Faith, Hope & Charity

A Faith Lehane Mystery

by

STFarnham

AKA Freelancer47

Chapter Eight

Previously:

"I guess I have to shoot your boyfriend then."

"He ain't my boyfriend." Just as I was about to put a bullet through the gap between Stone's arm and his ribcage in order to hit that asshole behind him, assuming of course that this gun was sighted in and accurate, I saw a shadow moving behind all of them. Shit, I thought, another one? But no, it was –

"Oof!" shouted the second bad guy, just as the first looked shocked and then dropped to pavement, his gun neatly intercepted by Stone.

"Hiya Faithy," said Xander with his lopsided grin, "need a hand?"

"Nah, I had it. But thanks anyway." I smiled at him, but I was surprised to see him. I kinda had the impression he didn't really like me much, sorta has good reason.

Stone got out his cell phone and punched a button. "Hey Dino," he said, "got a little problem here."

He listened a moment then said, "Yeah, hey you remember Al 'Bats' Cicciolino? Yeah, the one we put away two years before I left the force. Well, he's out now, and appears he's a little pissed-off at me, and probably you too. Anyway, send some uniforms over and you can put him back for 'felon with an unlicensed gun', 'parolee associating with felons', 'assault with a deadly weapon', 'discharging a firearm within city limits', and whatever else you can come up with."

He listened another minute then said, "Yeah, looks like he's stepped up from bats. See ya in a few."

"So these guys were after you? Not me? Not random?"

"Yeah," said Stone, "there are some people that no matter how often you teach them, they just never learn. But he did seem to think that you're Holly Barker, who you met the other day at Elaine's."

"Ah, so she's CIA, no wonder she doesn't like to advertise it."

"Yeah, I'll have to talk to her about it, because there's a small chance that this little mugging was aimed more at her them me."

"Okay, still nothin' to do with me, good." I glared at the muggers then said, "Where's my fuckin' manners? Stone, this is my friend Xander Harris, and X-man, this is Stone Barrington, my criminal lawyer."

"Criminal lawyer? What the hell Faith, whadja do this time? Rob a bank?" Xander asked.

"Nah, I don't need to rob banks, I inherited a pile from my Aunt. Then my cousin got himself killed in my new house right after he publicly accused me of stealing his inheritance. But Stone here has kept me out of the lockup, so far anyway. Now we're tryin' to find out who killed Roger. Wanna help?"

"Sure, but I don't know how much time I'll have, Giles sent me along to help you ride herd on your charges."

"Really? Cool. You want to come with us for a little B & E?"

Xander and I hadn't spent a lot of time workin' through our checkered past – after all, I almost fucking killed him and he doesn't try to bust my balls about it. What could I do to top that? Still, the reason we hadn't spent much time together since he got back from Africa was because I used to spend all my free time fucking that fuckin' Robin. Well at least that's changed now.

"Breaking and entering? What for?" asked Xander.

"Trying to keep me out of fuckin' prison again."

"Isn't B&E the opposite of what you should be doing to stay out of prison?"

Stone said, "Actually, I have the key to Mr. Wilkerson's apartment. Since his legal work was handled by Woodman & Weld, as well as anything else he could foist off on his lawyers, this is legal; the police would look askance if they catch us, but they couldn't do anything but bitch about it."

"Okay," said Xander, "legal crime, that's a new one."

A couple of cop cars arrived, followed by an chauffeured unmarked cop car carrying Dino Barchetti and Holly Barker in the back.

Dino and Holly got out, Dino conferred with Stone while Holly said to me, "You took out a couple of them?"

"I took down four and was about to shoot the other two when my friend Xander showed up, he and Stone managed to wrap them up."

Holly raised her eyebrows. "That's pretty good, where'd you learn how to do that?"

"I've been practicing Krav Maga since I was fourteen, and when I'm not doing other things for my employer, I teach unarmed combat to cops in Ohio at various Police Academy's."

"Very nice." As she got in the car, she looked at me speculatively, like maybe she was cooking up a plan concerning me. I'd have to fucking stop that, I wanted nothing to do with the CIA.

After the cops left with our muggers, we strolled towards Cousin Roger's apartment.

"What are we looking for, anyway?" asked Xander.

"Beats the fuck outta me. It's my lawyer's idea."

"Okay Mr. Lawyer, what are we looking for?"

"Anything to give us a reason for Mr. Wilkerson's demise, or even just a direction to investigate," said Stone.

"But shouldn't we be looking at that cop who actually shot him?" I asked.

"First, it's allegedly shot him, we don't actually know if he did it, it's just a suspicion, although a strong suspicion. And second, breaking into a cop's house isn't a very bright idea."

Xander said, "But we don't have to do it ourselves, we've got specialists for that sort of thing."

"The hell you say!" said Barrington. "What are you, organized crime?"

"No, no, we wear white hats. It's all for a good cause."

"Anyway, Giles wouldn't authorize a break-in short of preventing an apocalypse, would he?" I asked.

"He might, he thinks highly of you, Faith. But he'd rather not, so first let's see what we can find legally."

Giles thinks highly of me? When did that happen, I wondered. Nah, Xander must be wrong, he must of misheard something.

So, Roger's apartment consisted of four floors of a a well-maintained classic brownstone on a nice block. I could spend pages describing the place, and more pages describing where and how we looked, but there's no point because we didn't find shit. As far as we could tell, Roger spent his days watching porn on a 64" flat screen, or playing games on the most incredible computer-gaming setup Xander or I had ever seen, and his nights gambling away his allowance and clubbing. What a waste of space was cousin Rog.

"You know," said Stone, his arms outstretched to take in the whole apartment, "all this is probably yours now. I doubt that Roger bothered to draw up a will, so his possessions will revert to his mother's estate, which means it all goes to you. Although I'll have to double check to make certain. Hold on a moment, let me make a call."

While Stone called Bill Eggers, Xand and I flipped through Roger's DVD collection. It mostly didn't interest either of us, although there were a lot of musicals that some of the slayers might like, and a few old movies Xander thought might be worth watching.

Stone came out of the bedroom and said, "He did leave a will, a short one that he intended to add to but never did. After a couple of small bequests, most of his assets, such as they are, go back to his mother's estate, which means this apartment is now yours, along with the Cape Cod house, his trust fund and his Boston bank accounts."

"Just what I needed, more property." I was trying to get my head around this concept – back when I was a runaway sleeping in a park no one gave me shit and I had to scrounge in dumpsters to find enough to eat, now that I don't have a need for any help at all, more piles of stuff and more real estate comes my way. What's the sense in that? The universe has a weird sense of humor.

"Lucky you," said Xander, "I hope you enjoy the stacks of gay porn."

I said, "Oh just fuck me with a baseball bat." That got me two very odd looks from the men.

"You know Faith," said Xander, "inheriting all this is a great motive for offing Roger."

"Oh fuck, just what I needed. How soon will this shit get out to the investigators in charge of the case?"

"Hard to say, but sooner or later they will find out," said Stone. "On the other hand, we can put forward a good case that you didn't know about any of this, which is true – right?" He looked right at me, I nodded agreement.

He continued, "And we'll also point out that you didn't need any of his assets, your own being so much greater."

"Plus I already have a job with good salary, good benefits, and good friends. This whole thing started out as something cool and has turned into a nightmare."

"Nightmare? Really? Is that what you think of inheriting twenty million or so?"

"Hey, any possibility at all that includes me going back to prison for a crime I didn't commit is a nightmare."

"Yeah, but see, you've got something now that you didn't have before. You have assets, large assets. And what that gets you is the ability to hire people, people like me, to help you out."

"Yeah, I'm still getting used to that part. So, what the fuck's next?"

"For your next step, I think you need to sit down in your new house, and start reading anything you can find in your Aunt's desk, or anywhere else she might have stashed paperwork."

I sighed deeply. "Research, my fuckin' fav. Xand, you're gonna help."

It was about ten at night when Barrington drove off in his Mercedes, me and Xand got on the Fat Boy – I loaned my helmet to him – and we drove out to the house.

Casual conversation wasn't really possible on a motorcycle, of course, but I could feel X's surprise when I waved at my security guard as we breezed through the gates to my place an hour and a half later. I had made very good time on the empty roads, and we didn't spot any cops, and more to the point, no cops spotted us as I broke the speed limit by a large amount.

We pulled up to the front door and Xander stared open-mouthed at my well-lit house. "Holy hopalong batman, this is incredible!"

"Batman?"

"Sure, you're a wealthy heiress by day and hunter of dark underworld creatures by night, I'm gonna get you a cape and a spandex suit for your birthday and start calling you bat – urk!"

"Not batman," I said as I hit him in the shoulder, gently. "Try again."

"Batwoman?"

"Ehhh."

"BatSlayer?"

"A tiny bit better."

"Okay, I can see the writing on the wall: Faith the Vampire Slayer. No originality here, no ma'am."

"See, you didn't have to think too hard to get it. Now come on in, it's time for a midnight snack and I've got this great cook."

"You didn't import Andrew, did you?"

"What? No, why the fuck would I do that? Although he does make dynamite brownies. Still, my new chef, Jack or Jock Jhahhhh-ock, or some shit like that, I bet he can do brownies, too. I'm trying to learn how to pronounce his name right before he quits, 'cause his cooking is to kill for."

We walked in the front door, Xander looked at the Hummel figurines in the large glass display case just inside the door and said, "Geez, it looks like an old lady lives here."

"Yeah, Aunt Helen wasn't that old, but her taste was at least a century out of date. I'm definitely gonna put most of this stuff in storage and redecorate, if I ever find the time."

"You don't know shit about being wealthy, Faithy. You don't redecorate, you hire other people to redecorate for you."

"Oh, yeah, that's a fuckin' good idea." He was right of course, it's gonna be a while before I get used to being loaded, if ever.

We wandered into the library and Xander took a close look at the paneled walls. "Damn fine woodwork in here," he said. "This is hand-planed, solid cherry raised panels, look at the detailing!"

I grinned. "Yeah and look at some of these books."

"What for?" he asked, puzzled, "they're just books, aren't they?"

"Just check out some of the titles back in that corner bookcase."

Xander went where I indicated and tilted his head sideways to read titles. After a minute he straightened up with a strange expression and looked at me. "Crapadoodle! This looks like a Watcher's library! What was your aunt into?"

"Fuck if I know, but do you know what she died of?"

"No, what?"

"Officially it was a serving fork accident and exsanguination, but they're treating it as a murder because no one could find a fucking fork anywhere near her body."

"A vampire got her? Here? On Long Island? Near some of the most expensive real estate in the states?"

"Yeah, vamp attack seems a pretty good bet."

"What about your cousin? Did a bloodsucker get him too?"

"Roger? Nah, he took two 9 mils to the chest."

"I've known a few vamps who used guns. And one of them was four centuries old, although she was an incredibly bad shot."

"Yeah, but they'd usually followed it up by suckage, didn't happen this time."

"Hmmmm."

"I think one of poor Roger's bad choices caught up to him, gambling debts or something like that."

"If you owe the mob, they don't kill you – it being hard to make a corpse pay an illegal debt – instead they find some way of forcing you to cough up money, goods or services – remember the Sopranos episode about the unlucky gambler with the hardware store?"

"Huh, you're right of course. I even knew that, just didn't think about it. Anyway, we need to get Giles to look this stuff over. But for now, follow me, I want to show you something wicked cool."

I went up the main stairs and down the hall, opened a narrow door which exposed a cramped stairway that wound around what I supposed was the vent and fireplace stack, and finally opened a heavily weather-proofed door that allowed access to the rooftop walk. Xander looked around, the walkway started narrow, but opened up to an area big enough for lawn chairs. The moonlight over the ocean was entrancing. I stood right in the middle and started stretching.

"An actual Widow's Walk. This is very cool," said Xander.

He looked around, staring at the dark horizon, the moonlight reflecting off the water, for a minute, then he couldn't help but look at the roof, how it was constructed I suppose. Honestly, I was a little put out, here I was stretching, bending, looking damn good if I do say so myself, and he was studying the roof tiles by moonlight? But his attention snapped to me when I bent my right leg backwards and touched my toes to the back of my head.

"Damn flexible there," he said.

I looked at Xand out of the corner of my eyes. Now he was thinking about sex, I can always tell. Course it's been awhile, years, and just because he said he forgave me, maybe he still resents my actions. If the situation was reversed, would I have forgiven him? I don't know, but it wouldn't be easy, and I have been known to carry a grudge.

"Ya know Faith, when you spread your legs that far, with your foot touching your head like that, I think that's stretching a good thing too far."

I laughed. "But it feels so good."

Xander tore his eyes away from me and looked out over the ocean again. After a minute he said, "We could spend quite a lot of time up here, couldn't we?"

"Yeah. When our Slayers get here we may have to set some rules for this, 'cuz I'm gonna want some alone time up here, time when the girls won't be able to bug me."

"Oh, do you want me to head down?"

"What? No, you're welcome here anytime."

"Ah, I see," said the man who see's everything. Was my lame attempt at subtext getting through?

I showed Xander to a guest bedroom – being confused of what I wanted to do about me and Xand – and went back to reading Aunt Helen's letters. Among other things I found a copy of a title to six acres of of land near Boston which was owned by my mother – that was very odd. A little more digging and I found a copy of a bill of sale, that plot of land, but only three acres of it, was now owned by Boston's Metropolitan Transit Authority. A quick look a Google maps and it looked to me like that land was near the Logan Airport terminal of Boston's Big Dig – it might have been worth millions, or at least a few hundred thousand. So why did mom die dead fucking broke? And where the hell did she get it in the first place? I know she couldn't have paid any money for it. A little more digging, and I found copies of a transfer of ownership to, of all people, Aunt Florence. The fuck?

The next morning, after breakfast, I asked X to go down to the library and catalog the supernatural books. He naturally moaned and groaned, but went ahead. We both knew we'd need to send a list of the books to Giles just so we could understand what Aunt Helen was thinking about, besides, it might be helpful if there were any books here that Giles didn't have.

I sat down down in her, no – my – study and looked for anything interesting. But first I called Bill Eggers and asked him to research that plot of land in Boston – there was something about it – all of it – that didn't make any sense.

So next I started going through Helen's letters – it looks like she kept everything – and I found some from fucking Quentin Travers at the Council. I stared out the window, watching seagulls soar and dive, in a state of shock.

Finally, putting the letters down, I went downstairs, sat in the library, and watched while Xand check out the books. I said, "I found some letters from that fuckface Travers."

"What do they say?"

"I haven't looked yet."

"Why not?"

"I'm a little, uh, worried about what might have been going on."

"Umm, you'll worry yourself into a frazzle until you look."

"If Aunt Helen was a Watcher, why wouldn't Giles have mentioned it to me?"

"I don't know, maybe she wasn't, maybe he doesn't know, or maybe she was just a busybody, pushing her way into a world she didn't understand." said Xander.

"Yeah, could go either way. I'll read those letters later."

By mid-morning we were both tired of books, so Xander and I rode the Fat Boy into town. We needed some fresh air. Actually, I needed to get out of the house, it was starting to give me the wiggins. I got this mental image of me wandering through the place, old, wrinkled, in a frumpy housecoat with my hair in curlers and a pack of yappy little dogs at my feet, drinking tea and dusting my Hummel figurines. Just fucking shoot me now. So it turned out Xander didn't need much of a push to go for a ride either.

We explored around the neighborhood for a while – there was a surprising amount of raw nature on and around my land – then turned into town. I needed to buy some shit anyway. I parked near Murallo's grocery and we walked – there was some kind of shindig going on, tourists were everywhere.

I saw a familiar figure standing on the sidewalk. "Hello Chief Johnson," I said politely to the man who had arrested me a couple of days ago.

"Ms Lehane," he replied, his face mostly unreadable to me. "You haven't come across any more recently murdered corpses, have you?"

"Oh no, that's pretty unusual..."

"You know how many murders there have been in my jurisdiction in the last five years?"

"Uh, no."

"Three."

"Really? Just three until recently?"

"No Ms Lehane, three including your aunt, your cousin and your gate guard."

"Ah," I said, not knowing what else to say.

"Hi," said Xander, holding out his hand, "My name is Xander Harris, I don't believe we've met."

"Mr. Harris," the Chief said, shaking hands. "I've run across your name recently, too."

"Nothing bad, I hope."

"On a list of known associates of Faith Lehane."

"That's kind of a odd way of putting it, don't you think? We're friends as well as colleagues, is it against the law for friends to hang out?"

"Perhaps not, but I don't want any more murders in this town, is that clear?"

"As crystal. I should point out that neither of us are responsible for your recent rise in your crime statistics."

"So you say."

"Yes, we say," said Xander, "and our lawyers say, as well as our friends and our bosses."

"Okay then, see that you keep it that way." He looked at us sternly, nodded, and went on his way. Since finding out I was a local landowner, taxpayer, and possibly a voter, his attitude had been adjusted a little, but he really didn't like the extra work my family was bringing his way.

"Fuck me Xander, I move into a new house, a new neighborhood, a new state even, and it wasn't even a day before the fucking chief of police started eyeing me suspiciously. What did I do to deserve this? I mean really, what did I do? I thought I was one of the good guys! Trying, anyway."

A young woman walked up to us, a little younger than me, a couple of inches shorter than me, dark hair like mine, with a funny crooked smile. "Uh hi, uh Faith Lehane?"

"Yes, do I know you?" I asked, I could tell she wasn't a slayer.

"You should, big sis."

I felt stunned and confused. She leaned in close, I thought she was gonna say something private, but then I felt a blade near my stomach. I twisted sideways, too slow to avoid it completely, and the knife slid under my skin, scraping along my ribs. She turned and left, slipping through the crowds, gone seconds later. I turned to Xand, holding the knife in my hands, my blood dripping all over the fucking place.

"Xander!" He looked at my hand holding the knife, horrified.

TBC