Closer: A Novella (2 page)

What have I done
? He wiped the flat edge of the bloody switchblade against his black T-shirt and stared at the body.

Breed had insiders within law enforcement who investigated crimes, concealing evidence and bodies that linked back to one of their own. Most of them didn’t like humans, but cutting one up in a dark alley wasn’t going to win him any awards. Didn’t matter if the little shit deserved it. Now Kane was going to have to leave the city he’d grown to love. He’d heard stories about Breed jail and it scared the hell out of him. No one ever came out of that place the same.

Cognito was a far stretch from his childhood home, not to mention the fact that he’d been raised by humans. Kane didn’t know that he was different until second grade when his dad shook him for tipping over a glass of Kool-Aid onto the white sofa. He was shaken so hard that it fractured his arm and he peed in his Superman pajamas. Kane was so distraught that his own father had hurt him, that through his tears, he tattled on his dad for having sex in the backseat of the family van. It just flew out of his mouth and his mother stood in shock. Kane didn’t understand what sex was at that age, but on the way home from school he felt the emotions in the back of the van and knew they were wrong. He often wondered if he had never spilled that drink, if his relationship with his father would have been as fractured as his arm.

Hell, maybe the man never liked him. Kane could sure feel his disdain whenever he touched him, which wasn’t often.

When his younger sister came along, the arguments between his parents got worse. There was so much sadness and anger in the house that Kane gradually stopped touching people and often wore long-sleeved shirts. He didn’t have sex until his twenties—a late bloomer—and by then, the gloves were his thing.

In the dark confines of the back alley, he analyzed the crime scene, trying to put himself in a detective’s shoes. Traces of the act lingered beneath his feet, but it wasn’t as if his name was written on the wall.

Kane flicked his eyes up, expecting his name to appear on the brick building in front of him with a large arrow pointing down. A Vampire could pick up information in the blood, but they refused to drink from a dead man’s body. Worst case scenario? If they hired a Chitah. Not spelled like the animal, but they shared the same predatory traits. Those quick bastards could track his ass down and Kane was on foot tonight. Chitahs had an acute sense of smell, speed, and never gave up on a hunt.

He messed up his brown hair with his fingers, thinking about the groceries left by the newspaper stand. His night shouldn’t have ended like this.

Some lucky sonofabitch is going to feast on frozen lasagna and a six-pack, while I’m running for my life
, he thought.

Bile rose in his throat when he glanced down at a plastic sack with a box of condoms peeking out from the opening. It would be a long time before Kane would be able to shake the imprint of this night off his conscience.

Run? Hours could go by and a Chitah would still be able to track his scent if he remained on foot. His heart pounded as he glanced around. There wasn’t a single friend to call or place for him to hide out. That’s what happens when you’re a loner; no one is there for you when you need a friend you can trust.

“Shit,” he muttered, tugging at his left earlobe. It was a nervous tic of his whenever something upset him. He got a piercing when he was seventeen and was always messing with it until he eventually took it out. Since then, tugging at his ear had just become a habit.

A set of car keys glittered in the broken moonlight beside the dead man’s feet. Kane jogged over to where he’d dropped his gloves and dusted them off, stretching his fingers inside the breathable fabric. He felt naked without them. Kane nervously scrubbed his fingers through his hair, which he kept in disheveled chunks on top. It was razor cut, giving a rebellious look to his charismatic features. Once he got his shit together, he strolled over to the body and bent over, lifting the keys with a flick of his wrist.

“On second thought,” he muttered, squatting down and staring at the body. Kane pinched his fingers inside the man’s pocket and swiped his wallet. Stealing the car might buy him some time, but not much if the cops discovered who this psycho was and tracked down the license plates.

“Fuck you, John Doe,” he said, giving a two-fingered salute. “I hope all your victims get their revenge on the other side.”

Kane sprinted in the direction the man had been walking and wound up in the center of an old parking lot. There were only five cars and he ruled out the newer models because the keys were designed differently than the one pinched between his thumb and index finger. When it wouldn’t fit in the green pick-up truck, he walked twenty paces to a white four-door sedan with tinted windows. It reminded him of those car-chase movies he used to watch on Saturday nights after work. The key turned and the lock clicked open.

After a quick look over his shoulder, he got into the car and shut the door. It smelled like a musty cigar and Kane wrinkled his nose. There was a magazine rolled up between the maroon seats, and a can of soda in the cup holder.

Now what?
he thought, rubbing at his bristly jaw.

Kane flicked his eyes up to a shadow moving around a few yards ahead. He leaned over the steering wheel for a better look. A mangy old dog sniffed a strip of fabric waving in the breeze on a chain link fence. Kane leaned back and chuckled as the mutt lifted his leg over a pile of crates and took a piss. He sniffed in circles and found a rolled-up paper bag by the fence. After a few attempts, he managed to get his teeth into it and trotted off with his prize.

A car backfired in the distance and he adjusted the rearview mirror, staring at himself. Not many men had hazel eyes as captivating as his. They were a beautiful olive green on the outside with a splatter of orange in the center—as if an ink pen leaked from his pupils. His brows arched into a wicked slant that gave him a look of mischief.

Kane pulled off the right glove and wiped his sweaty palm down his jeans before adjusting his seat. The adrenaline wasn’t wearing off and his heart was galloping out of control. If he didn’t take some deep breaths and chill, he was going to pass out.

“What the fuck are you doing?”
he muttered.

The wallet creaked as he folded the leather back and memorized Mr. Psycho’s address. Instead of getting his ass pulled over in a stolen car while looking for a junkyard at two in the morning, it made more sense to drive to the owner’s house. He could dump the car and go on foot from there.

“Andrew Butcher,” he said, staring at the license of a smiling man with a gap between his teeth. “Are you kidding me? A. Butcher?” He gave an exasperated sigh and tossed the wallet in the passenger seat. Andrew was the kind of guy who might have squeaked by as a normal citizen, but something evil lurked behind the steely eyes in the photo that made Kane uneasy.

The ignition turned over with a noisy complaint and the engine sputtered, coughed, and decided to start up.

Kane’s black boot punched the gas and he wondered if it was a good idea to leave the scene so quickly. Did he leave any evidence left behind? The last place he wanted to end up was in Breed jail, because punishment never came with parole or a second hearing. You served your time if proven guilty and the accommodations were not stellar. A guy at work had spent fifty years in one of their small cells and didn’t have a favorable thing to say about it. A death sentence would be an act of kindness in comparison, and if you received one of those, it was carried out within the month.

He drove for over an hour trying to locate the address by using a map he’d found in the glove compartment.

The fan belt screeched as he slowed down on a long, shadowy street. It wasn’t a picturesque neighborhood, either. The dilapidated houses looked fifty years old and even the twisted roots of the trees looked like they were trying to escape. Two dim lamps cast eerie silhouettes, and most of the houses had iron doors that resembled prison bars. Creepy would have been a compliment.

“Twenty-eight, twenty-nine… bingo.”

The siding on Butcher’s house looked like it was made from roof shingles and the evergreen bushes in front of the windows were out of control. Kane leaned against the steering wheel and stared at a garage big enough to fit one car. It was an automatic door because it lacked a handle. The keychain didn’t have a clicker, so he ran his hand along the top of the visor until he found a small clip and hit the button to open the garage.

As the car rolled up the driveway, he flipped the headlights off and took one last glimpse around. Once the car was inside, he pulled out the key and the engine hissed like a poisonous viper. Kane got out and scoped the garage for a second clicker to shut the door.

“Shit, where did you hide it?” he whispered, pacing around the dark room that smelled of paint fumes.

Maybe Andrew Butcher only had one. If that was the case, Kane was going to have to lean in, hit the button, and make a dash beneath the door before it shut on him.

His worn boots tapped against the smooth concrete behind the car. As he scanned the neighborhood one last time, his bare finger slid along the edge of the trunk.

Kane froze.

It felt like the fingernail had ripped away from his skin and exposed the quick. Alarm raced up his spine and his heart pounded against his chest. A repulsive combination of terror and exuberance licked at his fingertips from the residual emotions left behind. Kane doubled over as if to throw up all over his shoes.

A body was inside the trunk.

Chapter 2

Kane had always been hypersensitive when it came to his abilities, but he had allowed his own fear and adrenaline to cloud the human’s emotions, which he should have picked up on with his ungloved hand.

The imprint on the trunk door was strong, but there was no fear or pain, which meant that Butcher had killed his victim before the body was put into the trunk. That evil little prick had enjoyed every minute of it, too.

Kane turned the key and the trunk lid popped open. The hinge creaked as it rose up, and all he could make out was a shadow of… a woman?

A draft blew in from the open garage reminding him that he was about to unveil a body in front of the whole fucking neighborhood. Kane reached for the clicker on the passenger seat and waited for the door to close. Once he had privacy, he flipped on the light switch by the door to the house.

“What the hell am I doing?” he said under his breath through clenched teeth.

“Locking myself in a maniac’s garage with a dead body, that’s what,” he answered. “Probably has a wife and kids inside and I’m about to expose the truth about what Daddy has been up to.”

He quietly turned the knob to the house and peered inside to see a small kitchen with a brown linoleum floor. In fact, it looked like the color brown had thrown an orgy in there and smoked a cigarette when it was finished. Brown cabinets, walls, countertops—even the shutters. He quickly noticed there were no flowers, cookie jars, oven mitts, or other decorations. It lacked the feminine touch and that brought a sigh of relief. Just a sink full of dirty dishes and a white garbage bag stuffed in the corner by a pantry door. Not to mention a giant bottle of bleach and three rolls of duct tape.

He shuddered.

The house was small and thankfully empty. Kane wedged through a broken door in the short hallway and stood inside the dingy bathroom. The reflection staring back at him could have been someone else. Is this what a murderer looks like? Tiny spatters of dried blood peppered his right arm and Kane flipped on the hot water, scrubbing himself clean.

Another wave of nausea churned in his stomach from all of the things he was handling, and he felt the human’s intent from earlier that evening. It was not nearly as strong as touching a person, but cookie crumb emotions were always left behind.

A patchy scruff on his square jaw showed how lazy he’d been that morning when he decided to skip shaving and sleep in. Still, it suited him. Kane’s mouth curved up a little on one side, giving him the appearance of smirking about something wicked. But the ladies never seemed to mind kissing it. His nose was straight and centered, drawing attention to his smoldering hazel eyes. They were the magnet that always made an undecided woman change her mind. He was a good-looking guy, but Kane never liked to be noticed for his looks.

His reflection didn’t seem to have any sage advice as it gave him a scolding appraisal.

A thought flitted through his mind and suddenly Kane couldn’t breathe.

What if she wasn’t dead?

He spurted out profanities while running down the hall. Kane damn near killed himself when he stumbled over a flimsy red rug in the living room. It didn’t have rubber lining on the bottom and he slid, losing his balance until a telephone table broke his fall. He flung the garage door open and walked towards the car to look inside the trunk.

A swath of brown hair covered her face and the first thing that captured his attention was her light blue dress. It was the style that all of the girls were wearing that summer in Cognito—delicate and strapless.

He’d never touched a dead body before and his stomach twisted into a tight knot. What would he feel? He slowly brushed the hair away from her face with his gloved hand. The sight disgusted him. Blood smeared down her cheek and pooled on the floorboard beneath her head. When his eyes slid over to the tire iron lying at her feet, Kane suddenly wanted to kill the sonofabitch all over again.