Ch.245Request Log #020 – Murder Machine (2)

Even if proper snow were to fall, the heat from Little Eire’s lights would melt it into sleet before it could touch the ground. Carmen naturally linked her arm with mine.

I wrapped my arm around her slender waist as she pressed against me without hesitation. It was half relaxation. But I made sure to use my left arm so I could draw my gun at any moment. The other half was business.

Carmen rubbed against me like a cat hugging a tree trunk. When she closed her eyes and smiled, she looked gentle, but she quickly opened them again and looked up at me with those sharp eyes.

“I’m just trying to enjoy myself before I end up in someone else’s hands, and it’s not so bad. Carmen may be greedy, but she doesn’t covet what belongs to others.”

I could only smirk at her bold statement as she leaned against me.

“I seem to recall hearing that you only seduce other men when you already have a boyfriend.”

“That’s… only when I’m with someone out of loneliness, not love. They say a man’s embrace feels the same whether you love him or not. Even vampires don’t only drink the blood of those they love.”

She waved her gloved fingers at the doormen in greeting. So she did have gloves but had deliberately taken them off, freezing her hands while complaining about it being 19 or 20 degrees.

The doormen were Irish half-breeds. Seeing how their gills on the back of their necks fluttered at the sight of Carmen, they seemed to be enchanted by her too. Carmen didn’t try to charm them, though.

They grinned at Carmen but straightened their backs when they saw me. They treated me like some high-ranking member of the organization, though all I’d done was handle a few jobs for them.

“Ah, why are you here instead of going to Mare… Welcome! The Morrígan said she’d like you to visit Mare sometime! She has something to tell you!”

So that was the reason—The Morrígan had a message for me. Come to think of it, I’d only ever been paid in cash for preventing the uprising.

I didn’t seek fame in the underworld. Rather than becoming Leone to the Italians or something to the Irish gang, I’d prefer to be respected by the newspaper boy in front of my house.

Still, I shouldn’t refuse the recognition that comes with the job. I was the one who caught that goblin Arnold and became his guarantor, so I deserved at least that much compensation.

“I’m working now, so another time. I already have an invitation anyway, so there’s nothing more to help with… thanks for the message.”

I could see the two mermaid half-breeds relaxing a bit at my mention of working. They might have mistakenly thought Carmen beside me was a reward from The Morrígan.

The Morrígan was known to give more curses to those she liked, so such a statement wouldn’t be particularly strange. Carmen and I both chuckled as we entered the bar.

Carmen, who had been enjoying the atmosphere, pulled away from me with a slightly sulky expression. When I didn’t try to hold her back, she smiled with satisfaction.

“It’s the first time Carmen has brought a man who gets more attention than her, and it’s quite upsetting. I think I’ll leave my friend at the bar and go work. I’ll be on stage, so we won’t be far apart, but men get angry when a woman who was pressed against them without an inch of space between them moves even ten feet away to the stage.”

I responded to her teasing with more teasing. When I didn’t approach her, she returned to my arms, leaning on one leg as if asking me to hold her coat.

“A man who once left someone he should have stayed with and went five thousand miles away to France is hardly going to get angry over something like that.”

Carmen finally showed a genuinely sulky expression. She pulled away from me and hung her coat on her personal hook, but it was still just pretend anger.

“Carmen likes talking about other men in front of a man, but she doesn’t like it when someone talks about other women in front of her. You know Carmen is quite contradictory.”

“If that weren’t the case, I wouldn’t have worried about you dying today. You might have been singing in a better place than a gang-run bar.”

Carmen just smiled at my words before passing through a door marked “Staff Only.” Since it was obvious I was her guest, I was given a seat close to the stage.

I didn’t drink since I was working. One glass of whiskey that tasted like Carmen’s perfume, which I’d had at the office, was enough if it wouldn’t cloud my judgment.

Not getting drunk easily doesn’t mean judgment doesn’t get clouded easily. I looked around once. Carmen’s voice added to the music that I usually considered background noise drew everyone’s attention.

Carmen sang well. Her singing skills were decent, but… more than that, she was a genius at making people listen to her voice. It was her natural charm.

Because of that, she got involved in all sorts of things, enjoying them but also feeling anxious about them. She was ordinary but not someone I’d want to keep by my side. Since I couldn’t drink, I lit a cigarette.

Cigarettes don’t cloud judgment. But then, an unwanted person joined my table. He was quite large. His face had a crying expression, but with deep scars. I could see a scar on his neck that looked like it had nearly been cut through.

It was obvious whose bloodline he shared. He sat next to me without asking. He brought two more organization members who were smaller and showed less mixed-blood traits to the two seats that should have been empty.

He wasn’t here to get Carmen’s attention. If he had been, he would have caused more of a commotion. Instead, he spoke with a sigh in his voice. People who knew Carmen were generally like that.

“Hey, mister. I hear you’re a contractor even Madam Morrígan wants to commend, is that right? We might not know your face, but we heard you talking with the doormen. Stopping the uprising, recruiting Arnold to our side… even bringing the Selkie lady back to her senses. They say you’ve done enough work to be called The Morrígan’s faithful hound.”

“Would such a contractor like being treated like a dog?”

He raised both hands at my sharp retort. It seemed he had no intention of threatening me.

“Among the Fianna, being a faithful hound isn’t an insult, detective sir. Seems you don’t know the story of Cúchulainn’s hound.”

“I’ve never attended a school good enough to give cultural lessons. Just tell me what you want.”

He glanced briefly at Carmen. She appeared not to care that I was talking with The Morrígan’s contractors. Or perhaps she was hoping for chaos to break out.

“I’m telling you to keep your distance from her. Two people were shot dead at her boyfriend’s house less than five days ago. The atmosphere has been very tense. Fortunately, no Fianna died, so Madam Morrígan said to leave it alone… Anyway, no one wants things to get noisier. You’re a contractor with a smooth road ahead, right?”

Two people shot dead, he says. One would be Carmen’s ex-boyfriend, and the other her ex-ex-boyfriend? Well, Carmen wouldn’t have called me if things had been resolved easily.

I recalled how Carmen had described her ex-boyfriend. She said he was a plump man with a round face. Someone who might not—or might—have looked good next to slim, pretty Carmen.

“It’s good that you’re concerned about Little Eire, but you should check your facts first. I’m sure she told the doormen too… that I’m working. She asked me to protect her because she’s afraid her ex-boyfriend might come looking for her with a gun. Yes, yes, I know that’s likely a lie. But there’s also a good chance it’s true. Did the fat guy die?”

The organization member who shared Gancan’s bloodline shook his head. It seemed to be news to him.

“No, it was an orc and a skinny human. Wait… that’s right? Carmen’s ex-boyfriend was a plump guy like a baby pig, but where did he go?”

So the request content was false, but at least it’s true that she didn’t come to me for a midnight date. Things were about to get complicated again.

“Did the police come to investigate? Seeing that Carmen came to work today and is singing, I guess not.”

“Right, we didn’t call the police. Carmen contacted the bar owner… and since the owner knows business would fail without Carmen, he got help from the Fianna and took care of it. Information for information. What about your job?”

I usually didn’t easily talk about my clients or the purpose of requests, but I couldn’t hide the fact that Carmen was my client, and since the job itself was false this time, I could talk about it.

I generally didn’t betray my clients. Betrayal situations were not such uncommon exceptions. The only major exception was my betrayal of President Clichy.

“Yes, yes. The ex-boyfriend Carmen is worried about is that fat guy. It’s obvious, isn’t it?”

It wasn’t hard to understand why all the men around Carmen carried sighs on their lips. I could piece together the situation.

Within the last five days—I’d need to find out exactly when—two men died at Carmen’s boyfriend’s house. That boyfriend was probably the fat man. But he didn’t die.

Given that this organization member also remembered Carmen’s boyfriend as a plump guy like a baby pig, Carmen hadn’t lied about that part. The mention of guns suggests there was a shootout.

It’s strange that none of the three men in the house took Carmen’s side. Or maybe we were misunderstanding something. At least I had The Morrígan’s goodwill that I could use in Little Eire.

“Well… this doesn’t add up. You said the bar owner helped dispose of the bodies. Is the bar owner also a member of the organization?”

He clicked his tongue in displeasure, but I wasn’t currently working for The Morrígan or her organization. I only showed courtesy to clients.

The organization member also refrained from showing complaints to a contractor who had received The Morrígan’s favor, apart from clicking his tongue. Or at least he pretended to.

“Anyone who runs a bar this size is obviously an executive. Are you thinking of visiting?”

I stood up. When he tried to stand too, I pressed down on his shoulder with twice the force, making him sit back down, and smirked at him.

“I’m just thinking about what excuse to give Carmen. If I confront her directly, she’ll pretend to be empty-headed and brush it off, so there’d be no answer. I’ll just use a simple excuse.”

Among people who act as if they pride themselves on being stupid… there were plenty who truly were. That’s why when someone who isn’t stupid gets mixed in, they become hard to find.

I crushed out my cigarette in the ashtray on the table and put a new one in my mouth. I gathered mana at my fingertips to create a flame half the size of my nail to light it. Taking a puff, I headed toward the staff door.

Someone was guarding it, but it seemed certain that The Morrígan’s message had reached this bar. Being of a different race than the fairy half-breeds, they seemed to recognize my face better than expected.

“Ah, The Morrígan’s contractor… This area behind is for staff, do you have someone to meet?”

It’s not strange that The Morrígan’s message carried more weight than the “Staff Only” sign. When I nodded briefly, he brought an ashtray.

“If you have business, you can go in, but the person who manages this bar hates dirt. Ah, haha… I’d appreciate if you could put out your cigarette so ashes don’t fall. Is that okay?”

He was respectfully subservient. Since he brought the ashtray and asked instead of just pointing, I crushed out my cigarette in the ashtray in front of me. He nodded gratefully once more and stepped aside.

I passed through the bar’s neatly wooden-paneled door and went to the back. Beyond the rooms typically found in staff areas, like those for hostesses, I headed to the manager’s office attached to the floor above.

Height is quite an important matter. It generally was. Those “high-ranking” types believed their authority would disappear if they weren’t even one step higher than others.

Light leaked in from outside the window. It wasn’t faint light, but it was artificial. It was bright outside, but the inside of the building was pitch dark. I knocked on the creaking office door, then pushed it open without waiting for an answer.

There was only one fairy executive who would think of covering up a crime of passion caused by Carmen. It was the first fairy I ever met. The fairy who noticed my doubled vitality and strength.

As expected, inside that door was a woman with goat hooves wearing a white dress. She was short but didn’t look childish. She snapped sharply.

“How rude. Are the Fianna the only ones these days who teach people to wait for an answer after knocking? Why don’t you show a little more courtesy when you enter?”

Bavan was prickly. It was somewhat enjoyable how different her reactions were from vampires who acted docile as if they would wag their tails due to their gluttony, or the succubi of Pandemonium.

“You should save that talk for when you think I can’t find the two corpses you buried, Bavan. Anyway, explain what happened. It seems Carmen dragged me here because of that incident.”

It seemed not only the men around Carmen sighed heavily. Bavan also heaved a sigh that could sink the ground. She looked like she had a headache.

“I wish you were a man I could chase away for showing off. I just don’t like The Morrígan’s trusted contractor stirring up trouble in Little Eire. Understand?”

“Skip the disclaimer and get to signing.”

Her gaze pierced through me again. When receiving favor, it was better to act a bit arrogantly. Groveling would only make Bavan close her mouth.

“This isn’t the first time Carmen’s lovers have shot each other dead… but this time, that’s not what happened. Carmen shot the two of them. There were four bullets found, two embedded in the wall… and the rest in their heads. Is there a problem?”

Bavan didn’t seem to care enough about Carmen’s ex-boyfriend to pay much attention to him. It’s natural since she was just cleaning up after her without taking interest.

I didn’t know when people in this city would start communicating efficiently so detectives wouldn’t have to go up and down gathering information.

It started to rain. From the sound hitting the window, it seemed like ice pieces, but when they hit the ground, they made a slushy sound. Sleet.

“One is missing. There was also the homeowner, who was Carmen’s boyfriend at the time. Can I get the contact information for the organization members you sent to handle the bodies?”

Daytime dates often ended warmly, and spending the night with vampires at dawn ended with a pleasant coolness… but I’d never seen a nighttime date end properly.