by Anna Rainn
I shuddered. I too remembered Bianca’s blond hair form the brief flashing images at my parking lot, but she hadn’t always been blond.
“Bianca was a redhead when we used to work together. That’s the way I remember her.”
Something played across Nick’s face. His eyebrows were pulled together in deep thought, his foot heavy on the gas pedal.
When over ten minutes of dangerous silent driving had passed, I timed it on my phone, I decided to ask him what exactly was going on.
“Do you still think my home is safe?” I asked.
“No. We’re going to the station.”
Why the station, why wasn’t he taking me to his house?
“Okay… Why?”
“Because I need to go do something, and I can only be certain you’re safe if you’re at the station with Owen."
“Where are you going?” I didn’t want him to leave me. He just shook his head.
“Can’t you just take me back to Caleb’s place? We are just friends, I promise.” I hated saying that last part, confirming Nick had some sort of right, but I really hated the thought of spending the night on an uncomfortable chair in a police station.
“It’s not about that, Marissa; it is about trust. I don’t know who this Caleb did or did not invite into his house. And I can’t take risks.”
“I highly doubt my café manager invited vampires in.”
Nick said nothing; he just kept driving.
“And the station is different how? It is a public place!”
“It takes more than recklessness for two fugitive vampires to attack a police station full of cops. And you won’t just be at the station; you will be with Owen. I trust him with my life, and I guess I’ll have to trust him with yours tonight.”
We were already parked in front of the busy police station, and I didn’t want to argue.
“Will I sleep at the police station every night, then?” I asked Nick as we walked to the door, his arm still wrapped around me, though more relaxed than they had been at Caleb’s building.
“No,” Nick said, thoughtfully, “this ends tonight.”
Chapter 20
The police station was busier than I had expected this time of night. Almost at midnight, a few officers scattered here and there, most doing paperwork on their desks. Nick kept his arm casually around my waist against all the stares. If anything, his hand slid lower in the face of the curious looks we attracted walking toward Owen Chase’s office.
Once inside, Nick let me go and turned to me.
“Stay here,” he instructed, shooting Owen a look. The two men stepped back and left me all alone in the small, cluttered office. When they finally returned, I was still staring at the closed blinds.
“Can I get you some coffee? It is not as good as yours, but it will do,” detective Chase offered.
“No, thank you.” I was tired, but I didn’t want any more caffeine in my system.
Nick was hovering at the door. Chase turned to him. “I got her,” he said. “Now go.”
“Don’t leave her alone for a minute,” Nick instructed, his tone too intense, too inappropriate addressing Chase who ranked higher. I glanced at the detective, but he smiled reassuringly.
“I know, Nick. You already told me. Three times.”
“She is tricky this one, she may try to talk you into letting her out of your sight for a minute,” Nick started again, not quite satisfied with the detective’s reply.”
“Nick. I know. We went through this several times,” Chase said, heading for his office door and holding it open for Nick. “Now go get the vermin who did this so she can go home safely.”
“I know, I should go, but I need you to promise,” Nick was pointing his finger at Chase. Obviously, their relationship went beyond work, the formality of the crime scene a mere pretense for watching eyes; the two guys had what looked like a long-running friendship that surpassed work and rank.
“I promise, Nick. I will use my seven years of experience in the force to keep your girlfriend safe for that one night. Now you go do your part.”
I turned to Chase. “I’m not his girlfriend.”
Nick audibly sighed and pulled me by the arm. His mouth on mine was strong and reassuring. I let the kiss linger, although we weren’t alone, although I was trying to prove there was nothing between us a split second ago. But then it had to end. Nick gave Owen a guy hug. “Take good care of her, please,” he whispered again. Chase just patted his back.
And just like that, I was left in Owen’s office, a panting package of messed up hair, wet eyelashes, and raw lips, as Nick disappeared out the door and into the night.
Owen locked the door behind Nick, the click audible in the relative silence of the night shift. I looked at him awkwardly. He signaled to one of the two chairs opposite his desk wordlessly, then moved back to his seat, gracefully positioning himself behind the file pyramid on his desk. I toyed with my phone for a few minutes, answered a text from Caleb reassuring him that I was safely home, checked the messages he posted on Black and Foam’s social media, then I was out of things to do. With an audible sigh, I started scrolling aimlessly through my Instagram feed: people on the beach, people at the gym, people in bathrooms taking selfies, people at dinner parties, people at the movies. Nobody was stuck in a police station in an attempt to hide from wild vampires. But then, again, I wasn’t updating my socials with my current state of affairs, was I?
I cocked my head from behind the big pyramid of files, then tried to peek a look at the detective from between the gaps. His head was sunk between his hands in deep concentration as he studied a paper in front of him.
I cleared my throat. Owen kept studying the file. I cleared my throat again, louder.
“Miss Cooper, do you need some water?” The detective asked without looking up. “There is a watercolor there.” He pointed at the corner of the room with one finger.
“Actually, I wanted to ask you a few questions,” I considered adding if you have time, but he obviously didn’t have time, and I obviously wanted to talk, so.
Chase straightened his lean frame into his oversized black leather chair and just looked at me. The relaxed friendliness I had seen from him earlier with Nick was now gone; Chase had his cop face on. He had detective eyes, observant, authoritative, intelligent, and guarded. There was no telling what he thought, what he knew, or what he planned. It was unsettling.
I stammered with his hazel eyes trained on me, then I led with the easiest question. “I needed to know when Black and Foam can reopen.”
“Depends on Nick,” said the detective.
I knew what he meant, and he knew I knew, but I wasn’t going to let go of my opportunity to fish for information.
“Depends on special consultant Hayes how exactly?” I asked, innocently, as if Nick hadn’t had his tongue in my mouth and his hand on my waist in front of the detective five minutes ago.
“We are relying on him to gather intel in order to catch the murderers. The sooner he delivers, the sooner we can end this.”
“So we will stay closed until you make an arrest?”
He nodded, his eyes falling back to his paperwork.
“Why? We can work regular business hours, and I can have a police escort back home. I doubt there will be an attack on a busy café. I have never heard of such a thing happening. Unless you guys cover it up.”
He fell into the trap. A flash of something invaded his otherwise emotionless hazel eyes as he looked at me again, "We don’t cover up things, Miss Cooper. Attacks are rare, very rare, and they never take place as publicly as the one on your friend did. Not just that, there was no precedence of an attack such as the one you suffered at your apartment. And this is reason enough for us to fear more reckless behavior from the culprits, and to keep your coffee shop closed until the threat is neutralized.”
“So best case scenario, I stay alive, but I go out of business?”
“Miss Cooper,” he responded patiently, “I understand you’r
e under a lot of pressure. It is not easy to be subjected to a hidden world, witness the murder fo a friend, and have two attempts on your life in two days. But Nick is on top of this. And I have reason to believe he will have this case wrapped up as soon as possible.”
“With an arrest?” I asked.
The hazel eyes gave me an annoyed look, then came a very subtle head shake. Not an arrest. Of course. Prison would be an all you can eat buffet for vampires, wouldn’t it?
“Then what?” I pressed.
“I can’t discuss an ongoing investigation, I’m sorry,” he gave me a fake polite smile. Cut it out, it said.
I didn’t. “So what are you going to do with them. I need to know because I need to be sure they won’t attack me again. That’s the whole point of me closing up, right?”
“In situations like this, the issues are handled internally,” he said, carefully weighing his words.
“By the vampires’ faction? How do we know the faction will keep the two murders away?”
“They are runaways. They broke their own world’s rules. And there is an ongoing arrangement with the leaders of the other side.”
“Who’s to say they won’t just say to hell with it at one point, or that they will escape their capture without us knowing?”
“We have strong… emissaries. And that’s as far as we’re discussing this.” Detective Chase pushed on his desk and got up to the water cooler himself. I doubt thirst was the reason, though; I think he wasn’t enjoying our quality time together.
“Okay, so when can I have my car back?” I asked, directing my looks at his turned back.
“Nick told me about this,” Chase said, and my interest in my car faded instantaneously.
“What, told you what?” I couldn’t keep the interest out of my voice, god damn it.
“He told me you will ask me a million questions and generally drive me crazy.”
How much exactly did Nick tell him in the ten minutes they spent outside?
Before I could object to Nick’s biased opinion of me, Chase continued, “He said you get testy when you’re scared.”
“I’m not scared,” I lied.
“It’s okay to be scared.” The tall detective was facing me now, “Vampires are scary. I was scared when I first met Nick, when I first found out about this.”
“How long ago was that?” I asked. The two men looked like they knew each other for a long time. I doubt Chase let his mask of formality drop so easily as he did with Nick, and Nick didn’t look like he is the kind of guy to trust anybody the way he did Chase.
“About seven years ago,” the detective answered, then with his body reclined into his leather chair again and his heavily lashed eyes on me, he continued, “There was a case. The body had been drained of blood, and there were other things,” he paused, deciding how much to tell, “paranormal things,” he finished.
I shivered.
“Was this the case with Bianca?” I asked him. “Was she drained of blood?”
“No. Her attacker didn’t have enough time. Or maybe according to Nick’s new information, he wasn’t after the blood.”
“What else could he have wanted?” I asked.
“I honestly don’t know. When it happens, it is always a hungry outcast, starving, and desperate. This seems to be different. All the signs point to something else.”
“How did Nick convince you it was a vampire, back in that first case?” I asked.
“He didn’t,” Chase answered. “He showed me.”
“And he’s been consulting in similar cases ever since?”
“Not just similar cases, normal cases too. Nick has a gift for seeing hidden clues and for tracking criminals,” Chase said. “He had his own experiences with the underworld.” I noticed how he never used the word vampires. “It is up to him to tell you, but I am happy to see him trust someone with his feelings again.”
“It didn’t seem to me like Nick had a problem in this area,” I said carefully. He sure didn’t seem to be a hurt loner that night at the bar, or every time he peeled my clothes off with no regard to time or place.
Chase just shrugged, obviously reluctant to let any more information out. What he had told me was probably a big enough breach of bro code or whatever, and I knew that if I wanted to learn more, it would have to be from Nick’s mouth to mine, I mean to my ears.
“He broke my heart, you know. A while back.”
Chase looked surprised. “You were in a relationship?”
“Well, not exactly no.” We fucked once. “We dated.”
Chase nodded. This makes more sense, the nod seemed to say.
“Nick will take care of this, and he will take care of you,” Chase said, putting a lid on the information platter and returning to his work.
My presence sure didn’t seem to be hindering the detective from his regular routine. I wondered what was he was working on, my case, maybe? But the papers were too far, and the piles of files between us were too high, I couldn't get a good look.
It was well past midnight, and I was dozing off on the chair opposite Owen’s when I was jerked back to the real world by a loud, sharp ring.
“Chase,” the detective spoke into his office phone, then he listened with his eyebrows pulling together in a frown. I saw his mouth open, then close. Then he spoke again, the voice betraying none of the hesitation I had just witnessed.
“I’ll be right there,” he said.
Chapter 21
Three days ago, my idea of murder had been very cinematic. A group of law enforcement officials in raincoats, feet splashing on wet concrete floors as the rain hammered on, flashlights reflecting off water puddles as they hurried towards a body on the ground. It was the imagination of someone whose only interaction with crime in the past six years was petty theft attempts at the workplace, of a law abiding citizen who went from work to house in a safe neighborhood where the only contact with the police was for parking tickets.
I took the thankfully uneventful quality of my life here in the city for granted. Growing up back home, my bubble of safety was even stronger. In a small town with only five annual arrests - I know the number because it was stretched in red across the front page of the local paper - all for minor traffic offenses and drunken incidents, the word murder belonged in books or on television. To me, murder was something from another world, a scene with careful professional lighting that illuminates the actors’ faces while keeping a foreboding atmosphere.
I kept going back to this cinematic clean version of death as detective Owen and I walked through a long alleyway. Chase had parked his car on the side of the road; the alley leading to the crime scene was too narrow for his Ford pick up.
“Stay close,” he whispered for what must be the fifth time. I said nothing, walking a little faster, eager to get out of the claustrophobic alley and to the narrow street at the end. Long buildings loomed over us from both sides, old and dark against the slightly illuminated sky. Nobody lived in these apartments, I thought, scared; not one window was illuminated. But then I remembered we were now in the early hours of the morning. Those hours where the sun hasn’t yet made an appearance, and everybody is deep asleep. There were only two functional street lamps along the length of the narrow passage. The light they casted was white and cold.
I was glad about my choice of footwear. If I had chosen to go with heels in my attempt to dress better and feel better this morning, the sound would’ve been unbearable under these circumstances. A girl in a dress and heels walking through a shady part of town before dawn; isn’t this how many movies start? But I wasn’t wearing heels, and I wasn’t alone. Detective Chase was behind me. He hadn’t placed his hands on me as Nick had earlier, but he was never further than one step back, closer to me than my own shadow. It made me feel a little better.
The little square of starlit sky was getting bigger as we drew closer to the street ahead. Coming out of the alley, Chase did place one hand on my shoulder. It wasn’t right that I was outside in the
heart of the night. It wasn’t right than Nick wasn’t here. But the alternative was me staying behind in the station, alone. Worse, in the company of people I don’t know, people who don’t know who to let in and who to keep out. So as per Nick’s instructions, I stayed with Owen Chase. And now, I was walking into a murder scene, my second murder scene in three days.
Owen squeezed my shoulder. I stopped and turned to him. My eyes had already been dancing everywhere, scanning the street stretching in front of us and the alley behind for any threat. There was none.
“What’s wrong?” I asked him. My voice sounded too loud in the quiet.
“There is nobody here.”
I pointed ahead. A still body laid on the floor, dark except for a fan of pale blond hair. “I think that’s the body.”
Owen shook his head, “We shouldn’t be the first people here. Where are the patrol officers and the forensic team?”
I paused. Owen was right. When Bianca was murdered behind Black and Foam, two officers arrived in response to my 911 call, patrol. Then two more for back up. Then the detective showed up with forensics, followed by Nick. There should be at least four people in uniforms here, waiting to brief the detective in. Yet, the street stretched before us, empty.
I shifted my weight between my feet. “Should we go back?” I asked Owen, dreading the trip back through the small passage.
He grabbed my arm, pulling me away.
“You’ll wait in the car,” he said. “I’ll take you there, and I’ll come back.” Owen started backing towards the alley. I could see his dilemma. Tucking me behind him would put me in front whoever may be lurking in the sinister alley, while keeping me in front of him left me exposed to the empty street where a murder just happened. So I stayed beside him as we turned and started heading back toward the alley. We were well into the street by this point, and our progress back was slow, with Owen scanning our surroundings at every step. There is no point in this, I thought, looking at the long buildings ahead, there is absolutely nobody here. We should just hurry back to the car and call for back up. I looked behind me, and I froze. The corpse in the street was standing two feet away from me, with blood-matted blond hair in its face, smiling. I knew this smile too well.