Technomancer (Unspeakable Things: Book One)

car.”
    I looked at her, swallowing the last of my breakfast. “What did they do to you?”
    “It’s not what they did. They were—threatening.”
    “Did they say something? Or did you just get a bad feeling?”
    “A little of both. They know about the objects, Draith. Be careful. They might even know about Tony’s sunglasses. The only reason you still have them is because they are hoping you will lead them to more players—more objects.”
    I stared at her for a moment. “Are you sure about that?”
    “Yeah.”
    “According to your logic, I must walk in there. Being nosy is the only reason I’m still breathing. Now isn’t the time to turn chicken and disappoint them.”
    She shrugged. “I guess not. Be careful.”
    “OK. If you change your mind, come up after me.”
    “I won’t,” she said.
    I got out of the car and walked up the driveway. I had the feeling I was walking into the lion’s den, but I’d felt that way before. I knew somehow the sensation was part of my regular life, even before the accident. I supposed one couldn’t be an investigator of actual paranormal events without being stubbornly determined about it. Normal people would have long since run off and sought counseling.
    Before I reached the door, three police officers wearing rubber gloves walked out and got into the cars. Two were uniforms, one was a woman with wild hair, normal dress, and rubber gloves. They glanced at me but said nothing. They spoke quietly among themselves and then drove off. It looked like an investigation team to me. I steeled myself, expecting to see something unpleasant inside.
    McKesson met me at the door, which was an elaborate affair of iron-bound wood and cut glass. The door alone must have cost ten grand. I marveled at it as I followed him inside. The entry was gray-white marble tiles—the real stuff, not something made of vinyl or polished cement. Yellow plastic crime scene tape was all over the place, but it had been pushed aside.
    The mansion was two stories and clearly built in a better day when people in this part of the country were richer and crazier. There were cupolas with Greek statues stationed under soft recessed lights, a grand spiraling stairway thatwould have caused a southern belle to swoon, and a huge saltwater fish tank that filled one curved wall between the kitchen and the dining room.
    I walked toward the fish tank first, noting the glass was cracked. The tank was half-full of cloudy water. Inside, a few exotic fish floated on their sides.
    “That looks expensive,” I said.
    “It
was
expensive. Must be a thousand bucks worth of sushi in there.”
    “Who owned this place?”
    “Some dot-com guy who lost his bank account over it. They rented it out to some people who called us about a week ago. We found the place like this. Never found the residents.”
    I looked at him sharply. “A week? About when I had my accident?”
    “Same night,” McKesson said, returning my stare.
    “Why’d you bring me here?”
    He pointed at the fish tank, and I looked at the dead fish. There were lights inside the tank, making it a bright point in an otherwise dim room.
    “What?” I asked. “Do you want me to scoop out the dead ones?”
    McKesson snorted and flipped a switch at the base of the tank. The lights inside it went out. I could see through the tank now. There was a darkened kitchen beyond. Three islands could be seen in the kitchen—it was big enough to run a restaurant.
    I frowned, noticing dark shapes laid out upon the counters and overflowing the sinks.
    “Are those body parts?” I asked.
    “Yeah. But they aren’t human.”
    I felt a chill. I didn’t want to walk back there into the kitchen. Not if it was full of chopped up monsters.
    “Not—
things
either,” McKesson said, reading my mind. “They are animals. Someone bought out a butcher shop. Sides of beef, legs of lamb, ham hocks, and at least ten buckets of lard. They even cut up a fifteen-pound turkey.”
    “What the hell for?”
    “Now you know why you’re here. They’re cultists of some kind. These events always attract them like beetles to a corpse. Don’t you specialize in investigating this sort of thing?”
    “I specialize in unexplainable events,” I said. “Not loonies with knives.”
    McKesson rubbed his chin and shook his head. “You know, a couple of years ago I would have agreed with you. I would have dismissed these people as freaks with a collective mental problem. But if you do