by Sky Winters
“OK, OK, I know. It was extremely stupid of me. But in my defense, I was right there, and when I heard ’domestic dispute,’ especially in the Upper West Side, I was expecting more of a, you know, yuppie squabble than a murder-in-progress.”
“Yeah, and that’s exactly why we call these things in,” said Peterson.
He sighed.
Kid’s gonna get herself killed. Goddamn stupid move making someone her age detective.
“Hey, I passed my detective test like all the rest,” said Miranda, her voice bristling. “And don’t talk about me like I’m not here, if you don’t mind.”
Peterson’s face twisted into an immediate expression of confusion and surprise.
“W-what?” he said, his voice in a tone of someone getting caught doing something they shouldn’t.
“What you just said,” Miranda responded, “about making me detective.”
“I, ah, don’t, I mean, what are you talking about?” he said, a slight stammer on this typically commanding voice.
“Yeah, kid, what are you talking about?” added Michael, now just as confused as the lieutenant.
“Listen, just get better, and I’m going to need a full report as soon as you’re up and walking around,” said Peterson.
And with that, he turned on his heels and walked away at a hurried pace.
Michael watched Peterson rush off, pointing towards him, his other hand on his hip.
“What the hell was that all about?” asked Michael, his brow furrowed in an interrogative expression.
“What are you talking about? He made a smartass comment about making me a detective. I know he’s a Lieutenant, but that’s still a fucked-up thing to say,” said Miranda, now feeling antsy from lying down.
“What comment? What are you talking about?”
“About me being a- you know what, nevermind,” she said, looking around for the nearest nurse. “I gotta get out of this bed.”
“Hey, hold on,” said Michael, holding up a halting hand and looking around.
But it was too late, and by the time he was able to flag someone down, Miranda had already yanked the cables off of her arms and plopped her bare feet onto the cold floor of the hospital.
Goddamn, kid, you’re gonna hurt yourself.
“I’ll be fine,” she said, standing up from the bed and stretching her long limbs, her chestnut-brown hair falling onto her shoulders in lazy tresses.
“Huh, what?” said Michael, turning around, his face in the same confused, caught expression as Peterson. “OK, fine. It looks like there’s no chance of me talkin’ you into resting a little longer, but let me at least find a doctor to get you sorted out.”
“Make it quick,” she said, “there’s a killer out there, and we gotta find him.”
Chapter 5
“So, what’s the plan, kid?” asked Michael, struggling to keep up with Miranda’s quick steps as she strode down the busy Manhattan street, away from the hospital.
“Find out who’s killing people, who tried to kill me,” she said, enjoying the feeling of being back in her own clothes.
“Christ, slow down, will ya?” he asked, his breath started to run ragged.
“Think of it as gym motivation,” she said with a smirk on her face as she looked back at Michael over her shoulder.
“Yeah, yeah.”
It was a typical spring day in the city. The streets were packed with people rushing from one place to the other, with the occasional knot of slow-paced tourists who never failed to clog up the arteries of the sidewalks with their meandering, aimless strolling.
“Listen,” Michael said. “I’m off-duty and also not 25 anymore, so I gotta run back home to do my dad stuff. I’ll catch you later after you’ve done the paperwork.”
“See ya, Mike,” said Miranda, waving over her shoulder as he split from her at the intersection.
Miranda stopped to grab a coffee, and checked out the headlines in the New York Post and the Times. Both were plastered with banners about the murders. Tossing a couple of wadded bills onto the newsstand counter, she took her coffee and her papers, and skimmed through an article as she walked, weaving in and out of the crowds with the sixth sense that living in New York can instill in a person.
But as she read the article, she noticed something: there was no mention of the wounds. Not a word, just talk about a potential serial killer who was targeting wealthy men and women who lived alone. It was probably for the best, as the city was beginning to slip into a sense of quiet panic at the string of murders, but the wounds were facts and they weren’t being reported.
Damn, nice ass on that one.
Miranda’s head shot up, and she turned around, catching the lusty gaze of a thirty-something guy in a suit as he walked in the opposite direction.
“Fuck off,” she said, while making a certain gesture.
And to her surprise, the man made the same expression as Michael and Peterson, that look of being completely surprised as being caught doing something.
“What the hell’s going on with everyone today?” she asked under her breath as she made the turn towards the Number Three station.
Taking the train, she headed back to her precinct, said “hi” to the usual people, and sat down at her desk to plow through paperwork. Firing a gun, even in defense, was always an issue, and as she filled out the necessary information, she couldn’t help but think about how it was only the beginning of a long, annoying process. Finally, after several hours, she finished, and got up to take a long stretch, looking out of the window at the dusk settling over the city outside. Turning her head, she felt the crinkling of the taped gauze of the wound on her neck, and decided to head to the bathroom to check it out.
She stood in front of the mirror, angling her neck to get the skin taut in preparation of ripping off the tape. Grabbing a flap of the white tape, she pulled, yanking the whole bandage off it a quick motion, wincing at the slight pain that rushed through her.
And what she saw under it was surprising: the wound was completely healed. There was nothing under the bandage but a few square inches of undamaged skin. It was as though nothing had ever happened.
She shook off the experience, and after sending the paperwork, decided to head over to the shooting range to pop off a few rounds, something that never failed to calm her down. Arriving at the range, she checked in, picked up ammo for her pistol, and got the necessary gear. Once in her aisle, she slammed the red button on the side of the range that sent the paper target to the desired distance. She wanted to start off slow, so she picked 50 feet.
Holding up her gun, she flicked the safety off and trained her sights on the middle of the chest of the target. She took in a deep breath and squinted one eye. Then something strange happened. Time seemed to slow down. She could see the target ahead, and her vision seemed to zoom in on it, and it appeared in her mind’s eye as though it were only a few feet away from her. Somehow, she knew the exact angle to hold her gun to hit where she wanted. She squeezed the trigger, and the crack of gunfire echoed through the range, muffled through her earmuffs.
The paper snapped back with the impact, and she waited for it to settle before firing off another round, then another. Miranda felt a level of control over each shot fired, almost as though everything around her came to a halt as she shot. She aimed up at the target’s head, and with a series of shots, finished off her magazine.
Hitting the red button once again, she brought the target back to her, the motor whirring as the target grew nearer. And once it arrived, she saw that each round had landed exactly where she was aiming: ten rounds dead-center in the chest, and five right between the eyes. She had always been a decent shot, but the skills she had shown were beyond anything she was normally capable of.
Miranda rushed to the counter, grabbed a couple more targets, and hung the first one up. Adjusting the distance, she hit the red button, sending this one back to the next farthest spot. Repeating the process, she fired two-thirds of her rounds into the chest,
and the remaining five into the head. Bringing the target back, she saw that just like the other, every shot hit home.
She hung up the final target, this time sending it as far back as it would go. It took a minute or so to reach its destination, and when it came to a stop it was no bigger than the size of a postage stamp in her vision. The target was now at the range where a rifle would be the preferred weapon to use.
Miranda lifted her pistol and took a breath, letting the small, blurry horizontal rectangle of the target drift into her sights above the gleaming, silver body of her service weapon. She took another breath, feeling that same slowing-down of time, and pulled the trigger. Another muffled crack, and the target in the distance flicked as though it had caught a sharp wind. Shaking her head at the improbability of what was happening, she lined up her pistol once again, this time firing all of her remaining rounds in a series of steady, aimed shots.
Without looking, she pounded the red button with her fist, and waited with measured excitement for the target to return. And as it grew closer, she saw that nearly every shot hit where she wanted. As the target came to a stop, she snatched it from its hanger and looked in amazement at the loose grouping of bullet holes at the head and chest. They weren’t perfect, but remarkable for a pistol at a distance like that. She folded the target paper in half and, in a rush, took her equipment back to the firing range desk.
“Damn, Walker,” said Smalls, a rookie officer, as he looked over the target paper tucked under Miranda’s arm. “You hit that at that distance? Jesus, you oughta enter the marksman contest; you’d clean up.”
“Just having a good day,” she said, leaving the firing range in a rush, her eyes fixed forward as she tossed the target into the trash can near the door.
But as she entered the main room of the precinct, which bustled with the activity of the dozens of officers working, a cacophonous swirl of voices entered her mind.
I can’t believe I’m gonna be filling out paperwork for the next fo-
-need to get this goddamn perp sorted out be-
-utting my fuckin’ overtime, this is a load of goddamn bullshit
The voices ran through her head, at different volumes and tones until her own thoughts were lost in the whirling eddy of sound. Clasping her hands on her temples, Miranda ran out from the main room, taking refuge in a small workroom.
In the silence of the room, she could feel the other voices quiet and drift from her mind. Her own thoughts began to take form once again, and after a few moments, she felt ready to go back into the station. Opening the door, she focused on her own thoughts, keeping mental focus as she walked through the precinct floor.
The voices remained as she walked, but were now quiet, a soft murmur behind her own thoughts. She needed to get out of the station, to get home, if only for a little while. She rushed through the station, performing the bare minimum of social interaction as she hurried towards the double-doors at the front. She burst through them, and into the warm spring air, almost running headlong into the crowd that packed the sidewalk outside of the station.
She weaved through the crowd, ignoring the expletives that shot out here and there as she bumped into pedestrians. Losing control of her thoughts, the voices rushed back into her head, now a chorus of dozens of voices from all of the people packed around her. Miranda began to move faster, rushing through the crowd but not knowing where she was going. But after a time, she worked her way through the tight cords of the people and into a side street, where only a handful of pedestrians walked here and there. Needing to sit down, Miranda walked to a nearby tree, leaned her back against it, and slumped down until she was sitting on the ground.
After a few minutes, her thoughts calmed down once more. By now, she couldn’t escape the reality of what was happening to her. Her aim, her reflexes, and what seemed like the ability to read the thoughts of others, whether she wanted to or not, and all since she got out of the hospital after the attack last night.
She looked up, her eyes wide with realization when the obvious occurred to her, that whatever happened last night, whatever that man did when he bit her, it must be the reason why these strange things were happening to her. Reaching into her coat pocket, she slipped out a cigarette, lit it, and took a long drag. As she smoked, she noticed across the street the telltale neon lights of a bar. Taking another drag, she realized that a shot of whiskey was exactly what the doctor ordered. She stood up, composed herself, took another drag, and started off across to her destination.
When she reached the bar, Miranda took one last drag of her smoke, stomped it out under her brown boots, and headed in. The place was a standard dive, with a simple wood bar lined with stools with torn fabric at the seats, dim lighting, a handful of working-class patrons who all seemed to be staring off into space in the same way as they took thoughtless sips from their pints of domestic beer.
“Whiskey,” Miranda said, ignoring the ogling from the men around her as she took a seat.
The bartender, a middle-aged man who looked like he’d been on life’s short stick for some time, nodded and poured her a finger, which Miranda tossed back as soon as the bartender lifted the bottle away. Her mouth burning from the taste, she gestured for one more.
“Someone’s having a rough day.”
The voice deep, rich, and masculine. Miranda turned in the direction of it, towards a man who was sitting on a stool a few down from her.
“What the fuck do you care,” she said, not looking up at the man’s face, instead turning her gaze back down to the murky, brown liquid in her glass.
“Let’s just say I’m someone who’s especially interested in your safety.”
Miranda lifted her head, a puzzled expression on her face.
“I don’t know what the fuck that’s supposed to mean, but you-“
She turned her head midsentence to face the man, and stopped speaking as soon as she realized who it was- it was the man who saved her the night before.
Chapter 6
Miranda’s hand instinctively moved inside of her jacket, her hand wrapping around the textured surface of her pistol.
“Easy,” the man said, holding up his hand, the corner of his mouth lifting into a sly smile. “I don’t think a gun battle is the solution you’re looking for here.”
Taking a closer look at the man, Miranda realized that he was one of those rare specimens that only the world “beautiful” could describe. With sparkling blue eyes that contrasted his white, porcelain skin, an elegant, statuesque nose, and full red lips, all set amid perfectly-sculpted bone structure, he was easily one of the most attractive men that Miranda had ever seen. And looking down below his neck, she could see the outlines of bulging upper-body muscles as they strained against the simple black t-shirt that he wore under an expensive-looking black coat.
Miranda took her hand out of her jacket and put both palms on the rounded edge of the bar, then leaned towards the man.
“Who the fuck are you, and why are you talking to me?” she asked, her voice a low hiss.
A bemused smile on his face, he took a slow sip from his glass of red liquid, and turned back to her.
“I’m the exactly guy you want to be talking to right now.”
Miranda noted that his voice, like the man the other night, was spoken with a strange accent that she couldn’t quite place. Almost Russian, but not quite.
“Oh? And why is that?”
He took another slow sip.
“I’m going to make a few statements, and you tell me if they’re true or not. First, you were bitten by a man last night, right on your neck. Right there,” he said, pointing towards the now-healed patch of skin on Miranda’s neck where the bite once was. She flinched as his finger moved towards her.
“Yeah, easy enough on that one; you were there for that,” she said, her voice tinged with suspicion.
“OK, fair enough,” he said. “But now the wound is healed. Interesting, no?”
Miranda’s hand went to the healed skin, her f
ingertips touching where the bite marks were.
“Next is the really interesting business. You’ve had moments where you’ve been able to focus at levels you’ve never been able to before.”
Miranda thought about the perfect shots on the targets. Now she was listening.
“And strangest of all, perhaps, you can hear the thoughts of others, whether you want to or not.”
Miranda’s jaws clenched; she was now upset that this man seemed to know everything about her predicament, but was simply toying with her.
“Tell me what the fuck’s going on with me, then,” she said, anger slipping into her voice.
The man gestured towards the seat next to Miranda’s, his “may I?” expression laced with mild coyness. Miranda nodded, and the man took the seat next to her, the seat groaning with the weight of his tall, muscular frame. As soon as he was next to her, she was reminded again of just how attractive this stranger was. As he took another drink, her eyes drifted along the thick, oil-colored tresses of hair that hung loose around his face, curling up as they neared the jutting angles of his jaw. Peeling her eyes off of his profile, she turned back to her drink.
“First of all,” she said, “what’s your name?”
“I am Roman,” he said, the words flowing from his tongue as though on a wave of molasses, rich and thick.
“OK, Roman, tell me what’s going on.”
“A woman right to the point. Well, to put it bluntly, you came across something that you were not supposed to see.”
The door creaked, and Miranda looked back over her shoulder and saw a pair of well-dressed men walk into the bar, order, and sit down a few seats from Miranda and Roman.
“You’re a police officer. I’m sure you’ve been looking into the string of murders that have been going on throughout the city.”
Miranda’s eyes narrowed.
“What do you know about the murders?” she asked, her voice a low whisper.
“I know enough to tell you that it’s not something you want to be sticking your nose into. Unless you want to lose it.”
