Dave Carver (Book 1): Thicker Than Blood by Andrew Dudek

disappearing a week . After Hawthorne died, that number returned to normal.”
    “I remember those kids going missing. My nephew...” Fuerte’s eyes drifted off. “You’re saying Hawthorne was...what, raping them? Killing them?”
    An image flashed behind my eyes, something that I still saw sometimes in my nightmares: mason jars beneath the floorboards of an apartment, full of blood; a golden knife on a black altar; tiny human skulls arranged in a pentagram.
    “They were sacrifices,” I said. “Blood magic. Hawthorne was using them to gain power. By that point, he was too powerful for the NYPD to stop. He’d have killed dozens of people before you guys brought him down. There was nothing you could have done. Some things are just beyond the reach of normal cops.”
    Fuerte stared at me for a long time. I could see the struggle on his face. He tried to keep it invisible, but there was no question that he, too, was reliving some painful memory. “So you killed him?”
    “I didn’t say that.”
    Finally, he shook his head. “What about Larsen?”
    I shrugged. “I think she was killed by something else that you guys just aren’t prepared for.”
    “ Someone else, you mean.”
    “I said what I meant, Detective.”
    He shook his head. “This is crap. Still...it sorta makes sense.”
    “The thing that killed Kim is still out there,” I said. “And unless someone stops it, it’ll kill a lot more people.”
    Fuerte smoothed his mustard-stained tie. “Let me guess: You’re the only one that can stop it?”
    “Not the only one,” I said. “But I’m the guy whose job it is to stop it.”
    Fuerte closed his eyes and leaned his head against the chair’s backrest. He stayed that way for a few moments. I sympathized with the man. It’s never easy finding out that the distance between the non-fiction and fantasy sections isn’t as long as you thought it was. Against every instinct in my body, I waited and kept my mouth shut. Fuerte needed to make this decision on his own.
    His eyes suddenly snapped open and he stood up and began gathering the papers back into the box. He didn’t look at me as he said, “Sorry for the inconvenience, Mr. Carver, but you’re free to go.”
    I blinked. Score one for me. Maybe I wasn’t terrible at this job. I took a business card I’d taken from the reception desk at the office and slid it to Fuerte.
    “If you ever have a case like this again—one that doesn’t seem to make sense—give me a call.”
    Fuerte took the card, slid it into his breast pocket, grunted, and left the room with his big cardboard box.
    I stood in the dark room, savoring the freedom I’d come very close to losing. I’d really thought I was going to jail. But I didn’t take too long. I still had a lot of work to do.

Chapter 12
    Emerging from inside the 108th Precinct, I took a deep breath of New York air. God, who knew I’d have missed that smell. I’d been in the interrogation room for a long time, apparently—afternoon had turned into evening, and the sun was settling down, getting ready to disappear behind the skyline. It was almost dark. Whatever the vampires were planning, soon they’d be free to put it into action. I had to get moving.
    Krissy was waiting for me on the street, leaning against the hood of Earl James’s car. I nodded to the lieutenant, who was sitting behind the wheel, as Krissy threw her arms around me in a tight hug. I surprised myself a little by squeezing back.
    As we got into the car, Earl looked at me. “Back to the office, sir?”
    “Are the cops gone?”
    “Yes, sir. They packed up about an hour ago. Took Kim to the morgue.”
    I nodded. “Let’s get back to the office, then.”
    The parking lot was still taped off, but the ambulances and cop cars were gone. The crowd had dissipated. The whole area had a strange vibe to it, like some deflated balloon. All that remained to remind the world that a woman’s life had been extinguished in this parking lot was the