Toys

Chapter 10

Although disappointed, the girls were mostly obedient at this age, and they scampered away to their room. “C’mon, Daddy!” they called to me. “You have to tell us a story now. Two stories. Because you’re denying us our dolls.”

I followed close behind and turned my thoughts to choosing a favorite bedtime story for my babies. I scrolled through the library menu on Chloe’s wall… maybe Don’t Let the Pigeon Land the Car, or Mr. Popper’s Penguins.

The thing about the girls and me back then, we had sort of a secret life. On the weekends, we loved to go off to the city’s very large library to read together. We listened to Mozart on earphones on the way there, then settled in to read Charles Dickens aloud. The point-if there has to be a point to everything-is that you can hate humans, but nobody should hate Mozart or Charles Dickens or J. K. Rowling.

As I was reminiscing about our little secret times together, my earring phone chirped-three quick beeps signaled an Agency emergency of some sort. “Damn!” I muttered. “This can’t be happening.”

“Daddy!” April said with a frown. “You just said a forbidden word.” I wasn’t supposed to curse.

The caller turned out to be Owen McGill, my partner at the Agency of Change and a longtime friend, probably my best friend-other than Lizbeth, that is.

“Grab your boots, Hays,” McGill said. “There’s been an ugly incident at the Toyz store in Baronville”-a tony Elite suburb at the northern edge of New Lake City, about twenty miles away. “They want you here right now. It’s homicides, plural.”

“Me? Now? I already had my ugly incident for the night. Lizbeth and I were attacked-by skunks. Besides, I’m supposed to be off.”

“Sorry, buddy. Jax Moore specifically requested you. ‘I want Hays Baker on this!’ That’s what he said.”

I exhaled. “All right, all right. I’m on my way.”

So much for reading bedtime stories, a romantic interlude with my wife, or even getting to taste my vodka with a twist of lemon. What a letdown, and what a shit night this was turning out to be.

I hadn’t even had time to take off my tux jacket before I was heading off to face, well, whatever was so important that Jax Moore had requested me at the crime scene.

Homicides-plural.