by A. J. Locke
Ethan nodded and started speaking rapidly. “We were hanging out with some others, and when it got late she invited me back here to crash. Said her roommate wasn’t going to be here. So…so we came back and…ordered pizza and played games for a few hours… And…and…um…kissed and…stuff. I mean not stuff…” He started shaking his head. “We…we just kissed. On the couch. Then went to bed. I mean…I mean she went to bed in her…in her room…and I slept on the couch. But when I woke up, I thought it was too quiet. I thought ma-maybe she went to get…get breakfast. Then I looked in her room and…and…and…” He started dry heaving and slumped against the hallway wall before sliding to the ground. Kyo and I knelt down next to him as he started sobbing. “Oh God, what did I do, what did I do?” he wailed. “I don’t even remember…I don’t remember anything…How did I do this? Why did I do this?”
My heart felt like it was breaking seeing the absolute anguish he was in, but my mind was also churning over his story because things weren’t adding up.
“Ethan, did you have a blackout episode last night?” I asked. “At any point at all?”
“No,” he breathed. “Not at all…You think…you think I did this and blacked out?”
“No, that’s not what I’m saying,” I said gently. I looked Ethan over again, then looked into the bedroom, then back into the living room. “Where is the knife?”
“Kn-knife?” Ethan looked confused.
“She was stabbed,” Kyo said. “Presumably with a knife or some other sharp object.”
“But I don’t see one.” I got up and carefully looked around the apartment, checking all the sharp utensils in the kitchen, even looking in the garbage can in case the weapon was discarded. I didn’t come across a bloody knife.
“Did you see a knife or weapon of any sort when you woke up?” I asked Ethan.
He shook his head. “No, there was no-nothing…”
“And yet somehow she was stabbed to death in her bed,” I said, frowning. “You slept out here, but you have blood on you. How did you sleep through someone murdering her and putting her blood on you?”
“Selene…I didn’t do it, I swear!” Ethan said, fresh tears welling in his eyes. “It wasn’t the blackouts or anything. I swear all I did was sleep!”
“I believe you,” I said to Ethan. It looked damning, but I was going to give Ethan the benefit of the doubt. I knew Ethan. He had killed people, yes, but only when he was being controlled. And he was free from that now. Although…
“What?” Kyo asked, seeing the look on my face. He stood up while Ethan remained on the floor, whimpering.
“I wonder if the ghosts trapped in those runes on his back could be messing with his head.”
“To the point where they’d make him kill?” Kyo said. “With no memory of it? Like they possessed him? I don’t know…”
“Well, we have to assume for the most part it’s the ghosts of violent people in there,” I said. I kept my voice low so Ethan wouldn’t overhear. Kyo and I had moved to talk in the kitchen.
“Yet there’s no weapon,” Kyo said. “So if somehow one of those ghosts possessed him and made him kill the girl, what did it make him do with the weapon?”
“I don’t know.” I frowned deeply. “This is fucking unbelievable. Now we have to call in a dead body and I have no idea how I am going to get Ethan out of this. They’re gonna arrest him.”
“Did you see her ghost rise?” Kyo asked Ethan. We had learned that even though Ethan never carried necromancy power, in this new body he was able to see ghosts when they weren’t wearing energy runes.
“No,” Ethan said, shaking his head and sounding utterly devastated. “Selene…what do I do?” The eyes that looked up at me were so scared and pleading, looking to me to make this all better that I had to look away. I was at a total loss as to what to do.
“Maybe we could…”
But Kyo didn’t get to finish his sentence because all of a sudden there were heavy footsteps and shouting coming down the hallway, followed by the door being kicked in and PTF officers pouring into the room. They made a beeline for Ethan and yanked him to his feet. I thought he’d looked terrified before, now he looked like he might die of fright.
“Ethan Lance, you’re under arrest for the murder of Ailani Leho,” the officer who had a vice-like grip on his arm said. He then proceeded to recite Ethan his Miranda Rights.
“Selene!”
“Let him go!” I tried to lunge for Ethan but was none too gently shoved aside as Ethan was dragged to the door. Paramedics with a stretcher had also arrived and gone into Ailani’s room.
“Ethan did you call nine-one-one?” Kyo and I were running after the officers as they took Ethan out of the apartment and dragged him down the stairs.
“No!” came Ethan’s distressed reply. “Selene, help me! Don’t let them take me!”
“Ethan!” But there was nothing I could do. We followed them outside, where to my shock, a barrage of media were swarming. As soon as Ethan was in their sights, they started snapping pictures and hurtling questions at him. I was aghast. Who the hell had called in the PTF, paramedics, and media?
I could do nothing but watch as the officers put Ethan into an armored vehicle and drove off. Soon after, the paramedics came out with Ailani’s body. At this point Kyo and I had receded into the lobby because once the news reporters saw me, they aimed their questions my way. Once the medics were out, I slammed the door shut and stood there staring through the frosted glass door with wide eyes at all the people moving around out there.
“Oh my God,” I said, dragging my hands through my hair. “They have Ethan. They came and took him away. What am I gonna do?” I started pacing in a tight circle. It felt like a ton of bricks had just slammed into me. Again. The first ton had been Micah turning into a Savage. Now this. How much did the universe or God, or whatever higher power was out there really think I could handle? I was going to end up losing my mind worse than Renton Morse had.
“They didn’t come back,” Kyo said thoughtfully. I stopped pacing and stared at him. “And they acted like you and I weren’t even here. That’s not typical behavior for when you find three people in the home of a murdered woman, is it? You don’t just take the one covered in blood.”
“No, you don’t,” I said, once again frowning. A frown might end up being my permanent expression at the rate my life was going. “We weren’t taken in for questioning. And there is the issue of how the PTF, paramedics, and media all just showed up here if no one called in a murder.”
“And they showed up shortly after we got here,” Kyo added. “It all seems too neat. I may not know exactly how things are done these days but I’ve learned a lot these past few months.”
“Meaning you’ve watched a ton of Law and Order,” I muttered. But he was right. I’d been involved in enough crime scenes by now to know that there was something off about this one.
“It’s almost as though it was set up,” Kyo was saying. I stared at him again, my mouth falling open.
“Set up,” I repeated. “Holy shit.” I pounded my fist against the wall. “This was a set up. No murder weapon, no memory from Ethan of committing the murder, the conveniently timed arrival of the cavalry. It was a set up!”
“Jacob,” Kyo said.
I nodded. “That son of a bitch.” Cold rage spread through my body. “His quest to destroy my life didn’t go so well with those articles he had Taj write, so he resorted to murdering an innocent girl to thrust Ethan and thus myself, into the spotlight in the worst possible way. Ethan already has a track record with murder; who knows what this will do to him.”
“I agree that it seems likely that Jacob set this up,” Kyo said. “But we can’t just go to the PTF and tell them that. We need proof.”
Proof. I looked around the lobby and spotted the security camera. I pointed it out to Kyo.
“That may be how we get proof,” I said. “Let’s pay a visit to Carlos and see if Jacob McNabb shows up on this camera.”
Carlos wasn’t there. Which shouldn’t have been that alarming, seeing as he had to leave sometime and didn’t exactly provide office hours, but the fact that his space was in disarray set off alarm bells. Kyo and I stood there looking around at the upturned and broken computer equipment. Even Carlos’s worktable had been flipped over. His large monitors were sprawled on the ground with cracked screens.
“Oh, no.” I moved forward, looking around everywhere on the off chance that Carlos was lying around hidden by some piece of equipment.
“I don’t see anyone,” Kyo said. He’d been looking on the other side of the room. I stopped by Carlos’s broken down desk and blew out a breath. Kyo came over to me.
“What do you think happened?” Kyo said. “Think the PTF did a raid?”
“That’s what I initially thought,” I said. “But if it was a raid, they would have confiscated every piece of equipment in here. It doesn’t seem as though anything is missing.”
“Okay, so maybe a dissatisfied customer took out their rage on him…”
“Yeah, I guess…” I trailed off as something on the ground caught my eye. It was half hidden under a tangle of wires, but as I bent to pick it up, a myriad of emotions were going through me and my hands were shaking.
“Oh my God,” I said. Kyo looked down at what I was holding.
“Shades?” he said, frowning slightly. He looked up at me. “Why do you look so spooked because you found the guy’s shades? Do they have blood on them or something?”
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “These aren’t Carlos’s shades. They belong to Taj.”
Kyo’s frown deepened. “The reporter guy? Are you sure? Why the hell would his shades be here?”
“I’m sure these are his,” I said. I looked at the ground again and spotted something else that sent another jolt through me. I picked up an expensive-looking watch with a large face and thick, leather wristband.
“This belongs to Dr. Lane,” I said. “I recognize it; it’s definitely his. And these shades belong to Taj. As for why they’re here, I can only think of one reason. Jacob McNabb.”
Kyo’s frown turned into a look of surprise. “You don’t think those items are here arbitrarily.”
“No. I think they were left here on purpose and are meant to be a message. Oh God, this can’t be happening…” I took out my phone and called Taj, but I got the same message I got last night. I then called the Guardian Sun and asked to speak to him, but was told that Taj was not in. Next, I called Dr. Lane’s cell and house phone but both rang out. I then called the morgue and was similarly told that he was not in. From the tone of her voice, I could tell that the receptionist found his absence to be strange. I hung up and looked at Kyo with fear and rage battling for supremacy inside me.
“Taj’s phone is disconnected and he isn’t at work. Dr. Lane isn’t answering either and is also not at work.”
“You think Jacob kidnapped Taj, Dr. Lane, and Carlos?” Kyo said. I heard the slight skepticism in his voice.
“He’s out to ruin my life, Kyo, and obviously he’s targeting anyone I know. We already suspect him of committing murder to frame Ethan and thus cause a huge upset in my life. Kidnapping is nothing compared to that.”
“Okay, but how would he even know about Carlos?” Kyo asked. “Taj and Dr. Lane I can see, but…”
“How did he know all those things he had Taj write about! By stalking my life! He clearly has been following me or has had someone else tailing me and reporting back. So he’s seen me come to Carlos for help.”
“Selene, calm down.” Kyo put his hands on my shoulders, but I brushed them off and started to move toward the exit.
“I cannot fucking calm down,” I said, heading down the ladder. Kyo was close behind. “I knew Jacob was a threat, but I had no idea he would go this far just to try and ruin me. Murder and kidnapping? He’s more insane than his damn brother!” We were out of the juice bar and making quick strides to my car.
“So what are you planning to do?” Kyo asked as we got into my car.
“Confront Jacob and make sure he doesn’t hurt those three.”
“Yeah, but…”
Kyo was interrupted by my phone beeping. I quickly snatched it out of my bag to see if it was Carlos, Dr. Lane, or Taj contacting me. It was an unknown number, but when I read the text message I knew that while it may have come from a burner phone from Carlos, he was not the one who had sent the message.
“Selene? Who is it? What does it say?”
I had just been staring at the screen with a deep frown on my face. I held the phone so tightly my hand was shaking.
“Selene, what—?”
“A bridge that spans two worlds, a place where ghosts can touch the sky, a hidden chamber where you can curl up, hide, and hope not to die. At one of these places your friends’ lives will be undone, if you are not present to save them, before a quarter to one.”
“A poem?” Kyo looked bewildered when I looked up at him.
“I never pegged that asshole for poetry,” I said. “But this is clearly a message from Jacob.” I checked my watch. It was only forty minutes away from quarter to one. “Oh for fuck’s sake. He kidnapped Lane, Carlos, and Taj and sent me a riddle about where they are. And I have forty minutes to figure it out.” I slammed my hands against the steering wheel. “When I find Jacob I am going to rip his heart out through his throat.”
“Three locations.” Kyo had taken my phone so he could read the message himself. “From what you’ve told me I think I’ve figured out two of them.” He showed me the screen and pointed to the first line. “This seems like it’s talking about the Brooklyn Bridge,” he said. “It literally uses the word ‘bridge’ and, as bridges do, it connects two places, which you can romanticize as ‘two different worlds.’”
“Okay, makes sense, what’s the other one?” I was trying to stay calm because flying off the handle wasn’t going to help. But I felt like I was drowning. I had been trying to get help for Ethan, and now it looked like I would have to leave him at the mercy of the PTF and try to stop Jacob from killing three men. Not to mention the fact that my boyfriend was still a missing Savage. Could it really get much worse? Yes. If Taj, Carlos, and Lane died, if Ethan went to jail for murder, and if Micah never recovered his soul. Looked like I had quite a mountain to overcome.
“The one about a lost chamber where you can curl up and die,” Kyo was saying. “Sounds like that bunker Renton was using.”
“It does,” I said slowly, thinking it over.
“The other one I am having trouble figuring out,” Kyo said. “A place where ghosts may touch the sky…”
I was quiet for a few moments as I thought. Then it clicked. “Renton’s bunker and the Brooklyn Bridge,” I said. “If those are correct then it seems as though he’s using locations that have significant meaning to me.”
“So where’s the third location?” Kyo asked.
“The place that has the most significance of all,” I said. “Affairs of the Dead.”
“Makes sense!” Kyo said. Then his excitement deflated. “But which location are they at?”
“Affairs and the Bridge are too public to hold hostages,” I said. “We have to assume that wherever they are he is also, waiting to pull the trigger or stab them or however the son of a bitch plans to kill them.”
“So that would leave Renton’s bunker,” Kyo said. “It’s secluded and no one really knows about it.”
“Yeah…except…”
“What? Why aren’t you driving off?”
“The PCC knows about the bunker,” I said. “It was made more accessible, lighting was even added. So if that’s still a place that’s seeing traffic from the PCC there’s no way Jacob would be able to use it as his kill stage.”
“Makes sense,” Kyo said. “He probably thought you would jump on that one because it’s secluded compared to the other two.”
“A trick riddle,” I said. “Send me in the wrong direction and b
y the time I realize I’m not in the right place it would be too late. It would take way longer than forty minutes for me to drive to Brooklyn. I think the only place it makes sense for him to be holding them is Affairs of the Dead.”
“But what if that’s the trick?” Kyo asked. I had my hand on the keys ready to start the car and head into Manhattan. “What if he knew you would figure it out and head to Affairs when they’re really at one of the other two places? The Bridge seems least likely, I agree, but has the bunker been in use recently?”
I paused to think. “Not as far as I know,” I said. “Micah told me they’d gotten all of Renton’s things out a couple months ago.”
“See, so that could be where they are after all…”
“Damn it!” I slammed the steering wheel again. “So what do I do, Kyo? I can’t be in two places at once.”
“But there are two of us,” Kyo said. “Divide and conquer.”
“Okay, yeah, but how are you going to get there—?”
Kyo suddenly disappeared from the car and reappeared outside, standing next to my window, which I rolled down.
“I realized that along with being able to conjure my sword, I can still teleport as well,” he said. “I can’t get myself there in one fell swoop, but I can move more rapidly than you can drive. I’ve made myself very well acquainted with the city and the areas of your travails, so I know how to get to the bunker.”
“Kyo, are you sure? This could be dangerous…”
“I’m a human who can teleport and manifest a ghost sword,” he said. “And we are on a time crunch so we don’t have time to argue. Just get to Affairs of the Dead. I will check the bunker then the bridge and call you. Just go.” He disappeared and reappeared at the end of the block before disappearing again. It was the best plan we had for covering the three locations and I just hoped we would be able to prevent a triple murder. I started up my car and drove off, driving as fast as I could without breaking the speed limit.
There were only thirty minutes left.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE