”

  I held up both hands. “I totally get that. You okay to get home on your own?”

  “Yeah, it’s a short walk, and I can get my steps in.” She grinned. “That’s another thing my therapist suggested, going for walks. I’m using one of those apps that counts steps.”

  “Nice. Walking’s good for you. I should probably do it more myself.”

  We both got up and someone immediately grabbed our table. We tossed our cups into the garbage, she put her tablet in her purse, and we both went outside.

  For a second, we just stood there staring at each other.

  Finally, I opened my arms. “Hug okay?”

  She let out a happy-sounding sigh. “Absolutely.”

  We hugged, and I said, “Let’s do this again sometime.”

  “I’d like that. Maybe next week?”

  “Sounds good.”

  She headed down Riverdale Avenue and I headed up 236th Street and I was home in about five minutes, a spring in my step.

  Should’ve realized all the times she chatted with me was her flirting. Or at least expressing interest. Well, maybe I could make up for it. Not sure how much time for dating someone I’d have in this life—it was one of many reasons why my social life has been kind of a wasteland—but at least Katie understood what I did for a living. And her anxiety meant she probably wouldn’t want to be going out much.

  When I got home, Rebekah was on her way out the door. She was, unsurprisingly, holding another box full of flyers. To my equal lack of surprise, neither her socks nor her shoes matched.

  “Oh, hey, Bram! Can you take a few of these and put them up? Elvin Mathis is speaking at Manhattan College on Friday.”

  I vaguely recalled seeing a news item about him on one of the televisions in the waiting room at the hospital when I was working a shift. “That’s the guy angling for the reservations to declare themselves independent from the Union, right?”

  “I think he’s got great things to say. I really support his cause.”

  “Well, I think you’re both nuts—but it’s also good that he’s talking about this stuff. He pushes for independence, it might at least lead to smaller improvements.”

  My cousin stared at me over her plastic-framed glasses like I was nuts. “It’s not about small improvements, Bram, it’s about changing things for the better.”

  “All the better changes in the world happened in small doses. The big changes usually involve body counts.”

  “You’re wrong, it’s the bi
g changes that matter.” She shook her head. “Look, I gotta go put these up in that new café over on Riverdale. Take some?”

  I nodded and held my hand out, smiling to make sure there were no hard feelings. It wasn’t the first time we’d argued about this stuff, anyhow. She was young, she’d figure it out eventually. “Sure. And hey, the coffee there’s pretty good, you should try some.” I instantly regretted saying that, as the last thing my cousin needed was a stimulant.

  As she handed me about a dozen flyers out of the box, she said, “Oh, did you hear? Ben Palmer died!”

  I blinked. “Really?”

  “Yeah. I only found out because he was the one who was going to put up Elvin while he’s in town. He convinced the college to let him lecture.”

  That didn’t surprise me. Palmer was a rich guy from one of the older families in Riverdale. The Palmers had owned the same mansion in north Riverdale since the Bronx was mostly Jonas Bronck’s big farm, and Ben used his money for serious activism. I knew that Rebekah had gotten to know him pretty well, since their social-justice paths crossed a lot.

  “I’m sorry about that. You okay?”

  “Yeah. I mean, no, not really, but that’s why I want to push this lecture, in his memory, y’know?”

  “All right. I’ll drop these off next chance I get,” I said, holding up the handful of flyers.

  “Thanks. Talk to you later.”

  She started up the street in her mismatched footwear, her uncombed hair flying around in the breeze.

  Loved that kid.

  As I walked toward the front door, my phone started playing “Daytripper.”

  “What’s up, Miriam?”

  There was silence for a second. “You still aren’t calling me Mimi.”

  “Consider it my present for convincing Katie to ask me out to coffee. We just got back from that new place over on Riverdale.”

  “That’s great! I’m really glad she finally asked you, and I’m really glad you accepted. Mostly because if you didn’t, I’d have to kill you, and I’m sorta kinda fond of you.”

  “Sorta kinda, huh?”

  “Well, you keep calling me Mimi—sometimes. Anyhow, I’m actually calling on business. Ben Palmer died.”

  “Uh, yeah, I just heard about that from Rebekah. News travels fast.”

  “This is bigger news than you think. Palmer was an immortal.”

  I blinked. “What?”

  “Just like Warren, he goes back to the colonial Bronx. He built a free bridge across the Harlem River to compete with the King’s Bridge, back in the day. The King’s Bridge charged a toll, and he thought passage should be free.”

  “Doing noble causes back then, too, huh?”

  “Something like that. Point is, that’s two immortals from the colonial Bronx killed in a couple of days. I don’t like this one bit. Can you check the crime scene? See if Lyd can let you in? I’ll pay your usual fee.”

  “Uh, yeah, sure.” I wasn’t too keen on asking Toscano for another favor after Warren’s body, but once I told her it was spook shit, she’d probably be okay with it. “I’ll let you know what I find.”

  I ended the call and shuddered. I was starting to come around to Miriam’s notion that the crazy vamp killing immortals was a much bigger problem than messed up binding spells.

  Chapter 6

  The good news was that Toscano was the primary detective on the case, which made it easier to go up to the Palmer mansion and ask her to look around. She gave me the hairy eyeball and groused when I told her it was more spook shit, but she told me to put on gloves and booties and let me look around the house so long as I didn’t touch anything.

  The bad news was that this didn’t do me a lick of good. It was a much nicer death scene than Warren’s, but pretty much the same thing: dead body with two puncture wounds on the carotid, very little blood, and no sign of a struggle. I didn’t expect the latter with Warren—he was usually hammered, especially at night, so anybody could’ve just walked up to him and whacked him—but here, it probably meant that Palmer knew his killer.

  And if Palmer was an immortal going back three hundred years or so, it would be perfectly reasonable for him to know a vampire.

  I walked out, ignoring the dirty looks from uniforms and crime scene techs, not knowing any more than I did when I went in, except that it looked like a vamp got him, too.

  After I was done, Toscano followed me out onto the street. This part of Riverdale was mostly winding, badly paved streets with no sidewalks and a number of really big houses. The house my parents owned up until my father’s inability to maintain a garden became an issue was a few blocks from here.

  “So what the fuck was that all about, Brammy?” Toscano lit a cigarette as she asked the question, figuring that being away from the crime scene was an opportunity to suck nicotine.

  “You really wanna know?”

  “Warren was a skell nobody gave a fuck about, really. Palmer’s hot shit, and I’m gonna have people lookin’ over my damn shoulder. So yeah, I really wanna know.”

  I sighed. “Look, Lyd, all I can tell you is that it may be a vampire.”

  “Seriously? Like that asshole I busted who tried to kill Mike?”

  Snorting, I said, “Kinda.” The asshole in question had a beef with Miriam’s dad when he was the wardein. He broke into the house on Seward and tried to attack Miriam—this, of course, was in her pre-wheelchair days. She took him out without breaking a sweat, and Mike called Toscano. “If this really is a vampire, I promise, I’ll let you know if I find it.”

  “You better.” She took a drag on her cigarette. “I hate this shit.”

  “I don’t much like it, either.”

  We babbled at each other for a few more minutes until she was done with her cigarette, then she went back inside to work on processing the scene some more, while I walked back over to the Henry Hudson Parkway service road to catch a bus back down to my part of Riverdale. Parking was never easy on these old streets—generally folks parked in their garages and driveways—and that problem would be metastasized by the cops and crime scene nerds, so I’d just taken the bus up here (after buying a new MetroCard at the deli around the corner, since the one I had didn’t have even one fare left on it, much less two).

  When I got to the bus shelter, a strikingly attractive African-American woman was sitting on the bench. Her skin was incredibly smooth, like mahogany, and she wore her hair in a purple snood. A matching purple shawl with a pattern of flames and streaks draped her shoulders, and her legs were crossed under a tan skirt, showing off her black boots.

  Just as I pulled my smartphone out to check the MTA’s app that told you where the buses were and how long you had to wait for the next one, the woman spoke in a beautiful, rich voice, with enough of a hint of an accent to show that English wasn’t her first language, but not enough of one for me to place it. “Anne DeLancey will be the next victim.”

  I blinked. “Excuse me?”

  She got to her feet and walked over to me, the boot heels clopping on the sidewalk. “Warham Mather and Benjamin Palmer have already been killed. The next target is likely to be Anne DeLancey.”

  Okay, this was starting to get weird, especially since she used Warham rather than Warren. “And you are—?”

  “Someone who is grateful for the service you did for the loa earlier today.”

  “Oh, you live in Edenwald?”

  She smiled, showing magnificent teeth. And seriously, that smile just lit up the whole street. She wasn’t very tall, but she had presence oozing out of her pores. “No, but I have many there that I consider friends.”

  “And why would Anne DeLancey be targeted?”

  “For the same reason why Misters Mather and Palmer were. She is an immortal, who was born Anne van Cortlandt in the late seventeenth century.”

  “How do you know about all this?”

  The smile grew wider. “I know many things, Abraham Goldblume. Including that you prefer to be called Bram Gold.”


  “Depends on the circumstances. Look, I don’t know who you are—”

  “No, you do not. Nonetheless, you may trust that I speak the truth. As I said, you did the loa a great service today. Bonita Soriano has been an irritant for some time, but Wardein Zerelli’s sanctioning of her should put an end to her meddling.”

  “That was the idea,” I said neutrally. Obviously this woman was plugged into my world. “Look, can you at least give me a hint as to—”

  “Your bus is coming.”

  I turned around and saw that a Bx7 bus was on its way down the service road toward the bus stop.

  “Yeah, okay, I—” I turned back only to see that she was gone.

  I shook my head. Probably a spellcaster. I thought I knew all the ones in the Bronx, but maybe she was new.

  Well, new to the area, anyhow. She obviously wasn’t new to the game.

  Sighing, I got onto the bus and headed back home. I hadn’t gone upstairs before, heading straight to Palmer’s house, so I took the time to scritch Mittens and refill his food and water. Then I sat down at the computer to send invoices to both Rodzinski and the Altys. I also caught up on other email, including a nice note from a reverend who hired me to stop a lamprey a while back, and one from Hugues reminding me that I’d better be at the Kingfisher’s Tail tonight to toast his little girl. I also checked a few social media sites and noted that Katie had posted her daily picture of her fish tank. She’d even mentioned me in the caption, though not directly. “A friend told me these pictures brighten his days sometimes,” she wrote, “and I hope it does the same today!”

  I also wrote up what little I learned at Palmer’s place and emailed it to Miriam, along with an invoice for a token amount—it wasn’t like it took that much time or I accomplished much, but if I didn’t charge her, she’d give me a hard time about it—then followed it up with a phone call.

  “What is it, Bram?”

  “So I just sent you an email. Not much at Palmer’s place—it’s Warren all over again.”

  “Puncture wounds on the neck?”

  “Yeah. Lyd’ll probably tell me more once they have an official cause of death, but even though this is a press case, it’ll be a couple days before the autopsy’s done.”