by Rhys Ford
Spencer’s fingers brushed his weapon’s grip; then the figure at the end of the alley called out softly, “Ricci?”
His partner’s words were curdled and thick, swollen with tequila and whatever else she had on her breath. Surprisingly, Johnson was fairly steady with her footing, catching herself when she lurched forward, almost stumbling over a water run-off trough in the pavement. A few jerking steps brought her to the ring of dim light coming from a fixture over one of the building’s loading bay doors, and she stopped, caught in its glow as if imprisoned by its brightness.
“Hey, Chang get a hold of you finally?” Something was off with Johnson, but Spencer didn’t want to startle the woman. “Because you were starting to worry me there.”
She shouldn’t have been there. Not by a long shot. Even as casual as their department tended to dress, Johnson passed into unkempt. She now looked insane, or maybe even in a fit of something dark, a pair of dull scissors had been taken to her hair. Long tufts stuck out around near bald patches, an uneven page boy hugging the slope of her round head. A few dark patches of blood speckled the top of her right ear, and Spencer couldn’t swear to it, but it seemed to be cut, a not-so-neat notch taken off of its tip. Either the swollen plump of her bottom lip slurred her speech or she’d upped her alcohol intake, because the garbled mess of words she threw out at him was impossible to understand.
Stepping closer to his partner didn’t raise his opinion. Johnson reeked, a salad toss of unwashed skin and booze. This wasn’t the cop he’d been handed when SFPD first pinned an inspector’s star on him, and she sure as hell wasn’t the woman he’d shared desk space with. Her clothes were rumpled and grimy, her button-up shirt splattered with something unidentifiable. The charcoal linen pants she’d been in the last time he’d seen her were torn at the seams, parting when she shifted back and forth, exposing her blue-veined pale skin. Mottling dappled Johnson’s neck and forearms; her sleeves roughly pulled up to her elbows and thick with something wet and foul-smelling.
“You’re looking rough, Johnson.” Circling around to her right, Spencer continued to talk softly, keeping an arm’s length between them. “Someone call you to come down here? About Foster?”
Bringing up Foster was a gamble. But unless she knew about Foster’s remains being scraped and dissected for clues on how he’d died and been dumped in the water, there was no other reason for Johnson to be there. Someone at the MEs’ office had to have called her, maybe as soon as Carter gave a tentative ID, and Johnson had gone off the deep end, straight into the bottom of a very long bottle.
“Foster was a fucking idiot,” she spat, long dribbles of spittle flicking out of her mouth. Several caught on her lip, dangling down and sticking to her pointed chin. “He wasn’t strong enough. Not hungry enough. A waste of time. Even dead, he’s causing problems.”
So she knew Foster was dead. That answered one of Spencer’s questions, but not the most pressing one. How the hell was he going to get Johnson in for help without her rabbiting?
Another step and he was in line with her shoulder, his eyes flicking down to her clenched hand when she twisted around at the waist to stare at him. Crazy burned through any sanity she might have had left, her face wild and harsh where the dim light strained to touch it. Her hand moved, shifting behind her, and Spencer’s stomach dropped when he spotted the pitted chef’s knife she held in her fist, the flat of the blade pressed against her thigh.
“I’m going to ask if you can drop the knife, partner.” His weapon felt solid beneath his hand, but Spencer didn’t want to draw the gun free from its holster. He needed to find a way to de-escalate Johnson’s twitchiness. “Listen to me. You need some help. It’s been rough on you these past months, and hearing about Foster was probably a shock—”
“Wasn’t a shock,” she mumbled, shaking her head. The tufts bobbed about, an uneven frenetic fringe dancing around on her scalp. “He needed to go. He wasn’t good enough.”
“Good enough for—?” Spencer began. Then his partner’s eyes narrowed, and the night turned.
Johnson lunged, sweeping the knife up from her hip. The angle was poor, easily defended, but Spencer didn’t have enough time to pull his weapon, hating to draw down on another cop. Ducking down, he twisted away, protecting his already injured side. A knot clenched at the base of his ribs, stitching a burning line down toward his hip. A dip in the ground—probably the same one Johnson tripped over—snagged the toe of his shoe, throwing him further off balance. Rough grit scraped at his fingertips, his hand skimming the ground while he righted himself, stumbling back a few steps to get away from Johnson’s wild swings.
“Listen to me,” Spencer warned. “You don’t want to do this. Put the knife down and we can walk out of this. I don’t know what’s going on with you. I don’t think you do either, but we can work this out.”
“Nothing to work out.” Her smile sent her jaw into a crooked angle, and Johnson drew the knife up again, crouching slightly. “It’d be better if you just came with me, but that’s not like you, right? Always have to push into things. Stubborn and a bit of a prick. Came in, swaggering like you were hot shit, but everyone knows you fucked up down in L.A., and the only reason you’re up here is because you’ve got friends covering your ass. No one’s covering your ass now, Ricci. Just you and me.”
“I don’t want to shoot you.” Resigned, Spencer edged back, keeping Johnson in front of him. His back was to the street, not a position he liked, especially if someone had come with her, but there was no helping it. She was spoiling for a fight, and he could only pray he’d get a shot into her knee to disable her. “Last chance. Put the knife down and turn around with your hands on your head. Don’t make this harder than it has to be.”
“You think you can take me?” She brandished the knife at him again.
“You’re the one who brought a knife to a gunfight.” He drew his weapon, angling his shoulders as much as he could to stay aware of the street behind him. “Let it go. Drop it and I can call Chang. He can help you. The department will take care of you.”
“Fucking department never gave a shit about me,” Johnson took a wobbling step closer to him, flecking spit out of her snarling mouth. “You’re in the Loser Tank. Right with the rest of us. Or didn’t they tell you that? Where they shove all the cops too useless to do anything but scrape up evidence for other cops to solve the cases and get the glory. How many of our collars we’ve had to share, huh? You do that down in SoCal? Split up everything like you’re sitting at Grandma’s table and the cousins have come to dinner? I’m tired of eating half a pork chop, asshole, and you… you’re the one who’s going to get me off the kiddie table and sitting up with the people eating the real meal.”
“You’re talking shit, kid. No one’s taken credit for our cases but us.”
“Yeah, go back to the reports. See who signs off on them. Betcha you find Sancho or one of the other senior stars with their grubby hands all over the arresting officers' line.” She shuffled forward another few inches, dropping the knife down with her arm slack and loose. “Review time and everyone will talk about how a great team player you are but not quite good enough to move up. Welcome to the fucking hamster wheel, Spencer… But, oh wait, we’ve got other plans for you. Guess Sancho is going to have to find another bitch to fetch him his wins.”
She was quick, much faster than he’d anticipated, especially considering she was more than a few sheets to the wind. The knife whistled through the air, coming within a hair of his face, and Spencer jerked back, amazed at how quickly Johnson covered the space between them. He should have had time, his mind argued as he backpedaled, striking the corner of the building with his shoulder. But Johnson was hot on his tail, raising her weapon for another slashing attack.
Either he wasn’t watching the blade enough, or maybe the shadows bent the light, but either way, the pitted knife found his arm, slicing through the meat of his bicep. Johnson jerked, digging the tip down into his skin. A trickle of blood slid do
wn the metal, turning into a fast-flowing rivulet when she pulled the knife free.
Spencer took his shot.
Up close, there was no chance he’d miss.
And he didn’t, but Johnson didn’t flinch.
The hole in her ribs was small, but it was big enough to have done some damage. Black powder burns stippled across her shirt, a point-blank shot with a recoil hard enough to pull Spencer’s hand up, but Johnson kept coming.
There was no blood.
There was no pain. Or at least, no reaction from Johnson other than a furious scream of rage and another flash of the blade coming down on Spencer’s shoulder.
This time, it went in deep. Digging down until it hit bone, the knife caught on something halfway in, and Spencer staggered back, fighting to stay conscious in the tide of pain drowning him. The light on the building wall dimmed, or maybe it simply drowned in the blood pouring out of Spencer’s wound because everything seemed to go red.
The irony of being killed across the street from the man who’d fought so hard to heal him wasn’t lost on Spencer.
He just didn’t have it in him to laugh.
The ground caught him, his knees slamming into the cement; then a roll of his shoulder placed him on his back, staring up at the milky dark blue night with its frosting of gray clouds. The heavy metallic scent of the city’s fog was beginning to carry through the breeze, or perhaps it was his own blood pouring from the cut in his shoulder Spencer smelled. Either way, it clung to his nose, puncturing his breath with stinging needles he could feel all the way down to his lungs.
Spencer aimed again, centering on Johnson’s chest. Her shirt fit too tight to her body for there to be a vest beneath it, but the first shot did nothing. On his back, bleeding and desperate, Spencer knew he had to stop her before she killed him. Squeezing down on the trigger, he braced himself for the boom of his gun going off and the death of a woman he’d worked cases with.
The report echoed, spreading out in rippling waves, and remorse flooded through Spencer when Johnson’s body jerked, the bullet striking the middle of her chest. Flailing back, she dropped the knife, a petulant scream tearing from her throat, and she clawed at the wound, ripping at the torn fabric.
Dizzy from pain, Spencer tried to get up, determined to reach Johnson to lend her help or, worse yet, stay with her so she did not pass alone. The agony of moving his shoulder nearly drove him back down to his knees. Pushing up off the ground, he was shocked to hear the clatter of a blade being picked up from the ground. When he looked up, Johnson stood nearly on top of him, the old knife once again clenched in her hand.
Her chest was blown through, the bullet he’d fired seconds ago tearing through her flesh, but nothing seeped from the hole. Instead, she’d recovered her footing and once again descended on Spencer to finish what she’d started.
He gasped, astonished at her lack of response. Pulling back, Spencer checked his weapon quickly, unable to believe what he was seeing. “What the hell?”
Speechless, he fired again, punching a bullet through her left arm. But Johnson kept coming, advancing on him with maniacal glee. Emptying his weapon into his partner did little to slow her down, mostly a pause with the impact of each shot, but she never wavered, holding the knife out while she closed the distance between them.
“Don’t worry. This is only going to hurt for a little bit,” Johnson cackled, her fetid breath ripe with a foulness Spencer choked on. “You’re exactly what we need.”
His vision was beginning to waver, but Spencer scanned the area for something to grab to hold Johnson off. Someone had to have heard the gunshots. Maybe even someone lingering at the MEs’ building, waiting for a ride or catching one last cigarette before driving home after a long day? He was getting dizzier, stumbling over nothing, and Johnson seemed to delight in the chase, keeping just out of Spencer’s reach but taunting him with distracting lunges meant to throw him off balance. He was going to have to get the blade away from her, but Spencer was damned if he thought it was going to do much more than piss her off.
“I don’t know what happened to you, but you need help,” he grunted, dropping his weapon to grab at his throbbing shoulder. “Shit, I need some help.”
He hit a section of chain link fence separating one building from the next, its harsh rattle much like the last breath of a dying man. A prickling set into his hand, blood dripping from his cramping fingers, and Spencer braced himself for Johnson’s next attack, prepared to wrestle the blade away from her as soon as she drew near enough. Planting his feet, Spencer struggled to keep his balance, unable to stop himself from weaving forward. The ground seemed to creep closer, and he looked down briefly, only to reassure himself he was still standing when his partner pounced.
Something white and fluffy struck Johnson in the throat. It came from behind him, shaking the fence as it went over. Its scream raked up primal fears from the back of Spencer’s mind, long-buried genetic urges telling him he needed to flee, but he was frozen in place, pinned by something he couldn’t name.
Johnson flew back, landing several feet away from where Spencer stood. She seemed dazed, the knife flung from her hand to rest against the building, its shape nearly buried in the shadows. Prowling near her feet, an enormous long-haired white cat kept his oddly dark eyes on Spencer, as if waiting for him to rush in.
“It’s a fucking cat,” he choked out, trying to catch his breath around the waves of pain coming from his bleeding shoulder. “Hold on. I’ll…”
The air around the feline shimmered, its body wrapped around smoky ribbons seemingly coming from under its fur. Twisting about, the cat fell into a convulsion, seizing up, then arching, working around Johnson’s feet and legs in a furious, graceless dance. Its skin split open, white fur peeling off in small chunks, the wind grabbing at the fluff and carrying it off, mingling with the rising fog.
Then the cat simply… unfolded, and Carter stood in its place.
His nearly white hair was loose, flowing down to his shoulders, and the cat’s starless night eyes blinked at Spencer from Carter’s face. Although dressed in a pair of jeans and a faded red T-shirt, the man might as well have been wearing armor for as untouchable as he looked. Gone was the controlled, rigid doctor, and in his place stood a man scented with the sting of a razor and the icy fire of a thousand stars. Spencer didn’t know what he’d been thinking to ever believe Carter was cold. The man burned. As icy to look at, the frost in his lithe form and sculpted features promised a lingering, painful heat guaranteed to pare off flesh if pressed too long.
“He is ours!” Johnson screamed, scrambling to her feet. She grabbed at the knife, working her fingers around its hilt, then lunged with a wild screech. “You can’t have—”
Leaning against the fence, Spencer could only watch as Carter pivoted, standing loose-limbed and deadly as Johnson leaped toward him. The knife stabbed up, awkwardly angled but still treacherous. Carter didn’t react—or at least not in fear. Instead, he opened his mouth and his teeth flowed downward, elongated canines stretching impossibly out, his snarl bristling with menace.
He caught Johnson with his canines, ripping at her throat before his hands closed on her shoulders. It was savage, a brutal tearing of flesh followed by the crackling pop of bones being broken, pulverized beneath an incredible force. But there was only Carter, standing weaponless, but without a doubt, the most dangerous of them.
Now the blood poured from Johnson, a torrent of sticky dark red syrup oozing from her wounds. Carter bit down again, ripping and twisting, forcing the cop to surrender. She fought her death, fists flailing, scoring hits on the side of his head and his torso, but Carter was relentless, pulling back from his attacks with mouthfuls of flesh, torn skin falling in a macabre confetti scatter from Johnson’s wounds.
Carter’s hands loosened, and he let Johnson finally fall free of his hold. At some point, she’d stopped fighting him, but Spencer hadn’t seen exactly when she’d gone slack. His partner fell from Carter’s—from the cre
ature’s— embrace, a broken china doll dashed to the ground, limbs flung out at impossible angles, and her eyes dimmed, staring up at the empty sky.
Gripping his wound to staunch the bleeding as much as he could, Spencer stumbled closer, dumbstruck at what he’d just seen. Staring down at his partner, there was no doubt in his mind she was dead. Her throat lay in frilled shreds, and her body was sprawled in a stillness he immediately knew marked a corpse.
Pulling his gaze from the woman crumpled at his feet, he stared up at Carter and growled, “What the fucking hell are you?”
Xian smirked, wiping drying flecks of blood from his face with the back of his hand, then said, “I told you I was a demon.”
About Rhys Ford
RHYS FORD is an award-winning author with several long-running LGBT+ mystery, thriller, paranormal, and urban fantasy series and is a two-time LAMBDA finalist with her Murder and Mayhem novels. She is also a 2017 Gold and Silver Medal winner in the Florida Authors and Publishers President’s Book Awards for her novels Ink and Shadows and Hanging the Stars. She is published by Rogue Firebird Press, Dreamspinner Press and DSP Publications.
She’s also quite skeptical about bios without a dash of something personal and really, who doesn’t mention their cats, dog and cars in a bio? She shares the house with Harley, a grey tuxedo with a flower on her face, Badger, a disgruntled alley cat who isn’t sure living inside is a step up the social ladder as well as a ginger cairn terrorist named Gus. Rhys is also enslaved to the upkeep a 1979 Pontiac Firebird and enjoys murdering make-believe people.
Rhys can be found at the following locations:
Blog: www.rhysford.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/rhys.ford.author
Facebook Group: Coffee, Cats, and Murder: https://www.facebook.com/groups/635660536617002/
Twitter: @Rhys_Ford
Rhys Ford, author of LGBT+ mystery, thriller, paranormal, and urban fantasy series. https://www.amazon.com/Rhys-Ford/e/B005UTGKSW
