“Get out of the road,” I said, but neither side was listening to me.
“We are not at liberty to discuss the full details,” said Diana. “We thank you for your assistance but—”
“How are we supposed to do our jobs if you won’t even tell us what we’re up against?” the short cop demanded. His voice was creeping steadily louder, and I looked back at the mortuary, hoping no one had seen or heard us, wondering what I could do to get these idiots’ attention. Murder Boy or not, I was just a kid; Diana didn’t take me any more seriously than the cops did. I felt the knife in my pocket, running my finger along the bumps in the nylon webbing. On a sudden whim I turned and walked to the side of the road, not saying a thing, heading straight for the darkest patch of shadow I could find.
“Hey,” said a cop—I couldn’t tell which one—and I heard three sets of feet following me in a rush, crunching on the ice. “Where do you think you’re going?” I stepped lightly over a snowbank and ducked behind a brick wall separating the mortuary parking lot from the small storefront next door. There was a narrow strip of lawn on this side, and I trudged through about eight inches of snow. About five feet into the snow-covered grass I turned to look at them: all three adults were standing on the shoveled sidewalk, watching me. “Get back here,” said the short cop.
“Come behind the fence,” I said.
“Don’t make me come after you,” said the tall cop. I sighed and took four large steps backward; they swore and followed me into the snow, until all four of us were behind the wall. “Listen, you little—”
“Thank you for getting out of the street,” I said. “Are you ready to stop acting like children?”
“Excuse me?” asked the short cop. “What are you, fifteen?”
“The men you saw breaking into the mortuary are very dangerous,” I explained again. “We’re not covering anything up, we’re not trying to get away with anything, we’re not even trying to piss you off, as much as I’d love to. We’re following monsters, and you were about to go in after them, and I didn’t want you to get killed.” Saying this out loud to a stranger felt deeply wrong, like I had just confessed to an intimate secret. These were my monsters, my demons, and talking about them out loud like this made me feel naked and hurt. They didn’t deserve to hear about them. The demons were mine alone.
The short cop sighed, then glanced at the wall a moment before looking back at me. “What it’s going to take to get the real story out of you?”
“What’s it going to take to make you believe us?” asked Diana. “And don’t say ‘seeing a monster in action,’ because there’s no wood to knock, and I assure you that is the last thing you want your town to see.”
“Follow them,” I said. “We don’t have the numbers to keep eyes on everyone we need to keep eyes on, so let’s split it: we watch Elijah Sexton, you follow these three.”
The tall cop raised his eyebrow. “Are you joking?”
“I stopped you from confronting them,” I said. “Following is different.”
“You don’t give us orders,” said the tall cop.
“You want to know what we’re doing,” I said simply. “If you think they’re drug dealers, follow them and see for yourself. Follow them, study them, do whatever you think is smart, but remember that approaching them isn’t smart. Don’t try to get in their way or you will die. I don’t want to mince words on this, okay? They can and will kill you, and we can’t stop them yet.”
“Yet?”
“We need more information,” I said. “Give me enough of that and I can kill anybody.”
The cops looked at me with obvious suspicion, but Diana froze us all with a whispered word.
“Quiet.”
I heard footsteps on the other side of the wall and the sound of car doors; they were talking, which was a reassuring sign they hadn’t heard us. I tried to listen to what they were saying but I couldn’t make it out. The car doors closed, the engine revved to life, and we crouched low against the wall as the car pulled out into the road. It drove away in the opposite direction from us, so we never saw it and they didn’t see us.
“I got the plate when they pulled up,” said the short cop, standing and flashing a small black notebook. “Let’s go run it and see what we get.”
“You’ll let us know?” asked Diana.
“Maybe,” said the short cop, and the corner of his lip curled up. “Wouldn’t want to interfere with your investigation.”
They walked back to their car, and Diana and I stepped back onto the sidewalk, stomping our feet to shake off the snow. “We need Kelly,” she said, watching them go. “She could talk to these guys; I feel like I don’t even speak their language.”
“At least they listen to you,” I said. “Do I really look fifteen?”