The Dragon at The Edge of The Map: A Crime Thriller Novel

by P. A. Wilson

  The Dragon At The Edge Of The Map

  By

  P.A. Wilson

  Published by Perry Wilson Books

  Copyright 2013 P.A. Wilson

  ISBN: 978-1-927669-00-6

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  CHAPTER 1

  Monique climbed the last set of stairs to her fifth floor apartment. She made herself a promise to get in better shape. She shouldn’t be out of breath, even with the smoking. It was a week until her birthday, another year gone. This birthday was a milestone, for her, not for most people. Thirty-six, half her life lived before what her father had done, and half her life after. If you could call what she did living, perhaps it was just surviving.

  The gig tonight had been great. The glow of appreciation from the audience still warmed her. It was two am, but maybe Rafe would still be awake, maybe the night didn’t have to end. Maybe the void would be filled for a little while longer.

  Sorting her apartment key to the top of the ring, she pushed open the stairwell door. The sight at the end of the hall, across from her own apartment, stopped her from taking the next step. Two men in overcoats and cheap suits stood staring through the open door of her neighbor’s apartment. The stairwell door slammed behind her, and both men turned to stare.

  Police. She reached behind her for the door, not sure why she felt the need to flee, but already thinking of where she’d go.

  A uniformed cop stepped out of the apartment and whispered something to one of the men. The other took a step toward her. He held out his ID and she saw a shield on the card, one she didn’t recognize. It didn’t matter, they were obviously cops; she’d learned to recognize the attitude.

  “Ma'am, this floor is closed.”

  Monique shook her head and stepped forward. No one was going to tell her she couldn’t get into her home. She needed a shower, and a meal. “I live there,” she said, pointing to her door. “What’s going on?”

  The detective – he must be a detective that kind of suit was almost a uniform for them – made a comment to his partner. Monique couldn’t make out the words but she figured it was something to do with making her go away. He turned back and said, “If you would like to answer a few questions, we can let you into your apartment.”

  He looked reasonable, and Monique didn’t have anything to hide. She shoved away a little voice that told her to call a lawyer before talking to them, that the last time she’d talked to a detective it hadn’t turned out well. “Sure, let’s get this over with.”

  She tried not to look through the open door as she passed. She hated the kind of people who slowed down to look at accidents. She told herself that whatever was in there wouldn’t be good. But her head turned almost as though someone had moved it for her. The uniformed cop pulled the door shut, but it was too late. She’d seen.

  There was a lot of blood and a body. He, or maybe it, now that he was dead, was broken apart like someone had taken an ax and chopped him into two pieces at the waist.

  Monique closed her eyes and slipped her key into the lock, feeling the presence of the cops behind her, reassuring now instead of threatening. She glanced at the mirror in the hall, needing to know what the cops were seeing. Her normally pale skin looked dull, reflecting the shock she felt from the scene across the hall, her green eyes shining from behind her messy bangs.

  The shaking was already starting. She clenched her fist to keep the panic from taking over. It stopped the trembling, but didn’t wipe out the vision of all the blood. She could handle this. She’d handled worse. She had to keep it together. Swallowing the bile percolating in the back of her throat, Monique pointed to the stools at the kitchen counter and turned on the coffee pot. She held up two mugs in query, and both detectives nodded. “Okay, what do you want to ask?”

  “Thanks,” the first detective said. “I’m Detective Watson, Larry. This is my partner, Mike Adams.” The other cop, younger than Watson, nodded. “Let’s start with your name?”

  She cleared her throat, hoping they didn’t take it as a sign of weakness. “Monique Duchesne.” She knew better than to volunteer any information. Anything she offered would be used as a thread to find questions that she wouldn’t want to answer.

  “And how long have you lived here?”

  She noticed Adams write in the notebook while Watson asked the questions. “Five years.” The coffee started dripping, so she went to get the milk from the fridge.

  “Where do you come from?”

  That was an odd question. “What do you mean?”

  “You know, we all came here from somewhere. Where did your folks come from?”

  “Why?”

  Watson shrugged. “Just curious. Why don’t you want to answer?”

  There it was. Cops didn’t like it when you held back information. Even if the question had nothing to do with whatever crime they were investigating. Monique was tempted to tell him to mind his own business, but she worried that he’d use that against her. “My dad emigrated from Yugoslavia. My mom was fourth generation Canadian.”

  He nodded, and Adams made a note. Watson continued. “And what do you do, Monique? For a living?”

  Damn. The questions were going to come no matter what she did. “I sing at Blue Scene and I do a bit of tour guide stuff. Why do you need to know that?”

  Mike Adams looked up from his notebook. “I thought I recognized you. You’ve got a great voice.”

  Monique smiled, but didn’t let down her guard as she poured coffee. “Thanks. So why do you need to know about my work?”

  Detective Watson ignored her question and sipped his coffee. “So is that where you were tonight?”

  “Yes, I got there around nine and left about fifteen minutes before you saw me. Is this where I should tell you I want my lawyer?”

  “No, the victim’s been dead more than an hour. We got an anonymous call and when we got here… well, you saw what we saw. I’m sorry about that.” He rubbed his forehead and Monique realized she wasn’t the only one pretending to be unaffected by the horror across the hall.

  Another sip and Watson asked, “Did you know him?”

  She loosened her grip on the mug before she snapped the handle. The panic wouldn’t push away, this needed to be over soon, or she’d collapse while they were in her home. She shook her head and rubbed at a spot on the counter. “He only moved in last month. I said hi to him once, and I think he had an accent, maybe eastern European. It was hard to tell from just a ‘good morning’. The guy liked Death Metal and didn’t understand you could play music at less than full volume.”

  “Did he have any visitors?” Watson was watching her closely.

  Monique shook her head again and rose to put her mug in the sink. Leaning against the counter, she said, “I didn’t pay much attention. I don’t remember hearing anyone knock on his door.” She crossed her arms, hoping they would get the hint that she wanted to be finished with the questions.

  The detectives rose leaving their half-empty coffee mugs on the table. “Thanks. I guess if there’s anything else we need, we can reach you here?”

  “Here or the club. Should I be worried about someone breaking in?”

  Detective Adams slid his notebook into his pocket, retrieving a business card. “Make sure you lock your door, and don’t open it to strangers. If you need anything, or something happens, call.”

  Monique took the card, a list of contact numbers filled the back. “So, it wasn’t random?”

  Detective
Watson looked her up and down. Monique felt the dismissal in his glance. “We don’t discuss open cases with the public. Just be careful, and you should be okay.”

  She kept her eyes on the floor as she let the two detectives out. Locking the door and shoving a chair under the handle to block any forced entry didn’t make her feel any safer. She slid to the floor and gave up fighting the inevitable. The darkness crawled over her as she curled into a ball, trembling with the memory of the room across the hall.

  Monique untangled herself from the sheets and stretched the last vestiges of sleep from her body. She could hear Rafe in the kitchen. Judging by the fingers of light pushing through the slats of the blinds, it was lunchtime. She stumbled to the bathroom to brush her teeth, and try to deal with the mess sleep had made of her hair.

  She’d called Rafe an hour after the cops left. He’d buzzed her into the building, and waited at the elevator. His warmth and strength driving the last of the fear from her.

  Ten minutes after leaving Rafe’s bed, she snuck into the kitchen to wrap her arms around him. He made her feel safe, at least until she remembered that safety was just a temporary feeling. Her neighbor had probably felt safe. Her mother had too.

  She pulled a mug from the cupboard and poured herself coffee. Rafe hated her smoking in his apartment, so she’d have to wait for her other vice.

  “Afternoon, babe. You hungry?”

  She watched him flip a grilled cheese sandwich in the pan. His strong hands holding the spatula delicately. His dark skin was as different from her pallor as everything else about him was. He glowed with health, and he carried a comfortable amount of padding on his frame. She was thin enough to garner looks of concern from strangers.

  “You know I am.”

  He flipped the sandwich onto a plate and reached for the bread to start another. “Are you ready to tell me what exactly happened last night?”

  Monique shrugged. When she’d called Rafe, she’d told him there was trouble with a neighbor. Leaving out the details meant she didn’t have to argue with him about how unsafe her building was.

  “What makes you think there’s anything else to tell?” Monique added a pile of potato chips from the bag on the counter to her plate.

  “Nightmares. You were fighting something all night.” His attention was focused on the contents of the pan. “You’ll feel better if you tell me what happened.” He glanced at her. “You know I hate that you live there, so I won’t mention it again.”

  “I like that building, and I can afford the rent.” She also liked her independence and knew Rafe wanted her to move into his place. Monique wasn’t ready for that, maybe never would be. It was an old argument and she didn’t want to have it again. “Sorry.”

  “I said I wouldn’t talk about it and I won’t. But unless you plan to work this out in your sleep, you need to tell someone how you feel.” He muttered something else to the pan as he flipped his own sandwich.

  “I don’t need to –”

  He slapped the spatula on the counter. “You do. You keep saying you don’t need to talk about your feelings, but you’re human and that means you feel something. It will turn you sour, Monique. If you don’t deal with this, it will dry you up and kill you.”

  Monique felt the familiar tightening of her stomach at the memory of the last time she’d talked about her feelings. But she didn’t want to lose sleep, so maybe Rafe was right, talking about it would make it go away faster. “Okay. Look my neighbor got murdered last night. I’m fine. I didn’t even know him.” Rafe didn’t know what it took to talk to a psychologist. How they twisted everything you told them.

  “Did you see what they did to him?” Rafe dropped his plate onto the table. “If you did, it would explain your nightmares.”

  “What do you mean, what they did to him?” There was no hope of getting out of this without a fight if Rafe had any of the details.

  “I knew something happened. I checked the police radio transmissions. And then I called my friend in the morgue. He told me what the body looked like when it came in.” Rafe had friends all over the city in all kinds of professions. His work as an investigative blogger meant he needed contacts. The goriest stories brought the most hits to his blog, and that meant more affiliate money. Monique didn’t like the fact that he’d used those contacts on her. That he’d known what happened before she decided to tell him, like he was testing her.

  No longer hungry, Monique pushed her plate away. Her hands reaching for the pack of cigarettes in her purse before remembering Rafe had no ashtrays. “Okay. Yes I did see it. Yes, it was horrible, but I am fine. I didn’t know the guy. From what the cops said, it was personal, so I’m fine. I’m fine.” She hated the shake in her voice at the end.

  Rafe pushed her plate back toward her. “Eat before you get so thin you disappear. If you were okay, why did you call me? If you are okay, why did you have nightmares?”

  “I called you because I didn’t want to spend the night alone. I was already going to call you before I saw the… and I don’t know why I had nightmares.” She took a bite of the sandwich hoping she could get it down her tightening throat. At least it would give her some time to cool off before she ended up saying something that would hurt him. That’s what always happened.

  “You say that all the time. Nothing bothers you apparently.”

  Monique didn’t want to have this argument, not now and, preferably, not ever. “I just don’t see the point of talking about feeling crappy. I really don’t feel that bad about it. Is that wrong? You used to like the fact that I didn’t weep over stupid things.” And it was safer not to care too much.

  Rafe sighed, and she could see him work to hold in his temper. “Sometimes I feel like I’m the only one who feels anything in this relationship.” He looked away from her. “If it’s just about the sex, let me know.”

  “It’s not.” She stood and went to the living area of the open plan apartment. “I’m going home. I think it’s best if we don’t talk for a couple of days.” If he really loved her, he’d let it go. Maybe a few days apart would cool everything down again. She started for the door.

  “Are you going to call me? Or is this your way of ending it? I deserve better than this if it is.” His voice was quiet, and Monique knew she’d hurt him more than she’d intended.

  “I’ll call you,” she said as she left.

  Waiting for the elevator, she wondered if he was right. Was this relationship all about the sex? Why did he have to want more than she could give? He knew why she couldn’t give him more, and it had been enough until recently.

  Perhaps it was time to end it, before he got hurt. Perhaps she should take advantage of this fight to leave.

  When the elevator arrived, Monique pulled out her cigarettes, ready to light up as soon as she stepped out of the front door of his building. Nicotine helped fill that hole inside where other people probably kept the feelings she hadn’t felt since her eighteenth birthday.

  CHAPTER 2

  Later, Monique turned away from her window. Staring at the rain wasn’t going to get her anywhere. If Rafe wanted to break up, so be it. She would survive. She always survived. She slipped her iPod into the speaker dock and let it run through her favorite playlist. Music always helped no matter what mood she was in or how bad the day had been. Nerves were making her jumpy. She needed to do something. The weak light through the window didn’t show it, but her home needed a cleaning. Anything that would help take her mind off the memory of the blood across the hall.

  It didn’t take long, but the familiar steps of dusting, polishing, and scouring brought a measure of peace. The staleness that dulled her senses lifted, replaced with the clean sharp smell of lemon and bleach. Monique threw the cleaning cloths into the laundry basket then leaned out through the open window and lit a cigarette, inhaling deeply. The rain had stopped while she was cleaning, the clouds evaporating to reveal the sky, pale blue just waiting for the sun to set and display stars.

  She knew logicall
y that the argument with Rafe wasn’t going to end the relationship. In her head, the reality of his accusation rang true, and she couldn’t argue against anything he’d said. In her heart, something twisted the words into weapons and truth didn’t matter. It wasn’t her fault she couldn’t feel anything. He knew her history, and he knew what she’d overcome. She hated that he was trying to change her. She knew she was broken. She didn’t need anyone to fix her.

  Broken had worked for the last eighteen years.

  She shook her head and stubbed the cigarette into the ashtray she held. Thinking wouldn’t solve the problem. She needed to talk to Rafe, but she also needed to take some time to get over the fight first. If she called him right now, there was a real chance she’d make things worse while trying to fix them.

  In the kitchen, Monique started a pot of coffee and then picked up the material Walk in The Past had sent about the new ghost walk she was leading in a couple of days. Vancouver had enough history to make hundreds of different tours, and she filled some time with leading tourists through the more seedy parts of town. The stories she told about the history of the area seemed to entertain. Some of them were true, and some complete fiction.

  Halfway through the material, Monique heard a door slam across the hall. Fear shot through her entire body. Were the police back? She walked to the peephole and glanced out, but there was nothing to see. Monique leaned against the door. The noise had definitely come from across the hall. Wanting to avoid going back to picking over her relationship defects, and bored with the reading material, she turned the lock quietly and darted across the hall.

  Monique tried to look through the peephole into the apartment, but the distortion blurred all the details. She leaned against the door, careful not to break the crime tape, and listened. Yes, there was something going on in there. Someone was tossing heavy things around.