by Riley Storm
Khove’s smile turned toothy as his lips pulled back. “Let him try. He got the jump on me before, but I owe that bastard for what he did here. This time, I’ll be prepared. No hopped up mage will stop me.”
The Queen stood and drew herself up to her full height, which was still far less than his. “You are aware of the risks, Khove?”
“Yes,” he said formally, ensuring everyone knew he wasn’t charging into this blindly. No, his eyes were wide open, ready for any trap.
And ready to spend some more time with that detective.
“Go then,” she said, coming to his side and resting a hand on his shoulder. “Let us know how we can assist. Everyone will be here at the Manor preparing the defenses, if you need anything.”
“I’ll be fine.” He paused. “Any ideas where he might go next, based on what he’s already hit?”
The Queen turned to the Reaver. The older man hesitated, looking at the map on the table in front of them.
“Two suggestions,” he said at last, reaching out to point at the map.
5
Stifling another yawn, she slipped into her car and flicked the radio on. Almost immediately, it came alive. Her eyes went wide at the size and scope of the reports flashing back and forth across the channel. She switched to the secondary. It was much the same.
Unlike bigger departments, the PFPD only operated on two channels. They simply didn’t have the numbers to need more. Tonight, both of them were jammed with traffic. By the sounds of it, so were the fire and EMS radios.
“What the hell is going on?” she asked the air, pulling out of her driveway.
Ten minutes earlier, Sheriff Dottner had called her up, waking her in the middle of the night and asking her to go check out a nearby crime scene. Although surprised, she’d assumed it was because he needed her expertise. Now, as she listened to reports of half a dozen other incidents throughout the city, Rachel couldn’t help but figure she’d been called as much for another body as for any other reason.
The city was on fire. The Sheriff’s small office was overwhelmed, and several of the officers sounded close to their breaking point. How long had they been at it before Dottner had called and woken her up? Too long.
As she drove and listened at the same time, it appeared that actual casualties were low to almost non-existent. All the places hit had been closed for the night, thank goodness. The streets were empty and so she drove without her sirens flashing, hoping to perhaps sneak up on anyone still at the scene.
That would be the big break she needed. Being able to bring down the perps responsible for the string of arsons and destruction that had rocked Plymouth Falls would certainly garner her more respect from the other members of the Department.
Rounding a corner, her eyes widened at what she saw. It wasn’t a fire. Instead, someone had stolen a bulldozer and driven it through the front of the store until only a few feet of it stuck out onto the street.
“What in the name of…” Getting out of her car, she crouched behind her door, surveying the scene for a second before hitting the highbeams of her vehicle to better light up the scene.
The building was destroyed. Once the dozer was removed, it was more likely than not going to collapse in on itself, based on what she could tell. Oddly enough, this wasn’t her first experience with such a scene, though she’d never expected to see it repeated in Plymouth Falls of all places.
A quick glance across the street revealed the construction site from which the dozer had been pilfered. Mangled chain-link fence showed where the criminals had simply driven over it instead of trying to open it. Whoever they were, it seemed their intent was simply to cause as much damage as possible.
She thought about radioing for backup, but then remembered there wouldn’t be any. The entire department was deployed across the city. She was it. This was her job. The citizens of Plymouth Falls were her responsibility, and she wasn’t about to let these assholes get away just because she didn’t have backup.
Drawing her gun, she crept off to the side of the street, approaching the destroyed building with as much calm as she could muster. The dull roar of blood in her ears and the hammering of her heart against her chest walls seemed like a dead giveaway, but she kept going. Ears open, listening for the slightest of sounds, she came to the edge of the storefront. The damaged store was on the corner of a T-intersection, but the building itself ran the length of the street.
Her back pressed to the wall, she peeked around through the shattered glass. Nothing but rubble. Crushed building, glass everywhere, and dull yellow metal of the dozer’s exterior shell. Nothing could be in there. Creeping around, she moved to the far side, where the driver’s entry and exit was.
The door was ajar, the cockpit empty. Moving into the building itself was far too dangerous. It could come down at any second, and Rachel had no intention of getting herself buried alive. The last thing she needed was to become the laughing stock of the force—assuming she survived. No, she was going to do this by the book.
Her eyes moved across the street. Mostly, by the book, at least. Giving one last look at the destroyed store, ensuring nobody would be stupid enough to be hiding inside, she moved across the street and into the construction site itself, trying hard to keep calm. She killed her flashlight as well, letting her eyes adjust to the darkness. No more than twenty steps into the empty site and her senses began to tingle.
She wasn’t alone.
The question was, where were they? Who were they? Crouching low against a hollow concrete cylinder used for underground piping, Rachel steadied her breathing and listened, extending her senses like she’d long ago learned to do. Hopefully, it would be more help than in the morning, when that handsome stranger had so casually snuck up on her.
After a second, she began to move again, the feeling growing weaker, a little more distant. Whoever it was, they weren’t looking at her. The silence grew on her. Seemed they moved quieter than they had any right to. Still, something told her she was getting close.
She eased herself into the shadow of a big grader in the middle of the site, taking cover behind its long snowplow-like blade. Taking a deep breath, she peeked up and over the top at the other side of the construction zone.
There!
Her eyes saw him, his shadow illuminated by the faint neon lighting from the store on the other side of the street behind the construction site. Stifling a gasp, she slowly ducked back down behind the blade. Whoever it was, they had been looking around, mostly at the ground. They didn’t seem overly concerned about hiding.
Rachel thought about radioing for backup, then cursed. She couldn’t. In her haste to respond to the crime scene, she’d left her radio in the car. She was on her own. Taking a deep breath, she steeled her nerves. Working on her own was what she was used to now. It was why she’d come out here in the first place.
Easing around the edge of the grader’s blade, Rachel crept forward, step by slow step, gun out and aimed at a forty-five-degree angle in front of her. Her hope was that she’d be able to close the distance to perhaps half. Whatever the shadowy figure was doing, they seemed absorbed in it, and so perhaps she could—
Without warning, no more than ten steps from cover, the figure snapped around and stared right at her.
“Freeze!” she shouted. “Police Department!”
The figure turned. They were going to run.
“Don’t do it!” she snapped.
They ran.
Without thinking, she brought her gun up and fired off a shot. The bullet clanged loudly off something metal in the darkness, but it didn’t slow the running figure. Cursing at herself for losing control and letting herself get spooked, Rachel gave chase.
Whoever it was, they were damn fast, but they obviously weren’t familiar with the town, because they ran right down an alleyway adjacent to the site, trapping themselves in a dead end.
“That’s far enough!” she barked. “Turn around, hands on your head.” Carefully, she reached down w
ith her off hand and got out her flashlight.
Flicking it on, she advanced to within twenty feet of the suspect before holding there. At that point, she was able to make out the details of his face.
“You,” she gasped, stunned as she realized she recognized the pair of cold steel eyes and the strong square jaw of the one looking back at her. “What the hell are you doing here?”
He didn’t answer.
“Fine. You’re under arrest.” She chuckled. “Looks like I just found my cause to get a warrant.”
A brief smile may have played across his face, but it was there and gone too fast for her to be certain.
“Come on, keep walking,” she said, cautiously backing down the alleyway until she could reverse their positions and have him walk in front of her. It was too dangerous to put cuffs on him like this. She needed backup for that. Unless…
“Put these on,” she said firmly, swapping her flashlight for her cuffs once they were in front of her car and she had a source of light again.
Tossing them at him, she watched carefully as he put the cuffs on both wrists with his hands behind his back.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, sitting him on the front of her car, not really expecting a response.
“This building and the construction site are my—company’s—property,” he said.
Rachel frowned at the slight hesitation before he said the word company. What had he meant to say? Organization? Was he part of some sort of crime syndicate perhaps? It seemed a little random to be operating in such a small town, but still, she couldn’t rule out any possibilities. Not yet.
“So what does that have to do with you?” she asked casually, patting him down for weapons. “Out for revenge after they fired you?”
The man—he was huge, she couldn’t get over that fact—frowned. Sitting down on her hood, he was still taller than her. “What? Of course not, Detective. I’m here trying to find out what’s happening, trying to figure out who’s attacking us.”
“Attacking you?”
He nodded. “All the properties in the town that have been attacked tonight are ours. I got here not long before you found me. I was searching the area for clues.”
“Right. Well first off, that’s my job,” she said casually. “Secondly, you’re still under arrest.”
6
Squeezing his bulk into the backseat of her car, Khove glowered up at the detective, trying to ignore the way she looked beautiful even with her gun drawn and serious face on. Even in the dim light of her reflected headlights, her eyes glowed with a blue light that was rare.
“Do you wear colored contacts?” he asked casually as she got into the front seat.
“Seriously?” she groaned. “You too?”
Khove frowned. “What do you mean? Me too what? What did I do?”
“You think you’re the first handsome criminal I’ve arrested who’s tried to flirt their way out?”
He blinked. “I’m not trying to flirt, Detective. I’m just curious as to whether your eyes are naturally that blue or not.”
“They are,” she said tightly. “Now stop analyzing my looks.”
Khove sat back—or tried to, the cramped confines of the rear of her police vehicle not allowing for much in the way of leg room—and he considered the detective’s words.
“I’m not the criminal, you know,” he said calmly. “In fact, I have an alibi.”
“Do you now?” she said, obviously still irritated over his question about her eyes.
Why was that such a big deal to her? She could be grateful for her looks. Taller than most, it was clear she worked out a lot. Her blonde hair pulled tightly back into a working ponytail and revealing the little tuft in the front center that came down a hair lower on her forehead, gave her a sort of heart-shaped face. Clear skin, and a lovely rear, too. How could she be upset over that?
Humans are so confusing sometimes.
“I do,” he repeated, trying to act calm, to diffuse the situation he’d inadvertently caused. “I was at our corporate headquarters until an hour ago.”
“So you’ve been unaccounted for, for the past hour?” she shot back.
He snorted. “You made the drive out there this morning, Detective,” he said. “You know as well as I do that it’s a forty-five-minute drive. This attack happened while I was en-route, and the others had already occurred. I didn’t do this, and you know it.”
“So why are you here?” she said, focusing on driving.
“To find and stop the human criminals from destroying more of our property,” he snapped, wondering if he should just break out of the cuffs and go. There wasn’t time for this. He’d initially hoped to enlist the detective’s help, but so far that was off to a poor start.
“The human criminals?” the detective echoed.
Khove winced at his slip of tongue. He would have to watch his words more carefully from now on.
“You have my alibi. Call and confirm it,” he said. “Then let me go so I can do my job.”
“Nope, you’re going to jail. We’ll sort stories out later, pal. You were caught red-handed at a crime scene.”
Khove snarled and casually snapped his handcuffs, bringing his hands out from behind his back. “If I was a criminal that had done this, not only would I not have stuck around at the crime scene like an amateur waiting to get picked up by the police, but I also wouldn’t have let you catch me.” He held up his wrists so she could see them in the mirror.
The cop car squealed to an abrupt stop and Khove’s face was smashed into the metal cage separating the front from the back.
“How did you do that?” she snapped, gun out and facing him.
“Ow,” he groaned, pulling his face back from the cage. “That hurt. Weren’t you supposed to put a seatbelt on me?”
“Shut up. How did you do that?”
“I’m strong,” he said plainly.
“Right,” she said, clearly not believing him. “Why wait until now? Why not do it earlier and escape? Why run in the first place?” The questions came rapid fire.
Khove’s teeth ground together. “Because I’m not your bad guy, Detective. I’ve been trying to tell you this all along. You startled me. I’m not used to being snuck up on, okay? It just doesn’t happen. I thought you were—” Cursing himself, he stopped speaking before he said anything else.
How could he tell her what he’d thought she was? Oh yes, Detective, I ran because I thought you were a possible minion of one of the most dangerous shifter-mages in centuries, and I wasn’t prepared to fight, since I left my gear in the car to refrain from alarming humans.
Somehow, he doubted that response would go over very well. Neither would him expressing his relief at finding her amidst the chaos ongoing in Plymouth Falls. His initial plan had been to come and enlist her help, as he’d told his Queen. What he hadn’t mentioned was the growing need within him to find her. To keep her safe, amidst the war his kind’s politics had seemingly unleashed upon the humans.
“I’m not the enemy,” he repeated instead of speaking any of his other thoughts. “Someone is after my company. They are attacking our property.” His anger at Korred slipped through, and he saw the fear in her eyes. She was afraid of him.
Maybe he shouldn’t have broken the handcuffs so casually.
“I’m sorry if I scared you,” he said quietly, sitting back into the car as best he could, trying to relax the situation. “That wasn’t my intent. I honestly did not expect to see anyone at the site back there. I was fairly positive the nearest unit was at least another five minutes or more away, based on how many other of our properties have been attacked.”
The detective just stared at him through those oddly blue eyes, calculating. Analyzing.
“How did you even know about the attack?” she said at last.
“I didn’t,” he admitted. “We theorized what buildings might be hit next, based on which ones had already been attacked. I got lucky and picked the right one.”
&
nbsp; She shook her head. “How did you know any of them had been attacked? This only started a few hours ago as far as I can tell.”
He smiled tightly. “Our security systems are all tied into the head office. We take our employees’ safety very seriously.”
Khove very carefully did not mention the number of informants they had in the city. None of them knew what they were reporting on, or to whom, simply that if something happened, they should call or text a certain number with information.
The system had been set up a number of years earlier. It was thought that if one of the other Houses made a move on Ursa, they would start with their holdings in town itself, before moving on the Manor. Now it was paying dividends.
“This is our property, Detective,” he repeated. “Someone is attacking us. Just us. What would you do in that situation? Sit around? Even if you had the resources to help an already stretched police department?”
Finally, he saw some of his words hit home. Her fellow officers had never experienced anything like this before. They were all born and raised in Plymouth Falls, he was fairly certain. Not this detective though. She had big city experience. He could see the worry for her peers in the corners of her almond eyes as they tightened ever so much, deepening the shadows there.
“Maybe,” she conceded. “Maybe you aren’t the bad guy. For now though, I’m still placing you under arrest.”
He sighed impatiently.
“It’s for my safety. After the way you destroyed those cuffs, I can’t help but wonder if maybe you’re hallucinating, or on some drugs. I can’t risk that.”
He was about to reply, but the radio crackled to life first as the dispatcher reported another building going up in flames.
The detective cursed.
“What is it?” he asked calmly.
“I’m the closest unit,” she said, keying the radio and speaking some code to the dispatcher, code that made precisely no sense to him. “Hang on.”
“Where are we going?” he asked.
“To the next crime scene.” The car started forward again.
