Destiny Strikes

by Flowers-Lee, Theresa

  Uneasy, he adjusted the utility belt tools like his gun and pepper spray housed at his waist. With one hand resting on the cold metal, he squared his shoulders, took a bracing breath of fresh air, and stepped inside.

  “Sir, I’m here . . .?” he began, lowering his voice soon as he walked into the cold, sterile room. Industrial ammonia opened his sinuses.

  Being here spooked the shit out him.

  Spotting the captain, he saw the older man at the last body-prep stations with his arms crossed.

  Travis stepped further in the room. His eyes drawn to squared chrome doors stacked four high on top of each other, containing his version of refrigerated coffins. Near the last steel bed, a tray of neatly organized tools made the tiny hairs on the back of his neck rise.

  “Sir, it sounded like this was an emergency,” he stated, eager to find out why he’d been brought here of all places. In his opinion, this wasn’t a place any sane person wanted to linger.

  Lifting his eyes away from the table, Travis searched the man before him for any clue to his current mood. In the morbid lighting, Captain Harris furrowed his fingers through the salt-and-pepper wavy mane. For many men in their sixties, Travis knew the captain counted it as a blessing to have that much hair left on his head.

  With a sigh, Captain Harris jerked his head in the direction of the dreaded wall Travis passed on the way in. Travis followed behind him, coming to a stop in front of cold locker number twenty.

  “Travis,” the captain began with a gruff voice. He paused, opened his mouth briefly, then shut it, his thinned lips compressing for several seconds.

  With one hand wrapped around the nape of his neck, Captain Harris tapped the fingers of his other on his hip, before raising stark eyes to Travis. “Before I show you this, I want you to understand.” He wavered yet again. “Why am I asking you to understand when I don’t is beyond me.” Clearly unsettled, he coughed into his fist. “I’ve seen some pretty weird things in my lifetime, Travis. Then again, this takes the cake. It makes about as much sense as it does for you to be a suspect, and it’s still unclear if it was an elaborate scheme she planned with that message, but everything pointed to a deeper relationship.”

  “Don’t worry about it, Captain. Belief in my innocence is enough until we find the real culprit. And yet, none of that explains why we’re in a morgue, or why you’re discussing this case with me any more than you already have.”

  A decisive wrench of the captain’s wrist turned a latch reminding Travis of a door handle used on 50’s model iceboxes. The catch-release echoed loudly within the silent room. Stepping away as the door swung open, the captain pulled the door wider until it rested against the close one beside it. The blast of frigid air added another layer of cold to an already-morbid room.

  A whisper of disquiet worried Travis as his superior stepped to the head of the table and drew on the handle of thin metal until the covered body was clear of its cubical.

  “During the ME’s post-mortem examination and documentation recording the state of the body, he confirmed the extensive damage and external bruising occurred ante mortem.” the Captain’s voice hardened, tinged with disbelief. “And yet, here’s where it gets strange, whoever killed her was brutal and caused a lot of damage, but the doc concluded that none of the injuries she sustained were the cause of death.”

  Travis shifted, then dropped his hands to his weapon belt, conspicuously gripping the solid weight.

  “Doc called me in over an hour ago,” the captain continued. “He’d double-checked and triple-checked his findings. When I got here, the man was beside himself.” The captain’s head bent, his thick eyebrows shielding his eyelids. “It was only through an act of the Almighty, that he believed me when I told him he needed to keep this out of his report.”

  Travis expected the removal of the white sheets to be a bit more dramatic, considering the captain’s weird behavior so far, yet the action was as gentle as the woman under the cloth had been. Travis swallowed hard.

  Pale as chalk, Barbara’s face was almost unrecognizable due to swelling and different-sized jagged gashes that marked her complexion. Dark blue-and-black discolored lacerations denoted signs of ripped and torn abrasions. Someone’s rage had shredded her flesh, not a weapon. His gaze fell to the markings marring her chest cavity. The pale form, silenced by death, devoid of all traces of the spirited female he’d seen almost a day and a half ago. The sight rattled him. His frustration over Barbara’s sudden interest in him seemed trivial now, compared to what she had faced mere hours later. That thought ate at his soul.

  “Captain, I’m not new to death and have seen my share before now, but I’m not seeing why you brought me here?”

  The respect and high regard Travis held for his superior intensified when the captain placed his hand gently on Barbara’s forehead. His eyes closed fleetingly before his thumb and forefinger settled on her sealed lids.

  “I’m going to ask you to take off the shades. I saw you take your shades off after you got into your car the night we found Barbara’s body. It’s not the first time I’ve seen your eyes, but the rarity leads me to believe there’s more to the story.”

  Travis found it a strange request, but there weren’t many secrets between them. He removed his dark glasses. The captain pulled back the dead tissue covering her eyes.

  Wide-eyed and staring at the body like he had never seen one before, he asked, astonished, “How in the hell did that happen?”

  One pupil was an exact match to his, an intense violet color. The other, a gray as hazy as storm clouds over the ocean.

  “That, my young friend, is what I’d like to know.” The captain turned, facing Travis.

  Travis had no answers. There were no medical record documenting the cause of his anomalies or how he’d receive the intense shade of violet.

  “Travis, I’ve known this woman since she was a wee toddler. I know we’ve never talked about this, and your secrets are safe with me, but when it comes to bizarre things like sudden changes in eye color, we’ve got a bigger problem on our hands than just a murder investigation.”

  CHAPTER 13

  Fallon lazed in one of the deck chairs situated on the back porch.

  The sounds of birds chirping and neighboring farm animals were not sounds of the city, but noises she’d grown accustomed to. The longer she stayed here, the more she found herself enjoying the tranquility and sense of peace it brought. Another hedonist aspect she’d come to appreciate with her newfound freedom was her penchant for nudity. The feel of early-morning sun stoking her skin without the fear of unwanted attention: heavenly.

  In a good mood and relaxed position, she let the answering machine pick up when the phone rang. A familiar voice filled the house and reached her outside.

  “Hey, sis, I don’t know what happened last night, but give me a call when you get this.” A few seconds passed before Michael added, “All right, if you’re not there, I guess I’ll talk to you later. Love you.”

  Fallon was tempted to get up when a second long pause followed without her hearing the beep.

  “Damn, that’s right.” She groaned. “I needed to call Michael.”

  Thinking over the prior evening, the only thing she truly remembered about last night was a deep-seated need to feel Earth’s currents under her feet. She remembered stripping. What happened afterward was a total blank.

  She’d found herself on the couch this morning with a blanket wrapped round her body. How she had gotten away from the storm’s grip and into the house remained a mystery. It was ludicrous to think of any human touching her unawares without receiving a low-level distribution of her gift. Deadly results were always instantaneous for anyone besides her family who touched her when she was incapacitated.

  Pushing the troubling topic of family to the back of her mind, she wondered what to do with hersel
f. With her need to keep her head down, her trips into town had so far been unsuccessful. A few people from the town had tried to engage her, but she ignored them. She hadn’t been sent here to make friends. Therefore, her only friends had become the weeks of loneliness, quiet, and the soothing sounds of nature.

  With every depressing thought ruining what had started out as a wonderful day, she found it a welcome distraction to see her first real chipmunk pause for a stray acorn that escaped the landscaper’s attention. The tiny head on its short squat body brought an unbidden smile. A shade browner than the rest of its body ran the length of its head, down the middle of its back, to its fluffy tail.

  The chipmunk’s antics of pause and step, to go for the acorn or let the human he sensed have it, evoked a memory of what had to be a dream. She closed her eyes as she tried bringing brief flashes of the officer from a few nights ago closer to her mind’s eye. Down the rabbit hole into sleep, she traveled to find him. When she did, he filtered in and out of her sight as he moved forward slowly. Then, a startling burst of speed carried him to her within a blink. His large hands caressed her skin, and every erogenous zone exploded to life.

  She hadn’t realized she’d closed her eyes until someone seized her then shook her, violently. A breath she wasn't aware of holding released as she stared into the face of a man who wasn’t Travis. His warrior build took him over seven feet and he was quite handsome with dark shoulder-length hair.

  “I’ll not let this man you think of disrupt your course,” he roared. “My arrow will always remain true.” His glowing eyes and upturned lip indicated a scorn she wondered how she deserved. The contemptuous voice added to her confusion. “Despite your puny attempts to control what you cannot, you will judge the world as I have. However, you may judge what I cannot: The fate of heaven’s punishment granted my offspring. Not I. My people will die without aid. You will fulfill the prophecy.”

  Her gaze darted around, anywhere but the stranger’s face. Frantic, she couldn’t pinpoint a way of escape.

  “Who the hell are you? And why are you fucking with me?” She tried to loosen his grasp on her arms with a hard jerk.

  In answer, thunder rumbled a distance away and darkening clouds blotted out any lingering signs of what had started as a beautiful, sunny day. Lightning lit the sky around her, and one thin vein, so bright the purple appeared blue, struck her sensitized, naked body. Weightlessly, she floated up from the lounger into the air with the force of her need and the power coursing through her veins. Rain drenched her skin in layers of fire and ice. As close to orgasm as she’d ever get, she made the mistake of looking down.

  Her whole body quivered over the unrelenting temptation of destroying everything around her. Fighting off the strong impulse robbed her of breath. Thankfully, after long minutes of deep breaths, she came to her senses and denied the presence within her the release it wanted.

  “I won’t do it. I won’t do it,” she chanted, taking several deeper breaths.

  The storm calmed. Stars winked out from behind clouds that dissipated as quickly as cotton candy melted on the tongue, and the pounding rain became a light sprinkle.

  Fallon landed softly on wet grass and wrapped her arms around her shivering body, which had nothing to do with being cold.

  Whomp. Whomp.

  An unfamiliar weight settled onto her back. Stretching her arms overhead, the heaviness there wouldn’t ease, especially in her shoulder blades. In the middle of reaching behind her to rub the sore spot, her hand connected with downy softness. She froze then moved again. It wasn’t skin. She twisted this way and that for a better view. Wings. She had fucking wings! They spread across her flesh as soft as any cashmere scarf as she slid them forward. Black gossamer feathers ruffled, the faint breeze lifting them.

  Fully charged electricity was the least of her issues. She’d gained freaking huge extensions to her body, and she never needed her family more. Yet, involving them would be like life before she left Seattle: more babysitting she didn’t want to put them through.

  She could imagine that call. “Hi, Michael, I’m staying out of trouble because I’m fighting an inner demon, literally. Oh, and before I go, you should really check out my new wings.”

  Yeah, good times.

  CHAPTER 14

  “In another couple of days, Mrs. Richardson, hundreds of atmospheric researchers are going to be camped everywhere.”

  Dennis’s companion listened intently to the conversation coming from the table behind him. She raised her slim fingers and brought them together in a duck's beak fashion, ending their earlier discussion quite effectively.

  He stiffened at the nonverbal command. “Hey, you found me, not the other way around.”

  Yes, since learning what line he belonged to, he’d toughened up. However, looking into her confident gaze and the malevolence lurking from the shadows of the beautiful shade of intense violet, he wisely closed his lips.

  The woman voicing her exuberance over the subject caught the attention of many of the small restaurant’s patrons. A server had even lingered at their table to listen. However, the facts remained the same. The woman who’d introduced herself as Anbesi was here to see him.

  “If you wanted to listen to someone talk about the weather, why are we here? Because, people only do that when they’re bored, and I can take a hint.” Dennis spoke under his breath to avoid causing a scene.

  She rolled her eyes and continued to listen to the conversation behind them.

  “I mean, can you believe it? Weather like this usually occurs in places like Florida, but never in North Carolina. I’ve witnessed a similar pattern of lightning in regional storms in Africa. We had our theories, but this could be another hotbed. It’s a truly amazing phenomenon, actually studying a place where lightning rises from the ground on a regular basis. This kind of breakthrough could decode one of the top mystery’s the earth holds.”

  Just when Dennis believed the remainder of his evening would be listening to other people talk, Anbesi rose from her seat. She nodded in the direction of the exit. His pride stung. The single most interesting thing about this dinner was the steak. It would have been the woman if she had paid any attention to him.

  On the way out, he heard the comments following him.

  “How the hell did he pull that off?”

  “I’ve never seen her before. Maybe she’s from outta town and they hooked up on one of those dating sites. Poor woman.”

  “Hope he’s not taking her back to his momma’s place.”

  Dennis looked to the sky when the woman with him pulled out her cell phone and started talking in a hushed tone. He pricked his ears and caught the beginning of her conversation.

  “I don’t know who he’s working with, but from what I’ve just heard it shouldn’t be too much longer.” The rest faded into the breeze as she moved away to prevent him from overhearing her conversation.

  There was a heavy mist over the darkened parking lot. Dennis slowed while she maintained a quick pace straight to her vehicle. The people inside were right. No one like her would give a man like him, one who’d spent most of his life at home protecting his mother, the time of day. Other than his three years at the community college, there weren’t many accolades Dennis could ascribe to his life.

  Then Raphael had found him and taught him exactly who and what he was. The news went to his head, a little. Tonight put him back in his comfort zone. “The fuckup, the failure, and the one everyone felt sorry for, instead of respected,” he whispered. He might be depressed, but it wasn’t a quality he wanted to advertise.

  He glanced up when her voice rose in anger. “But we know the Guardian can’t interfere. Don’t worry. I’ll find out what’s going on here.” When she hung up, she appeared so deep within her thoughts he assumed she’d forgotten him.

  He cleared his throat a couple of
times before saying, “You told me when we met earlier that Rafael sent you. So, what’s your deal? Why do you need me to find people with traits like ours, and kill them?”

  She tilted her head and long black locks slid over her shoulder before her sensual lips pulled back over her perfectly white teeth. “Because only the descendants of the Seven Fallen can usher in the change this world needs. Babe, you have yet to see what you can do.”

  CHAPTER 15

  “Ma’am, I don’t know what your great-great-great, and so on, grandmother's bible had to do with your daughter’s death four years ago,” Travis said with frustration, rubbing his forehead.

  Mrs. Baxter’s snort clearly indicated his ignorance, the scowl marring her seventy-two-year-old features. “Now listen here, young man, you’re the one that called me asking to come over at six in the evening to talk about my baby’s death.”

  She did have a point. He had driven hell-for-leather for more hours than he could count to reach the elegant condominium off Caswell Beach. He’d been lucky to find her so quickly at one of her many vacation spots.

  After leaving the morgue, he’d spent hours scouring over every website, obituary, and news article that hinted at mysterious deaths, and in particular, those with bi-colored eyes. He stopped at a newspaper posting of a woman from Minneapolis who’d been murdered in a home invasion. The mother found the body. It became a high-profile murder case with no suspects. When the mother went suddenly loco and advertised a picture she’d taken of her dead daughter, it became a public spectacle.