by J. D. Dexter
Fighting Midnight
Ankarrah Chronicles Book Two
J.D. Dexter
Copyright © 2018 Jackie Stewart
Cover art: OliviaProDesign
Beta Reader: J. Fink
All rights reserved. This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by United States of America copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, at “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
First Edition
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For permissions, please use the following email address: [email protected]
Other works by J.D. Dexter
Ankarrah Chronicles:
Meeting Midnight
Acknowledgements
I just want to thank all my readers. You guys are the best, and so supportive. Thanks for going on the journey with me to discover what makes Finley so special.
Special shout out to Olivia of OliviaProDesign for designing my awesome new book cover. My brother and sister-in-law, who have an inordinate love for all things Dungeons and Dragons, who helped me design and visualize Lando, Kuni, and my other Ankarrahi System natives. J. Fink, you helped make my story better than I ever thought it would be.
And to Grandma Alice—even though I killed your namesake character at the end of Book One, I still love you loads. I hope you like this book’s ending a little better.
01
I’m going to kill my mother. The one who gave me life. I want to watch the last flicker of life bleed from her eyes as I stand holding her dying heart in my hand. She ripped away the two most important people in my life as if they were simple irritants, like swatting gnats flitting around her head on a humid summer day.
The destroyed bodies of my adoptive parents lay scattered around my living room. The parts and pieces of people that held me, comforted me, supported me, and loved me litter my sanctuary like so much trash blown down a windswept alley. Their arms will no longer welcome me, their hands no longer dry my tears, and their mouths will never again smile with humor.
A high-pitched keening rises through the still, blood-soaked room. I back up against the crimson-streaked wall and lift my hands to block out the noise. My long, dark brown hair falls forward as I rock on my heels. The breath backs up in my lungs, squeezing my chest; there’s no air.
“Finley.” A deep voice booms through the thunder of static and rushing thump-thump of my pulse pounding in my ears.
The glowing white-blonde hair of Hunter, the man who has literally saved my life and filled my heart with love, fills my vision, blocking out the horror in the surrounding room. Focusing on his dark chocolate eyes, he becomes the anchor that keeps me from splintering apart and being swept along with the current.
“Finley, you need to breathe. You’re hyperventilating.” He grabs my shoulders, keeping his eyes steady on mine, as he wills me to follow his directions.
My mouth drops open, my lungs expand, sucking in a huge lungful of air. It shudders through my chest, and a shaky hiss shimmers through the air as I exhale. Over and over, he breathes with me. I can feel my legs once again, the bottom of my pants stiff and cool from the dried blood I waded through earlier. The beginnings of pins and needles shoot to my toes.
He blinks, his eyelids shuttering his eyes for the briefest of seconds, and I struggle to keep my hold on the last threads of my sanity. The darkness clamps down on my throat.
The chocolate depths find me once again, keeping me from the slide into crazy-town. His warm hands like furnaces against the iciness of my arms.
Hunter helps lift me to my feet, the top of my head barely making it to his chin. He pulls me into his strong arms, his big body absorbing the shudders wracking my own. I curl my arms around his strong back, and just sink into his strength.
Once again, I’m struck by the belonging and refuge I find in his arms. Since meeting him, it feels like I’ve done nothing but lean on him.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see the brown stains of drying blood caked around my fingernails.
“Hunter, they’re gone,” I whisper. “What am I going to do?”
“We’ll get through this.”
The pain spears through my ravaged heart, singeing the tattered edges with black. The rage builds once again, making me want to hurl like I’m on a tilt-a-whirl of black emotions. As I twirl around with rage, heat suffuses my body, flushing out the ice.
I pull back from Hunter’s arms, lifting my head to meet his gaze.
“I have to go back.”
“I know.”
Grief grabs me by the hair and pulls me around for a twirl. My stomach tries to settle between the lead weights and squirming butterflies. I sink back into the shelter of my boyfriend’s arms.
“I’ve got to do something, or I’ll go insane.” I can feel the pressure building up inside me.
Oh God, why did you let this happen? How could you let her just take them? And for such a stupid reason. Welcome them into your arms, Oh Lord. Shower them with peace and love.
My thoughts and mental prayers collapse in on themselves once more. Trapped between an adrenaline surge and extreme fatigue, I’m not sure which one I want to win.
Suck it up, buttercup. We’ve things to do, a person to kill. I can almost feel the edges of my heart blacken and shrivel as I plan and pray for Anixia’s demise.
She ripped them from me because I left Ankarrah. That’s it. No other reason, no other explanation. Rage ignites and burns in my belly. My body shrugs off the lethargy of sorrow as fury loosens my limbs.
I feed the wrath like I’m throwing more wood on a bonfire. Soon the false energy of trauma-soaked adrenaline sweeps through me like a cool breeze through a stuffy house. I switch my vision back to human normal, locking away the Spectrum—that side of me that marks me as Anixia’s daughter. It has no place in this hellish room.
I step back from Hunter, unable to look at him right now. The decomposing bodies—I can’t think of them as my parents right now or I’ll lose my crap again—can’t stay in here. I know I will be angry at myself for this later, but I need them gone from my house as soon as possible. Shutting down my emotions, I swallow a couple times to clear my throat.
“I need them moved, Hunter. I can’t have them in my house, not like this.” I wave my hand around the living room. I swallow convulsively.
I will not cry. I repeat this over and over, hoping it will come true.
I bite back my sorrow. The pressure is building behind my eyes, that hot, wet burn that signals tears are close. I close my eyes, pressing my fists against them.
I’ll let myself cry once they’re gone.
“I’ll see what I can do,” Hunter says, his voice tight.
I can only nod.
I can’t take the stink—that dirty-pennies scent that clings to the back of your throat—anymore.
“I’m going outside for some fresh air,” I say.
“I wish you wouldn’t, but I can see that you’re going to do it anyway. I can call the hospital to find out what they do to get blood out of fabric,” he offers quietl
y.
I close the door behind me and step out into the sunshine, glaring at the cloudless summer sky. There should be a deluge of rain spiked with hail the size of my fist with possibilities of tornadoes and lightning strikes.
It should not be a perfect summer day, a balmy breeze lifting the wisps of hair around my face. The sun should not be shining, children should not be laughing, and the air should not carry freaking honeysuckle on the breeze! I glower at the audacity of nature and life, feeling like Mother Nature is taunting me that life still goes on.
One unlucky kid peddles like his life depends on it after meeting my angry glare. His laughter cut off mid-chuckle, the joy and happiness draining from his face. I hope he doesn’t tell his parents a serial killer is down the block drenched in blood.
I turn back to the house, angry at myself for ruining someone else’s day, especially a kid’s. I glimpse my reflection in the picture window and am amazed the kid didn’t scream for help when he saw me.
My five-ten curvy body is half-covered in the darkening red of dried blood. My hair looks like a dark helmet, only a few pieces floating in the breeze. Dark streaks of dried blood stand out in stark relief against my too-white skin. Looking at my hands, it’s almost as if I dipped them in paint and forgot to clean them before starting my next project.
From my mid-thigh down, my pant legs have acquired an ugly ombre color—one color shifting into the next seamlessly. Thankfully, my yoga pants are dark, so it’s harder to tell that the crimson at the bottom is blood.
I can feel the tears backing up in my throat, choking me with their need to fall. Ruthlessly, I swallow them back, leaving them to burn in my throat. I’m not willing to say goodbye yet.
No longer able to analyze my reflection, I open my front door and push back into the horror.
“I got in touch with our laundry department manager at the hospital.” Hunter turns from the table. “He gave me the things we need to get to wash the couches.”
“I want to get rid of them.”
“Okay. We can do that, no problem. Do you want everything with blood on it gone?” He motions at the floor where he’s draped sheets over the mangled bodies.
“Yeah.”
Think of it like a problem to solve; something that isn’t real, just a mental exercise. Pushing forward, I stand alone surrounded by sheet-covered lumps, ruined furniture, and a literal bloody mess to clean.
Brian and Josh, cousins and two of my best friends, come in from the hallway. Brian towers over Josh’s six-four frame.
“One of my construction crews has an open site that can take the rug, the couches, and chairs, Finley-babe,” Brian offers. “The floor boards will be easy to dump, too.”
“Good. Yes. Let’s get started.” I move forward blindly.
“It might work better to move the furniture out of the way first, though.” Through the sorrow weighing me down, I can hear the spark of levity in Brian’s voice.
“Well, if you’re going to get all technical on me,” I try to match his lighter tone. It’s a little wet around the edges.
“Leave it to a woman to want to do things backwards.” Brian’s whiff of laughter floats through the room like dandelion fuzz on a spring breeze.
“What’re you gonna do?” Hunter sighs, his shoulders slumping as if under a heavy weight.
“Watch it, fellas. My brain’s not working right yet, but trust me: I’ll get you back,” I taunt. The heaviness weighing down my heart eases for a brief moment.
“Ooo, so scary.” Brian exaggerates, waving his hands in the air like limp noodles.
“You better believe it, dude.”
“Get the furniture moved, you two. Otherwise we’ll be here till tomorrow listening to you try to one-up the other.” Josh, always the referee, leans over, flicking his brown hair out of his eyes, and unplugs a lamp from the corner table and moves it to the table—the only clear, blood-free zone available.
“Yes, sir.” Brian gives Josh a salute. “Can you believe the pants on this one? So bossy,” he whisper-shouts and jerks his thumb in Josh’s direction.
I smother a laugh as Josh gives Brian another glare.
Turning to include Hunter in the fun, I find him inspecting the armchair that looks like an early Jackson Pollock canvas. He looks down at his clothes and then back to the chair a few of times. As I watch, the consternation grows heavier on his face the more he looks back and forth between them. With a firm nod of his head, he takes a couple of steps across the room so he’s standing by the table.
He takes his shirt off, probably not wanting it to get dirty, before stepping back over to help move furniture.
“Oh, for the love, Hunter. You couldn’t keep your shirt on?” Josh says with a whine.
“I didn’t want to get blood on it.”
“How does a trauma surgeon become finicky about blood?”
Something like sorrow flashes in Hunter’s eyes. He just shakes his head, “Let’s just get this done.” Hunter leans down and begins moving lumps off the rug, gently placing them to the side.
We all get down to the business of cleaning up misery and horror.
“Ms. Tindol. Department of Homeland Security.” A heavy thump accompanies a booming voice at my front door. “Please open the door.”
02
All the light and air rushes out of my body, leaving me swaying on my feet.
“Ms. Tindol. We know you’re in there. You’re not in any trouble, but we need to come in and discuss your absence.” Another series of heavy thumps. “Ms. Tindol.”
Josh’s hands ball into fists as his spine jerks straight. The door knob creaks under Josh’s hand as he opens the door.
“Sir. I’m looking for–”
“I know who you’re looking for. She’s here, but now’s not a good time.” Josh sounds like he’s clenching his teeth, the words spiked with hate and anger. Brian moves up next to Josh.
“That’s not your decision to make, sir. My name is Frank Whittier, Agent Frank Whittier.”
My gasp fills the room like smoke.
The bland, and utterly forgettable, features of Agent Whittier appear around Brian’s shoulders.
“Whittier. I told you to wait for me.” The soothing tones of DHS Special Agent Sarah Richardson falls like a gentle, cleansing rain after a heat wave into the room full of destruction.
“And I told you, I don’t take your orders,” Whittier snaps back.
“I believe I made it clear the last time we spoke, I will not be joining your band of merry men,” I say.
“I don’t care what you want, little girl. You’re mine.” Whittier stabs his finger in the air at me.
At his words, I feel everything I am drain out onto the blood-covered floor. I can feel a spark trying to light deep within me, like someone trying to get a lighter to catch on a windy day. My insides coil tighter with every word he speaks. My vision flickers between normal and Spectrum.
“You don’t have that authority, Whittier.” Agent Richardson executes an end-run around Brian and plants herself between Whittier and me. Her back is to me, one hand resting on the butt of her gun.
“We’ll see who has what authority, Richardson. Rangerson told me I could have her.”
My insides clench as the spark of that lighter finally catches, a small, blue-white flame burns in my chest.
“I belong to no one,” I growl.
“You belong to me,” he says quietly, a small smile on his face.
Richardson moves her coat out of the way of her gun, looking like she’s ready to pull it on him.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see another small group of people rushing towards my house.
No one but Whittier and Richardson are moving. What happened to the guys? Josh would have Whittier in a headlock by now.
Whittier’s smile curdles what’s left in my stomach.
“They can’t help you, not now.”
“What have you done to them?” I snarl. The pressure in my chest builds, squeezing my
heart, obliterating my lungs.
Whittier flicks his hand towards the door. All the men that were rushing towards my house now resemble mosquitoes stuck in amber.
Richardson’s palm sinks around the butt of her gun milliseconds before it clears the holster. She points her gun at Whittier, he merely smirks as he flicks his other palm at her. She falls to the floor. It doesn’t even look like she’s breathing.
I release the valve holding my building pressure, a piercing scream ripping from deep inside me.
It washes my world in bright white. An invisible wind lifts and whips my ponytail around my head. I feel lighter than a feather, a stark contrast to the leaden feeling of losing my parents.
Agent Whittier’s whole body looks like a black hole. Nothing but obsidian radiates from his body. Slick and shiny, it reflects the Spectrums of everyone else in the room. A kaleidoscope of colors that remain on the perimeter of his being.
One reflection is bright and hard to see clearly, seeming to float. Starbursts and rays of sparkles leap from it like a Fourth of July fireworks finale show.
Whittier lifts one of his arms, bent and stark like a weathered tree limb in winter. I throw both of my arms up in defense. The floating white reflection mirrors my movements.
“You can’t win, little girl. I already own you.” Whittier sounds strained.
“I belong to no one—especially you and your DHS Super Team.”
“Oh, but you do.” He raised his arm a little higher in the air, seeming to struggle under its weight.
Like I’m made of the light that surrounds me, I turn one of my palms towards him. From the middle of my hand, a delicate thread streaks across the space of my living room. It lands in the middle of his mass, sinking beneath the obsidian shell like light through a pane of glass.
Through my white-tinged vision, I watch eruptions begin in the center of his body, a volcano erupting into the sky. With each breath, the eruptions spread. His obsidian tomb bubbles on the surface, the core fracturing and quaking.
