5A/N: Hey, guys. Sorry for the slight delay. I was stuck on a slow part because blah. Also had a 4 day long migraine, so that was fun. Ugh. It was so awful, but it finally died, so yay.
Chapter length: 5549
Song listening to: "The Worry List" by Blue October, and "The Getting Over It Part" by Blue October
6
Another murder. The words swirled through Jack's mind. He struggled to make sense of them. Fleming was in jail, in police custody, so he couldn't have killed anyone. Unless he killed someone before and they just now found the body. Morgan finished speaking to the person on the phone, dropped his phone into the console between the two seats, and then gripped the steering wheel tightly like it might jerk them into oncoming traffic if he let go.
"Same MO?" Jack asked.
"The same," Morgan said.
"Well. Shit."
"He didn't do it."
"He couldn't have," Jack agreed. "It's a new fresh body, right? Here in Indiana?"
"Here in Indianapolis," Morgan said.
"And it wasn't Rhys."
"It wasn't."
"Well," Jack said. "Shit."
It wasn't Fleming. Couldn't have been him. Didn't make sense if it was him, and so it wasn't. Someone else killed someone in the exact same way. Another enraged werewolf, probably being controlled just like Fleming. This case just got a whole lot worse.
"Any leads?" he asked.
"Chief gave me the address," Morgan said. "You want to tag along?"
"You'd have to physically remove me from this case now. Yeah, I'm going."
Morgan nodded. "Good. I told the Chief about you. He said you're to be granted full access, and if you have any questions you can call him directly."
"How nice of him."
The detective shrugged, coasting through a yellow light. "We're supposed to have full cooperation with the SCD."
"Supposed to," Jack agreed. "Doesn't mean it always works that way."
It was nice that he didn't have to fight his way onto this case. This was how it was supposed to be, but usually Pre-Nat agencies didn't like to mix with human hunters. It put them all on edge. They had to let them work together in the end, but they were always hostile and short with him. It was nice to see that it would work out differently here for a change.
"Still need me to run by the post office?" Morgan asked.
"No," Jack said. "I'll update the drive and send it tomorrow. Just take us to the crime scene. How long ago did the body drop?"
"Four hours ago. Victim's husband called it in an hour ago. The Chief just got the file."
"So it wasn't Rhys." He knew that anyway, but having it confirmed didn't hurt. "Will the Chief let him go now or do we still have to post bail?"
"There's reasonable doubt, sure, but they still have DNA evidence against him," Morgan said. "He was still the perpetrated at the other crime scenes. He's just excused of this one because he was with us when it happened. Still have to post bail tomorrow."
"Alright," Jack said. "Did this one have their liver chewed on, or no?"
"I don't know. We'll have to look at the body. The ME report won't be ready until sometime tomorrow."
"Guess we'll have to wait, then." There was no way a mortician would let them back to see the body before the autopsy, and the mortician wouldn't know anything about the liver until they cut the victim open to see for themselves. "What else do you know about the case so far?"
"Just that it's another body and the same MO, except obviously a different killer."
"Not really. The killer is the psychic, technically. So it's the same killer, the instrument of death is just a different person," Jack said.
Morgan nodded. "Sure."
"We think it's the same psychic, right?"
"I don't know. I guess it could be a different one, but if it was, they're working together because it's just too similar," Morgan said. "So, either the same psychic or two powerful psychics who happened to have the same idea."
"Right," Jack said. He liked the idea of one corrupt psychic better than the thought of two or more working together.
"Here's a question for you," Morgan said, somewhat uneasily. "How are we supposed to take down this psychic if they can control people?"
"You get a hunter to do it for you," Jack said.
xXx
The crime scene was ugly. Bloody. A real mess. Anthony hated the look of it because it looked violent. There was blood all over the living room and kitchen. Smear marks on the floor where the victim, twenty-five-year-old Elizabeth March, tried to crawl her way to freedom. Her bloody hand wrapped around the cordless phone before she died. It was unclear if she died holding it or if it was ripped from her hands prior to her death. Either way, she never made the phone call. It wouldn't have mattered anyway because help wouldn't have arrived in time.
The body was still there. Cold and empty, bloody in death. Her sightless blue eyes were dark empty orbs staring into a void he couldn't see. She lay on her back, arms sprawled at her sides, legs askew, with her belly ripped open. Her throat was still intact. She didn't get it ripped out like Veer did. Her death was slower. She was alive when the werewolf started dragging her intestines out to chew on them. Hopefully she died soon after, because Anthony hated to imagine that kind of pain for any prolonged period, even just a few short minutes.
March was in a thin blue dress. She still wore one high heel, but the other was lost across the living room. Her final resting place was the kitchen. She left her shoe behind on her path to the phone, probably screaming for help all the way, crying and begging her attacker for mercy. She never stood a chance.
Her husband found her. He was in the living room, sitting stone-faced on the couch, staring down at the pools of dried blood. He was in shock, and rightfully so. Anthony moved around the crime scene with Valentine at his side, and the two of them didn't say a word. Anthony flashed his badge to get them in, and they walked the scene in silence, respectful of the tragedy that happened here. Anthony could almost taste the fear, smell the terror thick in the air, mixing with the first whispers of decay and the overwhelming stench of blood and death. His nose wrinkled against the onslaught. Beneath it all he smelled the werewolf. Violent and angry and merciless.
Forensics were still doing their run through of the place, which was why the body hadn't been moved yet. They were Pre-Nats, because this was a Pre-Nat case and any Pre-Nat could tell this was a werewolf attack. A few stared oddly at Valentine, but a quick scowl from Anthony had them looking away and minding their own business. If it bothered Valentine, the way people were looking at him, he didn't show it.
Anthony knelt next to the body. Valentine knelt on her other side. Together they stared down at her. She was a pretty woman, once. Long black hair in nice big curls, which would have fallen down past her shoulders if she'd been upright. Now the curls were splayed in various directions, like a fractured halo around her head. There was blood on her face and blood in her mouth. Her mouth was frozen in a silent scream. They'd have to break her jaw in the morgue to close her mouth and get her ready for her burial ceremony, if she was to be buried and not cremated. She had fair skin and a nice pretty blush dusting her cheeks, the only thing still giving her color. Her lips had once been painted pink with lipstick, but now they were cold and blue. She had long eyelashes, frozen at half-mast, revealing the dark orbs which had once been a pretty blue. Now they were empty and glossy.
Valentine pushed to his feet. Anthony glanced up at him, still crouched next to the victim. The hunter's lips were pursed into a thin white line, his eyes narrowed into angry slits. He was angry. Upset. This death shouldn't have happened. Anthony felt the same way. This woman didn't need to die.
This psychic is going to pay, Anthony silently vowed.
He got to his feet, nodded at a forensic guy, and turned to leave. All the evidence would be sent to the station in the morning. He'd have to pick it up then. For now, he'd done all he could. He could ask the husband some questions, but the man was traumatized and in shock, and he didn't have the right answers anyway. Anthony already knew the werewolf didn't know March. They weren't old friends who fell apart. They weren't ex-lovers. He had no reason to hurt her except that he was being controlled. If it was a him. It might have been a female. Anthony sniffed the air again. Probably male, but too many people had walked through the crime scene. The scent was polluted.
Asking the husband the standard questions was the wrong approach, so Anthony didn't even bother. They'd have to find this werewolf too, and track down the psychic. They needed to get Fleming out of lock-up. They needed a real break in this case.
Valentine was already in the car, waiting for him. He sat rigid in his seat, staring blankly ahead, expression flat. Anthony climbed into the driver's seat and just sat there for a minute before he finally keyed the ignition. They pulled out of the driveway and onto the road again.
"I want this psychic's head," Valentine said.
"So do I," Anthony told him.
"Good. At least we're on the same page. We're not arresting them."
Anthony wanted to argue purely on principal. He was a detective. He didn't kill people. He arrested them and let them be judged accordingly. Valentine didn't do things like that. None of the hunters did. They were judge, jury and executioner all rolled into one. On a normal day Anthony had a problem with that. Today was not one of those days.
"Any thoughts on where to find this werewolf?" Anthony asked.
"I'm thinking," Valentine said. "It just happened, so he's probably still in the city. I could check bars like last time but I don't have anything to go on. Did you notice the lack of footprints or bloody marks?"
"I did," Anthony said, grimacing.
"The psychic's getting smart. Having the werewolf cover up his tracks, or be more careful in the first place. I don't like it."
"Neither do I. It's all too clean. Like they're perfecting their craft."
"If they're controlling more than one werewolf, there could be a lot more bodies that we don't know about."
"I know. I thought of that, too."
It wasn't something he liked to think about. Left a shiver inching down his spine as he stopped at a red light and scrubbed a hand over his face.
"What are your initial thoughts?" Valentine asked.
Anthony shook his head, moving through the light as it turned green. "I don't know. Methodical. Careful. But I don't know if that's the werewolf or the psychic. They didn't go for the throat. They didn't go for the quick easy kill."
"No," Valentine said. "They didn't."
"That poor woman suffered."
"She did. Not for very long, but it would have felt like years."
They fell silent for a moment. Just the sound of the engine floating around them. A quiet thu-thump when they went over bumps and holes in the road.
"I don't think this one's as big as Rhys," Valentine said a few minutes later.
"Oh? Why's that?"
"It just makes sense. Rhys went for the throat because it was an easy kill. This one didn't. That meant she fought back, right? That's why her arms were scraped up. She tried to fight back but she didn't stand a chance but she caught him by surprise. So, this werewolf isn't nearly as big as Rhys. Probably a guy my size. Short and lean. He was fast."
"Makes sense," Anthony said.
"But why her?" Valentine asked.
"What?"
"Think about the two victims you know about. What did they have in common?"
"I don't know. They lived in different cities, carried different lives, probably never met each other."
"Exactly. So why her? Why Veer?"
"When we find the psychic, we'll have to ask them," Anthony said.
"We won't get the autopsy report or anything until tomorrow. I guess that leaves us running through bars and hotels."
"Shouldn't we wait until we have more to go on?"
"We don't have the time. He could skip town at any time, go out of state headed west just like Rhys. He's still in the city right now so now is our best chance to find him as long as we actually start looking and don't just wait," Valentine said.
Anthony sighed. "Alright. Where do you want to start?"
"Across town," Valentine said.
"What? Why? Wouldn't he go to one nearby? Maybe he's staying in the area."
"No, that's too obvious. He'd be hopping across town. The psychic is careful and smart. Methodical and calculated. We start across town in some dive bar and ask around for a guy my height. It's not much to go on. Just a possible height, leanness of his body, and his eyes."
"His eyes?"
"Probably golden, just like Rhys's. It's the usual color of an enraged werewolf. Hooks can make them agitated and leave them glowing nonstop. Rhys's were when I first saw him, even though I hadn't even said a word to the guy."
"Alright," Anthony sighed, shaking his head. "We'll start across town and look into bars."
"And hotels."
"And hotels," he repeated.
xXx
Her name was Isabella today. She liked that name. Isabella. It had a certain flair to it. Made her seem more upscale than she really was. Right now, she knew three things with absolute certainty: her name today was Isabella Deroux, she would live today, and the hunter would die.
It was a young hunter, eager to prove himself. Probably on his first solo job. Something simple, he was probably told. You'll do fine. But he didn't do fine. Isabella wasn't sure if he was hunting her or if he accidentally stumbled over her, but either way, he would die today, and she would live.
He had big brown eyes. Reminded her of a puppy. It was almost a shame to force him to put his own gun to his head and pull the trigger. The back of his head exploded, splattering against the back wall. His body fell limp on the plastic sheeting on the ground, for easy cleanup. He never knew what hit him. He wasn't aware that he died. He wasn't aware that he put his own gun to his temple and squeezed the trigger as his last action in this world. He wasn't aware of any of it because Isabella kept him locked away inside his own head and controlled him herself.
It was almost too easy. Such a waste, really. But he was young and foolish and in the wrong place at the wrong time. She thought of it as a blessing that he never knew what hit him. He'd worn that glazed look for hours, until she got them back to this very spot and put down sheeting, had him step onto it, and bring that gun to his head.
She rolled the body in the plastic sheeting. He was heavier in death than he'd been in life. Just a boneless heap crumpled on the floor. She wasn't very big herself, only five-foot-four, one-hundred-twenty-pounds. It took effort to roll him and then drag him from the room. The area was silent this time of night, dark and empty. She dragged the body out of the building and into the alleyway, before she wrestled the body into the trunk of her car. He was too tall to fit properly, so she twisted and smacked and prodded until she broke both his legs and folded them sideways to fit the body in the trunk. Then she slammed the lid shut and walked toward the driver's door.
She'd have to dump the body somewhere. Somewhere it wasn't easy to find. She hadn't planned on killing a hunter today, but it happened and now she needed to think about what she was going to do. The other hunters would be alerted of his death and if they found the body here, they'd be all over the place, hindering her work. She planned this for so long. Trained and focused her mind for so long. She couldn't let it end now. It was too soon and she had so much left to do.
She pulled out of the alleyway and onto a proper street. Took her phone from her pocket and hit speed dial one. Listened as it rang once, twice, three times, before finally it was answered.
"We've got a problem," she said.
xXx
A hundred miles away, Anthony stepped into a bar. The low lighting felt good to his sensitive eyes, and he itched the silver band on his wrist almost absently as he pushed through throngs of people. Valentine trailed behind him, letting Anthony part the crowd. They made it to the bar counter and sat on the two end stools on the left side. The bar was lively, but it was the weekend so that was to be expected. It was crowded, with people singing off-key to the songs playing, while others attempted to drunkenly flail in some kind of dance, and others played pool in the back. A few were trying their hands at darts.
Valentine flagged down the bartender. It was an older man, probably in his mid-sixties, with graying brown hair and dark eyes. He quirked a brow at the two of them, absently washing a glass with a rag. "What can I get ya?" he asked over the ruckus of the crowd.
"Looking for a friend of ours," Valentine said. "Maybe you've seen him."
The man frowned and put the glass down. "I don't know your friend."
"He might have been here very recently," Valentine said.
"We get a lot of people in here. Place is busy."
"Guy about my height. Eyes that look like they're glowing in the light. Golden brown. He's pretty thin."
The bartender shrugged. "Got a lot of people in here like that. Can't help ya."
"You didn't see any eyes that looked like they were glowing?" Anthony asked.
The bartender's gaze skittered toward them. "Can't say that I have. Sorry."
He didn't sound sorry. He sounded bored, tired of this conversation. Uninterested in helping them even if he did have the information they wanted.
"Can I get you anything?" the bartender asked. "Or you guys can leave."
"We'll leave," Valentine said, sliding off his stool. "Sorry to bother you."
The man grunted and turned away from them, walking down toward the other end of the bar to see to someone else. Valentine nodded toward the exit, and they made their way back through the throng of people, and outside. The chilly night air hit them full in the face, and Valentine tugged his jacket tighter around him. Anthony didn't feel the cool air as much; he was more adaptive, as long as it wasn't too hot or too cold. That was why he lived here, in Indiana. The hot months were hot and the cold months were cold, but it was never unbearably so like it could be in other states.
"That's the fourth bar," Anthony said after they climbed back into his car. He keyed the ignition and pulled out of the parking lot, onto the main road. "Any other bright ideas?"
"I don't see you coming up with any," Valentine said, almost sourly. He paused for a moment, and then sighed heavily. "Sorry. I guess I'm tired."
"We're all tired," Anthony said, shrugging. "We can't sleep yet, though. Not according to you."
"We can't. I just need coffee."
"We'll stop and get some the next time we come across a gas station."
They drove for ten minutes in silence before they came across a gas station. Anthony pulled in and parked right near the entrance, and left the car idling while Valentine went in to get his coffee. He came back out two minutes later with a Styrofoam cup, and took a sip of it as he sat in his seat. Put it in the cup holder and fastened his seat belt.
"Maybe we're going about this the wrong way," Valentine said.
"This was your idea."
"I know. I'm just saying. I could be wrong."
Anthony sighed, irritation stirring within him. "We've wasted half the night, and now you tell me you're wrong?"
"I said I might be," Valentine said. "I'm only human."
"Fine. How are you wrong?"
"Well, we've been looking at normal seedy bars, right?"
"Yeah."
"This guy is a werewolf. We've been assuming he's not from around here, because that's how it was with Rhys. Well, what if this guy is different? What if this is his starting point?"
Anthony frowned. Thought for a moment. Glanced sideways at Valentine. "You're saying he lives here."
"Maybe," Valentine said, shrugging. "It's a working theory."
"But?"
"It makes sense."
"I was afraid you'd say that." He shook his head, sighing heavily. Stopped at a red light, and sat there idling for a moment, clenching his hands around the turn of the steering wheel. "Alright, fine. Say you're right. Say it does make sense, and the guy lives here. How are we going to find him then? If he owns a place here like everybody else?"
"Welcome to the question," Valentine said.
"Well?"
"Dunno. This is your city."
"It's your theory."
"You're the detective. Detect."
The light turned green while Anthony shot the hunter a scathing glare. A car horn blared behind him and he snapped his gaze forward to drive through the intersection, quietly seething. "I hate you," he said.
"You really don't," Valentine said. "Or you wouldn't be housing me."
"I can kick you out."
"You won't."
"You're awfully sure of yourself, aren't you?"
He caught the hunter's shrug out of the corner of his eye. "It comes with the territory."
"How so?"
"One wrong move as a hunter and you're dead."
Anthony gritted his teeth. "Shut up and drink your coffee."
"If you insist."
xXx
Rhys sat alone in his cell, staring down at the floor without really seeing it. It was cold cement, hard and unyielding beneath his shoes. His sneakers had seen better days. There was blood caked in the cracks on the bottoms. They'd been swabbed by the forensics guys. They took his shoe laces. His shoes slipped around on his feet, a little too loose without the strings to tighten them.
He wasn't sure how long he'd been here. A few hours. Three, four, six, he didn't know. It was still dark out. It was this innate knowledge he had, as a werewolf. He could sense the time of day as easily as if he was reading a clock. It was roughly four in the morning, he guessed, still dark out. Dark and windy and just as unforgiving as it was here in this room.
It wasn't that he was anxious about cells in general. He'd helped put many people behind bars or in the ground. They were guilty. And he was guilty, so he really couldn't complain. They'd treated him fairly well. A few sneered at him, said he gave them all a bad name, and he couldn't blame them. Pre-Nats had to work hard to prove themselves to the government on a daily basis, and the fact that this kind of task force was needed everywhere was a less than stellar example of their control and placement in society. Still, the Pre-Nats here had mostly treated him well. They took his shoe laces, but weren't cruel about it. They didn't knock him to the ground and yank his shoes off before flinging them back at him. He'd seen that happen before. Stood there and watched because it wasn't his place to stop it, and criminal, homicidal Pre-Nats gave them all a bad name they didn't need. Everyone here was mostly kind. The Chief apologized, said he sympathized if his story was true, but he wouldn't be able to do anything about it until he could prove it when he brought in his own psychic to do a reading on him.
Rhys could understand his caution, of course. He just wasn't all that thrilled about the fact a psychic would be messing around in his head again. He thought he could still feel that other one, the one with the hooks. He thought he could feel the hooks shifting. A sudden flare of pain, a sudden burst of rage. Something. Something drilling into his mind, tainting his thoughts, and he didn't know what to think anymore. Were his thoughts even his own or were they this psychic's too? And now he had to let another psychic mess around in his head.
He was anxious. Nervous, anxious, bouncing his foot on the cold hard ground. The soft scrape of the fabric of his pants as his thighs briefly rubbed together shattered the silence that had fallen over him hours ago. He was the only one in this cell. He couldn't smell others. He was underground somewhere; the scent of the rich earth was strong despite the cement. It meant he was underground. Underground and out of sight and mind. Locked away in a lonely cell with no one in sight, just a blank gray wall outside the cell bars. The bars were thick, but he guessed he could break out if he really needed to. Normally, someone like him would be put in a more contained area, in a room cell instead of a cell with three walls and a line of bars for the fourth. They must not have considered him a flight risk. That was something, at least. Detective Morgan's vouching for him must have aided him, even if it was only in some small way. Small blessings, he supposed.
A door opened somewhere, down the hallway to his left. He heard it shut with a quiet snap, and then the stutter of footsteps. Someone with a limp. He lifted his head and was watching the opening through the bars when they appeared from around the corner. A young woman with long blonde hair and dark, sunken eyes. She looked ill. Smelt it, too. Rhys's nose wrinkled. She walked with a distinct limp, like she couldn't get her left leg to cooperate fully. Her skin was pale, her forehead shiny with a thin layer of sweat, visible in the gleam of the low lighting.
"You Fleming?" she asked.
Her voice was rough, like she'd been gargling nails. Rhys fought the urge to clear his throat in response, the scratchy tone getting to him. "Yes," he replied.
"Rhys Fleming?" she asked, like there might be some other Fleming down here.
He nodded, keeping his mouth shut as he watched her.
She stepped close to the bars. Beckoned him forward with a wave of her hand.
He pushed to his feet and walked toward the bars, frowning at her as he did so.
"Word on the street is, you know a hunter," she said, like it was fact and she just needed confirmation.
This is about Jack? he thought, confused. "So what if I do?" he asked.
Up close, he could see that her eyes were a deep, dark blue. Almost gray. Her pupils were blown, but he caught no fear scent on her. Pupils dilated like that typically when someone was scared or aroused, and she didn't smell like either. Some kind of drug, maybe. Or maybe just the sickness he smelled on her. "Tell me about them."
This feels wrong. Rhys shook his head. "Sorry, I don't know what you're talking about."
She rolled her eyes. "Look, I'm here to keep an eye on you until your meeting with the big boss. Answer my questions and I'll get you some food, something to drink, maybe a book if you're super helpful. Play the fool again, and I'll leave you here, parched."
Now that she mentioned it, he was thirsty. Hungry, too. He couldn't remember the last time he ate. A few days, he thought. Food hadn't been high on his list of priorities in a while. Now that she mentioned it, he felt the exhaustion weighing heavy in his bones. Felt the tremor in his hands from low blood sugar. Felt the pulsing headache forming behind his eyes. His stomach gnawed on itself.
"Why do you want to know?" he asked.
She shrugged. "Maybe I'm just curious. What's it matter to you?"
It mattered a great deal to him, actually. Jack Valentine had spared his life, and he would be damned if he returned that favor by doling out information to the wrong person.
"Tell me why, or I can't help you," he said, folding his arms across his chest. He stood a good foot taller than her, just glaring down at her. She had a stubborn streak in her. Her eyes narrowed, her lips pursed until the color turned white, and her hands landed firmly on her hips. Her chin raised defiantly. Rhys stared her down. He'd stared down commanders in the military; he certainly wasn't intimidated by this sickly woman. "Your choice," he said, as the silence stretched on.
She continued to glare at him. Unblinking.
He shrugged and turned to walk back to his bench in the back of the room, against the back wall.
"Fine," she said, when he was halfway there.
He turned back around and approached the bars again. "Well?"
"I'm sick," she said.
"I know. What's that have to do with whether or not I know a hunter?"
She looked left. Looked right. Her teeth caught her lower lip and for a moment he thought she might bite right through the white-pink flesh, before she stopped and stared at him again. "This isn't natural."
"What isn't?"
"This," she said, gesturing at herself.
"I don't understand."
"I'm sick but it's not normal."
"Pre-Nats get sick too," Rhys said.
She shook her head quickly. "No," she said, irritated. "Not like this. There's something going on. Pre-Nats are getting sick. Real sick."
He frowned. "What do you mean?" This was the first he was hearing about this.
"I don't know. It's not natural," she said, like he was missing the point. "It's wrong, all wrong. You hear me? Not right. Something's going on and the hunters aren't helping."
"Why would the hunters be involved?"
"Because they take notice when things get out of hand, right? That's what they do. They sit there all high and mighty and dispatch the Pre-Nats they don't like. Just up and kill them, put them in the ground. But they haven't noticed this yet, because if they knew it was happening they'd be worried."
"I don't know what you're saying," Rhys said, sighing. His headache was worsening. He was tired of listening to her.
"It starts in the muscles," she said. Gestured at her bad leg. "Then it eats you alive. You hear me?"
"I hear you," he said, "but I have no idea what you mean."
She huffed, frustrated. "You know a hunter or not?"
"Maybe."
"We had a deal. I tell you what's what and you say yes or no."
"You haven't given me anything. Just a bunch of nonsense."
She shook her head. "It's not normal," she said, again. "Unnatural."
"So you've said, but I don't-"
"Someone's poisoning us."
He snapped his mouth shut. Stared at her for a moment. "And you know this, how?"
"You know a hunter? Yes or no?"
He looked away. Stared down at the cold hard cement. At the dark stain in the corner near the bars, off to the right of where he stood. He thought for a moment, weighing his options, before he sighed and nodded. "Yeah," he said quietly, "I know a hunter."
"What's their name?"
"What's that matter?"
"Word is there's an elite hunter in town."
"The city is huge," he said. "People worried about one random hunter? How do they know he's the only one here?"
"So it's a guy."
He shrugged. "What's it matter?"
"Just tell me who."
"No. That wasn't our deal."
She huffed. Shook her head. "Get him a message when you get out."
"If I get out," he said, because his freedom wasn't guaranteed. He did kill people, after all. Five of them. Five people.
Bile rose in his throat again, like it did every time he thought about it. The pain behind his eyes sharpened, a dagger of unpleasantness.
"Just get him a message," she said, unaware of his struggle to keep from throwing up right there.
He nodded, not trusting himself to speak at the moment.
"Tell him about Ash."
"Ash?" he repeated, before swallowing thickly. "Who's that?"
She shook her head back and forth once, jerkily. "Ash. Not a person, it's a drug."
"A drug? I've never heard of it."
"It's new," she said. "Straight out of Sioux Falls."
"South Dakota? Why there?"
"Just tell him," she said. "Before we all die."