Dire Warning WC0.5

by Stephanie Tyler

  He’d come back here one night when this Were bullshit was all taken care of and help the others pass over.

  When a person was killed suddenly—violently—his ghost was often earthbound. Confused. Occasionally vengeful. The way he died was often the way he came back. And if there was unfinished business surrounding him, the ghost would somehow find a way to let the live humans know what was going on. This morgue was a breeding ground for unhappy ghosts.

  Dave opened the door to the room where the bodies were kept in storage until the funeral homes picked them up. The second Jinx walked inside, he spotted her, sitting in the corner, her pants and shirt stained and torn, her head down.

  And a ragged hole in her chest where her heart should’ve been.

  Some thought that ghosts were see-through. Corporeal. For him, that had never been the case, and he didn’t know if it was his ability combined with the fact that he was a supernatural being himself.

  When Dave pulled the body out, Jinx felt the ghost stir and move next to him. He noted the name on the toe tag—Paula Sully. He turned discreetly toward her and nodded, his way of acknowledging her. Ghosts did not like to be ignored.

  She didn’t move, even as she finally lifted her head and met his eyes. The familiar chill went through him as he went back to the task at hand.

  “She looks like she’s midtwenties,” he said, turning back to her body, and Dave confirmed, “Twenty-five. We made contact with her mother—she lives in Albany. She’s coming down to identify the body, but her boss already did.”

  “Who’s that?” Jinx flipped open a small pad and began writing the name and address of the man who employed Paula. His next visit would be to him, a Bill Sumner, who lived two towns over.

  “The same idiot who was the anonymous source in the article,” Dave told him. “One of the police officers told me he runs some paranormal research center.”

  Oh, great. “Wish I could’ve been a fly on the wall for that conversation.”

  He bent down to take a better look at the body while the coroner unzipped the body bag. The first thing anyone would notice was the hole cut into her body. Her heart was missing, but it had been done clumsily, like it had taken whoever did so a great deal of time and effort.

  If it had been an other—wolf, vamp—their power would’ve made the wound look like someone had cleanly punched straight through her body when they took her heart.

  “Do you believe this werewolf crap?” Dave snorted. “Almost as good as the vampire report from last year.”

  That had been a vamp killing, confirmed and quickly taken care of by the vampire society. But Paula hadn’t been exsanguinated. No, this murder had been long and painful.

  “People live for the sensational,” Jinx said, his voice making it sound like he was bored as shit. “To me, an organ stealing ring is way more scary than any wolf.”

  Dave nodded sagely, as if happy they were all simpatico on the supernatural stuff, and Jinx looked more closely at the body. There were slash marks all over her neck and arms, and she reeked of Were.

  But the two things didn’t match up at all. Because these marks weren’t made by a wolf, although someone had gone to great lengths to make it look that way.

  There was a hell of a lot more to this story. And Paula’s ghost was standing right next to him now, looking down at her own body, but she wasn’t talking. Normally, they didn’t shut up. Maybe she’d feel more like discussing things later, but at some point, he’d have to lead her into the light. Wandering the earth forever with no end in sight was a fate no one deserved.

  He should know.

  “Talk to me, sweetheart,” he murmured, when the coroner was out of earshot, and touched the body gently in hopes Paula would do something.

  Instead, she turned away, confused. He sighed and rezipped the bag over her body.

  “I’m guessing you’d rather me not tell the family what you suspect?” Dave asked.

  “That would be best,” Jinx agreed.

  “So you’re not meeting with the mom, then?”

  He shook his head no. Meeting with a family in a case like this was always the worst—the human was usually sobbing, the ghost sitting next to them, confused and screaming that she was right there.

  Sometimes, the ghost didn’t realize she was dead. Those cases were typically the worst. But Jinx had a feeling Paula knew exactly what happened to her.

  Dave spoke, pulling Jinx out of his reverie. “Agent Sixx, is there anything else I can do for you? Got another autopsy to perform.”

  “Have you seen any other bodies with this pattern recently?” he asked, and Dave shook his head.

  “I can look through the database, though. See if anyone in surrounding towns found something similar. But you can probably do that as well.”

  Stray could for sure—and was no doubt already on it. “Thanks for your time.”

  “You know, that guy, Bill—he said she was out on a blind date for Valentine’s Day,” Dave called to Jinx as he started down the hall.

  “Must’ve been a hell of a first date,” Jinx muttered.

  Chapter Four

  Rifter paced impatiently, waiting for Jinx’s return to talk to the wolf face-to-face. In the meantime, Jinx had taken and sent them pictures of the dead girl who smelled like Were but had obviously not been killed by a wolf.

  Well, obvious to them. To others, not so much.

  “This Bill Sumner guy Jinx texted me about is definitely the anonymous source—he’s the owner of the Paranormal Center and he’s finally gone on the record as the official source to accuse the murderer of being a wolf,” Stray told Rifter and Vice.

  “Not just a wolf—a werewolf,” Vice said sarcastically. They all looked at the new picture posted alongside the online article, a crudely drawn half man, half wolf. “Dude, what the hell is that?”

  Rifter’s Brother Wolf growled his disapproval, the sleek predator highly insulted at both the artistic portrayal and the accusation.

  “Dude, it happened right outside the bar, so Clyde’s freaked,” Stray added. “Guess you were right on target, Rift. We need to do some major damage control.”

  “This happens a lot, like the vamp accusation last year—they put that to rest easily enough. A few people believe and most don’t,” Vice pointed out. “End of story.”

  “They all say they have proof and it rarely pans out,” Stray added.

  Rifter knew they would have to make doubly sure of that.

  “We need to find out how she got close to the Were and who else Bill told. For all we know, they’re planting people in the Were community,” Rifter reminded them.

  A few months back, residents had reported seeing wolves running near the highway. It brought a flurry of reports from scientists claiming this wasn’t wolf country and they were most likely seeing strays.

  Linus had begun to breed wolves in the hopes that it would take some heat off the Were population. Rifter hoped that would work, but it wasn’t going to happen fast enough to soothe this situation. Wolves would need to lie low. Linus needed to get the word out.

  Except that Linus hadn’t been seen or heard from in days.

  Jinx came in then, up the stairs from the garage, sat on the kitchen chair at the table and stared at the one across from him, next to Vice.

  “Dude, what?” Vice asked.

  “Paula kind of followed me home,” Jinx said, pointing to the empty chair.

  “See, even the dead find me hot,” Vice pointed out.

  “I guess she’s not scared of us?” Rifter asked.

  “She’s not scared of anything anymore.”

  “So she’s going to, like, haunt us?” Vice asked, turning to the chair. “Sweetheart, you play with wolves, you’re going to get bitten. End of story.”

  “She didn’t
deserve to get killed because she hung out with a Were,” Jinx muttered. “And she shouldn’t be smiling at you.”

  “There are far too many Weres mixing with humans,” Rifter said. “It’s like the old times.”

  And the old times had gotten the majority of the Dire population smote by the Elders. Today, with news being reported with lightning fast speed, their cover could be blown within a matter of days if not shut down quickly.

  “What else did you find out about her? Because who she was is as important as who her killer is,” Jinx said. “It gives us a motive.”

  “Paula definitely worked for the PNR Center. Bill Sumner runs the group. It’s been around for years.”

  They weren’t weretrappers. No, they researched paranormal phenomenon and Rifter knew the weretrappers weren’t happy with them. They didn’t want other humans to expose the Weres and ruin any of their plans.

  “Bill says he has proof that werewolves exist. Says the dead woman had captured a shifting werewolf on tape and he believes she was murdered because of what she’d discovered,” Stray continued.

  Rifter looked at the group’s homepage, where the message told the world in no uncertain terms that a werewolf killed one of their colleagues. They claimed their evidence was safe and that it would be presented shortly.

  “We need that tape,” Rifter said.

  “Let me go to this Bill guy’s house,” Vice begged.

  “Yeah, that’ll work,” Jinx snorted.

  “You can go after the Were Paula knew—find out what he knows,” Rifter soothed Vice and that made his fellow wolf happy, because Vice’s Brother Wolf had been ready to shift right then and there. “But wait until we get more intel.”

  Vice groaned. “Maybe I can go to Clyde—or the police stations—and steal the video?”

  “I’m on it,” Stray said. “It’s all computerized surveillance and I should be able to alter it, if not erase it completely.”

  “Do it fast or I’m going there.” Vice was over Stray’s shoulder, watching the wolf work.

  “Any other ideas for getting the tape?” Jinx asked Rifter. “I mean, besides just breaking and stealing it.”

  “I totally vote for that,” Vice interjected.

  “We’ll work for this PNR Center,” Rifter said firmly. “Because they’re going to want protection from the big, bad wolf after all of this. And I think we make pretty good bodyguards.”

  “Who, exactly, is we?” Jinx asked.

  Rifter eyed him and Jinx sighed heavily but didn’t put up a fight. He knew he’d be needed to deal with any real ghosts that showed.

  “Fine, let’s pay a visit to the group,” Jinx said, running his hands through his hair. “But I’m going to need a run first.”

  Jinx got his run, with Rifter joining him. Not as fun in broad daylight but hell, they’d take what they could get. Over the hills and through the woods and all that good shit, until their Brother Wolves were far more pliant.

  By the late afternoon when they returned, Stray had made up business cards and an entire resume for all the Dires in a matter of hours, in case he and Vice or the twins had to relieve Rifter or Jinx.

  Rifter would let Vice near the PNR Center over his dead body. Considering the Dire couldn’t die, there was no chance of Vice getting involved.

  Now, Rifter and Jinx waited restlessly as Stray continued to try and collect some background information they could use on Bill Sumner so they’d know what—and who—they were walking in on.

  “This is interesting—Bill is convinced his family died at the hands of a shifter,” Stray said. “It’s all part of his upcoming book, My Life in PNR.”

  “Whether or not that’s true, we out him as a fraud,” Rifter said. “But we’ll also need to create a fake tape and replace his real one.”

  “One of you can dress up in a wolf suit and recreate the tape,” Stray added. “I can overlay it and make it look fake as shit.”

  “Suppose the tape’s real?” Vice asked.

  “We still out him as a fraud,” Rifter said. They had no choice.

  “I’m not dressing in a wolf costume,” Vice sniffed.

  “Yes you are—you owe me after the fight at Clyde’s,” Rifter reminded him and Vice groaned, because he always owed one of them something. “Is Paula saying anything?”

  “She’s spooked,” Jinx said. “Still hanging close to Vice.”

  Vice nodded in the ghost’s direction, even though he hadn’t been able to see this one. Sometimes he could, depending on how strong they were. But Paula was too new, Jinx told them earlier.

  “I can’t find more on Bill. It doesn’t look like he pulled anything like this before. It’s the usual crap—séances, banishing demons, but nothing beyond a few videotapes of weird orbs and some knocking noises. He’s pretty respected in his field.”

  “Yes, his field, not ours,” Rifter said. “It’s like he came out of nowhere.”

  “He claims he did that because it works well with his job,” Stray explained. “He thinks this somehow makes him all supernatural.”

  Rifter rolled his eyes. “This guy’s already on my nerves big time.”

  “Tell me about it,” Jinx said. “We should head out.”

  “She planning on riding along?” Rifter asked, referring to Paula, the who-knew-if-she-was-friendly ghost.

  Jinx patted him on the shoulder. “If she can tear herself away from Vice, I’ll make sure she rides with you, Rift.”

  Chapter Five

  It was less than a half an hour later when Rifter and Jinx pulled their Harleys into the driveway of the PNR Center. According to Jinx, Paula was nowhere to be found, but Jinx said she could show at any given time.

  Two young girls and a guy, all college aged, were coming down the walk. “They’re not hiring,” the guy told them. “Too bad, because it would’ve been cool to see a wolf.”

  “Yeah, cool,” Jinx echoed.

  “According to Stray, Bill says this place is haunted too,” Rifter said as they stared up at the house.

  “There’s no one supernatural here. Except us,” Jinx reported. “I don’t need to go inside to know that.”

  “We’re going in anyway,” Rifter told him, stomped up the porch and rang the bell. Jinx followed him up, grumbling the entire way.

  A young human female answered the door. She was small, maybe five foot two, with a cap of short blond hair and delicate features. More cute than pretty, with wire framed square glasses, and a tattoo of a tribal moon inked inside her wrist that Brother Wolf liked.

  She didn’t look like a PNR hunter.

  Then again, he didn’t know exactly what one of them was supposed to look like. He guessed the ripped jeans, the flannel shirt that nearly swallowed her and the purple fingerless gloves wouldn’t do shit against a wolf, vamp, demon or witch. She didn’t seem like she’d be all that intimidating to ghosts, either, but Jinx could judge that better than him.

  “Hi, I’m Marley—how can I help you?” She shifted nervously after introducing herself, still half hiding behind the front door.

  Her name was familiar to him since she’d been listed on the group’s website as a PNR investigator. Paula had been listed as Office Manager and Bill was the only one front and center on that site. He obviously ran the show.

  “We wanted to talk with Bill Sumner about a job,” Rifter started.

  “We aren’t looking for any more recruits,” she told him.

  “Good, because that’s not the job I’m interested in.” He handed her his card stating they were bodyguards specializing in providing security against supernatural beings, and she looked between him and it.

  “Seriously—you make a living doing this?”

  “I’m sure you get annoyed when people ask you that same question,” he said and that earned
him a smile. He didn’t do humans, period. She was cute and hit some buttons because he’d have to be dead not to react but he told himself it was all for a good cause.

  She’d been marked but didn’t know it, had the scent of Were all over her. And Rifter wasn’t leaving her side until that Were was no longer breathing, because even though the Were didn’t commit murder, he’d exposed himself to humans in a far too public way.

  “I’m sorry about your colleague, but I believe you’re still in danger,” he told her.

  “Thanks, but we don’t really need security,” she said, but she didn’t exactly close the door on them and he could smell her fear. He could convince her—and she would help convince Bill Sumner, who would for sure be a harder sell.

  “You most definitely do. I’ve been doing this job a long time and I know you guys are in trouble,” Rifter said firmly. “You’ve got to trust me.”

  Her eyes widened a bit. “Can you hang out here a minute?”

  “Sure thing.”

  She closed the door and Rifter and Jinx easily heard the discussion behind the closed door. Brother Wolf’s hearing was excellent and damned handy to have.

  “I’ll look them up . . . I think you should hear what they have to say.”

  “Never heard of them before . . . all trying to profit from what we have . . .”

  “She reeks of Were,” Jinx muttered. “What the hell is going on here?”

  “Maybe Bill’s a wolf?” Rifter mused, but the second the door opened, they knew that theory was blown to hell.

  Bill Sumner was tall with reddish blond hair, a grim look on his face. He too smelled like Were but was most definitely a human.

  Somehow, a Were had been in very recent contact with these two.

  “What makes you think we need this kind of protection?” Bill demanded without saying hello, waving Rifter’s business card around.

  Rifter bit back his smart remark and said calmly, “It’s all over your website. You say a werewolf killed a member of your group. We specialize in this kind of thing.”

  “How come I’ve never heard of you?”