Blood Moon

by A. D. Ryan

  Sitting in the car brought on an unusual bout of claustrophobia as David drove. It wasn’t something that plagued me in the past, but for some reason, I felt like a caged animal. I couldn’t sit still, my skin broke out in a cold sweat, and my heartbeat quickened with panic. David noticed my fidgeting, but he didn’t ask and I said nothing, mainly because I wasn’t sure anything was wrong. Just like earlier, I chalked it up to my meal last night since it was the only “unusual” thing I could attribute it to. With slight reservations, he accepted it as plausible.

  When we arrived, I was relieved to get out of the car, instantly stretching my entire body until my shoulders, neck, and lower back cracked satisfactorily. I reveled in the relief and tranquility that passed over me, a delightful quiver moving beneath the surface of my skin which forced goosebumps to prickle all over my body.

  David led me into the precinct, and when we arrived on our floor, we found our team already gathered around O’Malley’s desk. When he lifted his head and saw us, his eyes widened with excitement, and he waved us over frantically.

  “What’s up?” David asked, shrugging out of his jacket and silently offering to take mine, as well.

  I took him up on his offer and then perched myself against the edge of O’Malley’s desk while he hung them up on the coat rack. While waiting for O’Malley to speak, I picked up on something in the room. It wasn’t just the excitement that I saw gleaming in O’Malley’s eyes when we first arrived, but the air was infused with celebration.

  It electrified the surface of my skin, and not only could I feel it rolling off of everyone in waves, but I swear I could smell it. It confused me, because how did one smell something like that? Even that day we were organizing our investigation and I called Clarke out; while it was odd, his fear was more than just satisfying. It was mouthwatering.

  “I think we found that club,” O’Malley announced, and my heart beat faster with elation.

  “What?” I asked, stunned, but also to make sure I heard him correctly.

  His smile widened, flashing his teeth, and he nodded. “We won’t be sure until we check it out, but we’ve got a couple of leads from that club-goer we’ve got waiting for you. She said she was approached by someone looking to recruit new members.”

  “So you’ve got an address?” I asked excitedly. His smile was answer enough, and I flew to my feet in an instant. “Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go check it out.”

  David chuckled next to me. “You realize that it’s likely not going to be open to the public at ten in the morning, right?”

  “No, but we can go take a look around. Maybe the cleaning crews will be there,” I countered, itching to check this place out and talking a mile a minute.

  O’Malley held out a folder. “It’s possible, but why don’t you wait until you’ve talked to the girl they tried to recruit first? She’s been waiting for the two of you.”

  We walked into the room together, and our witness looked up. She looked a little worse for wear, a key indicator that she’d been up half the night partying. This deduction wasn’t solely based on her appearance—though her choppy black bob was standing up every which way, and her black eye makeup was smudged down her cheeks—but also because I could smell the alcohol seeping from her pores.

  The harsh light above the table glinted off of her eyebrow, nose, and lip piercings when she looked around the room. She seemed nervous, ringing her hands on the tabletop in front of her and tugging on her lip piercing with her teeth as her eyes darted about like a frightened animal, and when the sleeve of her shirt rose up her right arm, I saw a small, familiar mark on her wrist.

  She was from Donovan’s club.

  “So,” I started, glancing down at the file in front of me, “Sarah—”

  She released an annoyed breath and rolled her eyes. “It’s Raven, actually,” she corrected me.

  “Raven,” I repeated, suppressing an eye roll of my very own. “Cute.”

  Huffing again, her golden brown eyes narrowed in my direction. I offended her, and I sensed her annoyance like a gentle vibration that moved between us. Before she had a chance to snap, David interjected gently. “Raven.” Even though he was being as charming as possible, his voice indicated that he was working really hard to not snicker at the cliché Goth name this girl had chosen for herself. “Our colleague, Detective O’Malley, said you called the precinct this morning regarding an invite to an even more exclusive club than the one you’re a part of. Is this correct?”

  She turned her attention to him and nodded. “Yeah. I was at The Dungeon, partying with Lucia and Astrophel”—I bit my tongue, because there was no way to keep a straight face otherwise—“and this couple walked in. It was hard not to notice them, actually.” Raven’s eyes glazed over as she lost herself in the memory, and I sensed her mood shifting. I no longer felt the flare of annoyance, but instead picked up a trace of … lust. It was bizarre, and it made me uncomfortable.

  “She was blonde and thin, with legs that went on for days, and she had her arm looped through her companion’s.” She sighed, her body relaxing even further into the chair, and her voice took on a tone of longing as she described the man. “He was something else, you know. His brownish hair was a stark contrast to his flawless, bone-white skin, and the club lights would pick up hints of red scattered throughout—dude’s got a wicked-good hair stylist. He was unbelievably handsome, the strong cut of his jaw made even more so when he would lean down and whisper into the ear of the stunning woman on his arm.

  “They strolled through the place like they owned it—I don’t even know how they got in, actually. Donovan noticed them from his spot near the stage and approached them immediately.” Raven shrugged. “I don’t know what they talked about, but the woman smiled at him, said something, and he nodded before heading back to his office in the back.”

  I turned to David and lowered my voice. “We should call Donovan down.” David agreed with a nod and looked toward the two-way mirror along the wall to his right. Behind it, O’Malley and some of our other colleagues were watching, so one of them would make the call.

  “What happened next?” I asked. “Did they approach you right away?”

  Raven shook her head emphatically. “Not even. They continued to look around, and then they split up. The woman worked her way across the dance floor, drawing almost everyone’s eyes to her as she stopped to dance with a few people.”

  “And the man?” I inquired.

  Raven raised her big brown eyes to mine. “He stood by the bar, ordered a drink, and scanned the room. Then his eyes honed in on me.” She swallowed thickly, her eyebrows pulling together somewhat nervously as her apprehension poured over me.

  “And that’s when he approached you,” I deduced, but Raven shook her head again. “Then…?”

  She shivered, pulling her hands from the table and into her lap, her eyes following them. “I don’t know how to describe what happened. It’s kind of…foggy.”

  “Try,” I encouraged, leaning forward on the table. “Just, try.”

  Her head bobbed slightly, but she kept her eyes from mine. “I didn’t even realize I was walking toward him at first—in fact, it didn’t feel like I was walking at all. I felt like I was floating, being pulled toward him by some unseen force.”

  “Tell us more about this man,” David spoke up. “What about him stood out to you?”

  “His eyes,” Raven replied without missing a beat, and her head snapped up, locking her gaze on me. “They were green—kind of like yours, actually, but darker…almost sinister.”

  “And what did he say to you?” I probed gently.

  “Not much, really. He told me about his club, and how I was exactly the type they were looking for. I wasn’t sure what that even meant, but his voice was so hypnotic that I’d have believed anything he tried to tell me.”

  Taking in everything she told me, I nodded. “What happened next?”

  “The woman came back. She seemed on edge about something—
pissed off, actually—and her eyes were searching the room frantically as she took her boyfriend’s hand again. I don’t think she intended for me to hear anything, but she muttered something about The Dungeon being compromised by mongrels. That their scent polluted the air.”

  The information that Raven gave us so far confounded me. What did they mean by mongrels? She couldn’t possibly have meant the police, could she? We hadn’t been there in days—mainly because Donovan had been so cooperative and was sure to give us any information we needed whenever we asked for it—so how could she have known?

  I didn’t get a chance to formulate a theory before an even more relevant question came to mind: if she did know that the police had already infiltrated The Dungeon, why was it such a big deal? Perhaps she had something to hide, after all. Maybe she did have a hand in these murders—and Bobby’s.

  “Did you get the address?” I blurted out, desperate to follow this lead as far as I could.

  Raven’s head bobbed unsteadily as she reached into her pocket and pulled out a business card. “Y-yeah. He didn’t say anything else after she came back. He only handed me this card and told me to stop by later last night.”

  “And did you?” David asked, glancing down at the glossy black card as I took it, careful to hold it by the edges so we could dust it for prints in hopes of getting an ID on these two.

  I stared at the card, struggling to make a connection that felt so obvious. There was something familiar about it, and yet I struggled to place it… Why?

  “No. I mean, I was going to, but Lucia and Astrophel didn’t think it was a good idea. They suggested I call you. They’d heard Donovan talking with one of your officers about some pretty hairy activity going down and figured this was worth reporting.”

  I turned the card over in my hand, where I found only an address in the Warehouse District of Phoenix printed in a basic white font in the lower right corner. The memory slammed into me, shining bright like a lightbulb in a dark room. I’d seen this card before…

  At Samantha Turner’s apartment, right there on her coffee table amongst several others. I remembered bagging it myself before we left that day, but didn’t think it really meant anything.

  A smile played at the corners of my lips upon realizing that this could very well be the beginning of the end for this case, and a strange feeling swelled within me. It was a strange combination of relief and elation at having gotten what was probably a vital piece of information after chasing our tails, but there something else crouched just below the surface.

  Something hungry.

  Chapter fourteen | run

  After thanking Raven for the information, we had her prints taken. She was confused at first, until we explained that it was to eliminate hers on the card from any others we might find. Once processed, we took her to the elevator and watched her leave before heading back to our desks to fill in our team.

  O’Malley was just hanging up his phone when we approached, and he informed us that Donovan agreed to come down to talk to us. There was one problem, though; he apparently didn’t remember much from the night in question and wasn’t sure he’d be much help. O’Malley requested copies of any surveillance footage The Dungeon had, though. Hopefully it was useful.

  Even though I was unsure what to make of Donovan’s sudden bout of amnesia, we needed to get as much information as possible. While we waited for Donovan to arrive, David called the Phoenix precinct to see if he could get jurisdiction to investigate the address on the card. It turned out they were investigating a couple of murders that sounded very much like ours. When I told them about the card, they sounded as ecstatic as I was about it. Once we had the approval we needed, I hung up the phone and saw Donovan approaching my desk.

  “We really need to stop meeting like this, Detective Leighton,” he greeted.

  Laughing, I gestured toward the chair across from me, and Donovan took a seat, handing me the disc. “You really do spoil me.”

  “Flowers are so cliché,” Donovan quipped, relaxing back into the chair. “So, I’m told you wanted to talk about my visitors last night?”

  David joined our conversation, standing next to me. “We do.”

  “Well,” Donovan replied, “as I told the detective on the phone, I’m not sure how much help I’ll be. It’s all kind of a blur.”

  “Had a little too much to drink last night?” I inquired, equal parts teasing and seriousness.

  Donovan quickly shook his head. “Not at all.”

  “How can you be sure? You did say you can’t remember anything,” I reminded him, and he shrugged.

  “I realize how sketchy it sounds to say I don’t remember what happened—believe me, I do—but my bartender, Adam, assures me I hadn’t had anything to drink the entire night.” I recognized the name of the bartender as the one I spoke to when we were last here. Would he remember anything from last night? I’d have to remember to give him a call to find out. In fact, it might not be a bad idea to pay another visit to The Dungeon just to be sure.

  “So you don’t even remember what happened before they came into your club?” I asked. “How is that possible?”

  Donovan looked frustrated, but I was confident my line of questioning wasn’t the cause. He hated that he couldn’t remember. “I don’t know.”

  “Well, one of your club-goers said she saw you approach them,” I told him. “Did you?”

  Donovan fell silent, his eyebrows pulling together as he thought back. “I vaguely remember sitting near the stage in my usual seat, and then seeing them.” He clenched his eyes shut, possibly in an attempt to jog his memory. “At first, I had no idea how they even got in—I’d never seen them before, and I hadn’t approved any new members or potentials for last night.”

  “So you approached them?”

  Eyes still shut, Donovan nodded. “That’s what the surveillance video shows. Honestly, I vaguely remember speaking with the woman, but, for the life of me, I don’t recall what it was about.” Frustrated or weary, he rubbed his hands over his face. “It feels like it was a dream, to be honest. One that’s quickly fading away.”

  Things just kept getting weirder by the second. Either he was lying about not remembering, or he had the worst memory in the world, because how could he not remember a conversation with an uninvited guest in his exclusive club? What did she do? Hypnotize him? And his doorman? A ridiculous theory. The only way I would know for sure was if I located this woman and her companion and figured out exactly what went on at this club they were advertising.

  After watching the surveillance video that Donovan brought over, we were no closer to identifying this couple. One camera showed them entering the club, but they seemed aware of it, keeping their faces hidden. The woman was dressed in a tight black dress, showing off as much skin as possible, even with the cooler evening temperatures, and the man wore jeans, a basic black shirt, and a leather jacket. Nothing about either of them really stood out to me, except when I saw what Raven was talking about: they moved with confidence and purpose, and all eyes were on them.

  While I continued to study this couple, trying to see anything that could help me figure out who they were, Donovan approached the couple. The woman talked to him, leaning in as though whispering to him, and then he disappeared, presumably back to his office since we didn’t see him again. Even watching the recording with us frustrated him. The other cameras showed the mystery couple walk the floor—still being sure to avoid the cameras—and then they split up. The woman made her rounds, and, just as Raven said he did, the male parked himself at the bar until she approached him. She was right, too; the way she walked toward him seemed off. Having met her and walked her out, her gait was completely different in this video. It looked as though she was locked in some kind of trance, like she was being pulled to him by some unseen force, and it made no logical sense.

  Sure, I could keep going with my hypnosis theory, but what were the chances that was actually valid?

  I was starting to lose hope whe
n the woman reentered the frame. Her posture seemed less fluid than before—rigid and panicked…afraid—as she leaned in to speak with her partner. His own posture stiffened, and while he glanced around their surroundings, still sure to keep his identity hidden, her eyes flashed up at the camera and she bared her teeth for the briefest of seconds. It all happened so fast that I actually questioned whether or not it happened at all. While my brain tried to figure out whether or not I imagined it, my body reacted as though it was real. The hairs on the back of my neck bristled, my entire body quivered, and I found myself pulling my own lips back in a silent snarl. It felt instinctive.

  David’s hand touching down on my shoulder grounded me, and I pushed the defensive feeling aside. “Did you see that?” I asked him quietly, my voice noticeably lower and trembling slightly.

  “What?”

  I rewound the recording to where she looked at the camera, and we watched it again, but he still missed it. I didn’t, though, and it brought about the same reaction in me. Time and time again, I witnessed the absolute look of disgust on this woman’s face when she made eye contact with the camera. It was as though she knew we were watching her, and it only further cemented my theory that she had something to do with these deaths.

  We watched this part of the tape at least a dozen times, and David continued to look at me like he was questioning whether or not to have me committed. When I finally froze the feed on the exact millisecond that this woman glared at the camera, I excitedly pointed at the monitor.

  “Aha! See! Right there!” My excitement faded as I examined the look in her eyes and determined it as challenging. But who was she challenging? The club’s security guards? The police? No, the more I let her eyes burn into mine through the monitor, I felt like she was challenging me.

  That couldn’t be right. The only reason I felt that way was because I was on the other side of the video feed. She meant the look for whoever was watching and no one in particular. She knew on some level that we’d come into possession of the security feed eventually, so maybe this was her way of daring the cops to come find her.