The scream cut out abruptly. Creed’s body tensed, and he moved faster. He scanned the room numbers, identifying us as police as we weaved through the rush.
I nearly bumped into him as he came to a fast halt at the threshold of an open door. The room’s sprinklers had kicked on, and the sound of their spray filled the momentary gaps between the cacophony of bells, beeps, and alarms. Water bounced and streamed off the bed. Droplets ran in the black pile where our witness’ torso had once been. Head and limbs were intact and untouched, lying atop bedsheets that were barely singed.
Inching in, Creed stood at the foot of Dan Chandler’s bed. I moved up beside him, as a wave of hospital workers rushed in. Their grim, shocked expressions were disturbingly similar to the one frozen onto the victim’s face. Sleek, black ghosts seeped out at their heels, and I turned away.
I’d witnessed the birth of a human’s ghost many times. To my ability, it was compelling. It was also overpowering and emotionally pungent, and there were too many spectators to let it touch me. So I steeled my mind against its presence and focused instead on Dan Chandler’s soggy, cooked remains.
Right away, I knew, this one’s different. It wasn’t calculated methodical, like at the house. This wasn’t Act II. This was clean-up.
Water spewed from Creed’s lips as he gestured up at the sprinklers. “Get these damn things off! We’re losing evidence!”
Nine
I’d declined taking first crack at the body. The room had been too crowded to risk shifting even my eyes, and the hospital-wide eruption of strong emotions had left me bent over with my head in my hands. I was feeling better now. The sudden rush of fear response was ebbing. But it had come on like an ambush, assaulting me with rapid flashes of anger and panic I couldn’t fend off. I’d tried to sort through it, to find Dan Chandler’s last moments, but all I got was my brain feeling like it’d been put through a blender.
Creed bought my explanation that I couldn’t do anything without my kit, and that the blaring alarms had triggered a migraine. I knew he would. It was what I did; lying to avoid suspicion, pretending I’m something I’m not, feigning uncertainty when I already knew the answer—faking weakness when I had it in me to be stronger than four men put together.
I’d learned a long time ago. Dishonesty and duplicity was the only way to survive here, the only way to live. But was it living or hiding?
I’d been so many things over the years, told so many stories. Even I was beginning to believe they were true. Maybe Ronan is right. I have forgotten what I am. Was that why I was standing outside the victim’s room instead of inside? Fretting over the water in my hundred dollar boots and too concerned with being seen to utilize the gifts I was born with.
Hearing the elevator arrive down the hall, I looked up. A few moments later, Detective Creed rounded the corner. Retracing the route we’d run a short time ago, he was now moving at a much slower contemplative pace. His suit was soaked. Water had flattened his hair. His wet shoes emitted a noticeable squeak with every step. The woman walking beside him carried a heavy black case in each of her gloved hands. Blue coveralls hid the shape of her petite frame and most of her dark hair. Creed bent close as they spoke. There was a familiarity in their body language, a lack of acknowledgement of personal boundaries. They knew each other, but their talk was intense, as if their opinions didn’t mesh.
I watched his frown deepen and her awkward attempt at gesturing with her hands full. Based on the taut expression pinching her pretty freckled face, whatever the woman’s viewpoint, she wasn’t budging.
He lifted the tape and let her go under first. I lost sight of them as they entered the victim’s room. Their muted conversation continued. More voices joined in, two male, another female; uttering their dismay with louder, colorful words. I had no doubt the SCPD forensics team was smart. But they had no idea what they were dealing with. None of them could smell the scent of my kind clinging to the moist remains. None of them knew how easy it was to burn a man’s torso away from his limbs. To set a slow fire capable of doing its job before the sprinklers interfered. Ignited correctly, the victim would live right up until the end, watching his own body burn as the killer walked away.
Detective Creed exited the room. He flashed me a strained, obligatory smile. “I guess we know Mr. Chandler saw more than he told us.”
“Or more than he realized.”
He pointed to the row of chairs lined up against the opposite wall. “The officer I sent for your kit is five minutes out,” he said, taking a seat. “If you’re up to working.”
I sat beside him. “I’m fine. I want to get this done.” The victim’s room was in full view now. I nodded at it. “Anything?”
“Chandler was waiting on his discharge papers. The doctor left his room fifteen minutes before the alarms and sprinklers went off. Half the hospital came running down this hall. Yet, someone got in, torched our guy, and got out without any witnesses.”
I decided to play it safe. “We’re going to be here a while. How about some coffee?”
“Sure. Thanks.” He jerked a thumb at the hall. “Machine’s that way.”
Getting up, I set my bag on the chair and took out my wallet. “Cream and sugar?”
Creed looked up as a tall uniformed officer called to him from the other side of the tape. I recognized him immediately as my escort into the Chandler home. Noticing me at the same time, surprise lit Officer Evans’s gaze a moment. Then he looked back at Creed and gave the detective an urgent nod.
Creed stood, and I asked again, “Cream and sugar?”
“Whatever.”
“You don’t have a preference?”
“I drink coffee for the results, Miss Nite. Not the taste.”
I watched him walk back across the hall, his shoes still squeaking on the tile. As Evans lifted the tape, he gave me a friendly wink before turning away. Him I got. Evans was genuine. He was clever and eager. Friendly. Creed…I had no idea.
Following his vague gesture of direction, I went in search of the coffee machine. Rooms on both sides of the hall were empty and dark. I passed the nurses’ station and a few officers conducting interviews with the staff. Maintenance men with yellow buckets pushed their mops across the floor, drying up the mess left behind by the sprinklers. Power outages had been reported all over the building. One had left a convenient hole in the security video feed starting several minutes prior to the attack. We had no witnesses and no footage.
Dan Chandler’s death was orchestrated like a professional hit, but no lyrriken with an order of execution would burn a mark in a public hospital. It was a move made either in desperation or overconfidence. Neither were traits of Guild operatives. Especially ones who had already invited the Queen’s condemnation, with the mess they left behind at the house.
A woman in a bright pink nurses’ uniform rounded the corner ahead. Shadows spilled after her, extending in from the next hall where the overhead lighting was out.
The distance between us lessened. As we passed each other, I pointed at the disposable cup in her hand. She glanced at me as she walked by, and I caught the edge of her smile.
“Back that way,” she said. “Through the double doors. Careful, though.” Her voice faded as she moved away. “Most of this wing is still in the dark.”
I glanced over my shoulder. “Thanks.” Turning back around, I took the corner. The fluorescent light in the ceiling hummed and blinked above my head. Before it went out, I caught a glimpse of a man in hospital scrubs and a sweatshirt hurrying toward me. The hood was pulled low over his face. He didn’t see me approaching and bumped roughly into my shoulder as he walked by. The unexpected impact with his thick build unbalanced me, and the wallet fell from my hand. Its contents hit the shiny white-tiled floor and scattered, creating a trail of my fake life that stretched in through the open doorway of a dark supply closet.
“Awesome,” I sighed, mechanically bending to pick it up. Fishing for my forged drivers’ license, I reached into the closet.
My senses caught up to my preoccupied mind, and I drew in a sharp breath. Lyrriken.
The man was like me.
I heard the metal stairwell door slam closed. The sweet smoky scent of a recent burning drifted back in the man’s wake. And blood, I thought, tasting the metal tang on the air. It was fresh and strong. Close.
Looking for the source, I pivoted. My heel slid on a wet streak on the floor, and the blood-scent spiked. The closet light winked on. I was an inch from the body.
In his underwear, ankles and wrists bound with tape, the man was slumped against a tall cabinet. A dark wetness stained his hair. I wondered if his lyrriken attacker had knocked him out before, or after, he stole the orderly’s clothes and gutted him.
I dropped my wallet and took off in pursuit.
I thought about calling Creed, but even if I hadn’t left my phone in my bag, he had no business chasing after a lyrriken. I wasn’t sure I did.
Yanking open the stairwell door, I glanced up then down. The roof was closer. Brazen or not, though, none of us would be so reckless as to sprout wings in the light of day above the city streets.
Down it is.
Since he’d likely identified me as lyrriken in the same instant, I chose speed over stealth and didn’t bother quieting the heels of my boots as I sprinted down the stairs. It was a decision I regretted as I rounded the first landing, and the lights switched off.
Plunged into total darkness, I brought the scales out around my eyes. As my vision crisped up, an odd sound filled the stairwell. I turned to locate the noise, and something slick and forceful rushed under my steps. The soles of my boots lost touch with the concrete stairs, so fast, my body went horizontal. As it came down, I expected pain. Instead, my back hit with an odd sting. And I sunk. Water closed over my head and swept into my mouth. I bounced into the wall twice before my impossible circumstances registered.
A raging river, at least six feet deep, was rushing down the dark hospital stairwell, and taking me with it.
I pushed to the surface. Catching a hasty breath, billows of water lapped against my ears. It spilled like ice down my throat as I groped for the handrail—once, twice, three times. I couldn’t get a solid grip. The surface was too slick. The current was too vicious, as it pulled me back under and flung me along.
Sharp edges slammed into my back. My face struck metal. I tried to gauge how many flights I’d descended (and how many I had to go). Then the side of my head made fast contact with something affixed to the wall, and my attempt at reasoning fragmented like shattered glass. As the emergency lighting flickered on, I glimpsed a fuzzy streak of red enter the water. It trailed behind me while the white rectangles on the wall blinked on, off, on, off, in a continuous seizure-inducing rhythm.
I closed my eyes. They were of no use to me anyway.
Whipped around the turn of a landing, as I struggled a fourth time for the handrail, my left arm slipped between the columns. I tried to tug free, but I had no time. The unmerciful surge zipped my body along, and a loud pop reverberated through my pinned arm as the shoulder left its joint. I cried out with a gurgle. The floppy limb slipped from the railing, and my descent continued.
I bumped down the last step and onto the level floor. Floating at the bottom of the stairwell, I tried shifting, but I was soaked in water and pain. All I could do was choke and groan as the floor dried up around me. Dazed, I rolled over onto my bruised back. Pressure lifted off my dislocated shoulder, but the change in position did nothing to alleviate my ringing ears or the stabbing pain in my chest as I coughed.
At the moment, my rapid healing wasn’t anywhere near rapid enough.
Pushing the heavy mop of wet hair off my face, I blinked the water from my eyes. The constant fluctuating light was not good for my aching head. It kept me from realizing for nearly a full minute that I wasn’t alone. The man in hospital scrubs was standing less than two feet away.
Another figure lurked in the empty space behind the stairs. Considerably smaller than the man, it moved closer with the click of stilettos and the sway of feminine curves. By scent, I marked her as lyrriken. A quick assessment of size and shape made her a match for the woman at Nadine’s.
Armed only with my outrage, as she knelt at my feet and started slinking up the front of me, I didn’t move. I was wounded and outnumbered. More importantly, her warning shot had cooked a street full of people. I had no idea what she might do now that we were face to face. I still wasn’t sure she was Guild. She didn’t have the look.
Child-like in stature, the woman’s toned pale skin gave her human façade the appearance of a young twenty-something. I knew she was much older. Once adolescence was behind us, lyrriken aging slowed to a crawl. By human time-keeping, she could be well over a hundred. Still, she gave off a youthful careless air as she sashayed through the many puddles remaining on the floor. Despite the wet conditions, her short, chunky hair (a striking teal-blue, waxed to hold its gravity-defying position) was dry as a bone. As were her black silk leggings and beaded gray halter. Large, deep-set eyes resting above a small upturned nose, made her features remarkably waif-like. Her thin lips and dainty chin spoke of innocence. It was a deceiving guise as the girl moved fast and pinned me to the floor.
I groaned as she squeezed my throbbing left shoulder. I tried again to shift, but my internal signals were as blurred as my vision.
She leaned down. With no bra to contain them, her small breasts dangled in my face. A necklace swayed between them. I was more interested in her eyes. The ice blue of a frozen glacier, her elongated pupils sparkled in the unsettled light with a wild, eager sense of malice.
The girl inched up to my face. I pondered her next move, running through scenarios in my mind. Would she attack or interrogate?
Proving both guesses wrong, she kissed me.
I didn’t flinch. Neither did I respond as her lips manipulated mine with the passion and exploration of an eager new lover. Living as long as I had, I was far from a prude, but she had lousy timing. Banged up, bruised and bloody; I wasn’t in the mood.
Abruptly, she sat up and threw the back of her hand across my face. She wanted a response. So I licked my torn lip and said nothing.
“See,” the girl purred happily to her companion. “I told you it was her.”
“Come on, then,” he replied. “You’ve had your fun. Let’s go.”
“Fun?” Her voice strained in insult. “Is that what you think this is?”
“You’ve jeopardized us enough,” he said.
“You wanted a statement. I made one.”
His responding growl rang with disapproval.
“Are you retrievers?” I said, breaking my silence. “Did the Guild send you to bring me home?”
A finger to her lips, she whispered, “Shhhhhh,” and a lake of shimmering blue-green scales overran her neck. They slithered up her face, spread across one shoulder, under her shirt and down her arm. Enveloping wrist and hand, as the vibrant plates encased her fingers, gray claws slid out.
She didn’t finish her shift. It didn’t matter. I knew what she was.
Fighting her hold, as she gripped my chin, her claws stretched up over my lips. Knowing what the daughter of a water-elder could do, I turned my head, but I couldn’t stop the tip of her finger from pushing into my mouth.
Water came with it.
The excretion was a slow, controlled dribble. I thought it a threat, a demonstration of her strength and lineage. But as I coughed the water out, more pumped in, and the flow quickened.
Her claws dug into my face. The icy tide invaded my lungs.
Choking, I summoned my strength and ripped my right arm out of her hold. My fist struck her jaw, and she smiled. I hit her again, and her pretty head snapped to the side. With one more punch, her grip eased. Clawtips nicked my skin as she recoiled. I grabbed her hair and threw her off me. Her body hit the wall with a grunt. Scales retreated and gave way to bruised and bloody human skin.
I climbed to my knees. Spewing water from my
overflowing mouth, I wrestled to focus amid the still-changing light as my eyes darted between my two assailants. The girl picked herself up and laughed, like I was the most fun she’d had in a long time. The man, still clinging to the shadows, seemed uninterested in getting involved. He simply watched as I wrapped a shaky hand around the railing and got to my feet.
Eyes watering, throat burning, I was up, but I didn’t exactly cut a menacing figure. My left arm hung useless. My head and back had taken a beating on the stairs. My clothes were torn, dripping, and blood-streaked. One heel of my water-filled boots was broken. Pissed, I wrung out my shirt, tossed the soggy hair off my face, and lunged at her.
As I moved, scales took my right arm. Claws sprouted. Fire sparked from their tips. The agony of my dislocated shoulder slid to the back of my mind as a trail of orange burned along the edges of my scaled hand. With it, I grabbed the front of her shirt. Giving more energy to my flame, it flared; eating through the flimsy fabric and scalding flesh. Amid her scream, I moved my grip upward. Misery thinned her cries. The stench delighted my senses as delicate skin blistered and burned.
Soon, I would reach her heart. Burning it would ensure her death. But dead, she could give me no answers. And ending her would do nothing to help Ronan.
My fire reflected off her necklace. As it glinted in the light, I realized what rested in the hollow of her throat was familiar. I’d seen it before, in my glimpse of the Chandler family’s trauma. Now I knew what had happened to the necklace Ella wore to bed.
She’d taken it as a trophy, like some common serial killer.
Nite Fire: Flash Point Page 10