“Don’t you dare call me names, old woman. I’m so twisted sideways, I’m afraid to drive, and it’s your son’s fault. I don’t have to put up with insults from you as well.”
Gennadiya smiled.
“I meant you no insult. I happen to know my son cares for you very deeply. Probably more deeply than he should.”
“How do you know that? Has he said something to you?”
“No, he has not, and he never would. But no matter, I know how he feels as clearly as if I read it in a book.”
Andee returned to the bench and sat.
“Search your heart, child. Do you not feel the love he has for you?”
“I feel the love I have for him. The love he won’t accept.”
Gennadiya reached across the void and took Andee’s hand.
“Let me tell you a story,” she said.
Andee dropped her chin to her chest, “Not another story. What is it with you people and your stories? I don’t want to hear more stories.”
Gennadiya remained calm and unfazed, insisting, “It’s a story you should hear. It’s a story you should know.”
Homicide Detective Gerald Meeker crossed the main lobby on his way to the third floor and his office.
“Meeker,” the desk sergeant called to him, and Meeker turned to see an old friend.
“I thought you had pulled the plug years ago,” he said as he walked to the elevated desk that could serve as a barricade if the building was attacked. Meeker raised his hand, and the uniformed man leaned down to shake.
As the men clasped hands, Meeker frowned, “How long has it been, Fitz? The last I heard of you they’d stuck you in the Heights.”
Patrol Sergeant David Fitzpatrick smiled down on Meeker.
“I’m back here for the last thirteen months. I put in my papers, and they asked where I’d like to spend them. I said here.”
Meeker grinned, “Well, I’m going to hate to see you go, but it’s good to see you back. We need to get together and catch up.”
“Well, put, old timer. You still chasing bad guys?”
“As long as they’ll let me. Couldn’t stand to sit on a plank of wood all day. No offense.”
“None taken. Hey, got a message for you.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Some kid named Cat Stephens wants you to meet him down at the warehouse off Pier D.”
“Pier D?” Meeker asked.
“Yeah, does that sound right? Ain’t that place abandoned?”
“Yeah, it is. The kind of place this loser would choose.”
“Cat? That’s not a real name.”
“No, it’s the kid’s initials. His old man named him Charles Anthony Thomas. I think they wanted him to become a pope or something. Kid didn’t aim high enough.”
Meeker took the small square of light blue paper, folded it and stuck it in his pants pocket.
“You want me to gather up some backup?” Fitz asked.
“Naw,” Meeker shook his head. “If an army shows up, the kid will just rabbit. He’s a skittish one. I’ll go check it out, and if it looks hinky, I’ll call for help.”
Meeker turned to leave the way he had entered.
“Hey, you be careful,” Fitz called after him.
“Have to,” Meeker replied with a wave. “Too old to be a hero.”
The detective parked the unmarked car next to a rectangular hole in the wall the size of a large house. At one time, this had been a door through which cranes crawled between loading and unloading the freighters. Now, just a large hole in a wall remained.
Meeker got out of the car and slowly walked into the shadows and gloom of the abandoned building. It was a huge space. In years past, the area had been filled with machinery and conveyer belts. Now, it was empty. The size of the place made it all the more deserted. The cement walls and corrugated tin ones bore the scars of graffiti artists and taggers making their claims. I-beam rails stood overhead, and once they carried huge buckets on pulleys and cables. Now, it was empty, and the only sound besides Meeker’s footsteps was the flapping of pigeon wings. The detective felt minuscule as he crossed the cement floor. Once the floor had been cleaned and polished as food stuffs were packed here. Now the dusty area was littered with rat and pigeon droppings. Meeker was careful where he stepped.
As he walked deeper into the vacant area, the shadows became darker. He removed the mini-light from his coat pocket and clicked it on. Slowly, he turned in a circle, and the narrow band of light danced along the walls and abandoned machinery. Something moved. Something tall moved.
“Cat?”
The voice echoed in the chamber.
Meeker felt dampness in his underarms. His heartbeat increased.
He took several steps toward where the kid stood.
“Cat?”
He called a second time. The kid ignored him, and only the echo responded.
“You little pri...”
Meeker stopped. The kid wasn’t standing.
The kid was hanging. He was hanging roughly six inches off the floor by a chain wrapped around his neck and suspended from the I-beam. The kid’s entrails spilled down to the floor.
“Sweet Mary,” Meeker started a prayer, but added, “Cat, you stupid shit, what have you done?”
The corner of his eye caught movement. He flicked the light in its direction, but the movement skipped ahead of it.
He fumbled for the radio in his right coat pocket. He pulled it free.
“Dispatch, Unit 1371, requesting backup. Also send crime scene techs, a supervisor and ambulance. No code on ambulance. Need back up, request code two.”
He saw the movement again. It was like a shadow. It was silent. The only time he could see it was when it moved. Once still, it blended into the darkened walls. There. He saw it again, but it fled from the light.
He dropped the radio, drew his weapon and pointed, “Freeze, police. Step into the light.”
He heard laughter.
“I’m Detective Gerald Meeker, NYPD. Step into the light. Show me your hands.”
Again, laughter.
Then: “You think you can arrest me? You cannot. You think you can question me? You silly man. You foolish man. Give me the Unum, and I might let you live.”
“Stay where you are. Show me your hands,” Meeker felt his throat tighten, and his voice rose an octave. “This death is under police investigation. Produce identification.”
“Give me the Unum,” the shadow said again, and Meeker suddenly realized he was talking to the Cat’s dark dude.
Slowly, Meeker turned with his arm and his weapon outstretched and the other hand, the one with the light, following the first. There, a man. No, a shadow. No, right the first time, a man. A man in a hooded robe.
The man stood in front of the detective, some thirty feet away. He was the dark dude. He had to be.
Meeker leveled his weapon. “Show me your hands. Don’t move.”
The voice was deeper than before, “Give me the Unum, you can live.”
“This isn’t a debate. Show me your hands.” Meeker felt his voice creeping higher.
Slowly, the man raised his hands and flipped the hood back and away from his face. The face was angry and hard to see in the darkened area. The hands dropped to the neck of the robe and pulled a draw string. The robe fell away, and as it collapsed onto the floor, the man seemed to shrink.
But he didn’t shrink, exactly. He changed. From man to wolf.
The wolf growled and charged.
Meeker stood his ground. In the closing seconds of his life, he did not think of family, nor what he would miss. He remembered his training and as the wolf crossed the thirty-odd yards separating them, Meeker steadily and rhythmically pulled the trigger on his service weapon. Every shot was spaced with the front sight picture held steady on the animal’s chest. No time to breathe. Squeeze the trigger. Don’t jerk. Accept the death. Take the bastard with you.
When the wolf had covered the distance and pounced, Gerald “Jerry
” Meeker squeezed off the last round, closed his eyes, and silently told his wife he loved her. He took the brunt of the attack in his chest as he was pushed over backwards. He didn’t scream.
If nothing else, he would not let the bastard make him scream.
Fifteen minutes later, the responding units found the detective on the floor, blood drained from the throat wound, pooled around him. His head had almost been removed.
Alwyn walked into the house to find his mother and Miranda sitting at the breakfast nook. Both faces lined with worry. Both held cups of tea on the table, though neither appeared to have tasted any. As he closed the distance, even the birds outside, which could easily be heard, seemed silent.
“What’s wrong?” he asked?
He fought against the tiny chunk of ice that formed in his stomach when intuition or experience whispered things weren’t right.
“We don’t know, but it has to be bad,” his mother said.
“She won’t let us in,” added Miranda.
Some twenty minutes earlier, Alwyn had received a phone call from his mother. She had told him the three women had spent a more or less pleasant morning, and then Andee received a phone call. The other two did not know who had made the call, only that the agent had turned white and started to cry as she rushed from the room.
She had run up the stairs, locked herself in the room provided, and refused to let either of the Lloyd women in. Through the door, the last time Miranda checked, crying could still be heard.
Alwyn looked in the direction of the stairs, though from where he was, they could not be seen. He reached to his face and stroked his beard with the cup of his hand, a habitual motion both his mother and Miranda had observed him do when he was deep in thought or excessively worried. He looked back at the two women, grimaced, then left the room.
“Andee, open the door.”
Alwyn knocked again and waited for the door to open. It didn’t.
“Andee, I’m not about to stand out here and beg you to open the door. You can open it and I’ll walk in, or I’ll bust it off the hinges and have to face my mother. Your choice.”
He, again, rapped his knuckles, and before the third rap, the door swung open.
He stepped forward as Andee launched herself at him. They collided in the doorway as the woman hugged him, the full length of her body against him. Her arms clung around his neck, her face buried in his chest. She sobbed.
“They killed him. They killed him. Jerry’s dead. They killed him.”
Alwyn slowly, gently, wrapped the woman in his arms, and the two of them stood in the doorway. As he held her, he sifted through the many emotions he felt and tried to cordon them into separate parts of his being.
As Andee cried, Alwyn stroked her hair and held her close. He enjoyed her there, no matter the cause. He knew she was in great pain, but a part of him was grateful she was in his arms. He didn’t care the reason. After the first shock of the physical impact, he realized they fit together. She felt comfortable. She felt right. She felt like she belonged there. Then the guilt hit.
He felt guilty for enjoying her in his arms, when what put her there was utter devastation. He felt guilty for not thinking first of Meeker. The detective had been a good man. A good man now dead. He said a silent prayer for the man’s family. They had to be in pain. He had tried to warn him. He had told Meeker he would be no match for what waited for him. Had he tried hard enough? He should have stayed. He should have been there. It was, after all, his fight. He was the start of this bloodletting.
Anger cycled through him, anger fueled by the realization of a good man dead. A man who had dedicated his life to a calling. Not Alwyn’s calling, but a calling just the same. He was a man Alwyn recognized and while they might not have been friends, they were comrades, even if Meeker hadn’t known it. Both walked in the dark shadows of evil and picked up after the doers of such. Meeker had been Alwyn in another form, and he, the detective. They were the same, and Alwyn recognized a bit of him died with the detective.
The anger surged, and the professor gave way to the Unum. The Unum freed the anger and allowed it to surge, longed to let it erupt. The time would come. Lloyd forced the Unum back into his corner and asserted control. Control he had to maintain, for now. The woman he held was in pain, and he must comfort her. He must protect her. He loved her.
The silent admission shocked him. It caused him pause. Did he? He did. He loved this woman. He held her and let her cry.
After a time, gently, slowly, he separated them. He didn’t let go. She was where she belonged, but he had to see her. He lifted a hand, touched her chin and lifted her face. He looked into those dark brown eyes and through the pain and the tears, through the anguish, caught a glimpse of what could be his future.
He pulled her to him. He hugged her.
“Andee,” he whispered, “let it out. I will be here for as long as you need me.”
He held her and guided her to the bed as if they were dancing. He helped her sit and joined her. The woman cried for an hour and in time, the tears started to dry. In time, the acceptance of what had happened was no longer a shock, but became a part of life that must be dealt with. In time, the question of “how could this happen?” evolved into, “how do I handle it?”
She moved her head back and raised her eyes to his.
“Jerry’s dead,” she said.
She said it to affirm a truth, not to share information. She said it to help herself accept it.
“I know,” he nodded. “I will miss him. I wish I had known him better.”
“He was such a good man,” she said.
“I know.”
“In many ways, he was my father. Mine died when I was eight, and Jerry just took over. We lived in North Carolina and Jerry was here, but he always made sure I got birthday presents and cards. He was there at my high school graduation. He never made a big deal of it. He was just there.”
“He loved you,” Alwyn said.
“Yeah, I think he did. At first, I think he felt like he owed my real father, but as the years went by, I think he looked at me as his daughter.”
She lowered her eyes and looked at his shirt. A sad smile crossed her features.
“I’ve cried all over your shirt. My mascara has ruined it.”
“I doubt that, but if so, it was sacrificed for a good cause.”
He pulled her to him.
After a moment, she pulled back, “I have to go back to New York. I have to follow up. I have to try to catch this guy. I owe it to Jerry. I have to help.”
“I understand,” he nodded. “But before you go, you need to know something.”
She kept her eyes on him as she said, “Your mother told me about the custom of arranged marriages in your family. I understand if you don’t come with me.”
He arched his eyebrows.
“I see. Well, my mother means well, but she sometimes gets things a bit confused.”
He looked over Andee’s shoulder to see his mother standing in the doorway. The woman wore a wide-eyed innocent expression. Beside her stood Miranda, concern on her face.
Alwyn returned his focus to Andee and said, “I owe you an explanation and no one can tell you but me.”
Alwyn,” his mother barked, “You cannot...”
“What, Mother?” he challenged. “What can I not do? Tell her? It’s my story to tell or not.”
Gennadiya looked at her son. Her expression hardened.
“What can I not do, Mother? Trust her?”
“Alwyn, you must not. She is not Pauci.”
“She knows our country’s secrets. Do you think our family secret would not be safe with her?”
“She’s not one of us.”
Alwyn looked away from his mother, and his eyes found Andee’s. Beautiful dark eyes that questioned, that pained, that wondered what was going on around her. Alwyn raised his hand and held Andee’s chin, lifting it slightly to allow more light to refract through those eyes.
He held her gaze a
s he said, “You’re right, Mother. She’s not one of us, but how I wish she was.”
“What are the two of you talking about?” Andee asked.
She looked at Alwyn, then to his mother and back to him.
“Never you mind, young lady. Just go back to New York where you belong,” the mother directed.
Alwyn stood.
“No, she will not go back to New York. I will not allow you to send her to her death, and you know that is what would happen. She is unprepared for what she would face. The wolf is waiting for her. I won’t allow it.”
Andee stood and blinked her eyes, but forced them to focus, “What wolf? What won’t you allow? What are you talking about? I’m an FBI agent; you don’t tell me when I can go.”
Alwyn turned back to the agent.
“Please, I need to talk to you before you do anything. Give me just a minute.”
“You will not violate your oath to that woman,” his mother barked the command.
“That woman? Just who is that woman?” Andee snapped as she spun and faced Gennadiya, her mourning temporarily forgotten. It had given way to the rage of being talked around, talked around, and talked of. She focused on the older woman who stood in the doorway so smug, so sure of herself and her position. Andee fought the urge to slap her.
“By that woman, do you mean this woman? If you mean this woman, you want no part of that woman.”
“Stop it! Stop this, both of you.”
The bark from Alwyn startled all three women, and each flinched. The command was sharp like a rifle shot, but the growl that followed, low in volume, and deep from his throat reinforced his anger. It promised violence if necessary. It was the growl she heard in his office.
He turned to his mother and those ice blue eyes, usually so cool, so calm, so detached, were now the white-hot flame of a cutting torch. The heat held his mother at bay, and his words followed.
“Mother, you raised me from the time of my conception to be what I am. The Unum. I have been trained every day of my life to fulfill this role. I have been coached since childhood by you, as well as Father and others, to personify this calling, this obligation. This duty I carry is not just an expectation from you, but also from the family, from the clan. My service is to them, as well as you. I will not let your fear, your worry for your son, stop your Unum from doing what he has been raised to do. You cannot prevent me from being who you raised me to be.”
Shadow of the Moon: A Fantasy of Love, Murder and Werewolves Page 15
