No matter how much time she’d spent through the years with her old therapist working through her insecurities, no matter how irrational the thought, it was the one thing she couldn’t shake—this voice from her past reminding Corey that without her magical soul, she was worse than useless, she was disposable.
She looked at the older couple again. “They the ones who found the body?”
“Yeah.” Halloran flipped his notebook open, consulting his notes this time as they walked toward the witnesses. “Mr. and Mrs. Halbert. They live in Dorothy Cove. Walk the beach every morning. The Monitors said the husband and wife got close enough to see she was dead, but didn’t touch her. Confirmed the magical residue was plainly visible from where the ‘danes stood. Other than the Monitors’ footprints, the sand was smooth from the rain and tide last night. Nobody went near the body.” He flipped his notebook closed.
“I’m putting you and Young on this. Captain has me on something else at Rathmoore. Apparently the new schoolmaster is a friend of the Chief’s.”
“Another homicide at Rathmoore? Better you than me.”
Halloran laughed and shook his head. “Nah. Just a theft this time. No dead bodies and no ghosts. By the way, good job on your Rathmoore case. Not everybody could have handled that as well as you did.” He smiled and tapped his notebook as he glanced at the old couple. “You got this? The blackcoats are standing by.”
“Yeah. I’ll get their statement and wrap things up here.” Thinking of the blackcoats disturbed her. Knowing that someone could reach into the minds of these unsuspecting people and take their memories of this morning’s events away chilled her. It was so easy to strip a person of what made them… them.
Halloran ducked under the yellow tape and made to leave. “See you back at the station.”
Corey scanned the scene again, her gaze drifting past the low waves and out to sea. The dark water’s surface seemed calm, the gentle waves rolling softly to the shore. She wondered if the sea was aware—if the spirit of the ocean watched them from deep below as they claimed the body she had returned so violently to the shore.
Chapter Two
Corey clicked her seatbelt in place and stared through the windshield at the ocean. She thrust her key in the ignition with shaky hands and let the familiar sound of her Toyota 4Runner’s engine ground her. Seeing the dead girl had been unsettling. They looked so much alike. They had similar features, and as far as the wrists went, they even shared similar scars.
She turned the rear-view mirror toward her and, ignoring the old scars on her wrist that had faded to look like smooth burns, took in the contours of her own face. Her heritage, a mix of English, Irish, and Portuguese, made for a look that might be called interesting, and maybe pretty, but not beautiful. She analyzed her dark blue eyes and the way they curved down at the edges, her prominent cheekbones that no amount of makeup could soften, and her full lips. The dead girl’s mouth was different, smaller. But even in death, Corey could see the girl had an equally interesting face—striking, even.
And she was dead. Murdered. Discarded like something disposable. The idea that someone had looked at this girl and saw prey sent a cold shot down Corey’s spine. She steeled herself and stared into the mirror.
“Settle down, Proctor. Settle down.” She closed her eyes and allowed herself a deep relaxation breath—in and out. She imagined it washing through her, filling her lungs, cleansing her, relieving her of the dark thoughts from her childhood that threatened to spiral down and overtake her.
She’d been someone’s prey once, too.
Corey’s cell phone rang with a number she didn’t recognize. Grateful for the distraction, she tapped the phone and accepted the call. “Proctor.”
“Corey? It’s Bronwyn. Bronwyn Turnkey.” The woman’s voice shook as she cried into the phone. “Is it her? Is it Alicia?”
“Bronwyn?” The alarm in the woman’s voice made the hairs on Corey’s neck prickle. She pictured the petite, blonde receptionist from the front desk at the Prestigium Justice Center. She always wore flowery dresses and lipstick to match. It pained Corey to hear her so upset. “What’s wrong with Alicia?”
The woman sniffled. “She didn’t come home last night. She isn’t answering her phone. I realize it seems silly. She’s an adult, but… it’s not like her. She always calls. Always.” Bronwyn inhaled a stuttering breath. “I’ve been calling her all night. No answer. Then Inspector Ross said a girl was found this morning.”
Corey pictured the dead girl and exhaled as a burst of heat surged through her body and her chest tightened. She pumped her fists and worked to let go of the feeling of anxious helplessness that threatened to overwhelm her. She watched herself in the mirror. Settle down, Corey. Settle down.
She couldn’t expect the others not to talk about something as big as a body killed by magical means found by humans on the beach—most magical deaths took place within the protected realm of the witches and wizards. They had an entire department dedicated to managing magical crimes that took place in the mundane world, but even so, they weren’t all that common. Word would have spread through the station like wildfire. She wondered if Inspector Ross had shared the information about the body before or after learning that Bronwyn was worried about her daughter. Anyone who saw them together could see that the two women were very close.
She gripped the wheel tighter and brought the image of Alicia to mind. The tall girl filled her vision, with her fair skin and long blonde hair that she often wore in a thick braid. Corey had met her many times while Alicia worked as an intern in the file room at the MCU. Relief settled in her at the chance to share good news. “Bronwyn, it isn’t Alicia. I just saw the dead gir—the victim on the beach. It isn’t her. She has dark hair.” And she looks like me, Corey thought.
Bronwyn exhaled. “Oh, thank the stars. But Corey, she didn’t… Alicia didn’t come home. Didn’t call. She never does that. Never.” Bronwyn tried to muffle her sobs.
“Bronwyn, it’s okay.” Corey wondered what she would have done if she’d arrived on scene and recognized the dead girl. Part of her felt like she had. She’s just like me. She shook off the thought. “Hey, I’m heading back to the station now. I’ll stop by on my way in. Twenty minutes?”
“That’d be great. Thanks. See you.”
Corey looked in the mirror again, making hard eye contact with her reflection. “You get your shit together, Proctor. Don’t fall apart. You’re safe, and you’re here to catch the monster who did this. Get it together.” She held her gaze for a moment longer and then put the truck in gear and hit the gas.
The headquarters for the Magical Crimes Unit was located within the Prestigium’s Justice Center, a large office campus in a field at the north end of the island. The grounds were accessed through a portal hidden near the mouth of the tunnel at the start of the causeway. To outsiders, the property, which was surrounded by a twelve-foot wrought-iron fence, appeared to be a wooded bird sanctuary. Shrouded by spells that were maintained by the department’s Monitors, the buildings were invisible to humans.
The interior of the Justice Center Headquarters was bright and open with white walls and white marble floors, and the circular seal of the Office of Magical Law Enforcement—with its dragon clasping the flame of truth in one talon and the key of justice in the other—which was inlaid into the center of the atrium floor.
Bronwyn looked up when the door opened. When she realized it was Corey, she hurried over to her and grabbed Corey’s hands. “Oh, thank you so much for coming. I’m sorry to trouble you. It’s just… I can’t shake the feeling something’s wrong.” Bronwyn’s hazel eyes were puffy from crying, her black mascara smeared from rubbing her eyes.
“Hey, I get it, don’t worry about it. It’s no trouble.” Corey squeezed Bronwyn’s hand. “Why don’t you tell me what you know? I can put out an alert—have everyone be on the lookout for Alicia, okay?” Corey led Bronwyn to a chair in one of the many alcoves in the circular atrium and sat across the table
from her.
“Okay. Well, Alicia worked yesterday in the file room. Librarian Kimber cut her shift at three. It’s been slow this week with all you guys gone.” Bronwyn twisted a handkerchief as she spoke. “A friend of hers came to pick her up.”
“A friend? Do you know who it was?”
Bronwyn nodded. “Nick. They were going to the harbor to watch the storm.”
Corey opened her notebook, clicked her pen. “Who is this guy, Nick? What does he look like?”
Bronwyn shook her head. “No, Nikki. Nik. A girl. A classmate of Alicia’s at Rathmoore. They’ve been friends for a while now.”
“Do you know Nik’s last name?” Corey asked.
Bronwyn closed her eyes as if trying to recall. “I know she told me. I don’t remember. I think she lives down by the school, in the campus apartments.”
“Okay. Is there someone else you can call who might know? It would help.”
Bronwyn sat up and nodded. “I think so.”
“Good. Now, did Alicia say where they were going last night?
“Nikki’s boyfriend fixes boats. He’s a ‘dane.” She said it like her magical daughter dating a human was taboo.
“All right.” Corey was aware that some people cared about witches and wizard dating non-magical people, but she wasn’t one to judge.
“They were picking him up at a job over in the harbor. Going to a party after.”
Corey looked up from her notes. “Shag Harbor or Nahant?” she asked, naming the two harbors on opposite sides of the island.
“Nahant. Dorothy Cove Marina.”
“How did Nikki get here yesterday? If they were hanging with a ‘dane, did she have a car?”
“I didn’t see. I was busy at the desk when they left.”
“Okay, that’s fine.” Corey’s phone buzzed in her pocket.
She pulled it out and saw it was her partner calling. She placed a hand on Bronwyn’s. “Excuse me for one second.”
Corey stood and walked toward the wall for privacy. “Proctor.”
“Corey, it’s Ethan.” Inspector Ethan Young, always sounded so calm and upbeat. “The photos from the scene are back. I’m starting a file on Jane Doe.”
“Okay. I’m just across the way at the Justice Center. Be there in ten.” She ended the call and slid her phone back in her pocket as she sat down again with Bronwyn. “I have to run. Why don’t you call around and see if you can get me Nikki’s last name? And her boyfriend’s name? Then I’ll have something to go on. Okay?”
“Thank you so much, Corey. Thank you. I owe you big.” Bronwyn’s tears began to flow again.
Corey leaned over and squeezed her friend’s shoulder. “Try not to worry. We’ll find her. You know what? I bet she strolls in here the minute I leave with one hell of a story about how she lost her phone in the storm.”
Chapter Three
The office of the Magical Crimes Unit was home to twenty investigators. When the office was full, the air simply buzzed with activity. But with everyone away at the conference, things were operating at a slow pace.
The conference room was empty, and most of the offices were dark, but a few secretaries and a handful of inspectors still worked at their desks. A piece of paper floated off the desk of one of the secretaries and folded itself into an envelope in the air over her head. Then it hovered as the envelope addressed itself and then was sucked into a tiny vortex with a whoomp sound. Other envelopes whoomped into existence, arriving from who knows where, and they sailed along the ceiling until they landed in the inbox on the recipient’s desk.
Corey stepped into her cubicle and dropped to her chair. A new case folder had been placed on her keyboard. A yellow sticky note in Young’s neat cursive read: Jane Doe. She moved the folder aside and tapped her keyboard, waking up her machine.
She filed an alert report for Alicia Turnkey, making a note that she was Bronwyn’s daughter and worked as an intern here at headquarters. Everyone would see that and take note. They all knew Alicia. She added the physical details Bronwyn had given her of Alicia’s clothes and turned her attention back to the case file her partner had left for her. She opened the folder and stood, spreading the eight-by-ten glossy photos of Jane Doe across her desk.
From a distance, the pictures looked like they were smeared with blotches of neon paint. But it was just the unmistakable residue of magic that glowed pink, green, and indigo wherever it clung to the body. It was evident around the dead girl’s wrists, ankles, and mouth.
The first few pictures were of the girl from different angles while she was still buried in the sand. Her body lay on its left side with her right arm exposed and arched gently over her head. She looked as if she were swimming freestyle, caught mid-stroke. Her face was forward, her tilted gray eyes appeared to be looking at the sand only inches from her freckled nose. Curly brown hair pooled over her left shoulder; the ends trapped under the smooth sand.
A close-up shot revealed pale sand in the girl’s eyebrows and lining the lids of both eyes like salt on the rim of a cocktail glass. Her corneas were cloudy and the whites of her eyes speckled with the tiny explosions of red Dr. Harwing had pointed out as proof that she had struggled to breathe before she died. A strand of yellow-green seaweed wound through her hair and behind her right ear.
A sense of unreality washed over Corey at the physical similarities the two of them shared. She felt her vision going dark as a strange and unseen threat loomed.
I’m not in danger, she thought to herself. She realized she was rubbing the scars on her wrists and stopped, opting instead to clench her hands into fists and squeeze, a coping technique she’d learned from one of her first shrinks years ago when she was a child.
She’d been taught many different coping mechanisms through the years, but this was her go-to. Before long, the veil of darkness pulled back. She thought about calling her psychologist, and just as quickly dismissed it. She was fine.
“Settle down, Proctor,” she whispered as she gathered up the photos and shoved them back into the folder. She needed to open a case online and log everything from the scene into the Magical Crimes Directory. She pulled out her notebook and got to work on the administrative details of the Jane Doe, hoping the dry facts would push the weird threatening feelings aside.
“We got a match.” Young slid into his chair on the other side of the cubicle he and Corey shared. “And lunch.”
“Hmm?” Corey spun her chair to face him. His sunny spiked hair and blue eyes pulled Corey from her thoughts.
“Jane Doe. Magical scan got a hit.” Young handed Corey a one-page computer printout and a white paper bag from a local deli.
Corey breathed in the familiar scent wafting from the bag. “Lobster roll? Nice. I’m starving.” She unwrapped the sandwich, took a huge bite, and scanned the printout. “A reprimand report? Jane Doe’s got a record?”
Young finished chewing and leaned back in his chair. He listed the details. “Her name is Wanika Soto. Twenty-one years old. I got an address on Broad Street, in one of the on-campus apartments over at Rathmoore. She’s enrolled as a student there. She got picked up once, a year ago. Minor Abuse of Magic. She took one of her professor’s wands and transported several herds of wild boar into the school during finals week.”
“Guess she wasn’t ready to take her tests.” Corey looked up from the report. “What’s with the drug charge with the local police?”
Young nodded. “Her boyfriend back then was a ‘dane. Drug dealer. Kind of a low-life. She got busted with him. He was driving under the influence, had a few bags of pills on him, intent to sell. Anyway, it was her first time in trouble with the ‘danes. She took a plea. Got probation. She hasn’t been picked up on anything since. I checked up on the other people in the car when our girl was arrested. Two guys and another girl. Nothing on two of them, but her boyfriend was a real dirtbag.” He handed Corey a second report, this one a rap sheet from the human police outlining the adventures of one Damien Cooper, age twenty-two.
Young shrugged. “Nothing yet. This was a year ago. Just gathering facts, right?”
Corey nodded. “Right. I’m going to head over to her apartment, see what I can find there. You reach out to Dr. Harwing. Something tells me she’d like to know the name of the girl.”
“Ok.” Young turned back toward his desk. “And I’ll track down her parents. See if we can get someone to do a notify.”
“Sounds good.” Once Young was back to work and no longer paying attention to her, Corey pulled the pictures out of the folder again and spread them on her desk. She stared at the close-up of the girl’s face and whispered, “Wanika Soto. Wanika Soto. Wanika Soto.” Each time she said the girl’s name, she felt a tiny sliver of space grow between herself and the images.
This girl is not you, Corey, she told herself. She looks kind of like you, that’s all. She pumped her fists as she repeated the girl’s name over and over until it was just a bunch of syllables, meaningless and all running together. A chant. But she couldn’t quiet the voice inside her head that kept reminding her this girl had been someone’s prey, used and then tossed aside like garbage.
Corey’s mind sailed back in time to her childhood, to hidden moments when she had been someone’s prey.
She was a little girl again, sitting on the curb on Main Street, watching the Samhain parade go by.
The memory jumped and now she was watching as one of the witches on the parade float waved at her, tossed candy in her direction. She got up to collect the candy just as another piece was dropped a few yards ahead of her.
She turned to look at her mother, she wasn’t that far away… as she continued to follow the parade float for a little while longer. The candies the witch was throwing were her favorite. When the parade float reached the intersection, strange, rough hands scooped Corey up and tossed her into the back of a vehicle.
Death Comes Ashore Page 2