However Long the Night

Chapter 1-2

“Yeah.”

Jesse had no problem agreeing with Gideon’s suggestion. He was worried about Jonah—literally worried sick. But this didn’t appear to be an investigation that needed to involve him. Jonah wasn’t the type of person to spend a night alone. Jesse didn’t like to think so, but it seemed perfectly plausible that this time, Jonah invited home the wrong man.

Not that he would say as much to Derek.

* * * *

Derek’s reaction to the phone call was not what Jesse had expected. Three simple words. “I’m coming over.” No demands for more explanation. No questions about what Jesse had seen. Not even a shocked gasp or a tremor in his voice. Just, “I’m coming over.” Jesse might have told him not to bother, but Derek didn’t give him the chance. Three simple words, and then dead air.

Jesse had been friends with Detective Derek O’Dell ever since first hooking up with Gideon. He had seen Derek through good times, through bad. They’d passed favors back and forth so many times, it was impossible to tell who owed who what anymore. So when Jesse opened the door and met Derek’s grim, hazel eyes, he knew something was bad. He might complain about his nephew’s exuberant personality and colorful s*x life, but Jonah was still family. And if there was one trait to describe Derek, it was loyal.

He stepped inside and brushed the snow off his shoulders. His prematurely gray hair was in disarray, like he’d been running his fingers through it, and his normally smiling mouth was a hard, straight line.

“Gideon said it was human blood?” At Jesse’s confirming nod, Derek exhaled. “God, I hope I’m wrong then.”

“Wrong about what?” Jesse asked. “Do you have a theory about what happened to him?”

“Not a theory, just…” He stopped when Gideon appeared from the library, waiting for him to come up and stand next to Jess. “A theory requires knowledge I don’t have,” he continued. “And all I know is, he’s been obsessed with that demon that possessed Gideon and Emma. The one that made Gideon lose his memory? That’s literally all he’s researched for the past two years. He even lost his fellowship because of it.”

“What? Why?” Jesse looked over to Gideon, automatically hoping he would have some sort of answer. But Gideon looked just as perplexed as he did. “Why would he do that?”

“Honestly?” Derek glanced guiltily at Gideon before meeting Jesse’s eyes again. “I think he started out because he hoped to impress you.”

“To impress me? Please tell me he didn’t let himself lose his fellowship on some insane notion of impressing me.”

“I don’t think that’s so insane,” Gideon commented.

“But I’m sure that’s not why he stuck with it,” Derek was quick to say. “I don’t know what he found, but he got sucked into it. Like he’d finally find one detail, only to drive him to want to get the next. And the next after that. Research was his thing, remember. He lived for that kind of stuff.”

Jesse understood. That impulse that made you stay up all night because you just couldn’t put the book down. The need to find that rare volume that may or may not have the single page you needed. The constant, nagging feeling at the base of your skull that the answer was just around the corner, in the next library, in the next handwritten manuscript.

“Is that why he was in London? Chasing another lead?”

Derek nodded. “About a month ago, he came and asked me to keep an eye on his apartment. He’d gotten his passport and everything, said he’d finally figured out which collection some grim-something was in. He wasn’t going to be gone long, but then after he got there, his story changed.”

Gideon frowned. “To what?”

“To, ‘Well, they’re not just going to hand it over to me, Uncle Derek.’ And, ‘Honestly, you don’t want to know.’“

If he had been investigating the paranormal and the occult for two years, there was a very good chance that Jonah was well beyond dusty books and brittle manuscripts. But Jesse didn’t want to jump to any unwarranted conclusions. Especially since Gideon had sensed blood from a second human.

“So he didn’t give you any details beyond that? Where is his apartment?”

Derek held out a single key. “I figured you’d want to take a look through it. But I’ll warn you, the place is a fire hazard. I don’t think he’s thrown away a single thing he started.”

Gideon rolled his eyes. “Oh, great. More books.”

“You can stay here if you want. Unless you want to supervise from the hallway.”

“No, I’ll stay here. Someone’s got to be around when Dominique gets home from school.”

Derek had a visibly hard time suppressing his grin. “I never thought I’d see the day when the great Gideon Keel was relegated to babysitting. If I wasn’t on duty, I’d stick around just to watch.”

Gideon leveled an unamused stare at him. “After what you interrupted earlier? You don’t want to be alone with me, Derek.”

That was probably true. Jesse herded Derek toward the door. Despite the ease of teleportation, Jesse wanted to drive. The extra time would give him a chance to ask more questions about Jonah. Could he have kept Jonah from London, and from danger, if he had known what the younger man was up to? He didn’t even question if keeping Jonah from danger numbered in his list of responsibilities.

“I’ll call you if we find anything interesting,” Jesse promised as they reached the door.

Gideon nodded. “Call me anyway. Interesting is always relative.”

Jesse smiled a little, despite his errand. “I will.” As soon as he closed the door behind them, he turned his attention to Derek. “How long did Jonah plan to stay in London? As long as it took?”

“He had enough money saved up to pay for two months over there, but he kept telling us he hoped it wouldn’t be that long. Part of me actually hoped he’d meet somebody who’d distract him from all this, but as far as I can tell, he hasn’t dated much since this started.”

Of everything Derek had told him, Jesse found that the most surprising. Jonah was just the sort of person to be distracted by a pretty face. And he was just the sort of person who would attract distraction. His vibrant blue eyes could make a person forget his own name, and he flirted like it was second nature. It probably was second nature. Jonah was not the sort of person to dedicate his life to celibacy.

“I wish you had told me about this sooner, honestly,” Jesse said, once he ducked into the car out of the frigid air. “I could have at least kept an eye on him.”

Derek slid into the seat next to him. “You and Gideon have had your hands full. You didn’t need to worry about Jonah, too.” The car roared to life. “Besides, that might’ve actually encouraged his little crush. You didn’t want that.”

“I’d rather deal with his crush than this. In fact, I’d happily let him sniff around the house every day for the rest of his life, if he’s not out getting himself into trouble.” He knew Derek was worried enough about his nephew without detailing all the horrible scenarios Jesse feared. “Did he ever mention anybody or anything that he might have been…afraid of? Like he had gone too far?”

Derek’s bark of laughter was harsh. “This is Jonah you’re talking about. The kid’s not afraid of anything. And no, he didn’t mention anything. For as much as he talked about everything else, this was the one topic he clammed up on. He wouldn’t even talk to me about what happened after he got himself arrested two weeks ago.”

Jesse sat up a little straighter. “He was arrested. For what?”

“B and E. The charges ended up getting dropped.”

He sincerely hoped the charges had been dropped because Jonah had simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time, and not because somebody decided it would be easier to take care of Jonah themselves.

“Did you call your sister yet?”

“Not until I have something more definite. But, Jess…” Derek glanced at him out of the corner of his eye, clearly uncomfortable about something. “There’s something you should probably know. I had to hire a lawyer for Jonah, because I know f**k all about English laws. But I didn’t want to get some kind of quack, so I went with the only name I knew.” He took a deep breath. “David Brighton.”

“He agreed to take Jonah’s case?”

“Didn’t even argue.” With a frown, Derek glanced at him again. “Why? Should he have?”

Jesse shrugged. Just hearing David’s name sent an odd shiver down his spine. Tall and gorgeous with rich, dark skin and a body hard with understated strength. In another dimension, David was his doppelganger’s lover, and so Jesse supposed it wasn’t a great surprise that he recognized his more attractive attributes. He had occasionally wondered—worried—what would have happened if he had stayed in London long enough to meet David instead of running to Chicago to find Gideon.

“There was no guarantee that he’d be a lawyer in this dimension. That’s all.”

“I guess I got lucky then. But it’s not going to be a problem, is it? I still don’t understand how all this dimensional stuff works.”

“It’s not going to be a problem at all. In fact, David is probably the only thing we’ve got going for us. It’ll be helpful to have somebody to touch base with in London. If he saw Jonah as recently as two weeks ago, he might be able to give over some information.”

Derek let out a long, relieved breath. “Good. I’ll e-mail you all the contact information I have for him and let him know he can talk to you and Gideon about Jonah’s case. I don’t know the particulars, though I wish I’d been a little bit nosier about what was going on over there.”

“No, don’t start blaming yourself. Your plate is too full as it is, and Jonah is an adult. You shouldn’t have to worry about babysitting him, on top of doing your actual job.”

“Are you guys too busy right now to see what you can do? Because it would make me feel a hell of a lot better knowing you and Gideon were looking for him.” They turned the corner, and almost immediately turned again into the parking lot of a large apartment building. “I know I give Jonah a hard time, but he’s a good kid. I don’t want anything bad to happen to him.” He grimaced. “Anything else, at least.”

“Derek, we owe you so much that even if we were too busy, we would make the time for Jonah. We don’t want anything bad to happen to him, either.”

Derek pulled up to the unsecured front door of the building and put the car into park. “Just keep me in the loop, okay?”

“You’ll know everything we do,” Jesse promised.

Jonah lived in a three-story walk up. The building itself didn’t raise any alarms, but as soon as they stepped through the front door, Jesse understood why a poor graduate student might find himself there. The wallpaper on the walls was old, yellowed, and peeling, and what remained of it was covered in crayons and markers. Snow boots and heavy, wet coats littered the hallway that led to the flight of stairs, and thumping music bled from the walls.

Jesse followed Derek to the third floor. Each step creaked ominously, but the wood held strong. The room was at the end of the hall, and Jesse thought calling the space an apartment was a bit too generous. Immediately to the left of the door was a sink, a tiny fridge, and a stove with two burners. The living room couldn’t have been more than six feet wide and four feet from the kitchen to the far wall. A doorway led directly to the bedroom—or what Jesse assumed was a bedroom. There didn’t appear to be a bed in the room. Just a desk and books and paper.

In fact, there was paper everywhere.

“Does he ever clean this place?” Jesse asked, only half in jest.

“Believe it or not, this is clean.” Derek stepped around a stack of haphazardly placed books to go to the far end of the tiny futon that served as a couch. “I want to start here. Every time I came over, he always seemed a little too protective of what he had over here. I want to know what he was hiding.”

Jesse followed him, bending to pick up balls of paper as he walked. He absently unrolled a few, pulling the wrinkles out of the sheets. He expected to see notes, perhaps taken in a tight, careful hand. And at first, that’s exactly what he found. The pages were full with notes in a variety of languages. Most of them were translated directly to English. Other lines were completely left alone. Did Jonah know these obscure languages? Had he taught himself the words while researching these rare books?

Eventually, the notes gave way to one line, scribbled across the middle of the page. Sheet after sheet, the same line, over and over. Sometimes it was scratched out. Sometimes it was translated. Sometimes it looked more like a doodle. Jesse didn’t know the importance of the words, but he did recognize it as a puzzle. Something that had stumped Jonah.

Sinking to the edge of the futon, he flipped through the pages, looking for the significance of that single line. Derek had stopped rummaging, his gaze steady on Jesse, his breath inaudible. The only sound to fill the tiny apartment was the occasional scratch of Jesse’s nail across the paper as he sought out fragments of the phrase that had captivated Jonah. It was a Latin derivative, of that he was sure, but Jonah’s handwriting was atrocious, grown worse with his obvious frustration at not solving this last riddle.

Jesse saw the glimmer near the bottom of a sheet with a coffee ring stain in the upper corner. He must have stiffened or reacted some way, because Derek sat down next to him and peered over his shoulder.

“What is it?”

Silently, Jesse pointed at the phrase. Now that he’d seen it, it leapt from the page. He strongly suspected he’d find it repeated in the other languages he hadn’t recognized.

Derek shook his head. “Enlighten the ignorant masses here. What does it say?”

Votaries of Castelain.

“It says that Jonah finally figured out what he was looking for.” He ran his thumb over the phrase, then pointed to the first word. “A votary is a worshipper. Really devout. Maybe even a fanatic. Castelain is a name. Or a keeper of a castle.”

As Jesse watched, Derek’s normally amiable features hardened. “Are you telling me Jonah took off to a different country to try and get some magic book from a bunch of cult wackos?” He shook his head. “When we get him back here, I’m going to kill him. And then I’m going to sic his mother on him.”

“The cult might not be full of wackos,” Jesse said mildly. “There are cults all over the place. Most of them are pretty benign. They just offer some money to whatever vamp or demon wants a couple of followers, and they get something to worship in return. But it’s a place to start looking.”

“Except that demon who possessed Emma and Gideon didn’t exactly turn them into Fred and Ginger.” With a muttered curse, Derek rose from the futon and marched over to the small kitchenette. He dug around beneath the sink until he pulled out a garbage sack. “Let’s bag up everything you think you might need. The sooner you get to London, the happier I’m going to be.”

That would be easier said than done. How was he supposed to divine what pile of junk was actually junk, and what was necessary? He settled for throwing in all the discarded pages—the notes might be helpful—as well as a few books that he didn’t already own. There were two titles he didn’t even recognize, and that made his stomach clench. Would it be enough to merely find Jonah? Or was he in even deeper than Derek understood?

The question almost made Jesse laugh. Almost. When he was Jonah’s age, he was preparing to move to Chicago to seek out a vampire.