At First Light(Dr. Evan Wilding #1)(46)

Patrick looked wistfully at his empty beer glass, then pushed back his chair. “Well, that’ll do it. I gotta get home to the missus. Dr. Wilding, you mind giving me a ride back to my car?”

“Not at all.”

“Let me get my things, and I’ll walk out with you,” Diana said. “I’ll meet you at the front door.”

“She’s something, isn’t she?” Patrick said as Diana headed toward the locker rooms. “I’d like the missus to meet her.”

“I thought you were developing a crush.”

“Oh, sure. The missus gets crushes, too. You should see her when George Clooney comes on the screen. Don’t mean a thing.” Patrick held up two tightly crossed fingers. “We’re like this, the missus and me.”

“So these crushes are just a form of window shopping?”

The detective grinned. “Right-o. We can look at the menu from time to time. Just as long as we eat at home.”



A block from Ragnar?k, standing on the sidewalk, Evan hesitated as he reached for the door handle of the Jaguar.

Diana was already a distant shape in the rain, hotfooting it toward her car, a graceful if admittedly large gazelle disappearing and reappearing in the soft cones of light from the streetlamps. Evan watched until she reached her Jeep and the lights flashed as she unlocked it. On the other side of his car, Patrick was groaning about his knees as he gripped the doorframe and lowered himself in.

Evan frowned. The rain had already soaked his hair and shoulders and was working on the hem of his pants. Diana had started her car, exhaust spilling into the night.

But still he paused.

Something . . .

The hair rose on the back of his neck. Ice formed between his shoulder blades. He did a slow one-eighty, blinking the rain out of his eyes.

Pools of darkness filled the spaces between the lights. Nothing stirred but the drizzling rain, a thin fog, and the holiday lights blinking from a few of the closed shops.

No blood. No pigeon killers. Not even a little wooden figure.

You are the victim, he chided himself, of an overactive imagination.

But he had in his mind’s eye the image of Raven, a man he’d never seen but could picture perfectly. The dark hair; the sharp, narrow gaze; the feral hunger. Diana had a high tolerance for all things human. She was a firm believer in live and let live and keep your nose out of everyone else’s business.

If Raven made her uneasy, then there was something to the man.

In Norse mythology, Odin had sent a pair of ravens into the world to gather news and report back to their master, the king of the ?sir. The ravens represented the mind of man himself. Thought and memory. They were Odin’s spies.

Odin, the god of wisdom and death.

The god of the gallows. The god of runes.

Odin, with his missing right eye.

Just like James Talfour. And probably Scott Desser, whose orbital socket had been scraped with a knife.

“You coming?” Patrick said.

Evan shook himself and opened the door. He all but threw himself inside, pulled the door closed, and started the engine.

Patrick was staring out the passenger-side window. “Look at all that mist. Spooky, isn’t it? Puts me in mind of our killer. What do you imagine he’s doing right now?”

“I shudder to think.”

Evan punched the gas and accelerated down the street, hoping to leave his disquiet behind.

But the dark pressed close against the windows as the world kept watch.





CHAPTER 15


Evan’s rented house—which the owner had named the Aerie—sat atop a hill amid gardens and a rolling lawn that descended from the house like green waves flowing in all directions.

In times of stress or agitation—like now, when his brain was filled with thoughts of murderers and Ringwraiths—the Aerie was one place in the sprawling metropolis of Chicagoland where Evan felt safe. As he drove through his neighborhood, he turned off the car stereo and enjoyed the view.

He had rented the home two years ago on an indefinite lease from the erstwhile director of graduate studies at Northwestern University, now emeritus director, who’d lived in the house for more than twenty years and modified it to accommodate her own height of four foot nine. She’d installed low countertops and provided plenty of low-level cabinets. Bathrooms and the kitchen had been scaled down. For everything out of reach, there was the wizardry of electronics. The Tudor-style home was small compared to others in the neighborhood, which left more room for the gardens and spared Evan the feeling he was rattling around in a home meant to accommodate a family of giants.

His preferred style was cozy and intimate, and the house provided exactly that.

Once you passed through the wrought-iron gate, wound your way up between the pines, and pulled into the curved driveway, you slipped backward in time—outwardly at least—to Elizabethan England. The Aerie’s exterior consisted of warm brick, exposed half timbers, a steeply pitched roof, and what the leasing agent had called rubblework masonry. Inside, lustrous flooring and paneling, overhead beams, and long rows of mullioned windows made the space inviting. Every window in the house boasted a view of either the gardens or the stately trees in front. The kitchen was gourmet, with a large and airy side room that had once been a dining room but that now served as indoor accommodations for Ginny and provided the hawk with both a view out the windows and into the kitchen where Evan spent much of his time. There were two bedrooms up, one down. A basement with a wine cellar and an entertainment room and uncountable closets for storage.