Page 13 of Autopsy of a Fairytale

Bel choked on the cookie crumbs and grabbed her mug, gulping the tea despite its heat. “Husband? I haven’t even gone on a date with him.”

“Details,” Vera humphed. “Go out with the boy. It will be good for you. Don’t miss out on an adventure because you’re scared.”

“Sometimes it’s easier dealing with the dead,” Bel whispered.

“I know, sweetheart.” Vera placed a wrinkled palm over hers. “But you aren’t dead, and you need to live like it.”

“Thanks for dinner.” Bel smiled at her friend, suddenly needing this conversation to be over. Between the raw sex appeal of Eamon’s terror and Garrett’s heartfelt confession, she needed the safety of the one man in her life that didn’t fuel her anxiety.

“Anytime, dear.” Vera stood up and grabbed a Tupperware stuffed full of chocolate chip cookies off the counter. “Here, take these. You’re too skinny.”

They were back at that again. Bel silently accepted the container, knowing she would have to bring these to work. They would make her sick if she tried to eat that many before they went stale. “Thanks.” She wrapped the older woman in a quick hug.

“You know I love baking for you. Have a good night, dear. Get some sleep. You have bags under your eyes.”

Bel forced her eyes not to roll as she left Vera’s comfortable kitchen. Anyone else and the onslaught would have offended her, but she knew her neighbor meant well. She liked the woman even though her dog didn’t, and normally she trusted Cerberus’ instincts, but maybe he was more like her than she realized. Maybe his past, his pain, had changed him so mercilessly that his soul was forever scarred.

“Hi baby,” she called as she opened the door to her cabin, and Cerberus rolled onto his back. His tail whipped the mattress, and she toed off her boots, stripping on her way to the bed. She should shower. She should open her laptop and do some work, but instead, she pulled on the baggy tee shirt crumpled in her sheets. She would hug her dog for just a minute. She told herself she would scratch his belly, spending quality time with her favorite man before—

Teeth ripped into her flesh, and Bel jerked awake so hard, Cerberus grunted as her arm tightened around his ribs. Fear raced through her. Her scar burned, and it took a solid thirty seconds before she realized the pain in her neck was only a memory. Sweat clung to her skin, plastering her shirt to her chest as she pushed to a seat. Something about this nightmare alarmed her. It was the same panic that plagued her nights. The same attack, same teeth, same stench of blood, but this one possessed an anomaly. Something that had never entered her nightmares before. Black eyes. Watching her, taunting her, terrifying her. They stared through the darkness with their violent threats, and even though she had escaped the dream, Bel still felt them on her. They watched her, hunted her, and the longer she sat in the dark, the more the fear crept in. Instead of dissipating upon waking like it always had, it grew and multiplied, coating her skin, spilling into her lungs.

Bel scanned the cabin. Cerberus would have warned her of a break-in, but the tugging at her gut unnerved her. Someone was watching her. She could feel it in her bones, in the way the hair on the back of her neck rose with electric fear.

The room was empty, though. Her dog lounging unbothered on the pillows. The clock read 3:00 a.m., and Bel told herself she was paranoid. No one was here. No one was stalking her. This case was dredging up repressed memories. That was it.

She scratched the pitbull’s ears as she shimmied off the bed to grab a drink when a shadow outside her kitchen window moved. Bel froze, for a pair of black eyes hovered on the opposite side of the glass panes, watching her every move.

Bel hadher sidearm in her grip before she could exhale her panicked breath, thumbing the safety off as she bolted for the door. She flung it open, the thud of wood colliding with the wall a resounding gong in the silence, and she lunged out into the moonlight, bare legs shining in the pale light.

Nothing.

She found nothing. No monster lurked outside her window. No black eyes. No angel of death. Only the crickets mocked her state of undress. Bel clicked the safety back into place and rubbed her eyes, but the view before her remained unchanged. She was alone in the darkness.

Her bare feet padded over the dew-drenched grass, and she locked herself inside her cabin. The eyes had appeared so real, the stare so oppressive, that she almost felt them drag across her skin, but Cerberus lay undisturbed on the mattress, watching her lazily. If someone had tried to break in, the dog would have reacted, but the only things bothering his sleep were her and her nightmares. Bel sighed, sliding the gun back into the bedside table’s drawer before collapsing next to the pitbull. She didn’t want to worry him, but maybe she should call her dad. She wasn’t sure she was ready for a case like this. It was making her see things, convincing her that a reclusive millionaire found her sleep worth observing.

Bel shuddered at the memory of Eamon’s hungry gaze tormenting her skin, at the way his mouth twitched as if he wanted to learn what her fear tasted like, what her moans against his lips sounded like. She grabbed Cerberus and pulled him closer. Evil had come to this town. Evil in its most beautiful form, and the dread in her gut promised that the violence plaguing her new home had only just begun. She never jumped to conclusions, but Eamon Stone was a predator on the hunt. He was involved in this darkness, and she needed to figure out how before his sin swallowed her whole…

The blare of the alarm jerked both Bel and Cerberus violently from their dreamless sleep, and she slapped the clock, desperate for silence. She didn’t remember falling asleep, her adrenaline high after her nightmare, but the dog’s warm body had obviously lulled her to safety. She kissed his head and fumbled with her shorts before clicking the leash onto his collar. Thank heavens for this animal. She desperately needed the rest, and if not for his snoring and heavy weight, she would have stared at her ceiling for most of the night. Bel smirked at Vera’s cabin as she led him out into the early morning. She didn’t need a husband or kids. She had Cerberus, and he was the only man she trusted besides her father… and Garrett. The thought surprised her as the pitbull dragged her around the yard. It had taken her partner months to ask her out, and she realized perhaps it wasn’t because he was shy, but because he understood she needed time to adjust.

Business handled, Cerberus towed her toward the house, but then he veered sideways, pulling her along the plants lining the cabin. Bel’s heart lodged in her throat when she saw where he stopped, where he insisted on sniffing. The leaves under her kitchen window were crushed, as if a person had stepped on them. Black eyes flooded her vision as the dog refused to leave, insisting on smelling every inch of the bent stems. She told herself a rabbit had visited in the dead of night, and that was what the pitbull scented, but her lies were flimsily thin. Someone had stood here. Someone had been watching her.

* * *

The foreboding dread still cloakedher flesh as she ordered a vanilla latte and an Americano at The Espresso Shot. Bel barely registered Emily’s teasing her about buying Garrett’s favorite coffee drink. She didn’t even notice Abel Reus until she almost knocked his oatmeal out of his hands.

“No harm done, Detective,” Abel said softly as she apologized for nearly painting his shirt with his breakfast. In his late forties with thinning hair, Abel was a nice enough oddity in town. Like most of the locals, he got his coffee from The Espresso Shot, but he always insisted on ordering oatmeal to go, regardless of Emily’s irresistible homemade pastries. Bel had tried it once, and Emily Kaffe could turn anything into gold, the oats rich and creamy with brown sugar and cinnamon, but Bel didn’t understand how anyone could stare at her display of blueberry muffins, glazed apple donuts, or cranberry vanilla scones and choose hot cereal. This morning, Emily was selling kiwi fruit tarts, and Bel essentially had to physically peel herself away from the pastry case, reminding herself of the container of Vera’s chocolate chip cookies sitting in her car.

“I heard about Lumen,” Abel said as she snagged some of the complimentary napkins. “Such a shame. Do you have any leads?”

“I can’t talk about ongoing cases, sorry,” Bel said distractedly.

“Of course.” He stepped closer. “I hope you are taking care of yourself with such a dangerous killer on the loose.”

Bel paused and stared at the man. He often greeted her as she rushed through the coffee line on the way to work, but after last night, his comment set her on edge.

“I am, thank you.” Her phone vibrated in her pocket, and she thanked whoever it was for giving her an excuse to leave this conversation. “I have to take this. Have a good day,” she called over her shoulder as she fished out her cell, not noticing how Abel watched her every move until she disappeared down the street.

“Lina texted me,” she said by way of greeting when she arrived at the station. “She wants us to meet with her to discuss the autopsy.” She shoved the Americano at Garrett and leaned forward to set the Tupperware onto the desk. To his credit, her partner simply nodded, his face relatively neutral as he attempted to mask his eagerness for her answer to his date request.

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