There were a lot of questions I wanted to ask, some of which would probably lead us down very dark roads—like “What did you eat?” Ghouls are the only obligate carnivores we know of among the hominid species, and their meat of choice is usually human. They’d been content feasting on corpses until embalming and cremation became the norm. These days, they mostly go for live prey. A lot of disappearances can be traced back to the ghoul community. Since I didn’t want to get into a fight with these people while I was asking them for help, I held my tongue.

“We owned that land fair and square. Bought it in parcels and kept it in the family for as long as we could. We even paid our taxes reliably and on the regular, which is more than most of the humans around here could be bothered to do. But they got us anyway. Said we were an ‘eyesore,’ and started chasing loopholes.” The elder ghoul’s voice turned bitter. I still didn’t know his name. That was probably intentional. Humanize the child, because she was vulnerable, and they didn’t want her getting hurt. Hold themselves apart, hold themselves back, because they were adults and could damn well defend themselves.

I hated that we lived in a world where that sort of calculation was necessary, where we could search the sky for aliens and ignore the sapient species living in our neighborhoods and shopping in our stores. Even more, I hated the fact that I was helpless to change it.

“Let me guess,” I said, as gingerly as I could. “Estate taxes?”

The ghoul nodded. “They came at us with lawyers. Said we hadn’t filed the correct paperwork for inheritance, and we’d have to come up with money if we wanted to keep our place—a lot of money, because the land had become valuable while we were squatting on it and keeping to ourselves. Taxes got them through the door, and then they found a hundred code violations that needed to be fixed, a thousand upkeep flaws that needed to be resolved. We were smart enough to know they’d just keep coming, all those clever humans and their wicked lawyers, until they had what they wanted. So we sold while we could still make a little money. Enough to resettle ourselves, even if we’d never be as comfortable, or as much at home.”

“Couldn’t you move somewhere else and start over?” asked Malena. The ghoul turned to look at her. So did Dominic and I. She flushed, but shrugged and pressed on: “There’s lots of open land in New Mexico. You could build another warehouse, or buy an old airplane hangar, and try again. Hell, there are whole cities for sale, if you know where to look. Some of them even have liquor licenses.”

“I was born in Southern California,” said the ghoul. “My daughters went to school here, met their husbands here. My wife was consigned to the Great Rot here. I don’t want to go anywhere else.”

“Neither do I,” said Aurelie’s mother. She cast what could only be described as a fond look at her father, and said, “I’m a Valley girl. This is where I’m supposed to be. Aurie may feel differently when she gets older, when she gets tired of having humans in every direction. She’ll be the one who moves to a warehouse in the desert, not me. Although I guess I’ll follow her once there are grandkids.”

“Grandchildren change everything,” said the spokesghoul.

Right. “That’s why I’m here,” I said, trying not to sound impatient, even as I stressed the words as hard as I dared. “My grandmother is missing. If you were missing, sir, don’t you think Aurelie would want to be able to go after you? I need to know about the Crier Theater. Please.”

“I’m getting there,” he said—but he didn’t sound annoyed. If anything, he sounded approving, like he’d been hoping I’d push a little harder. “They tore down our whole complex. People rejoiced. Said it was a beautification project. The people who’d bought the land built a shopping complex there. It failed—something about sabotage and rats in the walls that kept chewing the wiring—”

“You say ‘rats,’ I say ‘vindictive hidebehinds who didn’t appreciate being rendered homeless,’” interjected his daughter.

“—and the place sat empty for a good ten years,” finished her father. “We were starting to put together a plan for buying it back and making our new home in the mall when that Crier fellow swooped in with his big network bank account and bought the whole thing lock, stock, and barrel. He tore it down, and built his new theater over the bones.”

“Which explains why there are six basements,” I said. “The shopping mall wouldn’t have seen the need to fill them in, and Adrian might not even have known they were there.” Or maybe he had, and that was why there were unmarked doors in the halls. He’d left the unused spaces accessible but ignored. That was better than hiding them. Hidden things got found, after all.