Contents
Title Page
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Other Books
Luna Proxy #2 (Werewolf / Shifter Romance)
MAC FLYNN
Text copyright 2016 by Mac Flynn
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission in writing from the author.
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CHAPTER 1
I stood on the precipice of death.
Below me was a deep, wide canyon. The bottom of the canyon held the rage of a swollen river. The sharp boulders and spray from the water told me its anger was great, but I didn't hear a sound of its fury. My feet teetered into oblivion. I shifted. A few pieces of earth crumbled and fell into the abyss. The small pebbles were swallowed by the raging waters. I would be no more noticed by those waters.
Around me was a desolate, blackened wasteland. It stretched for miles to the far distant, rocky mountains. I was alone.
Or so I thought. A noise behind me caught my attention. Footsteps. I spun around. Ten feet from me stood Mortale. He was half-turned to me. His head was bowed and his eyes were shut. He wore the same red overcoat with the black pants and shoes. A wind swept past him and whipped his clothes about him.
"Mortale!" I cried out. I took a step towards him and stretched out my hand. "What are you? Why do I want to follow you?"
Mortale raised his head. His eyes opened. They glowed a soft white in the darkness. I started back.
My heel slipped over the edge. I stretched out my hands towards the man who held my attention. He never moved. I tilted back and fell into the abyss. The raging water waited for me.
I gasped and sat up a few seconds before splashdown. My body was covered in sweat and I panted for breath. The darkness in my room told me it wasn't quite daylight. I fumbled for the switch on my lamp beside my bed. The light illuminated the room, but it didn't illuminate my thoughts.
I leaned forward and ran a hand through my long black hair. My whispering voice was shaky. "What the hell was that?"
I shook myself and tossed aside the covers. My alarm wouldn't go off for another half hour, but I knew I wouldn't get any more sleep this day. I threw on some clothes and stepped into the hall between the two bedrooms. The apartment was as silent as the grave.
I forsook food as I made my way into the main passage and down one flight of stairs. My dream had rekindled the curiosity that burned inside me. There was an insatiable need within me to find out the truth about the monsters from the alley.
I reached the door. It was unlocked just as it had been last night. I stepped inside the barren wasteland of identity. The bare walls, the spotless floor, the empty cupboards. Nothing told me a human had lived here. I looked everywhere and found nothing.
I sat down on the top of the mattress near the mess of sheets and sighed. "What do you know?" I whispered.
The reply was silence. I reached into my pocket. My fingers enclosed around the cold metal of the broken necklace. I pulled out the broken trinket and studied the strange chain and beads.
"Was it really you?" I wondered.
The silence was maddening. I fell back against the mattress. My arms stretched out on either side of me and my left hand disappeared into the mess of covers. Something crinkled against my fingers. I sat up and frantically burrowed into the blankets. My search brought me a small gift when I brushed aside the covers. A blank slip of paper lay on the mattress.
I picked it up and turned it over. It was a receipt. I read aloud the name at the top.
"The River Diner."
The date was from six months ago, but it was still a lead. The name sounded familiar. A quick search online would tell me exactly where along this city's slimy river lay this diner.
I pocketed the receipt and glanced at my watch. It was fifteen minutes till nine.
"Shit," I growled as I jumped to my feet.
I hurried from the room and down the stairs to the lobby. Meyer stood behind the desk and spoke to two strangers on the other side. They were a man and a woman, and both were dressed in black coats with plain brown pants. The man was a head taller than the woman, and the woman had long brown hair. I saw the man flash something inside a square black case before he tucked the case into his coat.
"Whatever I can do to help, officers, but I don't know anything about any murders," I heard Meyer tell them. His eyes fell on me as I tried to cross the lobby. "Hey, Leila!" The pair half-turned to me.
I paused and turned to him with a frown. "What?"
He nodded at the pair. "These two officers are looking into some murders last night."
I looked the people over. "You don't look like officers."
"We're plainclothesmen," the man explained.
The woman smiled at me. The expression didn't extend to her autumn-colored eyes. "We were just looking for witnesses to a couple of murders down the street."
I shook my head. "I don't know anything except that I gotta get to work."
I hurried out. The sunlit day smelled of rain, but the fresh scent didn't ease my mind. I paused at the bottom of the stoop and glanced over my shoulder at the door to the apartment building. The filthy rectangular piece of glass in the center of the door couldn't obscure the dark forms of the officers as they spoke with Meyer. Meyer shook his head, but waved his hand at the stairs. They nodded and proceeded up the stairs.
I turned away and glanced at my watch. Ten minutes until nine. I was going to be late for work again.
Work waited for me, or rather, a reporter from upstairs. His name was Devin Quill, one of the guys on the crime beat. I found him beside the mail room door with his tablet in hand and a smile on his face. I didn't trust that smile.
"Good morning. Mind if I ask you some questions?" he greeted me.
"Don't you have a mugging victim to bother?" I wondered as I pushed past him.
"Probably half a dozen, but today is homicide day for me, and I heard there was something in your neighborhood," he informed me.
I froze. My eyes widened. I spun around and narrowed them at Quill. "Like what?"
He shrugged. "Just some guys being torn to pieces by a large animal."
"And how'd you find out it was near where I lived?" I questioned him.
He laughed. "You're in the wrong department. You should be a journalist. As it is, I heard it from a source higher up. I won't name names because sources and all, but they heard you were being looked into."
I raised an eyebrow. "By another department?"
He nodded. "Yeah, but not the ones you're thinking of. The admin department is interested in you." He stepped closer and lowered his voice. The keyboard on his tablet phone was at the ready. "Mind telling me why you're suddenly so popular?"
"What I tell you about coming in here, Quill?" Elliott's voice interrupted us. He stormed from his office and grabbed the man by his collar. "You can wait for your hate mail like everyone-" The door to the mail room opened. In stepped Miss Bao. She had a look of death on her face as her eyes fell on me.
"Mr. Regis would like a word with you," she informed me.
Elliott dropped Quill and glared at her. "She can come up when his mail's ready."
"He would like to speak with her right now," she insisted.
E
lliott's frown deepened, but he turned to me and jerked his head towards Bao. "Go on then, but don't bullshit for too long."
I passed through the two men and followed Bao to the elevator. The doors closed behind us and we shot up the floors. Bao stood in front of me and close to the pad with the floor numbers. She slightly turned her head and her eyes fell on me.
"Why does he want to speak with you?" she questioned me.
I frowned. "Shouldn't you know that?"
She pursed her lips and faced forward. "He neglected to tell me."
I raised an eyebrow. That was her way to saying he hadn't told her a thing. That piqued my interest more than the summons itself. Bao was his right-hand man. By not telling her he had essentially amputated part of himself.
There were no interruptions on our flight up the elevator. That in itself was suspicious. We stepped off the admin floor and Bao led me down the long hallway. She stopped at the pair of doors that led to Reggie's office and opened one of them.
"Mr. Regis, she's here," she announced.
"Let her in and close that damn door," his gruff voice replied.
I stepped into the room. Bao shut the entrance behind me. The curtains behind Reggie's desk were closed. Darkness created deep shadows in the corners of the room. Only the lamp on his desk provided light. Reggie sat in his chair close to the desk. His elbows were on the desk and his hands were clasped together.
He gestured to the chair opposite him. "Have a seat." I took him up on his invitation and slipped into the chair. He studied me for a moment. The lamp cast deep shadows on his old face. There was tension between the lines. "I'm sure you're wondering why you're here. It's because of the attack last night near where you live."
I raised an eyebrow. "What about it?"
"We've had a few of our people working on the case. They've interviewed a few witnesses, and some of them say they saw a person matching your description around the scene of the murders shortly before and after the attack," he told me.
"Is that why Quill was bothering me?" I guessed.
His eyebrows crashed down. "What's Quill got to do with this?"
My eyes narrowed. He didn't know Quill was on the case. If that was true, than I wondered what people he had on the case.
I shrugged. "He was assigned to the case and knew I lived around there, so he asked if I knew anything. That's all."
"I see." Reggie's eyes flickered to my left before he returned his attention to me. "And do you know anything about the case?"
I shook my head. "Not a thing."
"I'm afraid I don't quite believe you," a new voice spoke up.
I turned my head to the left. A chair sat in the shadows of the corner close to the doors. A figure arose from the chair and stepped into the light. He was a man of about thirty with dark brown hair and bright blue eyes. His suit was impeccably matched to his muscled but slim physique, and his stance was confident. A crooked smile graced his lips.
It was Mr. William A. Fox himself.
"I don't really care," I retorted.
"Shut your mouth and show Mr. Fox some respect," Reggie snapped at me.
I spun around to face my boss and glared at him. "He just called me a liar."
"Because you are," Fox commented as he moved over to stand to my left beside Reggie's desk. He folded his arms over his chest and studied me with that strange smile of his. "And might I add you're terrible at it."
"Are you lying to us?" Reggie questioned me.
"And if I am?" I challenged him.
"Then I can put you on unpaid leave until further notice," he warned me.
I jumped to my feet and slammed my palms on his desk. "But I didn't do anything!"
"Then tell us the truth," Reggie demanded.
"I didn't do anything! I wasn't even there!" I insisted.
"Please remain calm. We just want to get to the bottom of this horrific crime," Fox spoke up.
My eyes flickered to him. "Why? What's it to you?"
"Miss Ulric," Reggie warned me.
I returned my attention to Reggie and waved a hand at Fox. "You're a reporter. Aren't you curious to know why your boss is so interested in five murdered guys?"
"You seem to have overplayed your hand, Miss Ulric," Fox commented.
I started back and glared at him. "What do you mean?"
"The police haven't released the number of victims, and yet you know exactly how many were murdered," he told me.
"So do you," I retorted.
He chuckled. "Like the newspapers, I have my sources. I can also attest to the validity of Mr. Regis' sources."
My eyes flickered between the two men. "Those sources don't happen to be the same, do they?" I questioned them.
Reggie's frown deepened. He leaned back in his chair and entwined his hands together. "Miss Ulric, I will ask one more time. Do you know anything about the incident last night near your home?"
I looked him in the eyes with a firm gaze. "I have no idea what attacked those men."
Reggie tilted his head towards Fox. The man folded his arms across his chest and shrugged. "Then we thank you for your time, Miss Ulric."
"You can go back to work," Reggie ordered me.
I stood and walked to the door, but paused at the entrance and half-turned back to the men. "Either of you happen to sic your investigators on my apartment building?"
Fox raised an eyebrow. "No, why?"
I shrugged. "Just wondering."
I slipped from the room and their prying eyes and questions.
CHAPTER 2
"So what'd he want?" Quill asked me as I entered the mail room.
"Aren't you supposed to be harassing an officer or someone?" I returned as I got to work on the tables.
Quill sidled up beside me and leaned his back against the table. He leaned back and his eyes searched my face. "Looks like whatever it was must be juicy, so 'fess up."
I slapped down the mail in my hand and spun around to face him. "If I give you a real story will you quit bothering me?" I snapped.
He raised an eyebrow and lowered his tablet. "That depends on the story."
"How about you find out why William Fox is interested in these murders," I suggested.
Quill's eyes widened. He pushed off the table and raised the tablet. "Is this legit?"
"I just had an interview with both Reggie and Fox, and they both wanted to know about them," I revealed.
Quill tapped away at his screen keyboard. "Did they ask you anything specific?"
I turned back to my work. "Leave my name out of this."
He stepped closer and leaned towards me. "Come on, you have to give me more details than that. What'd he know?"
"Fox or Reggie?" I returned.
He snorted. "Not that old windbag. I want to know what Fox knew."
"His sources told him how many people were killed," I replied.
Quill wrinkled his nose. "Is that it?"
I paused in my work and tilted my head in his direction. "You want a bigger scoop than the owner of our paper looking into some murders with his own resources?"
Quill furrowed his brow for a moment before a smile slipped onto his lips. "I suppose that's enough for me to leave you alone, at least for now."
"For forever," I returned.
He stepped backwards towards the door. "Forever's a long time, and a reporter is always racing the clock. I'll talk to you if I need any more info. Later."
I opened my mouth to protest, but he slipped from the room. "Damn idiot. . ." I murmured as I returned to my work.
The rest of the day was uneventful. I returned to the apartment to find two unpleasant surprises. I slipped into the apartment and found that Red was seated in the chair on the opposite side of the couch and far from the door. On the couch were the pair from that morning. The woman smiled at me and the man bowed his head.
Red stood and smiled at me. "Here's the working woman now. Leila, these are Officers Pararius-" he gestured to the man first, and then the woman, "-and Le
no."
"We're here to talk to you about the murders that took place last night just a few blocks away," Officer Leno explained.
"We're wondering if you saw or heard anything," her partner added.
"Why should we hear anything? Wasn't that a few blocks down?" I pointed out.
"It's just a general inquiry of those who live in the vicinity," Officer Pararius told me. "And we hoped someone could identify this individual." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a photo.
Red took the photo and frowned. "He does look a little familiar. Leila, what do you think?" He held out the photo to me.
I accepted the photo and studied the face. My eyes involuntarily widened. The picture was of Mortale. He stood in front of a white background and held a black board against his chest. On the board was a string of numbers, but no name.
I squinted. The tiny hairs behind his ears caught my attention.
"That's a mugshot of the interested person taken about six months ago," Officer Pararius spoke up.
I pulled back and shook my head. "Can't say that I've seen him." I handed the photo back to Red.
He frowned. "I don't know. I think I've seen him around." I crossed my arms over my chest and glared at him. He pursed his lips, but sighed and shrugged. "Or maybe I haven't. He's just kind of familiar."
"The manager, Mr. Meyer, told us he thought the man was a new tenant," Officer Leno informed us.
I snorted. "Meyer doesn't remember faces, he remembers payments."
"He seemed to remember your face quite well this morning," Officer Pararius pointed out.
I shrugged. "I just gave him a big down payment on this place."
"He also informed us you formerly held the room occupied by the suspect," the officer added.
I raised an eyebrow. "So what's your point?"
"We thought perhaps you might have struck up a minor relationship with the new occupant," Leno explained.
I shook my head. "No."
"You're sure?" Officer Leno persisted. Her narrowed eyes shifted from Red to me. "He's a dangerous criminal. We suspect he's killed several people within the last week."
"Positive, and if that's all you wanted to ask then I'd like to ask you to leave. I need to make my dinner."
Officer Leno's smile widened to an unbearably tight width. She stood, and her partner followed suit. "Of course, we understand." She stretched out her hand. "Thank you both so much for your time."