Ultimate Supernatural Horror Box Set

Chicago, Illinois

Tom

Tom Mankowski squinted at his Kindle Fire, determined to read the screen without making the font size larger. The author, some guy with a bunch of letters after his name who supposedly was on Dr. Phil a few times, was writing about the importance of intimacy in a romantic relationship.

No shit. I didn’t need to spend $14.99 to figure that out.

The ebook was called Twenty Tips For Keeping Long Distance Relationships Fresh, and was the first self-help book Tom had ever bought. The price surprised him—he thought ebooks should be much cheaper than that—but the topic was important enough to warrant the purchase.

Unfortunately, the content so far had been less than revelatory.

Call and text often? Check.

Send gifts? Check.

Phone sex? They’d actually taken it once step further, and used video chat on Skype.

Visit when possible?

Tom looked to the right, to the empty side of the bed. Joan hadn’t been over in two weeks. And it had been two months since he’s visited her in LA. In the past hundred days he’d seen her only eight.

Tom smiled every time he got a text from her. It warmed his heart when Joan FedExed a screener DVD of some film she’d produced. And the site of her in a skimpy negligee, doing her best to talk dirty to him on his computer screen but constantly breaking character and giggling—well, it beat the hell out of Internet porn.

But it didn’t beat being with her. Nothing beat being with her.

Tom was lonely. And the loneliness was made worse because he had someone who could fill that void. But she wouldn’t quit her job to move to Chicago, and he wouldn’t quit his to move to L.A.

He flipped the electronic page and read, Plan a surprise visit.

Tom had some vacation days he needed to burn or else he’d lose them. But Joan was in the middle of a shoot, and that meant 80 hour work weeks for her. Still, he could fly to California and be there for her at the end of her day, if only to sleep next to her for a few nights. It was better than lying in bed alone, reading an overpriced book by some PhD with a startling grasp of the obvious.

He blinked, yawned, and damned his pride, pressing the Aa setting on the screen to enlarge the font to a size 8. It beat getting eyeglasses. Then he adjusted his pillow and settled in to read about playing online games together.

Yeah. That’s what Joan would be into. Us fragging each other in an Xbox Halo death match. How the hell did this guy get on Dr. Phil?

But curiosity got the best of Tom, and he exited the book and began to surf the net, seeing if there were any online games about fifteenth century France, which Joan did have an interest in. He was flipping through Google pages when there was a knock at his door.

Tom’s first thought was the gun on his nightstand. As a Homicide cop, Tom had made enemies. And some of them were real doozies.

His second thought was, Maybe Joan is reading this same stupid book and is surprising me with a visit.

She’d called earlier that day, but it had been hours ago. Had she phoned from the airport, just before hopping on the red-eye?

Tom swung his legs out of bed, grabbed the terrycloth bathrobe on the floor (a gift from Joan) and stuck the Sig Saur in his pocket, first making sure there was one in the chamber. He walked out of the bedroom softly, on the balls of his feet, and traversed the short hallway to his apartment door. After an altercation with a very bad and very powerful man several years ago, Tom had improved his home security. The door was bulletproof, with a reinforced security bar. It was the same setup he’d installed at Joan’s house, and nothing short of a charging rhino could get through it.

Tom took a peek through the peephole, and saw two men in dark suits standing in the hallway. Caucasian, thirties, blank expressions. He noted how their jackets bulged, indicating they were carrying.

He palmed his Sig and said, “Yeah?”

The man on the right said, “FBI.”

They both held up badges and ID cards. Tom had seen a few in his day, and they looked legitimate enough. But you could buy anything online these days.

“What do you want?”

“It’s about your partner. Roy Lewis.”

Tom hadn’t expected that.

“What about him?”

“We believe he’s in trouble, Detective Mankowski. Can we come in?”

Tom didn’t like it. It was 2am, a highly abnormal time for the Feebies to drop in. But they both shared the classic, bored expression of government drones, and Roy was like a brother to Tom. Keeping his gun at his side, he went through the complicated process of unlatching the door and letting them in.

“The gun is hardly necessary, Detective,” said the same one, eying Tom’s piece.

“I’m a nervous type.”

They didn’t reply. Tom stepped aside and allowed them into his apartment. He noticed two things immediately.

First was their footwear. Rather than the expected Florsheims or equivalent, these men had heavy boots on, with thick rubber soles, suitable for combat. The second was their scent. It was odd, sort of a musk combined with something medicinal. Nothing that came from a bottle, and unlike any body odor Tom had ever smelled. Neither offensive or appealing, but certainly unusual.

He followed the men into the living room, where they turned to face him. No one made any move to sit on the sofa or easy chair, and Tom didn’t offer them any of the cold coffee still in the pot on the kitchen counter. He waited for them to speak first, an old cop trick. After a few seconds of silence, they did.

“We understand you and Detective Lewis were invited to an unusual gathering last weekend.”

Tom remembered the invitation, which had arrived via FedEx at work.

“Some sort of gameshow thing,” Tom said. “Win a million dollars or something like that.”

“Did you discuss it with your partner?”

Tom hadn’t. At least, not in depth. He and Roy had each gotten identical invitations, but they’d been working a gang hit, interrogating seven members of the Latin Kings over a period of four days, and he’d forgotten about the FedEx ten seconds after it arrived. After making the arrest, Roy had taken leave, mentioning he might check the invite out.

As far as Tom could recall, it was for some stupid reality show contest. Tom didn’t need the money, and he certainly didn’t want the fame. He preferred to keep to himself. One of the things he hated most about Joan’s work was the parties he was forced to attend when he visited her. All those Hollywood phonies, each trying to shine brighter than the next. Joan never acted that way, but it seemed almost every single one of her friends did.

“We spoke about it for less than a minute. Roy wondered if it was a scam. I had no interest. Didn’t even read the whole thing.”

“Do you have the invitation here?”

Tom had it on the desk in his bedroom, but something made him withhold that info.

“Not sure where it is.”

“Can you find it?”

“Why?”

The Feebies exchanged a glance, then focused back on Tom. “Because it’s evidence in a possible homicide investigation.”

Tom gripped the butt of his Sig tighter. “What are you saying?”

“We have reason to believe that Roy Lewis, your partner, has been murdered.”

It had been a long time since anyone had punched Tom in the face.

This was a whole lot worse.