The 2nd Cycle of the Darc Murders Omnibus (the acclaimed series from #1 Police Procedural and Hard Boiled authors Carolyn McCray and Ben Hopkin)

by Carolyn McCray

  Actually, peering around at the spooky setting, maybe Trey didn’t blame the guy so much. If it weren’t for the fact that there was some cool stuff happening here, Trey probably wouldn’t be so eager to chase off after Darc, either.

  Pulling out his own light, Trey moved along behind his partner. Always behind. There had been times in their partnership in which that aspect of their relationship had bugged Trey. But to be honest, most of the time, Trey found it comforting. Darc knew what he was doing, and Trey got to go along for the ride. Too much responsibility in going out in front.

  That thought brought Trey back around to the fact of Maggie’s pregnancy. It seemed like a lot of paths led there these days. This thing that was growing inside of his girlfriend’s belly was part of him, and he was going to have to walk out in front like all of the time.

  He could get Maggie to do that for him, couldn’t he? She’d be much better at that whole leadership thing. Maggie was tough.

  And Trey was a progressive-type guy. No need to follow stupid old gender roles. Which meant that Trey was off the hook. Problem solved, right?

  They walked to the edge of the field, more than two football fields back-to-back, as far as Trey could tell. Arriving at a barbed-wire fence, Darc pushed up on one of the strands of wire and pushed his way through. His pant leg caught on one of the barbs and tore off a huge chunk of fabric, but the detective didn’t even seem to notice.

  “Dude, are you okay?” Trey asked, hoping Darc hadn’t cut himself, but there was no response. There typically wasn’t when Trey’s partner got like this, but he always tried for one anyway. Glutton for punishment, maybe?

  Darc kept moving, even though just past the fence the terrain got a lot rougher. They were entering an area where there wasn’t much tending happening, it appeared. Trees and underbrush began several yards past the boundary of the fencing, and Darc was pushing himself through it, Trey doing what he could to keep up.

  “What are you following?” Trey asked. “And do you think this whole thing might be… alien… in origin?”

  Trey’s gut leapt and lurched in response to the idea. Just a few short months ago he’d thought for a while that he might be on the verge of finding Bigfoot. When that had turned out to be a bust, he’d been devastated.

  Maybe this would turn out to be even bigger. Sasquatch was one thing. Proof of alien life was so much bigger.

  He knew Darc was on the trail of something by the way his path never seemed to deviate more than necessary in order to get around behind a tree. But what was leading his partner on, Trey had no idea.

  He never did, though. The last time Trey had thought he understood what was going on, it was just because Darc had basically slipped into a coma and Trey had been forced to step up to the plate. That had been unpleasant.

  It wasn’t long before Darc shoved his way through a series of young saplings that were growing about the base of a larger set of trees. Each of the saplings that Darc pushed aside as he went past worked like a set of springs. Darc loaded them up, and Trey took them right in the face.

  “C’mon, man! Hold one or two of those branches, why don’t you?” Trey brushed aside the third whip-like young tree that Darc had sent toward him. If he were to look in a mirror right now, he had no doubt that his face would be striped with red lines from the slaps he’d gotten.

  And then they were through and into a clearing, and all thoughts of complaints were driven out of Trey’s head.

  There, in the middle of the open area, were the bodies of three teenage boys.

  And symbols. Lots and lots of symbols.

  This case had just become a lot more awesome.

  * * *

  The pathways that had led Darc here began to fade. The way in which the bull’s head had been positioned, combined with the odd placement of the human viscera, within, had triangulated a position that he now approached, with Trey in tow.

  The three figures on the ground were facing up, toward the sky, spread-eagled. They were arranged in such a way that each of their inner hands stretched out to meet the leg of the next body, forming a sort of rough triangle with its tips cut off.

  The arrangement of the figures lifted up off the ground in Darc’s mind, the lines limned in glowing light. The trails of logic spat blue and green fire, looking for patterns, searching for connections.

  “Dude, this is wrong,” Darc’s partner breathed, walking around the forms. “So, so, so wrong.”

  Trey was right. There was something wrong here, but it was not that to which he seemed to be referring. Strange formations and odd leaps of the logic lines were taking place in Darc’s inner landscape.

  There were the ciphers they had seen before. That was no longer unusual. Several of the symbols combined in Darc’s mind, forming a shining new result. Foolish herd.

  Glittering symbols that they’d found so many times before. With Father John. With the APA. With the Mayor.

  However, there was a connection here that the lines were striving to make. That was odd. They did not normally behave in such a fashion. Surging behind the smooth flow of the glowing patterns the logic formed in his mind was a writhing mass of grey feelings. Emotional responses that seemed to be pushing him toward a conclusion.

  This partnership between the emotional side of himself and the data-based patterns still sat in an uneasy space. The idea that anything other than pure facts might be motivating this inner surging was unsettling.

  Stretching out between the bodies were strands of intestines. The cords were thicker than what they had found inside the bull back at the first scene, and a gleaming cipher arose from the forms, dancing in Darc’s inner vision with an answer.

  Here were the missing intestines from the bull.

  As Darc and Trey approached the bodies, it became clear that the intestines had been sewn into the open abdominal cavities of each one of the teenage boys. Their necks all lay at unnatural angles, indicating that each neck had been snapped.

  Observing the intersection of the bodies with the precise way in which the intestines had been attached, another cipher arose, pointing out to the west of their current location. Back toward the alfalfa field of which Dr. Hutchinson had spoken.

  More answers lay out there. Or perhaps more questions. But one thing was certain. These deaths were all intended to send a message that was specific to Darc.

  Someone was using these deaths to communicate with him and him alone.

  * * *

  The Family Fun Center was starting to clear out. Well, not exactly. A better way of stating it would be that the crowd was changing. Instead of small children and their parents, the mix of those playing video games and streaming out of the laser tag arena was starting to skew a bit older. More and more preteens and teenagers were arriving, looking to spend their precious weekend minutes engaged in something cooler than hanging out at a mall somewhere.

  Mala had left Maggie back at the restaurant, spooning up the melted remnants of the sundaes they’d consumed together. The last Mala had seen of her, the pregnant woman was eyeing some artisan cookies that were on display out on the counter.

  Time to collect Janey and get back home. There wasn’t much point in staying much later anyway, as one of Janey’s new companions had already been collected by an older sibling. It shouldn’t be too much longer before Janey would be the only one her age left in the building.

  It was hard, though. There was a part of Mala that so enjoyed watching Janey have fun that dragging her away from it was a bit traumatic. Not that Janey ever complained, or at least not much. But Mala knew what that little girl had been through. The fact that she was capable of having fun was something of a miracle.

  Moving toward the ball pit, which was the last place Mala had seen Janey and the other little girl she was playing with, she almost ran into another woman who seemed to be doing the same thing as Mala. The behavior was familiar… the craning neck, the head swiveling from side to side. She was looking for her child.

  The wo
man was a bit taller than Mala, with short, spiked hair that was dyed a deep red. The effect, rather than being edgy or artistic, was surprisingly elegant.

  She was wearing a sleeveless blouse that exposed arms that seemed to belong to something sculpted of marble instead of human flesh. There was definition in the arms that spoke of a lot of time in the gym, but the result was not overly masculine or off-putting, as some female bodybuilders could be to Mala.

  Her skin was pale, but the creamy whiteness of milk, not the almost blue quality of someone who never saw the light of day. Blue-green eyes shown out of a face that was currently creased in a frown.

  “Jessalyn!” the woman called out. “Come on, Jessie! I told you five more minutes, and it’s been ten.”

  “Excuse me,” Mala said to the woman. “I think we may be looking for the same pair. Has your daughter been hanging out with a couple of new friends tonight?”

  The frown on the woman’s face cleared almost immediately as she refocused on Mala’s face. “Are you the mother of that lovely girl that my Jessie’s been playing with?”

  “Yes,” Mala answered, then checked herself. “Well, I’m her foster mother. In the process of adopting.”

  “That is so cool,” the woman gushed. “I’ve always thought that adoption was such a wonderful thing. I’d talked about it with my husband, before…” Her face settled into a shape that was somewhere in between sour and wistful.

  Mala glanced down at the woman’s hands. There was no wedding band.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” she murmured.

  “Don’t be,” the woman answered back. “Guy was a moron. Only good thing he gave me was Jessalyn.” She chuckled, seeming to collect herself. “And maybe I should give you my name before I continue with any more personal info. I’m Catherine Figueroa, but please call me Cat.”

  “Mala. So nice to meet you.” Reaching out a hand to shake Cat’s, Mala was impressed by the amount of strength there was in the woman’s grip. “Wow. You’re very strong.”

  “Ach. Sorry. Excited to meet someone new and I get all carried away. Try to rip off their hand.” Cat smiled at her, releasing her grip a bit.

  “No, you didn’t hurt me,” Mala clarified. “You just seem very… fit.”

  Cat’s look became wistful and sour again. “Yeah. When my ex left, I got kind of depressed, and I needed a change, so…” She sighed. “I cut off my hair and started going to this Cross Fit gym close to where I live. It was stupid, but I think it was also exactly what I needed.”

  “I think I can understand that,” Mala replied.

  “You divorced too?”

  “No, never married.” Mala shrugged, finding herself embarrassed, although she had no real sense of why that should be.

  Cat laughed. “Man, I’m like a juggernaut. Just barrel my way in.”

  “Please. Don’t apologize for that. I can be a bit reserved, so it’s probably for the best.”

  “Well, shall we find our girls? Crowd’s starting to look a little sketchy.” Cat began craning her neck again.

  “Last time I saw them, they were over by the ball pit,” Mala said, pointing over in the direction she’d been headed before running into this remarkable woman.

  “Oh, there they are,” Cat called out, catching sight of the two. “Girls!”

  Janey and Jessalyn turned and saw Cat and Mala, their faces falling as they seemed to realize that the evening’s fun had come to a close. Mala bent down and reached out for Janey as she got closer, pulling her in to give her a hug.

  “Did you have fun with Jessalyn?” she whispered in Janey’s ear. The little girl nodded her head vigorously.

  Standing back up, Mala noticed that both Cat and Jessalyn were looking at them. Cat gave her daughter a quirk of her eyebrow in what looked like a question, and Jessalyn nodded her head.

  Cat stepped forward to shake Janey’s hand. “Hey there. I’m Cat.”

  “Mom, she doesn’t speak,” Jessalyn said with a toss of her head.

  “Her name’s Janey,” Mala stepped in before Cat could apologize.

  “Janey? I am so happy to meet you,” Cat said, kneeling down to be at Janey’s eye level. “And thank you for helping my daughter have such a good time tonight. It’s been a while since I’ve let her out of her dungeon.”

  “Mom,” the little girl whined. “Stop being weird.”

  “Hmm… right,” Cat said, standing back up and brushing off her thighs. “Well, what do you guys say to a play date?” She gave Mala an inquisitive glance. “These two seem to have hit it off, and Heaven knows I could use some adult conversation.”

  Mala took a step back, her natural reticence fighting her desire to get to know this fascinating woman. “Oh, ah…”

  “Ugh. Sorry. I’m always doing that,” Cat said, shaking her head. “Shoving myself in where I’m not wanted.”

  “No, that’s not it at all,” Mala corrected her. “Reserved, remember? I would love to set up a play date.”

  “Great!” Cat gushed. “I’m so relieved. For a minute there it was like high school all over again.” She grinned at Mala.

  Mala reached into her purse and pulled out one of her business cards, handing it to Cat. “Here’s my number.”

  Cat glanced at the card. “Child therapist, eh? That’d be perfect for Jessie. How do you feel about a quick session?”

  “Mom!” the girl said, horrified.

  Laughing, Cat grabbed her daughter by the shoulders and dragged her away. “I’ll give you a call. You know, once my girl’s forgiven me for embarrassing her.” She waved as they walked off toward some nearby tables, probably to grab their belongings.

  As Mala and Janey headed back to the restaurant, Janey snaked her hand up and linked it in hers. It was a natural movement, one born of familiarity, and it send a tendril of warmth into Mala’s chest. She would do just about anything for this little girl.

  “Are you excited about seeing Jessalyn for a play date?” she asked, and Janey nodded her head again.

  It would be nice to have an opportunity to socialize with someone while Janey was occupied with a playmate her age. The last time they’d tried this, it hadn’t gone so well.

  Okay, that might have been an understatement. The other kid’s dad had turned out to be a psychotic killer. But one way or the other, this seemed like a good fit.

  Somehow, in one evening, Mala had gone from having no real female friends to having two. One more and she might start to approach normal levels.

  And wouldn’t normality be nice for a change?

  * * *

  Trey stared out over the alfalfa field, his jaw hanging down somewhere in the vicinity of his shoes. There was no way he was seeing what he was seeing.

  But there it was.

  Row after row of crop circles. Well, not really circles, but bizarre symbols and letters and… wait a minute.

  “Hey, Darc,” he said over his shoulder to his partner. “Aren’t those…?”

  “They are more of the symbols we encountered with Father John, and Van Owen, and Mayor Isaacson,” the detective stated, his inflection flat as… well, as the strands of alfalfa that had been pressed to the earth.

  Perfect.

  So, that clinched it. Instead of being handed a case that would have the possibility of getting Trey picked up by an alien life form, they were working one that might end up getting him dead. If past experiences with these psychos was anything to go on.

  Okay, so he had seen the symbols back where the bodies had been arranged. But Trey had been hoping that at least the crop circles might have been unearthly in origin.

  Although…

  “Darc, what if this means that all of the serial killers were all part of an alien plot?” he asked. His partner didn’t respond, but that wasn’t all that significant.

  Come on. It was within the realm of what might happen. Right?

  “I mean, how many of those alien abduction stories talk about mind control, right? And what better way to prepare the earth for futu
re terraforming than by getting rid of your biggest competitor?”

  “Such as the dolphins?” Darc asked, then turned and walked back toward the original crime scene. Trey got down off the fence where he’d climbed up to see the view and hurried off after his partner.

  “Wait. Was that a joke? Was that a joke, Darc?” he called out to the bald detective’s back. That couldn’t have been a joke, right? Darc didn’t make jokes.

  But this alien thing had some real possibilities. If it turned out to be true, Trey could see a book and movie deal in his future. Ideas of who would play him in the film started dancing about in his brain. Would they go older and a little rough around the edges, like Ethan Hawke? Or would they go young and hot like Zac Efron?

  Those were some important decisions that would have to be made.

  “Okay, so what’s our next play?” Trey asked his partner as he jogged to come up level with the big guy. “Where do we go from here?”

  Once more, Darc was ignoring him. And it wasn’t like his partner was doing that whole weirdo trance thing, either. He was just being a jerk.

  Trey opened his mouth to complain, when there was a whizzing sound that passed right next to his head. A sharp pain stabbed him in the ear, and when he lifted his hand to see what had happened, his fingers came away with something dark, wet and sticky.

  Blood.

  Someone was shooting at him.

  “Down!” He yelled at Darc, just as he realized that his companion had already grabbed him by his jacket and was pulling him down toward a fallen tree. They thudded down behind the thick wood just as two more whizzing noises sounded in Trey’s ear, and two explosions of wood splinters burst right in front of where they were hiding.

  “Someone’s shooting at us, Darc!” he yelled, but Darc clamped a hand over Trey’s mouth.

  Oh. Right.

  It probably wasn’t a good idea to keep giving the shooter an idea of where they were hiding. Concealment might have been a better plan, now that he thought of it.

  Instead, they were pinned down with nowhere to go. Trey swiveled his head around, trying to stay as low to the ground as he could.

  The fallen tree was in a small cleared area. The only other cover that Trey could find was twenty yards away, where there was a stand of trees grouped together. If they could make it over there without getting killed…