Page 12 of The Raven
She's Coming For You
The Cop
I’d already come to the conclusion that Lieutenant Brenner was an asshole, but my assessment was confirmed when he ordered me to the station and made me wait three fucking hours until he called me in for a meeting.
The time gave Nick and me an opportunity to review the case files piled on my desk. I’d rather have been at home trying to figure out how the fuck it was possible for Raven to be in my apartment, but there we were.
It didn’t take long for us to review Boogie’s case. No fingerprints were found at the scene, nor was any DNA detected. Hardly surprising, I doubted ghosts left behind forensic evidence. Maybe we should have called in the Ghostbusters; they might have had more luck.
Even then, I would have destroyed the evidence. Raven deserved her revenge.
There were no witnesses, either, but Nick had found security footage from a nearby garage that caught a shapely figure, wearing all black, following Boogie into his apartment. Having seen Raven in the light, it was undeniably her.
In the footage, the figure had their hood up, so it wasn’t possible to make an ID. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t surprised. Scary films I’d seen always made out that ghosts were invisible in mirrors and photographs.
But hey, what did I know? Until two nights ago, I didn’t even believe in ghosts.
I didn’t share my thoughts with Nick as he rambled on about how we could attempt to track the person down. And I certainly didn’t volunteer that the person in question was currently haunting my apartment.
Ziggy’s case wasn’t much better. Again, no forensic evidence was left behind by the culprit. Witnesses had been spoken to, but no one had seen anything other than Ziggy disappear into the alleyway while his supposed buddy left him to be slaughtered while he went to get his dick sucked.
“Roberts,” Brenner huffed, eventually deciding to honor me with his time.
Lucky me.
Letting out a heavy sigh and grimacing at Nick’s muttered, ‘good luck,’ I grabbed the files and followed Brenner into his office, the stench of body odor hitting my nostrils instantly. Christ, opening a window wouldn’t kill the man.
Brenner walked behind his desk, hatred rolling off him in huge waves. As he sat, his gut pressed against his stained shirt, the buttons straining to hold him in.
He didn’t indicate for me to take the chair opposite him. I dropped the files on his desk and remained standing, crossing my arms over my chest as I waited for the ass-chewing I was bound to get for my outburst the night before.
“I want an update on the investigation,” he said, glowering at me, the bags under his eyes telling me he’d had about as much sleep as I had these past few nights.
“No forensics, no witnesses, nothing to go on-”
“That’s not good enough,” Brenner roared, interrupting me and slamming his hands down on the desk. “I want answers!”
“What do you want me to do, make up the evidence?”
My temper frayed in a heartbeat. Ironic really, there was tons of evidence in Raven’s case, yet the prick was only too happy to ignore it in favor of an easy life.
“Of course I don’t,” he hissed, his eyes flashing with indignation. “But I want answers. I’ve got the whole damn town terrified that we’ve got a serial killer on the loose.”
“Unless they’re a Viper, I doubt they’ve got anything to worry about,” I replied, unable to stop my eyes rolling.
Brenner’s nostrils flared, his cheeks reddening. After a moment’s pause, the idiot opened his mouth. “You’re off the case,” he blurted.
“Excuse me?” I replied, my jaw almost hitting the floor.
“You heard. Everyone in this town knows you hate the Vipers, and I get it, I really do, I’m not exactly their fan, either. But you can’t remain impartial. You’re too close to the victim of last year’s Halloween-”
“Raven. Her name is Raven,” I growled, my jaw and fists clenching.
“See, this is what I’m talking about,” Brenner huffed, standing up. From my periphery, the entire office next door had come to a standstill, watching the scene unfold between me and Brenner. “You’ve never been able to accept that Mills was responsible for killing her.”
It took every ounce of strength I had in me not to launch across the table and throttle the prick. It was only the soft tapping at the door that prevented me from doing just that.
“What?” Brenner bellowed.
The two of us continued glaring at each other as Nick opened the door, poking his head in, but not daring to step into the lion’s den. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I thought you ought to know. There’s been another murder.”
“Who?” I said, my head whipping to Nick.
“Uh-” he paused to look at a note in his hand. “Jason Buckley.”
“Christ,” Brenner muttered, scrubbing a hand down his face. “Whoever is doing this is serious about wiping out the Vipers. Grim is going to commit damn havoc unless we find out who is responsible.”
“Let’s go, you can brief me on the way to the scene,” I said, my attention focused solely on Nick.
“Not so fast, Roberts,” Brenner stormed around the desk to block my exit. “I told you, you’re off the case.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me?”
“Do I look like I’m kidding?”
He stared daggers at me, refusing to move. A muscle ticked in my jaw as I glared back at him, my pride demanding I fight him on his ridiculous ruling until the logical part of my brain kicked in.
“Fine. I’ll tidy up the files and hand them over to you. I’m sure you’ll have no problem finding the killer.”
I grabbed the files off the desk, doing my best to hold in my smirk and the need to wish him luck with arresting a ghost.
It took a couple of hours to finish typing my notes before I dumped the files on Brenner’s desk. The office was deserted; every cop in the station had been deployed to the latest scene.
Nick texted me frequently with updates. It sounded like Brenner was running around like a headless chicken, walking all over the evidence, and making a complete fool of himself.
From what Nick had said, Buck had suffered a very painful death, and the preliminary cause of death had been recorded as loss of blood, not from the two puncture wounds in his abdomen, but from the gaping wound in his ass.
Like the other two murders, I had no sympathy for how Buck had met his fate. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get over reading the report detailing the damage caused to Raven’s back passage.
Buck deserved everything he got.
With Boogie’s and Ziggy’s case files no longer my concern, I debated about getting stuck into other caseloads, but the need to see Raven was too compelling. Turning the lights off in the office, I headed outside to where my car was parked.
Only, I didn’t make it that far.
The second I stepped outside, hands grabbed me, one going around my mouth to stop me from shouting for help, another set pinning my arms behind my back, while a third removed my gun from its holster, along with my car keys and phone.
“Hello, Detective. We’re going for a little ride.” It was a voice I would hear in my nightmares until the day I died.
Grim.
In the dim light of the station parking lot, I made out the faces of Pyro and Butcher as they helped Grim shove me in the trunk of my own goddamn car and slammed the hood down.
Echoes of doors shutting reached me in the dark, followed by the engine rumbling to life. As the car began to move, I fumbled around, managing to pull up the shelf covering the spare wheel, and rummaged around for the wheel brace I kept in there.
The drive was only short, but by the time the car came to a stop, my heart pounded furiously as adrenaline pumped its way through my system. I clutched the wheel brace in my hand, unwilling to go down without a fight against the fuckers.
When the lid popped, I jumped out, cold water from a muddy puddle I’d just landed in seeping into my shoes and socks, and chilling my feet.
“Whoa, chill, Detective, we just want to talk,” Pyro said, his tone laced with amusement as he held his hands up in surrender.
The three of them surrounded me but had sensibly, or rather, frustratingly, kept enough distance that even if I were to take a swing, I wouldn’t hit any of them.
Not to mention, Grim was pointing my gun at me.
“What do you want?” I sneered, lowering the brace.
“Who’s killing my boys?” Grim's dark eyes were fixed on me, the hand holding my gun unwavering.
The first time I had the unfortunate pleasure of meeting Grim, I thought he was unhinged. Over the years, he’d turned from unhinged into a complete psycho.
“How the fuck should I know? Ask Brenner, he’s investigating the cases,” I replied, not giving a shit that I was throwing Brenner under the bus.
“Bullshit, Roberts. We know you’ve been at the crime scenes,” Butch hissed, his voice low and menacing. “And we all know how tenacious you are at investigating crimes.”
The three of them smirked as a wave of fear rolled through me, but I pushed it away, refusing to let them intimidate me.
“I was. But Brenner has taken the case over. You know, high priority and all that. Boogie and Ziggy deserve only the best detective for the job, and that’s not me.”
From behind me, Pyro growled. Grim’s eyes narrowed on me as he took a step forward, still keeping enough distance that I couldn’t strike him with the wheel brace.
“Where’s Raven?”
I raised a brow. “Raven? As in the Raven you raped and murdered last year? I imagine she’s rotting in her coffin.”
Lies.
Grim didn’t reply for a few seconds, his eyes darting between mine as if he was trying to figure out if I was telling the truth. “Buck said he saw you and her talking, so I’m going to ask you one more time. Where. Is. Raven?” he said, lowering the gun as he took another step toward me.
Trying not to show any hint that he’d just surprised me with the news that Buck had seen Raven, I dropped the wheel brace and took a step forward, meeting Grim toe-to-toe.
If he, or the other two morons, wanted to hurt me, they would have done it by now. This wasn’t my first showdown with the Vipers. I knew how they worked. They fed off people’s terror.
“Raven is dead. You made sure of that. But if by some miracle, she’s risen from the dead, then you ought to watch your back, because she’s coming for you.
For all of you,” I said, refusing to tear my gaze away from Grim.
“And I hope she does. I hope she ends every single one of you in the most painful way imaginable for what you did to her, and I hope she does it with a goddamn smile on her face.”
Grim’s response was to glower at me, hatred filling his eyes.
From behind, footsteps shuffled before Pyro spoke. “You know what I think, Detective?”
Finally pulling my gaze away from Grim, I twisted to look at Pyro. “Enlighten me.”
His lips pulled into a lopsided smile. “I think your obsession with the dead girl has sent you loopy. I think you’ve found yourself a Raven look-alike, and you’ve somehow managed to convince her to do your dirty work.”
I snorted. “Is that so?”
“Yeah,” Butch said from the other side of me, closing the gap. “I think Pyro has hit the nail on the head. After all, you couldn’t convict us of anything, and you can’t do the dirty work yourself, can you? Not when you’re supposed to be a law-abiding cop.”
A humorless chuckle left my lips. “It’s a good theory, but that’s all it is. A theory.”
“I guess we could put our theory to the test,” Grim said, cocking my gun that he’d been holding down by his side.
“We kill you now, and when the three of us go on to live happy and prosperous lives, we’ll know you were involved.
” He raised the gun, pressing the nozzle against my forehead.
“And as for the Raven-wannabe-bitch, she’ll get the same treatment as her doppelganger.
It’s been a while since we had that kinda fun. ”
Grim stared at me for what seemed like an eternity, his finger hovering over the trigger. My knees threatened to buckle as fear gripped me hard, and I was certain my heart was going to beat straight out of my chest from where it was pounding so hard.
Time slowed as I watched in horror as Grim squeezed the trigger.
Click.
“Fuck.” My body sagged when Grim pulled the gun away, the three of them laughing.
They must have taken the bullets out while I was locked in the trunk.
Fuck my life.
“Consider this a warning, Detective,” Grim said, throwing my gun onto the muddy ground. “If anything happens to the rest of us, we’re coming for you, and the chamber won’t be empty next time.”
Grim’s parting gift was a solid blow to my stomach, knocking the wind right out of my lungs and leaving me gasping for air as the three of them disappeared into the night.
It took several minutes to regain my breath and get to my feet, my body shaking from the encounter. I’d had run-ins with the Vipers before, but I’d never thought my life was about to end.
Grabbing my gun and my car keys from where Butch had thrown them, I searched the deserted park looking for my phone before reluctantly accepting that they’d probably kept it so they could interrogate it for clues as to the identity of the mystery woman I was allegedly working with.
For the drive home, my mind replayed the meeting, hoping Raven was back at my apartment so I could talk to her about everything that was going on.
Arriving home, I checked no one had followed me before bolting to the communal entrance, and sprinting up the stairs to my penthouse, not bothering to wait for the elevator.
When I reached my door, I quickly locked it behind me, making sure to double-check the locks. Certain that no one was getting in, I paused when the sound of whimpers reached me.
Panic flooded me, and I rushed to the kitchen where the noise was coming from, freezing at the sight before me.
Raven was on the floor, her back against the counter, and her arms wrapped around her knees as her whole body trembled. She slowly raised her head, her cheeks stained with tears, and her watery eyes finding mine.
“Help me,” she whispered. “Please, Mason. Help me.”