Are normal cases a safe thing?
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Tanya Huff and the writers of the shows Blood Ties and Moonlight. Also some characters borrowed from the show Flash Point, so it´s eventually a bit of a triple, but I couldn´t resist it, as I liked this police show very much and it takes place in Toronto too. I´m writing for entertainment only and don´t make any money with it. No copyright infringement intended.
Rated M for reason, as there will be some strong stuff ahead in coming chapters. Hurt/comfort. Angst. Horror. This story belongs to a loosely tied together series for Blood Ties.
This story takes place between Blood Ties episode #4 Gifted and episode #5 Deadly Departed. Vicki has just finished the case of Sarah in the Cobb Institute and is still gnawing on Mike´s reaction on Henry´s sudden outing, that happened in a rather unfortunate situation. She gets a new case to investigate and much to her relief, it seems to be a normal one, as she just had her first experiences with the world of the paranormal. And we know, that Vicki is a tough woman, always taking matters in her own hands...
And also Henry is still brooding over it, if he acted right with an outing, when he gets an unexpected call...
Chapter 1
An unexpected call
Henry was leaning over his desk and was coloring up his new graphic novel. Any way he couldn´t concentrate like usually, because his thoughts were drifting off to the night last week, when he had presented himself to the detective in all his vampire nature.
It hadn´t been a good moment. Not this relaxed situation, in which he could in all calmness somebody confront with the truth about his nature, without it being ending up with the typical Henry-vampire-monster reaction. Being honestly to himself, he had to state that he might have acted a bit too spontaneously. But the detective had seen too much of him in the Cobb-Institute; his eyes, the fangs, his physical strength...as that he might have been able to push that aside as an illusion. To manipulate the detective with his vampire compelling skills might have worked out, but a cop´s brain wouldn´t simply forget that without asking, what the heck he actually had seen. And a Detective Celluci who was investigating him behind his back like in a killer case, was by far more dangerously and incalculable for Henry, as to out himself, even when the moment had been the most unfitting of all.
Henry took a deep breath and adjusted his ink pencil, filling up the shape of the figure.
In that moment his cell phone rang.
He tried to ignore it, but the ringing went on and he remembered that he hadn´t switched on his mailbox. With an angry sigh he threw the ink pencil on his desk and pulled his cell from his pocket. Perhaps it was a call from Vicki, who needed some help in a case.
The voice on the other end was the sonorous of a man.
"It´s Augustus here! Henry Fitzroy...?!" the man greeted him.
"Yes! Hello Augustus...what´s going on...?" It was already unusual that Augustus was calling in, not contrary The man who cared for the matter of the immortals and who cared for it, that one could live as a vampire relatively undisturbed and without territorial fights, as long as everybody was acting by the rules.
"Hello Henry, old friend...how are you? How are your graphic novels going...?"
"Well, for sure you aren´t calling just for some small talk, hm?" Henry went in medias res immediately. "And to answer your question, Augustus: I´m well and I´m just working on a new novel. Final chapter. Coloration. But why are you calling? Are there any problems ahead?" Problems was meaning among vampires, that probably quarrels about an assigned territory were in front of the door or a contract was put in question or worse.
"No! There are no problems to worry about, Henry. But you´re about to get a visitor in your city." Augustus tried to calm him down. Point one sounded good, point two wasn´t what he might enjoy.
"A visitor? Somebody traveling during a removal?" Staying over day was such an act called. To give shelter for a day until the next sunset.
"No, it´s no removal, Henry...I´m having somebody here, who wants to come to Toronto cause he has official business over here. A vampire from Los Angeles."
"Augustus, you know that I´ll give shelter for one day, but I´m no hotel for those of our kind. One day; yes! In a pinch also two, when it´s inevitable, but not days- and weeks long." Henry already warned him prematurely.
A longtime visit, a vampire, with whom he would have to share his territory for good for a longer time, that was something, he won´t have use for currently. First of all he had to keep the thing with this detective Celluci under attention. And when additionally a second vampire was running through Toronto...Not all too long ago, the city has had its vampire hysteria, when Norman had tried to mix up Toronto his very own way. And Detective Celluci was already goaded when it came to vampires.
"So, Henry, when I´m honestly with you...and I have to, then I can´t tell yet, how long this visitor will stay in Toronto. He´s a private detective and investigates in a case of betrayal. He´s contacted me a couple of minutes ago, cause he knows that Toronto belongs to a vampire who plays in the "territory league"...!" Augustus pushed the situation to the fact, that Henry won´t tolerate anybody else in his city.
Henry thought it over. Territorial.
There was a species living in Los Angeles, a sub-species which was showing differences. As far as he knew, they were able to walk around outside in daylight, without bursting into flames directly. By this problems could grow, should the other turn out to be an opponent, while Henry was helplessly lying in daytime sleep. They were drinking blood like him. And in difference to him the obviously couldn´t cope with silver.
"And what do you want from me now, please?" Henry sounded a bit...angrily. Not because of Augustus call in general, but if he would have to share his territory with another vampire for a longer time right now...the last thing he had any need for!
"You won´t have to give him shelter personally, Henry. I´ll organize him a place in a hotel to stay, for the time he´ll stay in Toronto."
"As long as it isn´t the Four Seasons directly beside me! He does not have to crowd me all that time right beside me."
"I´ll be already caring for some distance, Henry. No prob! Only...when he´ll have to stay in your city, he´ll have to search for a feeding source..."
Henry was thinking. Hunting ground. When the other one was staying for longer, he will have to search for food, that was inevitable. He would investigate everywhere around, but feeding was another question.
"As he can´t tell me how long he´ll have to stay, I want to make an agreement with you for a hunting ground!"
"Okay. Looks like it´ll be inevitable, Augustus! So well, tell him, when it comes to this, that he shall stay north of St. Claire and east of Mount Pleasant Cemetery. All what´s going north of it, is okay with me. Will I catch him south of it or even in Downtown, then it means serious trouble for him and you know, what I´m talking about, Augustus..." Henry warned him. He would neither tolerate a feeding in the restricted area, nor, the less a feeding accident, alas a corpse left behind! Who ever was about to feed in Toronto, had to stay with the rules! Feeding without a kill. He had promised to protect his sources, his donors, even from getting hurt anyway.
"Good, I´ll tell him..." Augustus took a deep breath of relief. That had gone pretty well. And with a smile he added: "He won´t be disturbing you, Henry! Thank you very much for your cooperation!"
Henry nodded. "When will he be arriving?"
"Tomorrow evening. His plane lands at around 5:30 pm. So I might tell him that his visit in your city will be okay, Henry!?"
"Yes, you can tell it him! And I´m expecting that he acts inconspicuously!"
"He´s an private detective, Henry! These guys are always working discreetly." Augustus assured him.
"I know! I know one!" Naturally he couldn´t see Henry´s grin.
"Well, good! I´m glad that we could come to an agreement, Henry!" Augustus was feeling better now than in the beginning of the call. Henry was a vampire of royal birth. He was way older than his client from L.A. and in some certain things Henry acted like the son of the king he still was. And when it came to his territory, he was giving no pardon. On the other side, Henry was reliable partner in case of agreements. He was keeping along the made agreements as long as they weren´t put in question from the other side. Henry feared nothing more than a war among vampires, but would be determined to stay his ground in case of!
"Thank you very much, Henry! And when any question occurs, don´t hesitate to call me. I´m always reachable for you!"
"Okay, Augustus and thank you for calling and...for your trust. I´m always yours! Good night, old friend!"
"Good night, Henry...!" It clicked in the connection, when Augustus hung up.
Henry sighed. It would have been easy for him to give Augustus a No, but the man was also a very old friend, beside the business that his family was fulfilling since generations. Henry knew him personally since some forty years, when he had taken over the function from his father Augustus Tiborius. And with a smile he asked himself, why the family was tending to the names of ancient Roman emperors. But maybe it was pointing out the importance of the business, that they performed for the community of the immortals. Whereat most of the vampires or immortals were definitely loners, in difference to the specimen that would be approaching his city soon.
After a long view out of his wide windows, Henry turned back to his illustrations.
Slowly his illustrations were filling up with colors and the longer he worked, the more he managed it to get his thoughts away from Detective Celluci and the visitor. After one hour he was satisfied by his work and he put the color inks aside. He switched off his desk lamp and got his coat to enjoy a snack in a club. Actually he wasn´t hungry because he had been feeding last night, but some distraction would be fine now. It wasn´t that late and in one of the clubs he often frequented, he would find those distraction that he needed now. Perhaps he´d meet one of his old acquaintances to spent the night with.
Henry locked up his condo and entered the elevator and drove down to the basement garage.
There wasn´t much traffic in the garage this time and only few moments later he steered his black Jaguar into the busy Bloor Street West. The street was one of the main traffic arteries of the city and practically always pedestrians and cars were on the street. After some minutes he reached one of his favorite clubs, he parked in a side street and mixed up with the row of waiting people, who were crowding the entrance from which loud jazz music was coming.
"Ah! Mr. Fitzroy...!" One of the doorman greeted him with a smile, waving him in irrespective of the waiting line. When one of the waiting girls grunted, the doorman replied; Conference with the boss, Lady!" What naturally was a plain lie. Henry simply was a regular guest. And those were let in ever, regardless of how many and of how much gotten dolled up girls were pushing in front of the door. The inside was jam-packed. Hundreds of scents and multiple babble of voices where forcing on him, but by long training he was able to push back this flood and to filter for the essential. His nostrils widened and he checked the air, looking around with a friendly smile, until he found a young woman standing at the side, who looked somewhat forlorn. Calmly he moved over to her, looking her over. Only shortly, but long enough to wake her interest without making a cloddish pass at her. Henry didn´t like that and he won´t do that too. He had been grown up to a gentleman like behavior. He turned his head away, being fully aware that she was still watching after him. Like by coincidence he turned over to her again.
"Are you searching for somebody?" he casually asked her.
"Uhm...no, not exactly. I came in alone..." she answered and looked in his face.
"May I invite you for a drink?" Henry asked with a smile.
"I´d love to...!" she followed him to the bar and Henry ordered a cocktail for her and a mineral water for him. The young woman looked very likable and the evening might be developing very pleasant...
Toronto Metropolitan Police- Homicide
Mike was sitting at his desk when he saw Crowley approaching. His mood went down to Point Zero. When she opened the door to his office she had only a few files in her hand. That was already unusual. Normally she used to pile up files over files on his desk.
"Detective Celluci, these are the documents for your on-the-job-training in Vancouver. Your plane goes 10:50 am tomorrow from Toronto. Training files, tickets and hotel reservation are added. Much success, Detective! And good night!" By this she left his office again.
Man, that´s the maximum of politeness that this hag is able to, Mike thought with a grin. Then he grabbed his cell phone from his desk.
It was ringing for a while until Vicki answered the call.
"Mike here! Hello, Vic...I wanted to tell you that I got my training approved! I´m flying tomorrow in the early morning, shortly before eleven am."
"How long will you be gone there?" Vicki asked while she kneaded the base of her nose.
"That´s running over four days, from the day after tomorrow. So I´m...including the flight back...yeap! Here it is! I´ll be back in Toronto on Saturday morning...!"
"Okay, then I´m wishing you much success and have fun. You really had to wait long enough for it, Mike."
"Yup! After ten years in the service it was about time, too that´s my turn finally!" Mike leaned cozily back in his office seat. "And how is it going on your side?"
"Ohh, so lala. Adultery, defalcation, adultery...the usual knit pick even. P.I. routine..." she mumbled.
"Not that creepy shit as with this girl, little Sarah and her father Stephen, I hope..." Mike sounded a bit angrily when he reminded the unfortunate event from last week.
"No! Completely normal stuff. And Sarah..."
"Listen to me! I don´t like it, that this Fitzroy is dragging you into this paranormal crap!...A vampire! As if the usual gangsters aren´t messing things up enough..." Mike´s voice regained more sharpness.
"Henry doesn´t drag me into anything!" Vicki protested.
"Call that as you like, Vic. Since you´re working together with him, you´re having only such cases. I think this to be rather dangerously!"
"Henry is helping me! He isn´t my employee! That is Coreen..." Vicki bit back.
"Doesn´t matter as what you´ll list him up. Helper. Employee. Anything else...first you don´t tell me what he is. And then you practically know nothing at all about him! I´m honestly asking me, where your cop instincts have gone to...!" Mike was slowly gaining momentum, that she could hear by his voice. He did make no secret of his antipathy against Henry.
"Ups! And cause of my, in every sense, blurred sight of the world..." Vicki referred to her RP. "...and my non-knowledge, as you´ve so eloquently put it, you´re sniffing after Henry like after one of your killers!" she snarled yet.
"Apropos sniffing! Where from at all are you meaning to know, what I do? I´m only trying to protect you, Victoria!"
"Protection! I don´t need protection! And do you seriously believe, that Henry doesn´t know what you´re doing?...Mike! Mike!...Henry gets enough of it to know that you´re after him!"
"It seems to me that this guys has his eyes and ears everywhere. Or his footmen, who´ll bring it to him..." Mike cursed. When he was thinking of it, he didn´t like it to let Vicki all alone with the vampire.
How ever could Vicki be so careless in acting with new partners?
Eventually this bastard was a vampire! Who is drinking blood, human blood! Or had Fitzroy Vicki already that kinda spellbound, that she didn´t see the danger anymore. In the movies vampires were hypnotizing their subordinates, so that they obeyed and didn´t get it anymore, whom they were serving. Like this crackbrained Renfield in Dracula. And to let Vicki back for five days now with a new and incalculable partner, really chapped his hide. Was the stress as a freelancer private eye not sufficiently enough, that she was always maneuvering herself into new danger?
"Vicki! Please be careful! Keep out of dangerous tasks...Hopefully that isn´t wanted too much of you, Vic!"
"Thanks for your concern! I wish you a good flight. Till Saturday, Mike!" Her voice sounded very frosty. Then the click indicated, that Vicki had hung up.
"Crap!" Mike threw his cell on the desk in frustration.
He had a bad vibe about that...
At the same time in Toronto Downtown
"I´m staying somewhat longer tonight, Ms. Langdon!"
"Okay, Mr. Fulton, I´ll be still finishing the mail, then I´ll be gone..." the young office assistant replied, when she was balancing a pile of folders. She shoved the door open with her foot, then she was outside.
The man in the office chair logged in with a password to a data file, to which only he had access. He shot the door a look, then he opened a list and started to work. His fingers were flying over the key board, changing codes here and there and numbers switched from red to green, when various amounts of money changed the owner and were lead to different banks. Now and then he looked up from his screen to check if nobody came in or moved along outside his office.
Then the office assistant opened the door, only looking in and said: "I´ll go now, Mr. Fulton! Good night, till´morrow."
"Yeap. Nice evening, Ms. Langdon, see you tomorrow..." he replied. Then she was gone. He heard her high heels clicking over the parquet floor, then outside the door feel shut.
Pretty nice, but even not the brightest bulb in the box..., he thought. Only works here, cause she holds her butt up to Johnson...
With an icy smile he let himself sink back in his leather chair, crossing his arms behind his head and he watched over his work in utter satisfaction.
His boss would be very satisfied.
Another 875 thousands of Dollars had been filtered through the company structure, splitting them over different accounts, which were running over the Bermudas and Switzerland to meet again on the account of his boss. 875 thousands of Canadian Dollars, which had turned into white funds from various transactions which all had been illegal. Innocent like freshly fallen snow.
When the shipment from Macao would be coming in, there would be the next discreet transactions ahead when the brokers would pay, before the stuff would be flooding Toronto and Montreal. The Canadian market was thriving over the last time and when they stayed carefully, it would be expanding further on, he thought with a smirk, before he closed the data file and turned over to inconspicuously, utterly legal payments.
What slipped from his attention, was the fact that a little mistake had happened three days ago. Coincidentally Mr. Johnson, the owner of the trading company, had looked himself over the payments to get an overview of the running transfers in the most recent quarter. Thereby he had seen irregularities in two payments, which he couldn´t explain despite internal research. Payments which had been delegated by Mr. Fulton.
Mr. Johnson put up his cell phone. He thought it over for a moment. His company was about to arrange important business agreements with a new Chinese partner in Toronto and to start police investigations now, seemed not to be recommendable. That wouldn´t look good, when amidst negotiations for longtime business connections in China, the name of his company would show up in connection with the police. For sure, manipulations in business reports, defalcation and to cook the books...that was occasionally happening even in the best companies. But his Chinese business partners were attaching great importance not to lose face. And they would see this that way, would the company´s name be called in one breath with the TMP.
A private eye could investigate that discreetly, without partners or employees growing suspiciously. Beside this handling avoided lawsuits, worth several millions should the accused turn out to be innocent, but would see his reputation ruined. In the business often enough a bare suspicion could be enough to send a career down the drain. And this might become really expensive for him!
After thinking it over again, he dialed the number from the advertisement.
Victoria Nelson Investigations. Private detective. Discreet investigations of all kind. Observation, legally accepted evidence. No case is too difficult for us, no case too uncommon. Under it he found the contact data.
He intentionally ignored the The occult is our specialty.
He dialed the cell phone call number.
Vicki had just finished her conversation with Mike. Her mood was below Zero or on the boiling point, depending on how one would look at.
Her cell phone was ringing again.
Once again Mike? What did he want though?
Without looking at the caller-ID, she pressed her cell to her ear and so her voice was rather harsh, when she answered the call.
"Yes?!"
"Miss Nelson, Private Investigations?" a male voice asked. It wasn´t Mike.
"Oh, beg your pardon! Yes, you´re speaking with Vicki Nelson, private detective...Sorry, but I expected somebody else. What can I do for you?"
"Walter Johnson from Johnson Inc.! I have to beg your pardon, that I´m calling you on a Sunday and at this time, Ms. Nelson."
"That doesn´t matter..."
"Thanks. Look...I´m gonna need your help and it´s with some urgency. I right about to have important business conversations and I´ve found...irregularities in transfers and account transactions! i´ll need somebody who might investigate discreetly in my company without causing unwelcome attention."
"You´re suspecting an employee or a business partner?" Vicki asked without hesitation.
"Yes, an employee. I want to have that cleared as inconspicuously as possible, before I would involve the police with a verified evidence. Look, Ms. Nelson, it won´t make a good impression, when the name of my company shows up in connection with the TMP, when I´m right about to close important trading agreements."
"I´m completely understanding, Mr. Johnson." Vicki reassured him.
So a case of defalcation or betrayal. Nothing that uncommon for a P.I., she thought.
"Can you take over this case?" he asked. He had put some pressure in his voice. Probably he was under some certain pressure himself.
"Yes, I can take this! How do you imagine to handle this in detail, Mr. Johnson?"
"I´ll smuggle you in...you´ll come to my company as a volunteer of accounting. You´ll be assisting my office assistant and me. Then you´ll have the possibility to investigate and you´ll only report to me!"
"Sounds good! Might you come over here afterwards, Mr. Johnson? Then we can talk about the details in my office."
"In about half an hour? Would that be okay for you, Ms. Nelson?
"That´s okay! You´re having my address?!...251 Huron Street, second floor..."
"I have it. Thanks so much. See you soon..." it clicked in the line.
Vicki shoved her cell back in her pocket, pulling on another pullover and she rearranged her hair that was tousled from the work out. About half an hour later Mr. Johnson was sitting in her office. A short conversation with him and she had a new client and order.
A totally normal case. A safe thing.
Nothing paranormal. Just as Mike had recommended her.
To be continued.