“No, he was not!” Zael says. “He had a couple of weeks holiday leave. He came back a day early when we found that Garrett girl’s body on Sunday because I asked him to come in. We were shorthanded.”
Storm feels a jolt of satisfaction. His gut is telling him this is the one. Lowry was on two weeks leave. This means he was on leave during both of the previous Wolf-Claw attacks as well as during Rachel’s murder.
“Where did Lowry go for his holiday?” says Storm. “Did he mention what day he came back?”
“He was in London. He had some personal stuff to take care of…” DI Zael’s voice trails off as he realizes this is not helping matters for Lowry.
“Look, it wasn't him,” Zael says. “I’m telling you. I’ve worked with the guy for near on three years.”
“We’ll find out when we question him. He’s gone to ground. I’ll let you know when I find him.”
“Where are you headed to?” DI Zael says curtly. “I’ll meet you there.”
Zael insists on coming. Knowing the sensitivities and of joint task-force politics and the highly-strung senior personalities involved, Storm grudgingly tells him the address. He warns Zael to tread carefully.
Storm arrives outside the run down old shop, windows now boarded up, and drives straight past it. If Sergeant Lowry is inside, he does not want to tip Lowry off by parking up directly outside.
As Storm parks his car some distance up the street he hears a police siren blaring. He curses. Moments later DI Zael’s car comes into view, sirens still blaring and lights flashing. Zael parks directly in front of the shop. The absolute idiot.
Storm races to the shop as DI Zael emerges from his car with his hand at his gunbelt. “Cover the back entrance,” he snaps at Zael as he runs for the front.
“I’m telling you he won’t be in there,” DI Zael yells at Storm’s back. “Lowry’s one of the good guys.”
Without waiting for DI Zael, Storm shoves his shoulder into the front door of the shop. It flies open. It wasn’t locked. Storm enters the shop, his flashlight in one hand, his gun in the other. “This is Special Agent Constantine Storm,” he calls, announcing his presence. No point sneaking around now. It could get him killed.
There is no response. Storm goes rapidly from room to room, listening for any sound within before he enters each door. At the entrance to the last room he hears a faint noise, like a voice shouting from very far away. He enters the room cautiously, shining his flashlight into its dark depths.
There is a cage at the back, and a figure inside it. From the doorway Storm shines his flashlight around the room, making sure no one else is in there before approaching the cage. Reassured, he shines his flashlight directly at the man inside. It is Sergeant Hank Lowry. He is yelling, but Storm can barely hear his voice. This must be one of those cages magically enhanced to muffle the sound of anyone within it.
Storm can see that Hank Lowry is handcuffed to the bars of the cage. He is squirming and writhing, but he is unable to escape his restraints. Even then, the cage door is locked. Someone wanted him well and truly tied up. Storm goes closer. When he is two meters away from the cage, Hank Lowry’s voice suddenly becomes audible.
“Help me,” he is yelling. “You have to get me out of here. She’ll kill me. She’s coming to kill me.”
“Who put you in here?” Storm asks.
“She’s coming,” Lowry yells. “She’s coming for me!” He writhes and kicks frantically with the urgency of his words.
Storm tries the cage door but it is locked. No way is anyone going to get it open without a key. He gets his phone out of his pocket. He is going to have to call for someone from Mystics to break the lock open.
“There’s no time,” Hank Lowry screeches hysterically. “You have to get me out of here now. Please!”
“Calm down,” Storm tells him.
“I did it,” Lowry screams. “I killed them all, okay? I killed those girls. I killed Rachel Garrett. I did it. It was me. Now get me out of here, please!”
“I’ll need a key,” Storm says dryly. In all of his career no suspect has confessed so easily. He only wishes DI Zael had been here to witness it. “A lock breaker will be here soon.”
“I wanted India,” Lowry moans. “I was so lonely. All I wanted was a mate. A pack. It’s not my fault. You have to help me. Please.”
Storm goes to the doorway to look for Zael but there is no sign of him. “Zael?” he calls. “Keep an eye on the front, will you?” If someone really is coming for Lowry, Storm thinks he had better try to get the man out of the cage.
Lowry is still kicking the metal of the cage sides frantically, pounding it, delivering each blow with the entire weight of his body, but not leaving even a dent. His face is awash with perspiration, his eyes wild. As Storm approaches the cage Lowry suddenly stops kicking. His chest heaving for breath, he goes still. He is staring at the door of the room.
Storm hears what Lowry has heard. The sound of multiple vehicles approaching, then parking up outside, their engines gunning loudly to announce their presence. There is a chilling victory cry in that sound. Someone has come for blood. Multiple someones.
“Fuck,” Storm mutters, dialing the number for back up, knowing that there is no way they will arrive in time.
Lowry starts crying. “Help me,” he whispers. “You have to help me.”
Chapter 28
ALYS
I’m driving, you’re riding.
I insisted it many times, but Diana didn’t trust me. Can’t blame her. I wouldn’t trust me either. Finally I had to remind Diana of Storm’s mortality before she agreed. Only after insisting that I couldn’t block her out of my mind did she grudgingly let me take control over our body. I can feel her in there jittering with anxiety and discontent. It’s the last thing I need tearing away at my focus.
I had to agree to her terms. Despite my best efforts, I still can’t control her body at will in the daytime when she is strong and full of energy and aware of her own consciousness. And certainly not now that she knows about me and will be vigilant. I have only done it when she is sleeping or tired or scared or sick. Only in moments when she hadn’t even been aware that her control over herself had slipped just enough for me to take over while she was unaware.
So I’ll let her have it her way for now. But only until I grow stronger than her, though I won’t be telling her that any time soon.
No killing anyone, she tells me now. Remember you promised no killing anyone this time.
“Yeah, whatever,” I say, making the cab driver glance at me in the rear-view mirror. I glare until he looks away.
I much prefer it when she isn’t riding. When I can’t hear her at all. When she is blissfully asleep and unaware of what I had been doing.
She is fidgeting inside my head. Are you sure this is going to work? I’ve never shot a gun before.
“I have.”
As the cab approaches the right road in Shoreditch I tell the driver to park up around the corner from the shop. I don’t need him being a witness to anything he isn’t supposed to see. And I don’t need him to recall my face later and tell anyone about me going there. I pay him in cash and get out, waiting for him to drive off before I jog up the road in the direction of the shop.
Are we here? she asks. Is this the place? Where’s the shop?
“Chill out.”
Hurry, she urges.
“If you’d had a car we would be there by now,” I tell her.
Getting to the corner of the road I loiter there, and take a casual glance towards the shop. A cop car is outside it. I see Storm’s SUV parked up the road.
He’s already here, she says. You can run in and warn him.
“And have him ask us how we know about this place? I don’t think so.”
Both cars are empty. Storm must already be inside. I stroll casually up the road towards the shop. I pass a fire escape on an adjacent building that leads to the roof. She sees it.
You can get up to the roof, she s
ays. She is right. It has a vantage point overlooking the road. We would see anyone arrive.
Do you think the pack is here already? she says.
“I doubt it. They didn't seem the sort to arrive quietly.”
Are you a good enough shot to—
“Will you shut up?” I snarl.
There is a squeal of tires somewhere behind me. A swift glance over my shoulder shows me four muscle cars roaring around the corner.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
Is that them? she asks, the feeling of her seeming to tense in my mind. Is that his pack?
“Looks like it.”
You have to do something!
“Doing it,” I mutter.
I turn back on myself. There is no time for me to go down the alleyway to behind the shop without them seeing me. I jump up and seize the bottom of the fire escape ladder with my fist. Hauling myself up in one smooth motion, I get my feet onto the rungs and climb swiftly up it.
By the time I have reached the roof, the brutish hulks have got out of their cars, every one a man but one. They are whooping and hollering. No doubt they are aware that Stephen Manners, their treacherous former pack member, is inside and can hear them and is terrified. And they can see the cop car too. They know a cop or two are inside, but they are not scared.
A tall brunette has got out of the lead car. The body language of the others seems to worship her. There is no doubt that she is the alpha.
I drop down flat on the roof and crawl on my elbows to the edge. The firing angle from the edge is awkward, but I point my gun straight down towards the pack. Six of them have emerged from the four cars. Three of them are already on my side of the road.
What are you doing? Diana says urgently. Three are going to go inside!
I let them go. Having them in there is better for me than having them out here. The other three have parked their two cars on the opposite side of the road. As soon as the pack alpha and the two with her have disappeared inside the store, I pick off the remaining three as they cross the road. Pop! Pop, pop! Bull’s-eye. My shots land square in the middle of their chests, the silencer muffling them. Diana gives a little squeal of horror at each one. I chuckle.
“Relax. They’re werewolves. A normal bullet isn’t going to kill them. Not even dipped in your buddy Theo’s crazy elixir.”
Theo’s crazy elixir is the only reason all three of them have dropped onto the ground as if dead. Otherwise one bullet each would have barely slowed them down. I reckon I have five minutes at most before they regain the ability to move.
Fortunately the other three already inside the store do not come back out. They must not have noticed yet that their buddies are down. Good for me. I swiftly descend the fire escape and jog down the alleyway at the side of the store.
Where are you going? she cries out in desperation as I leave behind the front door. Clearly she expected me to follow the werewolves in and shoot them in the back before they got to Storm. If they haven’t already.
I don’t bother to reply. I’m not going in by the front door for sure. She must think I’m crazy. This one body of ours is no match for one werewolf, let alone three. The front door is also recipe for getting caught, and the one thing that I am going to make sure of is that we don’t get caught.
Shots sound from within as I jog down the alleyway. By the time I have run into the overgrown, weed infested yard behind the store and peered in through the gaps between the metal slats boarding up the back window, the three werewolves are inside the back room with Storm and DI Zael.
A small magically enhanced flashlight on the ground is doing a half-decent job of lighting up the dim room within. Storm must have dropped it.
The first thing I see is Detective Zael face down on the ground with a werewolf riding him. Flipping hilarious. He is reaching desperately for his gun which has fallen on the ground, as the bleeding werewolf on top, a six-foot guy ripped with muscle, pummels him. DI Zael is not having much luck getting to that gun. No doubt each of those furious punches is cracking a rib or two. Poor Zael.
In the room’s doorway, flat out on the ground, is another werewolf. It is weakly stirring. Storm must have hit it with the max setting of his stunbommer. But he didn’t get the alpha werewolf, because that one is brawling with Storm, both of them locked in an intense wrestling match. She may be a woman, but there is no fucking doubt that she is a full blooded alpha.
“Sexy,” I purr, watching the man-hunk that is Storm struggling to pin her down. The flexing muscles on his arms and back are clearly visible through his shirt.
Is this any time for perving? Diana yells at me.
“I perv at every opportunity.”
I switch window slats, choosing a different gap to try to catch a view of the cage. Regardless of what Diana made me promise, I need to put the sergeant out of his misery before he gets a chance to tell Storm that it was me who dragged him into that cage in the first place. Little did she know that when she made me promise to save Storm, it was a death knell for Lowry. She can’t have both.
I catch a glimpse of Lowry still in the cage where I put him and get my first pleasant surprise of the day. Hell if he isn’t dead already. He must have been caught in the firefight between the werewolves and Storm and Zael. One of the werewolves’ silver bullets has gotten him right in the back of the head. Had to be a silver one or he wouldn’t be so neatly dead. The pack got what they came for after all. Stephen Manners is dead.
And my job here is done.
I am about to turn my back and leave, when I notice that the alpha werewolf is getting the better of Storm. She flips him over, and I see blood on his thigh. Not such a fair fight after all. She has managed to shoot him. I grimace. I had thought Storm could handle this, but not if he is bleeding out. I positioned the muzzle of my gun into one of the gaps between the slats and wait for the exact right moment before pulling the trigger.
My wolfsbane elixir-dipped bullet rips into the alpha’s shoulder. It is just a flesh wound. But the elixir does its job. She slumps over on top of Storm.
I wait, watching for a minute. Storm shoves the alpha werewolf off him and gets to his feet. He cuffs her with those ultra-special sigil-enhanced cuffs I’ve been coveting. He takes his second pair of cuffs off his weapon belt and then picks his stunbommer off the ground. He aims it at the werewolf fighting with DI Zael. I swiftly turn tail and hustle myself back down the alleyway.
What are you doing? Diana yells. Storm still needs help.
“If we don’t leave now, we’ll be the ones who need help. You think Storm’s not aware a shooter was outside the window? And if Storm and Zael can’t handle one bleeding werewolf, then they’re not worth the air they’re breathing.”
I get to the street and take the time to detour to the three werewolves still lying on the ground outside the store. They have begun to stir. I pump each of them full of another couple of rounds just to be sure they won’t be getting up before Storm’s backup arrives.
My job done, I stick my gun in my bag and stroll away.
Chapter 29
DIANA
A week later I am back at Agency Headquarters for the third day in a row, and I am excited.
“How are you liking your new office, newbie?” says Monroe, ruffling my hair.
Remi laughs as she deposits another box of files next to the one that Monroe has already dropped on the ground. It had thunked loudly thanks to the bare floorboards of the barren room that they have both been jokingly calling my office.
This room, in the attic of the old building, had not seen daylight for years before I had commandeered it. Storm had hired me to look over some old unsolved cases belonging to various Agency teams and asked me to get a feel for them, in case I find any new leads.
Rather handily, I wasn’t allowed to remove the files from the premises, which means I get to work at headquarters and see Storm and the team. The downside is all the other people who I don’t want to see.
I’d said I needed a quiet space,
the thought of working in the main office with so many eyes watching my every move being too daunting. So Monroe and Remi had found me this empty space. Currently there is not even a desk in it. Just a flying hammock that had been a gift from Theo, the ropes at its ends magically attached to thin air.
After much debate this week, Monroe and I had agreed that maybe, just maybe, he was the one who had found the lead that had helped Storm break the case wide open. Naturally I am not going to tell Monroe that Alys had broken the case before Storm.
I am hoping later today, and with Theo’s help, to bury Alys for good. I have already got rid of the amulet Theo had given me, seeing as the only thing it had achieved was to block off my psychic abilities. My dreams had returned, and disturbing though some of them might be, their return had been reassuring. And it had meant I could actually take this assignment when Storm offered it. I suspect I have Monroe and Remi to thank for that.
Psychic for Hire Series Box Set Page 66