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not likely to take in guests from the parole board. Up by the old brewery where Simondson’s body had been found, only two blocks of old wooden houses stood in domestic isolation west of the freeway off-ramp, and I doubted most of them would have suited his taste.
    Solis continued. “He was staying at a cheap motel near the airport.” The coincidence that I’d been in the area just hours after the man’s death was disturbing: Georgetown lies eight miles due north of the airport on the route to Seattle. The cheapest airport hotels with weekly rates were mostly on the north end of International Boulevard, where it passed a cemetery and approached the new light rail station next to the freeway. Neither were the sort of places in which Simondson would have willingly spent time before his incarceration, and I couldn’t imagine Boeing hiring him on straight from jail. Georgetown was a bit rough but hardly Blood Alley, so any nonindustrial death there was remarkable. I didn’t buy the coincidence any more than Solis did and the timing was more suspicious than he knew.
    About four days ago in London I’d been told that my assailant had been seduced and manipulated to kill me. The next night, I took out the vampire who’d done it and wrecked Wygan’s plans for London and myself. Even vampires can use a telephone or e-mail, so one of the asetem in London had let their Pharaohn know things had gone bad and how. I could guess which white-skinned monstrosity that had been. I’d tied off my own loose ends in London, Wygan had tied off some of his here, and all the oddities of timing were no more coincidence than I was a pastry chef. Wygan didn’t want me to talk to the man who’d killed me. Too bad for him that I wasn’t inclined to be pushed any further. I’d just have to hunt down the guy’s ghost instead.
    “What’s the autopsy say?” I asked, reclaiming my coffee cup.
    “No report yet.”
    “You think the body might have been dumped?” Because if it wasn’t, what had brought Simondson—middle-aged and conservative—into Seattle’s post-grunge bohemia in the first place?
    Solis shrugged. “Perhaps. I may not have time to follow up until the report is in. While you have been gone, the homicide rate doubled.”
    “You can’t blame that on me.”
    “Not legally. Not logically. But it feels right.”
    “Gosh, thanks. Now I’m home, it might go back down.” But I wasn’t betting on it.
    Solis didn’t seem inclined to bet that way either, but he didn’t say anything. He took my flippant attitude and pointed look as a hint that I wanted him to go away since he couldn’t arrest me. He put down his mug and walked to the door without my having to push him.
    “You shall let me know what you discover.”
    “Of course. And you won’t try to arrest me for every weird occurrence in King County.”
    He raised his eyebrows as if I shouldn’t count on that. “Stay out of trouble. Or at least off my case load.”
    “I don’t intend to land on your desk or Fishkiller’s slab, thanks.”
    “Ah, but the best of intentions ...” Solis said, waggling his hand dismissively as he strode out into the hall and to the elevator without looking back.
    I frowned after him as I retreated inside and locked the door, thinking that if I were Wygan, I’d have put my pet security guy on the job of tidying up: It kept him too busy to wonder what the boss was up to, and Goodall was strong, ruthless, and smart enough to know the moves without the disadvantages of the usual vampire time limits during summer hours. It also had that classy “I’m one step ahead of you” touch that’s so endearing when you deal with psychotics and megalomaniacs.
    Now that I’d had coffee, it was unlikely I’d fall back asleep for a few hours. As long as I was up, I thought I should feed Grendel and take him for a walk before he decorated the kitchen floor. I also thought I’d let Quinton get a little more sleep—at least one of us should, and