The Collector (Emergence Book 1)

by Kelly Lynn Colby

  Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Why didn’t you say something?”

  My heart was breaking. “I don’t know. I didn’t want to invade your privacy or make you relive that nightmare.”

  I put my cheek on her knee, wishing I could absorb her grief instead of just share it. God bless Gina, because she didn’t say a word. She just held us both.

  If I was being honest, I needed to put it all out there. “I didn’t want you to think I was crazy. I’d never had a friend before, and I kind of liked it.”

  Amelia laughed as she pushed us off of her. “Well, you still have one, because I believe you.”

  We both turned to Gina. She pulled her hair from its ponytail, I assumed to keep her hands busy. She nodded toward the blanket-covered statue in the corner. “What do you see when you touch Walter?”

  Amelia whistled, though it sounded weaker than normal. “Damn, girl, good connection. You were really strange at the shop the other day, Fauna. Is that what was happening? You were—I don’t know what to call it—psychically connecting to someone else’s memories?”

  All of the odd things my friends had seen me do through the years must have been flowing through their minds. I imagined the questions coming for quite a while. Yet, I felt nothing but relief that they both still sat here listening.

  I should have done this years ago. Just one more thing I owed Albert Johnson.

  “That statue surprised me. I’d never experienced anything like it because every piece is a remnant.”

  Gina’s raised eyebrow asked me to elaborate. So, I told them everything that led me to the Collector’s condo.

  “And the dead body.” Gina chewed on a strand of hair. I could practically see the wheels turning in her mind. “Can you read our thoughts?”

  “I cannot. I can’t read anyone’s thoughts unless it’s in one of those remnants. Then I’m immersed and experience exactly what the person who left the memory felt and thought.” I looked everywhere except at Amelia. “Sometimes, it’s hard to tell where I end and the other person begins.”

  Amelia leaned over me and picked up her now room temperature souffle and shoved a healthy spoonful in her mouth. She obviously didn’t want to dive in any further. “Is there anything else?”

  “No.”

  “Good.” Gina grabbed the remote. “Maybe I can still catch the ending.”

  And just like that, we pretended like everything was fine, and back to normal. I wondered when the other shoe would drop.

  A knock on the door made all three of us jump.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Before I jumped up to grab the door, I slipped on my gloves. Amelia and Gina exchanged a look. I wondered how long it would take them to adjust to this new truth.

  In the dim hallway, Flores raised his chin in greeting.

  “Detective Flores?” My mind spun with the possibilities of him showing up at my door. “Has there been another one?”

  “You don’t watch the news, do you?”

  I opened my door wider so he could see my girlfriends angled over the back of the couch to get a look at him. “I have company.”

  He turned to go. “Well, if you’re busy.”

  “No!” That came out much louder than I’d intended. “I can go now.”

  “Good.” Flores absorbed my anxiety with his calm and steady eye contact. “A deal’s a deal.”

  An honorable man stood on my front stoop. He really was going to keep me informed on the case. Maybe he could even use my help. For a moment I wondered if he was single, but the ring on his left hand bespoke of his takenness. It was always the good ones.

  Light from inside flashed on the badge around his neck as Amelia pulled the door open wider. Gina joined her on the other side and whistled.

  My face flushed at the appreciative stares of my friends. “Detective, you remember Gina from the gallery. And this is Amelia, the third of our triple threat. Amelia meet Detective Flores.” I peeked around the door jamb. “I take it Detective Collins doesn’t know you’re here.”

  Flores checked the watch on his wrist. “He’s at the crime scene. We should hurry.”

  Though Flores was on board with my abilities, Collins’s attitude toward me said he’d be a much tougher sell. Yet, nothing could upset me at the moment. Amelia and Gina believed me and seemed to take to the idea of my curse pretty readily. After the honeymoon period relaxed, I was sure I’d get more pushback and questions. For now, I’d enjoy the glow and go find this killer.

  I grabbed my fully charged phone and turned to my girlfriends. “Will you lock up please?”

  Amelia nodded. “I got it.”

  Gina chewed on her lip as I left with Flores. “Be careful.”

  “I will.” I clomped down the steps behind Flores.

  I had to ask the question I’d been avoiding. “Who was it?”

  Flores shook his head as he opened the door for me. “You really don’t watch the news, do you?” Rather than continue to lecture me, he pulled out his phone and pressed play on a recording of a news broadcast.

  In a pants-suit and too much make-up, the African American reporter spoke in a robotic voice that offered no comfort to my fear. “Local fortune teller, Amethyst Redmayne, was found stabbed to death in her business earlier this evening. Police have refused to confirm or deny if this murder is connected to the killing two days ago of beloved psychic personality, George Martinez.”

  She didn’t say anything about Albert Johnson.

  “Have you been to the scene yet?”

  Flores shook his head. “No, but from what Collins described, I’m not sure it’s our guy.”

  “Why would you say that?”

  “I’d rather you see for yourself.” He waved at my hands like they were magical tools, which, in some ways, I guess they were. “I want to see what you discover.”

  The row of businesses in the concrete strip mall included a nail salon, barber shop, pizza joint, and two bars. Among this typical Houston collection, Amethyst’s colorful window decorations and fancy sign font existed in a wholly different dimension.

  I waited in the car while Flores talked to Collins outside the crime scene. Whatever was said didn’t sit right with Collins judging by the way he stomped off to a hysterical woman next to a marked car. With a wave of his hand, Flores called me forward.

  After taking a deep breath to quiet my mind before it was invaded by more horror, I joined him in front of the shop. “She wasn’t killed at home?”

  Flores squinted into the incense-heavy entryway. “It looks like she was camping out in the back room. The address on her license leads to an empty lot on a neighborhood hit hard during the last floods.”

  My middle brother lost his house at the same time. I sympathized with Amethyst.

  Flores held up the badge around his neck to step into the building.

  Lots of folklore existed about thresholds and their magical qualities. I was starting to believe some of it was fact, because I sensed nothing outside the doorway. But as soon as I crossed into the palm reader’s storefront, a wave of heavy anger washed over me and I immediately felt threatened. My arms gripped my elbows as if afraid to extend out and touch the source of the fury. I hadn’t felt anything like this at the other scenes.

  I gagged as the metallic taste of blood flooded my mouth. I felt like I was choking on it. This scene was fresh, not drenched in decomposition like the other two. At the moment, I wasn’t sure which was worse.

  One of the crime scene guys gave me an aggressive look. His emotions were but a whiff of annoyance above the true ferocity of the anger dripping from the walls. My entire digestive system flared in agony as the emotion attacked me physically. I hadn’t even gotten to the actual scene of the crime yet. I shook as I tried to fight the tension in my gut that wrecked me like the worst food poisoning possible. If this kept up, I’d be useless. Flores might never let me come back.

  Without asking permission, I removed a glove and wrapped my hand around Flores’s wrist. My s
tomach muscles unclenched in phases from my throat all the way down my torso. Flores’s calm confidence soothed the angry onslaught like the most effective Pepto Bismol available.

  To his credit, the man didn’t flinch at my touch or rush me forward. After I established my mom’s hymn as a loud barrier around myself, I released Flores with a grateful nod. “Did you find a Collector piece here?”

  “Not yet.” The detective pushed the crime scene guy aside, either not noticing or choosing to ignore the way he looked at me.

  As I turned the corner into the back room, my head rammed into a solid wall and I bounced back a step. Flores caught me with a hand behind my back. I blinked tears from my eyes and realized there was no physical wall in front of me, just the opening to the backroom, much like at my store.

  Flores’s stable stance didn’t flinch as he twisted in front of me, blocking the full scene. “Are you sure this is what you want?”

  “Yep.” He couldn’t read my emotions, right? I would have said anything he needed to hear to keep me here. “I just want to find this guy and end this torment.”

  As I moved around Flores, I realized the sheer anger left in the room was so strong it coated the walls and stained the very air. That was what I’d run into. This was different from the other scenes. This killer was furious. Collins might be right. This might not be the same man. Though the church hymn kept me from shitting my pants, my abdomen still ached.

  I kind of wished I had one of the blankets that covered Walter to build a barrier between me and the embodiment of evil that left his mark here. The floor was covered in blood, pieces of human flesh were strewn upon a hanging cat calendar and a gaudy incense burner, and the stereotypical lamp hung with beads. I’d seen cleaner slaughterhouses.

  I closed my eyes and breathed through my mouth. Though my stomach wanted to rebel, I wasn’t about to prove judgmental crime scene guy right and vomit on the floor. I needed to make an assessment and get the hell out of there.

  “He was beyond angry, more than furious. He was frustrated and surprised and—” I closed my eyes to help block the horror, to actually get into his mind, “—loathing, I think.” A burning in my shoulders and tension in my neck usually combined frustration with aversion.

  Flores shoved his hands in his pocket. “Are there any memories?”

  I whispered to Flores, while keeping half an eye on the disapproving officer behind us, “I probably have to touch her. After what she’s been through, her body will hold the freshest impression.”

  Bile rose into my throat. I half hoped Flores would refuse my request. I never imagined touching one dead body, let alone two in less than a week.

  He stared into my eyes like he could do a bit of mind reading himself. Then he walked into the hallway. “We’re going to need a few minutes. Everyone, step back.”

  I stared at the calendar for August that featured a pair of orange kitties playing in a green field full of dandelions. It would be peaceful if not for the bit of skull clung to it.

  I rubbed my hand over my forehead as Flores reentered the room. He seemed so calm and centered in the midst of the carnage.

  “How do you do it?” I asked him.

  He didn’t ask “do what?” I could tell by the way he took in the room with a sweep of his eyes, he knew what I was asking. “It’s my job.”

  I wasn’t satisfied with that answer, but I had enough mysteries to solve without adding another. The experienced detective bent down and put plastic covers on my shoes like a parent tending to a child.

  I moved toward the armchair where a large, dry spot on the floor left me a small, unstained place to stand within touching distance of the mutilated corpse which I’d avoided looking at directly until now. I thought the last victim had been torn to pieces. In comparison, he’d been surgically sliced and mercifully put down. That was a kindness compared to Amethyst’s treatment. This woman, with gray, streaked hair and wrinkles—accentuated by her make-up, instead of hidden by it—had been brutalized. Half of her head was missing. She had fingers torn off. Her insides were mixed together like a stew, which explained the smell of sewage that overwhelmed the copper of the blood.

  I would never watch another horror movie. This was not entertainment.

  “Here.” Flores handed me something in a small vial. “Smear some under your nose.”

  The fresh smell of peppermint calmed my stomach. It helped, but it only masked the horrors highlighted with my other senses. It reminded me of cherry-flavored cough syrup. A bit of sweetness fooled you only through the first whiff, after that, it burned all the way down.

  While shoving one glove into my pocket, I stared at the palm reader’s left ear. Somehow, it had escaped the carnage unscathed and clean. Touching it wouldn’t hurt me. Anything I saw was all in my head, anyway. I could do this. My shaking fingers ignored my internal pep talk and tried to betray my own emotions more than sensing the ones of the killer. His anger still hovered around me, but I needed to know more. Internally, I cranked my mother’s voice to extra high. I’d done this more in four days than I had the entire previous year. I think I could separate myself better this time.

  At least, I hoped I could.

  When the tips of my fingers brushed her ear lobe, all I felt was pain. I screamed as her voice echoed in my mind. A man leaned over her. His scarred arm flashed up and down so fast, there was no way he was thinking about what he was doing at all. Jewelry flashed on his finger, a wedding ring maybe. My mother’s voice insulated me only enough for me to recognize Amethyst’s inability to focus on her attacker. Tears blurred her vision as her body jumped at each blow of the blade.

  “Fake! Goddamn con artist!” Blue eyes, burning fiercer than any red fire, burrowed into his victim’s memory.

  His nose was thin and straight. His eyebrows looked groomed. Between the gore dripping from his face and Amethyst’s tunnel vision as she weakened, I still couldn’t give an accurate description.

  I had no doubt, however, that it was the same killer.

  It was his anger that filled this place, but I didn’t get even a little from Amethyst. Albert and George had both reflected the killer’s joy back to him. But not Amethyst. She couldn’t sense him.

  Holy shit.

  She wasn’t cursed.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Concern washed over the hot pain as someone grabbed my shoulders and pulled me out of the impression. Air filled my lungs in ragged gasps, relaxing the tightness of Amethyst’s chest when blood filled in the cavity. I leaned into the warm arms of Detective Flores, soaking up his calming presence, as I tried to get my emotions back into check.

  “You were screaming. I couldn’t leave you like…”

  I swallowed bile that threatened to sicken the scene further and pushed against the doorframe to the hallway. I couldn’t even remember the tune to Mom’s hymn.

  As he released me, I felt cold and had to resist the urge to fall back into his embrace. “It’s the same killer.” As soon as I said it out loud, I was certain. With complete clarity, I also knew I had to get away from the hovering anger beast that threatened to overwhelm me.

  Without looking at any of the people staring me down, I headed straight for the door. Usually, stepping out into the humidity of Texas in August took my breath away. This time, it was like I could breathe again. With both hands on my knees, I closed my eyes and inhaled. The flurry of knife blows filled my mind. I jumped up and opened my eyes and paced on the cracked sidewalk. “Definitely the same guy.”

  “How do you know?” Flores led me without touching a single bit of skin toward his car.

  “I saw him. Well, as much as Amethyst could see of him. Those blue eyes. Scars on his forearm.” That made me remember my bare ones. The comforting leather left my pocket and engulfed my hands. The practiced movement and the tight feel over my skin brought back a measure of calm to my emotions. I had to separate mine from Amethyst’s. Though a moment ago, they were one and the same.

  Flores opened the door
to the Ford for me. “I’ll have you talk to a sketch artist. You might have better details this time.”

  “I can try, but I don’t think it will help.” I flopped in the large seat. The seat belt reached across my chest before I knew what I was doing. Instinctive. Like protecting myself from horrible emotions, like the ones I was just exposing myself to on purpose.

  What in the hell was I doing? Sharing their pain won’t bring them back. The killer’s anger was only growing. I thought about his precise slicing of the last victim compared to the out-of-control rage this time.

  And she never laughed. Her emotions were abject terror mingled with pain then back to terror. Not a single reflection of what the killer was feeling. Plus, he’d called her a fake. How would he know? He targeted the cursed; I couldn’t deny that fact. Maybe since Amethyst only pretended to be one, he didn’t get the high he was searching for. “She wasn’t like us.” Oh man, could I say us? “That’s what was different. He was furious, because she didn’t reflect his joy at what he was doing. That’s what he’s looking for.”

  Flores started the car. “He’s targeting people who can sense emotions.”

  Having someone else believe me so readily still sounded inauthentic to my ears. “Don’t make fun of me.” I wanted to leave the car and get an Uber, but one look at the house and the stretcher made me stay where I was. “Take me home please.”

  Flores adjusted his mirrors—as if anyone else had driven his car. “I had an aunt who knew things.” Flores’s voice was laced with a quiet confessional tone. “I wasn’t like my brother or the rest of my cousins. She knew as soon as she held me that first time we visited her in Mexico. She told me it would be tough, but it’s alright because it’s just the way that I was made. Love whomever you love.”

  Oh, Flores was gay. I hadn’t picked up on his sexuality at all. I hadn’t sensed any lust from him at all—which was more rare than one might think—to point me in one direction or another. Though I had to mentally chastise myself since I noticed his ring and assumed he was married to a woman.