by Alexa Rynn
I ignored the tone in her voice. “But the girls okay?”
“She’s fine, I intercepted a call she made to her mother. Her family is on their way to be with her.” She pulled up a call log on another screen like she needed to prove her point to me.
I nodded. “Good.”
“Is it?” She bit her lip the way she always did when we were kids and she wanted to scold me about something but knew it was probably a bad idea. “Braden, don’t you think the way you’re apprehending these guys is getting more and more violent?”
I rolled my eyes and turned around, heading back over to where my supply corner was. “Not this again, Hayden. I’m dealing with rapists and murders here, excuse me if I don’t want to give them a candy bar while I stop them from ruining yet another persons life.”
“That’s not fair, Braden, you know that’s not what I mean. But what was the point in spending all that money on personal trainers and experts in all those crazy martial arts you learned if you’re just going to beat the shit out of these guys anyway?” She got up from her chair. “I feel like its getting out of control. I’m scared… I’m scared that even when you find the guy who killed dad that you aren’t going to stop.”
I slammed my fist down on the table hard, cracking my knuckles. Anger overcame my body the way it did anytime my little sister tried to talk to me about my father and what I had witnessed that day, “Hayden, what was the deal when all of this started?”
She swallowed. “I just don’t understand what the point is, it’s been two years and you’re still no where near closer to the truth. What if you never get there? Are you going to do this forever? Lurk around in the darkness saving people? That’s no life, it’s a secret life.”
I grabbed some rope and handcuffs out of one of the drawers and shoved them into my bag, replacing the supplies I had used earlier. “When all of this started you promised that you could leave emotion out of it. This is business, Hayden. You aren’t my little sister when we’re doing this. You’re my informant, my eyes out there. That’s the arrangement, now if you cant handle that anymore let me know and I’ll find someone who can.”
She paused for a second and looked into my eyes for something I probably lost a long time ago. She sighed after a second and swallowed back down whatever else had been on her mind. “Like you could find someone else to put up with you.” She slipped on a pair of gloves and started to dusk my jacket and facemask off with a small brush in case any spare hairs or fibers had gotten on any of the fabric. Being cautious was key in this business. “Besides, you know I wasted four years at Stanford getting my tech degree just to be your personal security system.”
“That’s what I like to hear.” I made my way back over toward the computer center and glanced at the monitor for updates on the girl I had saved in her house less than an hour ago. Such a short amount of time but already her life was probably completely turned upside down.
Maybe I should have felt bad about leaving her there without a second thought but I didn’t, I never did. I wasn’t there to make friends, I was there to do a job and get the hell out after the threat was gone. Them knowing anything about me put me and the few people who I actually cared about in danger.
Hayden came up behind me and closed out the police report. “You need to get some rest. You have a meeting first thing in the morning and you need to be on top of your game, I don’t have to remind you how important Mr. Cunningham is to our new project.”
“You got anything else for me?” I asked her, running my hand through my dark hair. “I’m not ready to call it a night yet.”
She sighed. “Of course you aren’t but it’s time, the city is safe for the time being, Braden.” But she exited out of a window way too fast and didn’t meet my eyes, the way she did when she wasn’t being completely honest.
“Tell me,” I howled. “Now.”
“It’s late and it’s nothing the police can’t handle.”
“I’m the judge of what calls I do and don’t take.” I shoved the spare chair out of the way and looked down at her with anger. “Tell me what’s going on, Hayden, or get the hell out of here so I can look into it myself.”
She pulled the window on the screen back up. “It looks like a mugging over on 23rd but some bystanders have already called the cops I’m sure they’re already on their way so there’s nothing for you to worry about.”
I laughed sarcastically and pulled a pair of fresh gloves over my hands. “Oh, yeah, I’m sure the cops are going to rush over to one of the worst neighborhoods in town to make sure everything is okay.”
“Braden,” she called when I was halfway out the door.
I turned around.
“Be careful,” she whispered.
I didn’t answer and let the door swing shut behind me.
She was the second woman that night I left confused and startled.
Chapter Four
ADDISON
“You don’t believe me!” I practically yelled in my mother’s face.
My mother walked around the end table in my living room and sat down on the sofa next to me. “I didn’t say I didn’t believe you, dear, I just simply suggested that maybe you imagined a few events of what happened. I mean, it would be perfectly understandable if you did. You were in a state of shock after all.”
I threw my hands up in the air. “Now you sound like Jerry.”
My mother puffed out her heavily glossed lips and patted me on my knee. “Well, your stepfather can’t go back to the office spatting stories about superhero’s who saved his little stepdaughter from a murderer who was terrorizing her. He would be laughed out of town by all the other detectives.”
This whole thing had been a disaster since the second I called 911. Everyone seemed to think I was in the middle of some breakdown and was having some kind of hallucinations or something. Like I could have imagined what happened to me.
“He wasn’t a super hero.” I rolled my eyes. “He was a real man, he was just in disguise! He clearly didn’t want anyone to know who he was or what he was doing. It was … it was… out of this world,” I finished breathlessly.
“Out of this world is right,” my mother told me.
Unbelievable. What was the point of having a hot shot cop for a stepfather if no one believed anything I said when it came to things that were against the law? This man, who ever the hell he was, had saved my life and he wasn’t even going to get credit for it. The world needed to know about him, the world needed to give him all the glory he deserved.
How had no one broken this story yet? I can’t be the only person he’s helped, can I? No, that would make no sense. How had he known when and how this guy would strike? The cops didn’t even know he had been here but this stranger with a mask did.
“Come on.” My mother pushed her long dark hair behind her back and stood up, smoothing out her pantsuit. “I think it’s time we get you to the doctor for a check up.”
Leave it to my mother to be perfectly dressed even when she had shown up hours earlier in the middle of the night. She always looked flawless no matter what time of day it was and I always looked like I had just woken up, much to her disapproval.
“I’m fine. Just a little shaken up.”
“You heard Jerry, it’s still a good idea for you to get checked out.” My mother pulled me up by the arm and gave me a shove toward the hall. “Why don’t you go put on something a little more appropriate and put those clothes in a plastic bag I told Jerry we’d bring them to the hospital.”
I felt like a child again being ordered around by my mother. I had thought I wanted people around me but I had started to think I would be better off alone for a while. I needed some time to process everything that had happened. It had been a whirlwind since the cops showed up.
“Mom, I just need a minute to myself, okay? Why don’t you go ahead and talk to the doctor and I’ll be a few minutes behind you?”
She stared to shake her head but I cut her off. “Mom, please? I’ll be
fine. I mean the jerk is in jail it’s not like he’s going to come back and snatch me up.” I gave her a gentle shove toward the door.
“But what if… what if you have more…. You know? Sightings of things?”
I tried my best to not flip out on her. It wasn’t my mother’s fault she didn’t believe me. Most people in their right mind wouldn’t. “Mom, I’ll be fine. If I’m not there 15 minutes after you then you can call Jerry and have him send out the search team. I just need a minute to myself.”
My mother shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other. “What about if I wait in the car for you? You just come on down when you’re ready.” She opened the door and stepped out onto the porch. “I’ll just be right down here, see?”
“Mom! Go. I’m fine, I’ll be right behind you. Love you!” And then I closed the door in her face before she had the chance to fight me on it anymore. I appreciated the thought of her but I just needed to breathe for a second.
Twenty minutes later I still hadn’t caught it. I kept overthinking everything that had happened. Was everyone right? Had I just imagined that a man in a black mask with green eyes had come into my room in the middle of the night to save me? Could I really have apprehended that man all by myself in my state of shock?
It seemed unlikely. But was it more unlikely than a super fast and strong man in a costume and altered voice doing it? Nothing about it made any sense and it had started to drive me crazy.
I slipped down from my bed onto the floor and hugged my knees to my chest. Could I really have a mystery hero running around my brain that doesn’t exist? And if so then what the hell was the wrong with me?
I ran my hands back and forth over the carpet until one of my fingers brushed against something lodged under my bed. I grabbed the fabric in my hand and pulled it toward me, turning it over in my hands.
It was a black glove.
I hadn’t imagined him at all. He had been there.
He had saved me. That settled it.
I had to find him.
Chapter Five
BRADEN
The door to my office swung open and my childhood best friend, Trent, came bursting in. He clutched the side of his stomach and slammed the door shut behind him. “She’s coming… she’s coming… she’s… she’s really worked up.”
I snapped my computer shut and sighed. “My mother?” I was expecting her at any moment since I had released the one remaining security guard I had kept on this morning. Running around the city fighting crime was a little challenging when you were always trying to ditch overgrown men who attracted attention the second they entered a room.
Trent shook his head and glanced toward the shut door. “Your mother? No! Hayden! I had to run past her on the steps just to make it up here in time! You did something wrong… you did something to upset her.”
“What else is new?” I rolled my eyes and glanced at my tablet behind my desk. The girl from last night still hadn’t checked into the hospital to get looked at, nor had she gone down to the police station to make an official statement according to their databases. What the hell was she waiting for?
“No, it’s worse than usual. Just act natural when she gets in here!”
I scoffed. “Trent, when are you going to stop being scared of Hayden? We aren’t kids anymore. You know she’s not going to put you in a headlock and steal your lunch money, right?”
A shade of red formed in his cheeks. “I’m not scared of her! Besides, how many times do I have to tell you that I was sick that day?” he grumbled.
I laughed and closed out of the databases I was accessing illegally. “You can say it as many times as you want I’m still not going to believe it.” I clicked on the browser that brought me to the cities traffic cams and started to shift through the busy streets of LA. I had shown up too late to catch the mugger last night. By the time I got there all that was left was an elderly woman standing confused in the middle of the street. I’d made it my mission to hunt the scumbag down, if there was one thing I hated it was when a piece of crap like that got away.
It happened more than I liked to admit.
But they never got far. The more they ran, the harder I hunted.
And I loved the hunt.
The door snapped back and my little sister stomped into the room like she was running away from a fire, her light hair sticking up and blowing in every direction, a fierce and hungry look plastered in her eyes. Trent was right; she was more worked up than usual.
Trent leaped over to the couch in the corner of my office and draped his arm casually over the back of the arm. “Oh, hey, Hayden, I didn’t know you were in yet.”
She shot him a glare. “Please, Trent. Like I didn’t see you shove past me as you ran like a bat out of hell up here.” She kept her gaze on him a few seconds, enjoying watching him squirm.
I push the tablet away from me. “Good morning, sis.”
She dodged her head back around on me, locking her death glare on me. “Don’t you good morning me, you big idiot!” She threw a huge folder down in front of me. “You know what’s in here?”
“Nope but I have a feeling you’re going to tell me.” I winked at her then grinned at Trent but he just shook his head, not wanting to mess with Hayden when she was in this state. Ugh, where had this guy left his balls?
“Save your charm for some girl dumb enough to buy it, Braden.” She shook her head back and forth. “You fucked up, you fucked up badly. That little mission you pulled off on Hudson last night? The girl you saved is an absolute lunatic! She hasn’t even gone to the hospital yet!”
Hayden was the only person in the world I would tolerate talking to me like this. She got a pass because she was my kid sister… to an extent.
“That hardly makes her a lunatic.”
“Oh, no, what she’s doing instead makes her a lunatic! She’s writing to every newspaper and magazine who will listen about the mystery man in the black mask and glowing eyes who saved her from an intruder last night!”
“SHE WHAT?” Trent screamed from the other side of the room. “Oh crap! THIS IS A DISASTER! She knows! She knows who you are! She’s figured it out! Every news crew within an 100 mile radius will be here at any moment!” He leaped up from the sofa and looked out the window. “What the hell am I going to do? I can’t go to jail!”
He was such a pussy.
Hayden sighed loudly. “Remind him why we told him again? I know he’s your best friend but he’s not exactly the most trustworthy person in the world.”
Trent spun around, appalled. “Hey! I’m trustworthy.”
I snapped my fingers and brought them both back to attention. “Let’s focus here, please. What’s the big deal? We’ve intercepted letters and emails from people I’ve saved before, they always drop it eventually.”
“I did intercept them,” she informed me. “But she keeps sending them. And…” She trailed off, grinding her teeth back and forth against each other a few times. “She’s claiming whoever this man is talks like a… a robot.”
Trent laughed from the other side of the room. “So she looks loony is what you’re saying.”
But my sister didn’t look so sure.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I told her. “What was the point of developing that voice box in my mask if I wasn’t going to use it?” I pulled the tablet toward me again and glanced at the screen. No new notifications. Where the hell was this guy?
“That was only in case of emergencies! The intention was to always get in and out of there without being seen or having to communicate with them at all. Once the threat is taken out what else is there to say?”
“And I did that but sometimes circumstances change the actions you take. She was a mess; she wasn’t going to call the cops for help without some kind of support. Once she was stable I got out of there as soon as I could.”
Trent waved my sister off, suddenly calm. “Don’t worry about it. She’ll forget about it or think it was a fragment of her imagination once she reali
zes nothing is coming of it. Just like the others.”
It’s a nice thought but something about her made me worry she wasn’t like the others. She didn’t seem like the type to give up on something or forget about it just because no results were happening right away. She seemed… different.
“I doubt it,” Hayden said. Her eyes were still locked on me. “According to the emails she’s shopping around she has proof.”
My sister suddenly had my full attention. “Proof?”
“Like a video?” Trent looked horrified.
“Like a glove.”
Trent frowned. “A glove?”
“Uh huh, according to Addison Cooper this mystery man with glowing green eyes left one of his gloves behind. She just can’t wait to show it off to anyone who will listen to prove she’s not making this up.” Her eyes traveled down to my hands. “How could you be so careless?”
She was right, it was completely out of character for me. Two years and I had never made a single mistake and here I go making two in the same night with the same damn woman. It didn’t look good, especially if she could figure out where the glove came from or get some kind of fibers off it.
“She’s just a freaked out woman, she’ll forget about it.” I turned my back on my sister, not wanting her to see the regret and anger on my face. I had fucked up, and bad. I prided myself on not making such stupid mistakes.
“Her stepfather is a cop.”
“A COP?” Trent asked.
“Braden,” my sister warned me. “We need to get that glove back.”
“Where have I heard that name before? Addison Cooper? Why does it sound so familiar?” Trent turned the name over and over in his mind, trying to figure out where he knew it from.
“Braden,” Hayden whispered.
“Addison Cooper… Addison Cooper… Addison…”
“Braden!”
