Page 16

“Yeah, Dale and Mags—they’re from this pack we’re tight with—keep dragging us into their territory drama. Hope you’ve got snacks cos it’s gonna be properly boring.”

Rory’s phone, attached to the dashboard, burst into life, its screen lighting up with “Detective Dickface.” Rory’s knuckles whitened on the steering wheel as he glared at the device like it had personally offended him.

The phone kept ringing.

And ringing.

My fingers twitched. The tension rolling off Rory in waves made the car feel smaller by the second. Just as I couldn’t take it anymore, Rory hit the button.

“What?” he barked into the speaker. “Why are you calling me?”

“There’s been a development,” a male voice replied. “I know that Killigrew Street likes to know these things as soon as possible.”

Rory’s jaw clenched. “Why are you calling me ?”

“Noctule isn’t picking up his phone.”

I tilted my head at Rory.

“Seb’s code name,” he muttered to me before speaking back into the phone. “He’s probably still on his weekly call.”

“There’s another body. ”

The transformation in Rory was as swift as sunshine swallowed by thunderclouds.

His entire body went rigid, and before I could blink, he’d yanked the steering wheel hard to the left.

Horns blared as we cut across two lanes of traffic, the car swinging around in a U-turn that had me gripping my seat.

“Your usual station?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll be there in twenty.” Rory hung up without waiting for a response. “Change of plan. Though I don’t think letting you see a dead body was part of Seb’s orders.” Rory drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, a mischievous glint in his eye. “You should probably wait outside the room. Right?”

I rolled my eyes at Rory’s tone. He wasn’t really asking—just like no one had asked if I wanted to be locked in the hotel, or have my whole life turned upside down.

I stared out the window, watching London blur past. No one had actually told me how they planned to help me, yet, or what exactly would happen to me. Just vague promises and dire warnings.

“Right. Yeah.” The words tasted bitter.

But then… maybe seeing this body would tell me something useful. If this was what the demon mark did, shouldn’t I know exactly what I was facing?

My fingers drummed against my leg as we drove. The closer we got, the more my resolve strengthened. Everyone kept making decisions about my life—my safety, my future.

“Actually,” I said, straightening in my seat, “I want to see.”

Rory’s eyebrows shot up. “Seb will actually murder me if he finds out I let you—”

“Let me?” I cut in. “I’m not a child. This is happening to me . I deserve to know what I’m up against.”

A slow grin spread across his face. “Fair point. Just… promise you won’t faint on me? ”

I scoffed, but made no verbal promise. My heart was already racing—partly from nerves, partly from finally taking some control back.

Rory weaved through traffic with surprising skill given the state of his car, taking corners at speeds that had me gripping the door handle. “You’ve certainly made quite the impression on Felix,” he said, changing lanes. “He was gushing about you to Priya earlier.”

“He’s nice.” I sat up straighter. “You need to be nicer to him.”

Rory’s eyebrows shot up at my boldness, but his smile widened. “Noted.”

“What’s with the whole Noctule code-name thing?” I gestured to his phone.

“We all use them. They’re all animals and I made them all up.” He preened slightly. “Seb’s is Noctule. It’s a type of bat.” He grinned at me like it was the most hilarious joke in existence.

“Right,” I said, pretending to get it. “And what’s your code name?”

His smile morphed into a scowl. “Terrier. It was revenge for Kit’s being Poodle.”

I burst out laughing, the mental image of the intimidating Kit being called “Poodle” too much to handle. “You’re joking!”

“Kit literally threatened to end me, but everyone loved it too much. Even Seb smirked. Slightly.”

The idea of these dangerous supernatural beings running around with ridiculous code names was possibly the best thing I’d heard all week.

The Cortina screeched to a halt in a definitely illegal parking spot outside Southwark Police Station, the engine’s rattle dying with a wheezing cough.

“Come on.” Rory hopped out, not even bothering to lock the car. “Round the back. Just so you know, Detective Dickface and I have a bit of history. And by history, I mean I properly can’t stand him. Long story.”

“Okay…” I wasn’t particularly surprised. I’d only met him yesterday, but Rory already seemed like the sort to attract a few enemies here and there .

“I’ll try and rein it in, because you’re here, but no promises. Oh, and I should probably warn you, he’s a telepath.”

I stopped dead.

“He says he doesn’t go poking around in our heads, but I wouldn’t trust him as far as I could throw him. Which, given he’s built like a brick wall, isn’t very far. But you get my point.”

I followed him down a narrow alley that stank of rotting rubbish and stale piss. We emerged into a small courtyard where industrial-sized bins dominated the space.

A tall Black man in glasses and a slightly rumpled suit leaned against the wall. Even with his tie askew and his wave-patterned fade growing out at the sides, he somehow radiated authority. His gaze locked onto me immediately, his eyes narrowing.

“For fuck’s sake, Rory.” The man pushed off from the wall. “Who the hell is this?”

“None of your business, Teddy Bear.” Rory’s whole demeanour had shifted, tension radiating off him in waves.

“It absolutely is my business when you bring random civilians along like it’s a school trip.” The detective’s voice dropped dangerously low. “What were you thinking?”

“Oh right, because leaving him to wander around London by himself when there’s a bloody demon hunting him is a much better plan?” Rory stepped closer, squaring up despite being nearly a foot shorter. “What would you rather, Detective—another corpse to add to your collection?”

“Another case?” The man’s eyes snapped back to me, something flickering across his expression—sympathy? He stared just a touch too long. Was he trying to read my mind?

To distract him, I stuck out my hand. “Flynn Carter.”

The man’s grip was firm. “DI Maxwell. Theodore Maxwell.”

“Otherwise known as Teddy. Teddy Bear.” Rory beamed at me, and Theodore sent him a look that could have frozen Hell. “He’s one of our police links. ”

“Let’s go. But Rory?” Theodore’s jaw clenched. “Next time, follow proper procedure.”

“Proper procedure?” Rory’s laugh was sharp enough to cut glass. “That’s rich coming from you.”

The air crackled between them, laden with heavy history. I shifted awkwardly.

Clearing his throat, the detective appeared to ignore the jibe. “We’re lucky this one was in our borough,” Maxwell said, guiding us through a back entrance. He swiped his ID badge at least three times before we reached the morgue.

The temperature plummeted at least ten degrees, and our shoes squeaked against the polished floor. A clinical smell of disinfectant burned my nostrils.

Rory lowered his voice to ask, “You sure you’re up for this?” and I automatically nodded.

Then, as I took in the body-shaped lump under the white cloth, my stomach twisted with the sudden realisation that maybe I wasn’t up for this after all.

Theodore drew back the cloth with a flourish.

Time seemed to stutter, like a skipping record. The woman looked to be in her forties, her dark hair fanned out across the metal slab. My brain tried to process what I was seeing while simultaneously insisting this couldn’t be real—couldn’t be a person. But it was. She was.

“Third one this month.” Theodore’s voice echoed off the tiled walls.

“Same markings.”

Her skin had an unnatural grey tinge that caused bile to rise in my throat, but it was her chest that was the most horrific part of it all.

An intricate pattern spread across her chest like creeping frost, radiating outward from her heart.

The design seemed to shift and move under the harsh fluorescent lights, though that was possibly my imagination.

The sight dragged me back to Dad’s funeral.

I was fifteen, staring at his too-still face in the open casket, while Katie—barely twenty and just starting her floristry career—fussed with the flower arrangements she’d insisted on doing herself.

She’d filled the whole church with sea lavender and white roses, determined to make something beautiful out of something so awful.

But here in this stark morgue, under harsh fluorescent lights, there was nothing gentle or beautiful about death.

“Oldest victim so far,” Theodore said, reading from a notepad. “The others were all under thirty.”

“Seb won’t like that.” Rory crossed his arms, tilting his head to one side. “Goes against some of his incubation theory.”

I took a step closer, drawn by a morbid fascination with the frost-like markings.

As disturbing as the thought was, they were almost…

beautiful. Like the phosphorescence that sometimes painted the waves on midnight crossings—except these patterns spoke of death, not life.

My gaze traced each crystalline line, and the reality of my situation began to sink in, like the slow, horrible realisation of a ship taking on water.

These same marks would spread across my skin, turn me into this hollow thing before me.

I’d seen enough waterlogged corpses pulled from the harbour to know death had many faces, but this… This was something else entirely.

I felt my grip on reality slipping, the rising tide of panic threatening to pull me under.

The cold hit me like a punch to the chest. My fingers went numb, ice spreading through my veins. The room tilted sideways.

“Whoa!” Rory caught my arm as my knees buckled. “Shit, shit, shit. I’m such an idiot.” He guided me to a plastic chair in the corner, crouching down in front of me. “Put your head between your knees. That’s it.”

“I’m fine,” I mumbled into my legs.