But he held up a finger. “I know what it’s like to lose a loved one to magic, Mrs. Kostorov. People shouldn’t be allowed to harm others with potions.”
His admission shocked me. Morales didn’t talk a lot about how his father and little sister, Blanca, had died in a terrible accident when his father tried to make a potion. Drew was eight years old at the time and tried to go into the burning house to save them, but it had been too late. All he had to show for his effort was a scarred left hand and a lot of guilt.
The locks on the doors clicked. A moment later, the panel opened to reveal a birdlike woman with a nest of blue hair perched on her tiny head. She wore a black dress and sandals with pantyhose. Her eyes were red-rimmed and swollen.
I instantly felt guilty for my annoyance at her lack of cooperation.
“He got them at an apothecary called the Golden Thread. Friend of his told him to ask a guy there for it. The code word is Priapus.”
Her hand shot out and put something in Morales’s scarred left palm. “You find that bastard.”
Morales looked solemnly down at the woman. “You have my word.”
He held his hand behind his back to show me a tiny plastic zip-top bag with some powdery residue inside. The outside of the bag had a red cupid with a bow and arrow printed on the front. We’d deliver it to Mez, but it was pretty clear Mr. Kostorov had purchased Basil’s bad potion.
She turned to me. “And you tell that Baba that I need some more of her Widow Juice.”
I nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”
The tiny woman pulled herself up, as if having done her duty she felt a weight lifted from her shoulders. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go lay down.”
“Of course,” Morales said, “thank you.” He handed her his business card. “If you think of any more information or need anything, please call.”
She looked at the card for a moment, and when she looked up, tears flowed freely from her eyes. “My Sergei was big like you. I miss him.”
He put his hand on hers and squeezed. “He was a lucky man, Mrs. Kostorov.”
“We were both lucky,” she corrected. “You married?”
“No, ma’am.”
She patted his hand. “Big man like you won’t stay on the market for long. Just be sure you don’t marry one like that one.” She pointed at me.
“Hey!” I protested.
“Why’s that?” Morales asked, ignoring my indignation. I couldn’t see his face, but his tone sounded strangled, as if he was fighting laughter.
“Man like you needs a soft woman. Woman who’ll give him children and bake bread.” She shot me a look that was so full of scorn, I gasped. “That one over there don’t appreciate a good man. She’s probably a feminist.” She spat out the word like a curse. “They’re all trying so hard to be like men that they forget to be women.”
“Listen here—” I began, but she cut me off.
“Hush, man-hater.”
I sucked in a breath to respond, but Morales began pushing me toward the steps. “That’s really good advice,” he said to Mrs. Kostorov. “I’ll be sure to look for a woman who likes men.”
She nodded, as if they’d made a deal. “All right, you go now. I’ll call if I think of anything else.” She patted him again before withdrawing back inside. As she closed the door, she looked at me with a scornful sniff.
Once it was closed, Morales turned and put an arm around my stiff shoulders. I tried to keep glaring at the closed door, but he steered me away. “Come on, man-hater. We got work to do.”
He wrangled me into the SUV and ran around to get in and take off before I exploded.
“Can you believe— Who the hell did she think—” I sputtered before we’d made it twenty feet.
“She’s just old-fashioned.”
“Old-fashioned is when someone prefers penny candy, print books, and Norman Rockwell paintings. That woman sounded like she resented getting the right to vote!”
He shrugged. “Who cares?”
I shook my head. “I can’t believe how mean she was.”
“She did just lose the love of her life, Kate.”
“She seemed nice enough to you.”
He smirked down at me. “Guess that makes me the granny whisperer.”
We rode along in silence for a few minutes. Finally, I couldn’t stand it any longer. “Do you agree with what she said?”
“Which part?”
I rolled my eyes. “About how you need a woman who’ll give you lots of babies and bake bread.”
He shot me a side-eye. “She really got under your skin, huh?”
“I don’t know.” I sighed. “I mean, this isn’t the first time someone’s acted like me being a cop is a betrayal of my gender.”
“Do you think you’re betraying your gender?” he asked carefully.
“Hell, no.”
“Good. Because honestly? I’m terrified of the idea of you cooking.”
“Excuse me, I can cook. I made a bad-ass potion back in the day.”
“You cooked dirty magic potions. That’s not exactly the same as making bread.”
“Right, it takes way more skill. Just because I don’t cook doesn’t mean I can’t. I’m usually just too tired from chasing down bad guys to make something.”
“I’ll believe it when I see it.”
I turned and shot him a suspicious look. “You’re trying to get me to cook for you like that old lady wanted!”
“What can I say? I’m a product of the patriarchy.”
“You’re full of shit. The truth is, you’d be bored as hell with some mousey woman who never challenged you.”
He looked at me. “There’s challenging and then there’s pain in the ass.” He left little doubt about which category I fell into.
Chapter Twelve
After we left Mrs. Kostorov’s, we decided to check out the apothecary she’d told us about. On the way there, I got a call from Dixon.
“Finally got something useful on Basil Valentine’s phone.”
I blinked. I’d totally forgotten I’d asked Dixon to take a look at it. “What’d you find?”
“Tracked a number back to Seattle. Looked like a dead end at first—a dry cleaner. But just in case, I plugged it into ACD,” he said. “That number was tied to an FBI investigation. I guess when I looked it up, it notified an agent who’d worked on it, and he called me just now. Agent Rick Logan. He said they had a case going into a money-laundering operation tied to that dry cleaner a couple of years back.”
“What happened with that case?”
“According to Logan, they had to drop the case when their lead witness showed up dead next to the Fremont troll.”
“Figures.” Witnesses in federal cases had a nasty habit of coming down with a bad case of death. “Who were they going after, though?”
“Logan said they were trying to tie the laundering operation to the Fangshi.”
“Of course.”
“Yep. Said they even had the Seattle field office of the MEA in on the investigation, but they couldn’t turn up shit either. After one of their agents was executed, the trail went cold.”
“Fuck me.”
Morales stopped the car at a light and turned to watch me. I held up a finger.
“I wish I could say that made me happy,” I said to Dixon, “but, you know.”
He snorted. “Yeah, I get it. Also, I ran those plates from the Mercedes. According to my buddy at the DMV, the car is registered to a man named Alexander Hung.”
“Yep, that’s the guy.”
“I checked him out in ACD, too.”
“Well? Don’t keep me in suspense.”
“He’s been sued a bunch of times, but no criminal convictions. His name pops up in connection to several criminal cases—no charges, though. Last agent who made notes said they thought he was a hit man for the Fangshi. Officially, though, he’s a legit businessman.”
“What kind of business?”
“Dry cleaners.”
I huffed out an ironic laugh. “Naturally.”
“He came up with some new alchemical cleaning process,” Dixon continued. “He’s got at least a dozen stores on the West Coast.”
“Christ. And last night, we saw him getting a payoff from a Votary outfit. What the hell is going on?”
“That’s starting to feel like something we may be better off not knowing.”
“No shit.” I sighed. “Thanks, Dixon. This is really helpful.”
“You got it.”
I hung up. “Fuck.”
“Tell me,” Morales said.
I gave him the rundown.