Page 8 of Veiled Justice (The Other Detective #1)

When Krieg turned to me, his mercurial eyes were solemn. ‘You can come in with me, but you need to be aware that you’ll be walking into an ogres’ den. Do you understand what that means?’

I understood: it meant that not only was it Helga’s home but it was Krieg’s official residence, too.

When I stepped inside I’d be on their sovereign land where their rules took precedence over mine.

Here, High King Krieg was King in every sense of the word; his rule was law and I was subject to it.

My badge – and my authority – meant nothing.

If he wanted to, he could kill me here with zero repercussions from the Connection.

My heart was thundering in my chest and my mouth was dry, but I merely nodded. I’d be damned if I’d be scared off from doing my duty. Passing the death message was part of my job, a shitty horrible part but my responsibility all the same.

This time I opened the car door before Krieg could do it for me and scrambled out of the Range Rover.

On the other side of the vehicle, Krieg paused, removed his suit jacket and chucked it back into the car.

He rolled up the sleeves of his black shirt, exposing heavily muscled forearms covered with a light dusting of dark hair.

It had been approximately 657 days since I’d last had sex, so clearly that was the only reason that my gaze fixed on all of that corded muscle. I tore my eyes away with effort. My thoughts were unprofessional and wildly inappropriate so I focused on the house in front of me.

The sprawling, red-brick barn conversion was ridiculously large – it had to have at least eight or nine bedrooms. There were outbuildings with their own front doors around the main building. I wondered how many ogres lived there. I guessed I was about to find out.

A whole murder of crows were perched on the roof watching us with beady black eyes but eerily silent.

They were part of Krieg’s legend: the story went that one of his ancestors had bargained with a magical being who granted all of his line the ability to speak to birds.

Krieg was frequently seen with the crows, and rumour had it that you couldn’t say anything in their presence without it getting back to him.

I’d seen him with them before, but I wasn’t sure whether he could talk to them or they were simply well trained.

Still, I was pretty certain I’d witnessed him having a silent chat with Loki, so my money was on the rumour being true.

Krieg strode to the front door and opened it. I followed him into a huge, double-height room with sofas, a dining-room table and a kitchen. The walls were plain but there were brightly coloured ceramics dotted around that brought a pop of colour and warmth to the space.

A red-headed ogre surged to his feet when he saw Krieg. He opened his mouth to speak then snapped it shut when he spotted me at Krieg’s heels.

‘Hanlon, wake Jón and Freja,’ Krieg ordered brusquely. ‘Now.’

The ogre turned, marched down a corridor and disappeared. He was better at following orders than I was.

Krieg sighed softly then knelt in front of the fireplace and started to build a fire. It certainly wasn’t for heat – it was the middle of summer and the room was warm even at that time of morning. So why was he building it?

I watched his methodical movements as he laid the kindling with absolute precision. He struck me as a man whose movements were always measured; I suspected that even in the heat of battle his punches would be calculated and precisely placed.

When the fire was burning, he stood and leaned against a wall, arms crossed over his chest. I followed his lead and also remained standing. We faced the corridor down which Hanlon had disappeared and waited.

After a few minutes, Hanlon returned with two more ogres in tow. The woman was undeniably Helga’s mum: like Helga, she had beautiful blonde hair and an enlarged right arm. My eyes flicked to her hand; unlike her daughter, she still had her life and her pinky finger.

‘Leave us,’ Krieg ordered Hanlon. He left the room without comment or complaint. Yep, he was definitely better at following orders.

‘Your Excellence?’ Freja’s voice quavered and her eyes flicked fearfully to the fire behind Krieg. To my surprise, he didn’t reply.

On the mantelpiece behind him were two large pots, one of which appeared to hold white sand and the other black sand.

Krieg reached out, took a fistful of the black sand and threw it into the flames.

In a flash the fire turned green – and stayed green.

I had no idea what that meant but clearly Helga’s parents did.

Freja let out an agonised moan of distress and slid to her knees.

‘Helga is dead,’ Krieg said briskly, his tone businesslike as if a short while ago he hadn’t cradled her dead body and rocked her like a baby.

Like me, he knew the importance of delivering such devastating news with as much stoicism and calmness as possible because with those simple words he had destroyed them.

A part of me was grateful that he’d chosen to tell them; notifications were always awful, but none were as bad as telling a parent that their child was gone.

Helga’s father, Jón, clenched and unclenched his fists as he tried to hide the tremor that had overtaken his fingers.

He was breathing heavily but evenly, in a way that suggested he had temporarily forgotten that automatic reflex and it was only through conscious effort that air continued to sweep into his lungs. ‘How?’ he asked tightly.

‘She appears to have been on a bodyguarding contract. Do you know anything about that?’ Krieg asked.

‘No.’ Jón’s hands clenched even more tightly; he was shaking with contained rage or grief, perhaps both. ‘She wasn’t cleared for such work.’

‘I’m aware of that – but somehow she was working as a bodyguard.’

Her mother was still on the floor, staring down at the tiles in front of her. She seemed lost. A single tear splashed onto the ceramic and she stared at it before reaching out and wiping it away as if she wanted to wipe away her grief.

She looked up at Krieg and I saw the raw agony in her eyes. ‘Did she kill her attacker?’ she asked desperately. ‘Harm them at all?’

‘Her knife was bloodied,’ Krieg answered vaguely – and deceptively. He had bloodied the blade himself. I noted that the slice on his palm had already healed. Handy.

Freja pressed a hand to her heart. ‘Thank Hel for small mercies,’ she whispered, her voice catching. I knew enough about ogre culture to recognise Hel as the name of their goddess – the goddess of Death.

Krieg introduced me. ‘This is Inspector Wise. She is investigating Helga’s death.’

Both parents barely acknowledged me; they continued to stare at Krieg with bemusement until finally Jón asked, ‘She’s from the Connection?’

‘Yes. They have resources we do not. I will stop at nothing to see that Helga’s killer is found.’ The unspoken words even work with the Connection did not need to be voiced, but we all heard them.

‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ I started. ‘And I’m sorry to have to ask you questions right now, but time is of the essence in tracking down her killer.’ My dad’s cold case had taught me how icy a case could get; how impossible it was to gain purchase once the days and weeks slipped away.

Neither of Helga’s parents responded immediately. Jón sat on the floor, put his arms and legs around his wife and she collapsed against him. Her eyes were glassy with shock and tears that were spilling unchecked down her cheeks.

Wrapped around Freja like a safety blanket, Jón looked up at me, his eyes also brimming. ‘Ask your questions,’ he choked out.

I needed to make it quick, get the basics; I could question them further at a less sensitive time. I squatted down so I was at their eye level. ‘Do you know Helga’s PIN code for her phone?’

They both shook their heads so I pressed on. ‘Do you know of anyone who would seek to harm Helga?’

‘No,’ Jón said fiercely. ‘None would dare. All know she is loved by King Krieg.’

Ogres may have known that but other species would have been ignorant of Helga’s place in ogre society. I considered it best not to point that out. ‘Do you know where she was supposed to be last night?’

‘With Aron,’ her mother said immediately.

‘Her boyfriend?’

‘Her best friend,’ Jón corrected. ‘They were born in the same month. They have been inseparable since birth.’

‘Was she dating anyone?’ I asked. Her mother shook her head.

I suppressed a grimace. Her parents had no idea if Helga had enemies and they didn’t know where she’d been the previous night. I could question them again if I needed to, but for now I’d leave them to their grief and misery. Hopefully, I’d have better luck with her friends.

I saw death frequently and I often saw love, too; after all, grief was just the other side of the coin. Time and again I’d observed that the deeper the grief, the truer the love had been. It reminded me that there was far more to the human condition than death and darkness.

These parents were ogres and they dealt with death regularly as part of the fabric of their being.

They weren’t wailing and gnashing their teeth like some human parents might have done, but they were on the floor with no one defending their back, with no weapons drawn.

I knew enough about their culture to recognise the significance of that: it showed that they were broken.

They had loved their daughter with all that they were.

And I would find the person who had taken their daughter from them.

‘Thank you for your time.’ I looked at Krieg. ‘I’ll see myself out.’

My heartbeat sped up again as Krieg pushed off the wall and strode towards me, but although he looked purposeful I didn’t fear for my life. My heart was pounding for other reasons. He walked past me and I followed him wordlessly.

I glanced back at Helga’s parents. Now that the questions were over, they broke down completely and sobbed brokenly in each other’s arms. Cries of distress echoed through the large space.

Behind them, the fire burned green.