Total pages in book: 56
Estimated words: 52447 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 262(@200wpm)___ 210(@250wpm)___ 175(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 52447 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 262(@200wpm)___ 210(@250wpm)___ 175(@300wpm)
I look up and the doors are open, making an obnoxious beeping sound, and Jack is holding them so they won’t close. “Tic Tac?” he asks.
I lift a finger at him. “You are way too in my business,” I say before I step into the hallway.
“About that,” he says, joining me yet again. “I want to apprentice for you. How do I make that happen? Or just be your assistant. I can make your life easier.”
“Says the guy who just helped the killer get away.”
Two cops approach and stop in front of us, both of them pale with tight lips. One punches the elevator button and the other murmurs, “It’s ugly in there. Be prepared.” With that, they both move on.
It’s not the first time I’ve seen everyone in blue shaken at a crime scene, but there is something about everyone’s eyes tonight that I can only call haunted. My cellphone buzzes and I glance at it in my hand to read Tic Tac’s reply: What the hell? I just saw online someone tried to kill your father.
I reply with: And Kane saved him. Nothing is as it should be tonight. More later. I stick my phone back in my purse, which is about as natural as adjusting your bra in public, but we’ve all had to do it. I start walking and Jack says, “About me helping you—”
I halt and look at him and he’s barely above eye level. He’s short-ish. The freak in the mask was not. Not that Jack is on my radar. I’ve promised myself to set him aside for now and I’m going to do just that “Help me by being quiet,” I say, my voice a low shout, which makes more sense if you’ve ever been pissed at someone in a library or a movie theatre. I have.
At the library, some guy got aggressive with me over the latest Stephen King novel, and my competition didn’t even look like he could read. I had two options. Take him down or shut him down. Quietly. I preferred option one but I settled for two.
As for the movie theatre incident…
I’m not proud of that one, so I just won’t go there right now.
Jack doesn’t want to go there either, even if he doesn’t realize that fact.
“I can’t have the crime scene in my head when all I hear is your voice,” I add. “Do you understand?”
He does a zip his lips motion over his mouth and nods.
I say, “I hope this lasts.” I look skyward and say, “Please, Lord, make it last.” I rotate away from him and start walking, and I’m already reaching for my zone, finding that headspace that allows me to step into what I call my Otherland and just be in the moment. Because when I’m there, nothing affects me. Well, almost nothing. We’ve already established I have a thing about rivers of blood. I don’t even know why. And I’ve only had to deal with it two times in my career, anyway.
We round the corner and there’s a plastic tent set up, which is never a good sign. “It must be messy,” Jack observes. “Really messy. I’ve never seen anything like this.”
Unfortunately, I have. And it was a bloodbath.
My stomach rolls and I will myself to get the fuck over this weird phobia of mine. I study dead bodies all the time. Hell, I have conversations with dead bodies. I remind myself of the case where the victim was tied to the chair and holding his head. None of that bothered me beyond the obvious sick fuck who needed me to catch him and lock him away. Or kill him. Which is how that story ended.
We close the space between us and the cop standing guard. Both me and Jack instinctively pull our badges from our jumpsuits. The officer, who is a beautiful shade of green right now, eyes our identification. He doesn’t offer words of advice or words of remorse, he simply motions us to the door. I eye Jack and lift my chin, directing him to take the lead. “Go do your job.”
His lips curl and I can almost hear him swallowing his words. He also does as I’ve instructed—which is a miracle in and of itself—and enters the apartment. A moment later I hear, “Dear God. Oh my God. Dear God. God, please be with us and protect us from this evil.”
The officer exhales and gives a little shake of his head.
Alrighty then, I think. Otherland, here I come. I step inside the door, where blood splatters the walls and sloshes around my feet.
Chapter Twelve
The scene comes at me with the force of a wrecking ball.
There is blood everywhere, so much blood—on the walls, the light fixtures, and all over the furniture. And I don’t have to ask where it came from, either. Body parts are laying in random areas of the room. From what I see, it appears to be one body.