Chapter 10: Chapter 10

Ivy and Lyric looked like they could’ve been sisters, even though they weren’t related at all. Both were tall and muscular, with Ivy having an inch on Lyric, who was almost six-foot. Lyric wore her pale blonde hair short and tinged with pink while Ivy’s cascaded down her back in long ringlets. She often pulled it up before she did anything too dangerous. The four of them had grown up together, so when they were given this assignment, Cutter thought it would be a great group to work with. So far, they hadn’t disappointed him. Working together closely had brought them to this location, and while Cutter was still having a hard time wrapping his mind around how he came to be sitting here, he was hopeful it would all make sense one day.

“Well, I did some research, and she does have a Facebook page and a Twitter—though pretty much everything she posts has to do with school. She’s a pretty girl,” Rider said, not caring that he had food in his mouth while he was talking. “I definitely think she could be our gal.”

“But she’s here,” Lyric reminded them. “And she’s been here the whole time, right?”

“The search I did shows her graduating from Tarrytown High School in 2011 and then going to college in Buffalo before buying a house in Reaper’s Hollow four years ago, around the same time she took the job at Thomas, but I couldn’t find any other legal records.”

“That’s about all we knew going into this,” Ivy reminded them. “The information we got from Sky wasn’t that specific, and it certainly didn’t have a name, let alone a picture, but how has she not been on our radar?” Sky was Lyric’s sister.

“Her name is spelled, R-U, by the way,” Rider said, eyeing him as if he’d passed on the wrong information on purpose. “She has no public record—no tickets, no fines, no credit other than the house loan,” Rider spoke up, laying his fork aside for a moment. “And then… if she really is who we think she is, there has to be something literally blocking her from us.”

“What could that be?” Lyric asked, shaking her head.

Everyone looked at Cutter, who met each set of blue eyes and raised his own eyebrows, wondering why they wanted him to be the one to answer. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “A cloaking device of some sort. Maybe a spell.”

“A spell?” Ivy repeated, looking at him like he’d gone mad.

“Why not?”

“Who would’ve cast it on her?” she asked, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “We haven’t dealt with anything like that in… centuries.”

“Like I said, I don’t know. But if she is who we think she is, then there’s only one person alive who might know the answer.”

“And… we can’t find her either,” Rider reminded them.

Cutter tried not to grow frustrated. “Look, I know this isn’t what you guys want to hear, but if you want me to do this right, you’ve got to give me time. I can’t just stroll up to the woman between meetings and say, ‘By the way, you’re not who you think you are,’ now can I? Let me get to know her a little bit better, and I’ll figure it out.”

“That sounds great in theory,” Lyric said, setting down her water glass, “but in the meantime, we have another body. And it’s not too far from here.”

Cutter’s fork clattered against his plate. “When? Where?” he asked, leaving out the additional question of, “Why didn’t anyone tell me this?”

“I sent you a text,” Lyric replied her eyes sharp. “This morning, just on the other side of Rockefeller State Park.”

“With the three in NYC and the one in Albany over the last three weeks, it seems like this part of the country is becoming a little more popular. For some reason.” Rider was staring into his eyes, and Cutter could see he was just as concerned as he was himself.

Shaking his head for clarity, he said, “It’s confirmed?”

“Yes. Uriah told me this afternoon,” Ivy said.

Once again, Cutter’s eyebrows shot up. If Uriah was contacting Ivy, this had to be important. “So he thinks…”

“He seems to think it has to do with the missing Keeper,” Ivy said, her voice steady. “And I agree. If we know, maybe they know, too.”

“We can’t let them get to her first,” Rider said, his voice punctuated with conviction.

“We can’t let them get to her at all.” Cutter meant that on more levels than he was currently able to understand. “The taking—what are the details?” Was it possible this was just a random Reaper, one passing through? Somehow, Cutter didn’t think so. The details might confirm it.

“Uriah said it appeared to be a heart attack. Jim Carpenter, forty-two, father of two who worked at an insurance office ten minutes from his home in the country, was discovered in his bed by his wife when she awoke in the morning, turned over, and saw he was unresponsive. Seems easy when it’s put that way, doesn’t it?”

Cutter nodded. It sounded simple, but he knew that wouldn’t be what Jim Carpenter remembered if he could tell his side of the story. “And no one else heard or saw anything, I’m sure.”

“Do they ever?” Rider asked, wiping his mouth with a napkin.

While Cutter knew it was possible for there to be a witness in some cases, there was no point in going into that now. “What time was his name inscribed in the Book of the Dead?”

“A little after 7:00 AM Jerusalem time,” Ivy replied.

“So just after midnight here?” Cutter said more to himself.

“Yep,” Lyric agreed. “He doesn’t even make sense as a target. There were three other people in the house. Why just him?”

“The most explainable,” Rider shrugged. “He could easily have had a heart attack. His kids are fourteen and sixteen. They weren’t going to die of natural causes.”

“Aneurism, blood clot, respiratory failure…” Lyric began a list of natural causes of death, grabbing each finger on her left hand with her right as she did so.

“Not as easy!” Rider said, over her.

“It doesn’t matter what it looks like anyway,” Ivy said. “I mean, sure there’s no reason to alarm people, but what would they do if they suspected something supernatural anyhow?”

“Make a bad movie,” Rider suggested. “Cast K-Stew in it.”

Cutter rolled his eyes. “If it is who we think it is, he is always cautious,” he reminded them, standing and gathering up dirty plates, no longer hungry. Half of his spaghetti would end up in the trash.

“So should we split up? While you’re working on finding out if Ru is the missing Keeper, we could investigate and see if there’s anything we can do to find out who took out Jim Carpenter.” Lyric folded her arms, also finished with dinner.

Cutter finished scraping food into the trash can and turned on the hot water in the sink to warm it up for the dishwasher. “It wouldn’t hurt,” he decided. “I guess there’s nothing else you can find out about Ru right now, so why not?”

“Any idea where her parents are?” Rider asked. “Maybe tracking them down would help.”

“Yes, sort of,” Cutter muttered, opening the dishwasher. “She said she doesn’t have a dad, and her mom lives in Tarrytown.” He remembered the comment Candice had made about Ru’s mom and wondered if it was important.

“No dad?” Rider repeated. “That could be significant.”

“Yeah, and when she mentioned her mom, one of the other teachers said something like, ‘I’m surprised you even call her that,’ or something.”

“That makes it sound like there’s a possibility she could be adopted,” Ivy said, scratching her chin.

“I can look into adoption records in the area dating back to the nineties,” Lyric volunteered.

“And I’ll start working on Carpenter this evening. I should be able to pick up some good contacts in this kind of weather,” Ivy nodded.

Cutter finished loading the dishwasher and dropped a packet of soap in, trying not to make a face at Ivy who was a firm believer that one could contact others mentally more easily in clear weather even though he was certain it didn’t make any difference.

“In the meantime, what are we going to do about you-know-who?” Rider asked, scooting his chair back. “If it’s him, and he knows half as much as we do, he’ll be on her before we know what hit us.”

“If he knows what we know, he wouldn’t be hanging out in the woods collecting middle-aged men,” Cutter reminded him. “We can’t do much about him until we have her. Let’s take this one step at a time, unless anyone has a better idea.” No one seemed to, and even though Cutter didn’t like that answer any better than anyone else did, they’d have to accept it. “Besides, we don’t even know it’s Nat. It could be anyone.”

“How much are you willing to bet?” Rider leaned his head against the wall, his chair balanced on the back two legs, and the new teacher in him wanted to tell his cousin to put all six feet on the floor.

Biting his tongue, Cutter didn’t respond. He was fairly certain this had to be Nat, too. It was clean and cautious, something most Reapers didn’t care about anymore. No, Rider’s bet was not one he was willing to take.