The cops led me into an interrogation room but didn’t remove my cuffs. I waited in silence, my eyes riveted on the two-way mirror. I knew Detective Orlando was watching me, drawing out the moment for all it was worth.
What do you think? I asked Cyon in my mind. Why set me up when they could have finished me off?
“I’ve been racking my brain over that one myself. The Crimson Circle wants you out of the picture, but they are also offering you front row seats for what comes next. Curious.”
I nodded. At least we were on the same page. The door to the interrogation room opened, and Detective Orlando and another cop whose name I couldn’t remember entered the stuffy room. The small space felt cramped. Orlando could barely contain his glee. Bastard!
“Where the hell is Benson?” I demanded.
“Stuck in traffic. I figured we’d get started. What do you say?”
I was tempted to tell Orlando exactly what I thought of him, but it would only make matters only worse. I had to pretend to cooperate, to do whatever was necessary to increase my odds of getting out of this jail cell. If I lost it with Orlando, he would keep me confined here as long as possible.
“Fire away,” I said.
“Let’s cut to the chase. Why did you murder Hendrix?”
“I didn’t.”
“So what happened, then? Security footage outside the building shows you breaking into the man’s workshop.”
“I admit to that. I believe Hendrix was connected to last night’s killing spree at the Amlight theater. I rang his doorbell. When he didn’t answer, I decided more drastic measures were in order.”
Orlando cocked an eyebrow. “Why would Hendrix be behind the murders?”
I hesitated. I didn’t like hanging a murder on an innocent man even if he was dead. “I don’t think Hendrix killed those people. I was hoping he could help me find the man who did.”
“Breaking into his workshop seems like a strange way to gain his trust.” A grin curled Orlando’s lips. This guy was a piece of work.
“When he didn’t answer the door, I feared the worst. Unfortunately, I was too late.”
I was lying now, but there was no way around it unless I wanted to tell Orlando about the magic mirror.
“You’re telling me the killer from the movie, let’s call him our obsessed fan, got to Hendrix first?”
I nodded.
“What happened when you entered the workshop?”
I took a deep breath and said, “I found Hendrix tied to a chair. While I tried to set him free, the killer knocked me out. The last thing I heard before losing consciousness were gunshots.”
I could almost swallow my story. Killer sounded a hell of a lot more convincing than demon doll or mirror monster.
“You’re saying someone else was in the warehouse when you broke into the place?”
I nodded. The churning in the pit of my stomach was getting worse.
“So this mystery killer knocked you out and murdered Hendrix with your firearm. Is that correct?”
Orlando’s knowing grin disturbed me. He looked like a man with a card up his sleeve, the proverbial cat who ate the canary.
The detective cracked his knuckles and leaned forward, inches separating us. Eyes flashing with a triumph, he said, “How do you explain that the security footage doesn’t show anyone else breaking into the workshop or leaving the place?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. I have no idea.”
Detective Orlando studied me for a moment. “Let me show you something I found fascinating.”
He nodded at the other detective, who produced a beat-up laptop from a leather satchel. He put it on the interrogation table and powered up the machine.
“Hendrix was a paranoid fella who liked to keep an eye on his workers. Not only did he secure the outside of the building with cameras, but he placed a few inside his workshop. Lucky break for us, as it allowed us to review the security footage from the murder. And, lo and behold, look what we stumbled upon.”
Orlando pressed play on the video. It showed Hendrix’s workshop. In the footage, the guy was still alive, his eyes squirming with mortal terror. I experienced a renewed burst of helpless rage, cursing myself for not having been able to save him.
But after another moment, my rage turned to icy fear. The blood drained from my face when my double stepped into the scene. I looked at myself facing Hendrix for a beat before the mirror duplicate raised my gun and shot Hendrix three times. The image flickered, and static rippled around my double. Science and magic don’t play nice with each other. Still, a slightly distorted image wouldn’t make much of a difference in court. The video would easily turn a jury against me.
I was in trouble, and Orlando knew it.
He gleefully froze the frame, almost as if he was eager to show me the video again. “Do you have anything to add?”
This was the time for me to ask for a lawyer, and Orlando couldn’t wait for me to make the request. Instead, the door to the interrogation room opened, and a familiar figure appeared. Even though I doubted Benson could help me now that the police had this tape, I experienced a wave of relief in his presence. If I told him what happened, he at least wouldn’t immediately think I was crazy or trying to bullshit him. He knew I wasn’t a fraud, had seen enough weird shit over the last year to conclude that the forces of darkness were real. But it was hard to contest the power of the security footage.
My enemies had orchestrated the perfect trap. If I wasn’t caught in it, I might just admire their cunning.
“I know you told me to wait, Detective Benson, but given the evidence…” Orlando stammered. I took pleasure out of seeing him squirm.
“I need to talk to Raven in private,” Benson said.
Orlando was about to protest but decided against it. He had already gotten enough satisfaction from showing me the tape. The two detectives rose and left the room.
Benson turned off the camera that had been recording the interrogation. We were alone. For now.
“Listen, Benson I know how it looks, but I can explain.”
He took a seat before me, his eyes coolly searching my face, his expression unreadable.
I wouldn’t call the man a friend, but Benson knew I was batting for the right team. I was one of the good guys. At least I had been until now. Could the power of the tape sway his mind? Would the detective swallow my story about a magical double—and if he did, would it change anything?
“I did not kill Hendrix,” I said, my voice sounding weak to my ears.
“I know. You’re innocent.”
His words hung in the air. I regarded the detective wordlessly, surprised that he had needed so little convincing on my part.
“The Crimson Circle is behind this. I know it, you know it. But the other boys in blue might have a hard time accepting the truth.”
A chill crept up my spine.
Something about Benson’s voice sounded off; there was a cockiness to the way he addressed me that was different from his usual world-weary tone.
“How do you know the Crimson Circle is involved?” I asked, my voice struggling to maintain a measured tone.
A cunning smile split Benson’s face.
“Simple. I’m the one who set you up, Raven.”
Shock rippled through my gut, and I strained against the cuffs until the metal chewed into my flesh. The feeling of betrayal took my breath away. Had Benson turned to the dark side?
I tried to say something, but the words escaped me.
Benson’s fingers began to dig into his throat, and to my horror, he proceeded to pull his face off. A mane of silver hair spilled out from his black skin. A beat later, the lifelike flesh-and-blood mask hit the interrogation table like a discarded skin. I forced myself to look up from the unnerving sight to the woman now facing me. She sported a fiery red eye tattoo that marred her otherworldly good looks.
I glanced again at the Benson mask splayed out on the table. The disguise had transformed into a wooden mask sculp
ted to look like a horned devil. I was looking at the Japanese Noh Mask I had donned multiple times in the past to impersonate my enemies. According to Skulick, the mask had belonged to a fourteenth century Japanese mage and allowed the wearer to duplicate the appearance of anyone he or she set their eyes on. I had last used the Noh mask to infiltrate one of the Crimson Circle’s secret occult auctions. My cover was blown when someone magically removed the mask from my face, forcing me to make a quick exit.
My enemies were turning my weapons against me.
For a split second, my attention shifted to the interrogation’s room one-way mirror. Detective Orlando had to be bearing witness to this madness. Any moment now, he would storm into the interrogation room, gun blazing.
Almost as if the mystery woman could read my thoughts, she waved her finger at me. “They see what I want them to see.”
This just kept getting better. The woman was a spell-slinger. That would explain her crazed expression, as well as her affiliation with the deranged cult. Black magic was a fast track to a psychotic meltdown. The human mind was ill-equipped to process such enormous power and tap into the unfathomable mysteries of the dark side. Power came at the price of one’s sanity.
This woman had to be the mage who had plucked the Noh mask off my face back at the auction house. As I stared at the cultist, I reflexively lashed out at her head-first. The demon was egging me on, eager to fight, to draw blood.
To my amazement, an invisible wall stopped me before I could strike her. The force slammed me back into my chair. I gasped, stunned by the magical blow.
“Who are you?” I said in a strangled voice.
“My name is Lamia Crull.”
I bit my lips, holding back a groan of frustration. I had never seen this woman before, but I was intimately familiar with the last name. Kovan Crull had been the leader of the Crimson Circle. And that meant this crazed wench was related to the cult leader.
It also meant I was in very big trouble.
She leaned closer, her icy beauty making her look like a wraith. “I’ve dreamt of this moment ever since you murdered my father, Raven.”
11
When Lamia Crull smiled, I saw her father in her beautiful yet cruel features.
Kovan Crull. A Russian crime boss who had terrorized this city long before he dabbled in the occult.
Other crime bosses let their goons do the dirty work. Not Crull. He developed a taste for inflicting pain. And when his victims approached oblivion, he would pause and stare into their bloodshot eyes as the light went out.
“What do you see?” he would ask. “Tell me, who else is here?”
None of his victims had given him the answers he sought, and Crull had become increasingly obsessed with what comes after we die. And so he turned to the occult. Ancient rituals and demon worship took over his life. His criminal empire became a means to finance his goal of unlocking the mysteries of death itself.
Eventually, the gang mutated into a lethal cult of fanatics—the Crimson Circle.
Kovan Crull’s brazen acts of cruelty made other gang lords turn on him. His brutality drew unwanted attention from the police, jeopardizing all their criminal enterprises. He had become a problem they couldn’t ignore any longer–he had to go. The rival gangs reached out to Skulick and me, aware of our expertise with these sorts of occult issues, after their own attempts at stopping Crull had all backfired.
I recalled the day I arrived in the Cursed City, how I had hated the sprawling metropolis almost on first sight. There was something rotten about the place, and at the time I couldn’t have imagined Skulick and I would ultimately set up shop here.
Within a few days, our investigation into the Crimson Circle’s activities led us to an abandoned warehouse near the docks. When Skulick and I entered the structure, weapons ready, the members of the Crimson Circle didn’t acknowledge our presence, so caught up were they in their horrible ritual. A widening pool of blood expanded around three human sacrifices at the center of the insanity. The sound of Crull’s incantation drowned out our advancing footsteps.
To this day, I understood little of the ritual that would have punched a hole between our reality and the dark realms beyond. All I know is that if we’d shown up a few minutes later, the world would have ended.
l Ieveled Hellseeker at Crull. The cult leader’s eyes were blank, fixed on a place invisible to normal senses, and his features were shrouded by the cowl of his brimstone-colored robe. The words continued to flow over cracked lips, and the walls of the building shook as the air grew heavy with paranormal energy. Each syllable was like a punch to the gut, triggering waves of physical pain. I bit back the bile creeping up my throat and gritted my teeth as I aimed my blessed pistol and hesitated. I was used to shooting monsters, not humans. But even though Crull wore the face of a man, he was as monstrous as a hellbeast. A demon in human disguise. Worse than most supernatural monsters, in fact, because he was eager to betray his own species for the mad pursuit of power.
I don’t quite remember if it was Skulick or me who pulled the trigger first. Both our bullets punched into Crull, clouds of red punctuating the impact. The world froze, and the final words of that strange tongue died on his lips. His white eyes cleared, and the Russian mob boss fixed us with a look of unbridled hatred.
“What have you done?” he croaked.
“We saved the world, asshole!” I said.
The cult leader collapsed, joining the sacrificial victims at his feet. The other members of the Crimson Circle spun toward us, their features twisted. Crull had been a living god to their deluded eyes. His death shocked them to the core of their rotten souls.
Sirens grew audible in the distance—the soundtrack of our victory over the Crimson Circle. It was over. The cops would be here soon. The killer cult that had terrorized this city over the last few months was broken.
Broken…but not defeated. They had one last trick up their sleeves.
“You stopped the ritual,” a cult member proclaimed, the veins in his neck standing out against the skin as he spoke with mad glee, “but you won’t undo Kovan’s work.”
The words sent a chill down my spine. It turned into outright terror as, one by one, the members of the Crimson Circle produced razor-sharp daggers from their robes and aimed them at their hearts.
Skulick and I could only watch in stunned silence as the cult members committed mass suicide, joining their fallen leader in the next world. By the time I reached the first body, it was too late, and the downed cultists were drawing their final, gasping breaths. I stood there, paralyzed by the collective insanity on display. What had Crull held over these poor souls for them to so eagerly follow him into Hell?
“At least it’s over,” Skulick said, gently covering the face of the woman nearest to him with the blood-red fabric of her hood.
“Yeah,” I muttered, unable to get the cultist’s words out of my head. “We won. Now let’s get the hell out of here.”
We only thought we had won. All too soon, we would learn that the interrupted ritual had created a breach between the two realities.
On that day, the Cursed City was born.
Back in the interrogation room, I sucked in my breath and did my best to push the horrific memories of that fateful confrontation aside. My questioning gaze bore into the cult leader’s daughter. Crull having a daughter came as news to me. If we’d known, maybe we could have prevented her from rebuilding her father’s cult. She regarded me with a mixture of hatred and triumph, basking in her victory.
“This time, Raven, you and your partner cannot stop us.”
We’ll see about that, I thought.
“Everything I’ve done over the last two years was leading up to this. I dreamt of this moment, when I would stare into the eyes of my father’s murderer and taste his defeat.”
“Hate to break this to you, sweetheart, but your father had it coming. He was a monst—”
Her fist lashed out and detonated with my face. The punch whipped my he
ad back and almost knocked me out of the chair. I sure had a way with women.
Lamia glared at me, her eyes blazing with fanatic devotion and joy.
“Soon everything you know will end, and a new order will rise from the ashes of the old world. We are about to witness the glorious beginning of my Dark Lord’s kingdom here on Earth.”
I shook my head. “You’ve been sipping your daddy’s Kool-Aid.”
I almost expected another punch, but this time Lamia held her rage in check. If looks could kill, however, I would have keeled over.
“The planet is doomed. The signs are everywhere. Open a newspaper, watch the news. Pollution, war, crime—it’s all out of control. We have turned on each other. The darkness is winning,” she said.
“You’re being played, Lamia. If you think Satan will reward you if you offer him access to this world, you have another thing coming.”
Lamia shook her head and waved her finger at me. “My father served the devil. I don’t.”
I cocked an eyebrow. “What are you talking about?”
A smile curled her lips as she spoke. She was enjoying every second of this exchange. “There are rival factions in Hell, demons vying for supremacy who believe the fallen angel has grown soft. When my father died, my world ended. I lost everything that day. Rival mob gangs took over my father’s criminal empire, murdered my mother and siblings. But I survived. During those dark times, an archdemon approached me with a better plan.”
I had a sinking suspicion about where this was headed. Was it too much to ask that once—just once—I could take a break from saving the world?
Shadow Detective Supernatural Dark Urban Fantasy Series: Books 7-9 (Shadow Detective Boxset Book 3) Page 18