by Brynna Curry
The body was laid out in front of the pulpit, the beautifully carved wood already staining. The girl, no more than eighteen if she was like the others, lay limp and lifeless in a pool of her own blood. Macy choked back the urge to vomit, and plucked up the note pinned to the girl’s shirtsleeve. She didn’t have to read the paper to know what it said, but she did so anyway.
“Only one left, Macy. How much longer will it be before I come for you? Her sins are forgiven. Yours never will be.” The killer had left notes on the other eleven bodies, and they all said the same thing. Was he still here, lying in wait for her? She took her little flip phone out of her pocket, dialed 911. “Lieutenant Macy Dean, I need to report a homicide at the old Saint Michael’s parish.”
“…Please fasten your safety belts,” the stewardess’ cheery voice announced over the intercom. It scared her right out of her skin, and for a moment, she thought her own creation had come off the page. Forgetting about everything except the story, Liv hadn’t worried about the plane crashing, which she did anytime she had to fly. Her newest novel was almost finished. It was bloody, terrifying, and confusing. No way would the reader know who the murderer was until he had killed his last victim. If time allowed, she’d be finished before she made the trip back across the foam. Most of her waking hours, and some of the dreaming ones, filled her mind with knife-wielding psychopaths, axe murderers, dispensable characters, and cold calculated plots. Who else could say that? Never would she dream of doing anything else for a living. Liv buckled her safety belt and waited with clenched fingers for the plane to land. With work set aside, panic grabbed hold, prompting fervent prayers that it wouldn’t crash, or blow up, or suddenly be under siege by a group of terrorists, or…
* * * *
Ryan Corrigan stalked back and forth in front of the courtesy desk. Liv’s flight was late, and now he would be too. He scowled at the board announcing arrivals and departures. The receptionist at desk was saying something about the weather being a factor in the delay, but he wasn’t paying attention. The plane taxied to a stop and began to unload passengers.
Liv dropped her carry-on and ran to meet him, her laptop banging against her hip with every stride. Lifting his sister off her feet, he twirled her round in a circle. “I missed you.” He set her on wobbly feet and picked up her bag. “Liv, you look great. I’m glad you’re finally here. It’s been too long. You couldn’t talk Skye into to coming with you? How’s Ma?” His grin split from ear to ear as he studied his little sister. She had grown into a pretty young woman since he’d last seen the girl she had been. Ten years had transformed her.
“One question at a time. No, he’s all broody about something dire happening to me. I left him to his doom and gloom. It will pass soon enough. He’s courting the Riley girl, if that’s what you’d be wanting to call it, and who knows else. Ma sends her love and biscuits.”
“Well, let’s get you home and settled in.” Ryan picked up on that survey of hers and hoped the worry didn’t show. Liv would nag him till his grave to get the heart of it, and he just couldn’t tell her.
“You’ve been in America too long, Ryan Michael, as you’re sounding like more and more like a yank.”
The house was a two story in an upscale neighborhood on the outskirts of the city. Living in the middle of all those people was more than he could have tolerated. Yellow roses twisted and turned up the side trellis. It boasted a garden in back. That had been his doing. His personal touch. Flowering fruit trees lent calm to the well-used small space. Their scents wafted heavily through the air. Petals from the cherry trees fell haphazardly on the ground in natural decoration. Two iron and wood benches stood facing each other, prompting an afternoon among the flowers or conversation. In the center of it all was a whimsical fountain featuring a young maiden and her frog prince. Water spouted from the golden ball where each of their hands rested.
He’d decorated the interior tastefully in dark wood tones, brilliant true colors, though it certainly wasn’t Spartan in nature. Clean lines and soft fabrics were the background for a treasure trove of figurines he’d collected for as long as he could remember.
Ryan ran a loving finger over a mermaid’s porcelain hair. She’d been a gift from his father. He had kept her, remembered his father’s words all of these years. He had found the woman, answered the questions. Then he’d lost her. Women were all manner of trouble, including the one in his living room. Liv might be pretending to take in the statues, but he knew she was really studying him.
“I see you brought out your collection, Ryan, and added ten times the like to it.” Wizards threw their arms high and cast spells. Fairies danced on grass and sand, or flitted through leafy ferns looking for trouble. Sirens called to their doomed sailors in the night. Dragons ran rampant, while knights fought against them valiantly. Some were cheap dime store trinkets while others were costly works of art. If it was mystical or a myth, he managed to find a place for it here.
“If you were in trouble, you’d tell me?”
Finally she had decided to get to the point. “Yes, I would, Liv.” He lied through his teeth. “I’m fine, just homesick. You being here will help that.” It was all he could say. Liv knew he was lying. So he wouldn’t talk about it yet. She glared at him. Good thing her telepathic link with Skye didn’t extend to him as well.
“It’s just stress and work, Liv. In fact, I hate to do this, but I have a meeting in an hour, the only appointment I couldn’t cancel. I’m sorry. I wanted to play tourist with you.”
“Go on to your meeting, Ryan. You don’t have to entertain me.”
Which for him translated into, “I’m going to prowl through the house and see what kind of dirt I can dig up on my big brother.” She wouldn’t find anything. He couldn’t afford to be that careless again.
“I’ll see you for dinner then?”
“Seven o’clock, and don’t be late.”
Chapter 3
Just live
Jack stood in his efficient modern kitchen and burnt his morning toast. Cooking had never been his forte, but Serena had loved to cook. He was on his sixth cup of coffee, and it was only seven o’clock in the morning. The nightmare had come again like clockwork. Three-thirty this morning, he had watched her bleed to death in his arms once again. So to block it out he had gotten up, drowned himself with a shower and coffee, and went into his office to work.
He tried to make something tangible out of the thoughts running wild through his head, but nothing would gel. The sun shone brightly. Birds sang as they flew through the sky. Men had coffee while they read the morning paper, and their wives kissed them goodbye on the way out the door. He hated those men who still had the ones they loved. Mothers would go shopping with toddlers and babies, after they had tearfully sent older children on to school. Houses would be cleaned. Work would be done. Life would go on. Jack refused to acknowledge it all. Today he wanted to do nothing but think of her.
The phone rang four times before his brain actually registered it was ringing. He answered, knowing who would be on the line.
“Roarke. Hello, Ellie.”
He huffed into the receiver at the unwanted interruption.
She answered in kind. “Hello yourself, how is the world treating you?”
“Cut the chit chat,” he growled. “You’re calling to remind me about the signing at Berringer’s tomorrow. I haven’t forgotten.” He scowled out the window at the bluebird that had dared to light on the windowsill. Stupid bird, stop singing. Don’t you know what today is?
“A writer must do these things. That is, if he wants to sell the books he writes. It’s a beautiful day outside. You should go down and see how things are setting up.”
“I’ll be there for the signing. I don’t want to deal with people today. I want to be alone. I like it that way.” He could almost see Ellie sitting back in the soft leather chair at her desk amid the lushly furnished and beautifully decorated room in soft pastel colors, but he knew she would have rather been at the little b
ookstore on the corner of Main.
She let out a heavy sigh at his tone, but said nothing, only waited patiently.
“Make an excuse. Tell them I have Bubonic Plague or I’m conferring with the powers that be. I don’t know. Hell, Ellie, make up something. I’m not coming down.”
“Don’t you swear at me! However you may think, it isn’t healthy to stay shut up in that house for days at a time. You might find yourself with something worse than the plague. Come down and look things over. That’s an order from your boss.”
He had known Ellie a long time. She had been friends with his mother. Her husband Sam had been his captain back when he’d been on the police force. He got up to pace. If Sissy could see him, she’d have called it prowling the room and known he was spoiling for a fight. He had no one to fight with, nothing to fight against. “Ellie, don’t start. It’s the way I work. I need the isolation. I need...” Her.
“I know. It might get easier if you would get out once in a while. See new faces. Meet new people. She wouldn’t have wanted this for you. It’s been a year since her murder. You can’t stay in this black pit you’re living in. She was a good cop, and an extraordinary person. What if it had been you? Would she be where you are? She died. Punishing yourself won’t bring her back. It’s time.”
He plopped unceremoniously into the chair.
“How? How do you lock away something like that and go on?” He paused, waited until he was sure his words would be steady. “Today is our anniversary, our marriage and her death. The first since…” He felt the tears roll down his face and gave up trying to stop them. Who could see them? Why did it matter if they did? Couldn’t a man grieve?
“My heart breaks for you. I can’t imagine that kind of pain. But if you won’t help yourself, how can anyone else help you? Why don’t you come over for dinner tonight? We’d love to have company. You and Sam can play cards or watch the game, but you shouldn’t be alone tonight.”
What he wanted to do was hide, from Sissy, from the world. “I don’t know.” Not happening. Even though he hated alcohol, when ten PM came he wanted to be well on his way to sloppy drunk. Passed out on the bed where maybe the whiskey would mask the hurt. How had he sunk so low? To just toss his beliefs out the window. Maybe he could eat a gallon of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream, mmm, and pass out with a bellyache instead. No hangovers.
“Uh, huh, you’d rather sit there brooding over something you can’t change. I know you. You’ll get rip-roaring drunk unless you get out of the house.”
Bingo, you win the brand new Mercedes. “All right, I’ll be there.”
He started to hang up the phone, but she said, “One more thing, go to the store and look over your work. Honor her memory instead of mourning her death today. Take a walk in the sun and see what life still has to offer you.”
* * * *
Liv looked at her watch, noted the time. Had she been gone for three hours? She hadn’t gotten much farther than a few city blocks from Ryan’s. Every place she stopped in had something that caught her eye. Now she lugged five shopping bags unsuccessfully while window-shopping. Each bag held something her credit card thought she couldn’t live without. The wind chimes in the glass shop made the prettiest tinkling sound, like fairy pipes. They had butterflies etched in the glass. Ma loved butterflies. Somewhere in her arms were art supplies and a snow globe with a Pegasus inside it. Skye needed some new brushes. He had a love for horses as well as art. Then there was the glass fairy she’d bought for Ryan to add to his collection.
She’d treated herself to three new dresses. The blue one was a little on the long side, for her taste, but the cut made up for it. The gourmet candy store had netted her two pounds of peanut butter fudge, her favorite. She thought about finding a grocery and getting the makings for dinner. Then she saw the bookstore, wondered if she’d even be able to get the door open with all her packages. But she didn’t want to pass it up. She loved a well told story as much as she loved to tell them herself. A sign in the window announced a book signing. Jack Roarke. The author’s name didn’t ring a bell. He was probably new. She’d come back tomorrow, browse around, and buy whatever book the author was signing. It only took a few minutes to hail a cab, and she was heading home.
* * * *
Jack growled about it, and griped to himself. He wasn’t going to go. He scowled at the walls and pretended to be working. It would have been a good excuse. Yeah right, like that was going to happen. Finally, seeing no other way out, he snatched up the keys to his 69 Z’28 and slammed the door behind him. As always, whenever he saw his father’s car, he had to bite back the urge to fawn over it. Black as night, souped-up every way Ed Roarke could think of, it flew like a bat out of hell. He fondly remembered conning the keys out of his dad many times when he was young. His father must have been crazy to actually hand them over. It had way too much power for a sixteen-year-old to handle.
His mood was dark and it was a perfect day for the ride. He got in, turned the key, and sighed loudly. This car would never purr, it was meant to roar like a lion. To rule over all others. Okay, so he was obsessed. A guy was entitled to some small pleasures in his lifetime. This was his.
Both his parents had died in a plane crash several years back. He hadn’t foreseen that, either. It had hurt, terribly. Though after time, he’d gotten through the grief. His mother had been born into money. Ran with the right class crowd, but one run-in with a cop from Nowheresville, USA and she’d been sunk. They had been happy, and that was what was important. After he was born, his mother couldn’t have more children, but he’d had friends. That had been enough.
Jack lowered the windows and cranked the radio wide open. AC/DC thumped behind him through custom speakers screaming the opening refrain of “Back in Black.” He gave into the speed, climbing toward sixty, and let the wind ruffle his hair. Ellie had been right. The sunshine was improving his mood. He pulled up to the curb outside the bookstore, just snatching a space left by a cab. The bells rang over the door as he went in.
The cashier greeted him, “Good, afternoon, Mr. Roarke. I’m Sandy. Mrs. Berringer said you might be coming by. I hope you’ll find everything you might need.” Cheered, he gave her a rare smile and watched her cheeks flush. She couldn’t have been over twenty. A pretty thing too, long tan legs flashed him through the glass bottom counter. A nice victim for his new psychopath? Or his hero’s love interest? Maybe.
“I’m sure I will, thanks.”
He made his way toward the back of the store where tables were already set up. Copies of Stroke of Midnight were stacked in neat piles. A few pushes here and there, and it might make bestseller. It was a terrifying novel about a serial killer who stalked and murdered Wiccan priestesses. Everything was looking up, now if only number three would cooperate.
He sighed heavily in disgust. The new characters were flat. He’d used Sissy for his muse so often that every woman was her. She’d be the first one to nag him about it too. “Jack,” she’d say in that lilting voice of hers, “Amelia, Mandy, Charlotte, they’re the same person. You’re going to lose your audience if you don’t get a fresh outlook. The research is as important as the writing.” Sissy would have been right. So he wouldn’t touch the story for a week, and he’d force himself to observe the life going on around him. Hmm, he’d bet counter girl would love to be his muse and anything else he wanted. If he was interested, which he wasn’t. Not really, but it was nice to know he still had it.
Chapter 4
Greed
Niccolo Gueraldi slid his feet into plush black slippers and got out of bed to begin his day. He didn’t consider the habit slovenly as some would. No, indulging was something he could certainly afford to do. At his age a man was entitled to some luxuries. Had he not worked his way from beggar to king? His youth spent on a gamble for survival, though he had enjoyed the work. He smiled to himself. I was an excellent thief. One who had never been caught. One who never would be, since he’d retired.
At twelve he’d
run away from home and the stifling atmosphere of his wholesome Italian family. He hated their religion, their togetherness. Hungry and lost on the streets, he fell in with the wrong sort of people. Or maybe he would have turned bad in any case. To debate the fact was no longer of any consequence.
At first he’d stolen so he could eat at night. No one took care of you on the streets except you. Picking pockets on Coney Island turned into dime store electronics in the Bronx. He’d learned the inner workings of security systems as the field grew. There wasn’t one yet he hadn’t been able to circumvent seamlessly. It kept him alive, and if it hadn’t, he would have done it anyway.
His turning point took place when he accepted a job raking clean a jewelry store for a piece of the take. The fascination of holding all that cold fire in his hands was more than he could resist. He stole other gems—rubies, emeralds, sapphires—but none captured him like those estate diamonds. It was gratifying to watch the cops scramble, knowing he wouldn’t, couldn’t be caught.
Ten years later, at twenty-two, Niccolo had shown up on his mother’s doorstep. She opened the door, took him into her arms and never asked why. His father welcomed him; his siblings rejoiced. They never guessed where he’d been and what had gone on in the missed time. Why should they? He was family, and he was home. He found their faith disgusting, and he used them for anonymity. Who would suspect a good college kid from a nice Catholic family?
Those days are long gone. His black hair had gone pepper gray, but his eyes still held cold steel through and through. At sixty-two he could no longer participate in his work like he liked. Where his body aged, his mind was a sharply honed blade. He picked up the bedside phone, dialed. He had business to complete.
* * * *
Liv woke to the sound of light traffic outside her window. Not so much noise for a Friday morning. Shouldn’t people be rushing about to school and work? Glancing over at the alarm clock, she noted the time. Eleven o’clock. I overslept! Staying up until two o’clock working on the end of her manuscript might not have been the best idea.
