Page 25 of Capitol Matters

His beat-up Ford Bronco sat at the other end of the row of units. I walked forward, fighting off residual chills, and extended my palm to mentally reel the Bronco’s keys from his front left pocket.

Donovan’s hand clapped against his thigh too late to stop the theft.

“Really, Fitch?” He turned to glare at me as I jingled them in the air. “You’re leaving me like this?”

“Grimm has faith in you,” I replied. “Who am I to question that?”

“Asshole,” he grumbled.

I chuckled.

Speeding up, I made my way toward the Bronco. I kept my focus fixed ahead to avoid an accidental glimpse of the storage unit that would house the councilman for the next few weeks. It was an unfortunate arrangement, but a necessary one.

The more I thought about it, I decided the kidnappees had lucked out. Of the lot of us, Donovan was the ideal jailer. He was kind enough to be sympathetic and might even put effort into providing creature comforts. He would take no pleasure in his captives’ misery and wouldn’t forget to feed them. I wasn’t sure I could say the same about myself.

By the end ofthe second week, Capitol Fitch had found his rhythm. No more sweaty construction work meant time for patrols with Holland, whose ice queen façade was slowly beginning to thaw.

Maximus followed up Monday, informing me in the vaguest way possible that he knew about Yankee Doodle. At least, he knew the councilman went missing, and both of us were content to leave it at that.

I’d even squeezed in a second kidnapping. A fast grab after work Wednesday night, for which I prepared in advance by parking my car next to the space typically used by the city treasurer. She had gone down on my list as Ms. Speak to Your Manager, due to the bobbed haircut that made her head look as round as her ass. I made quick work of stuffing her in the Porsche’s cramped front trunk and ferrying her safely to Donovan.

With only two down and six to go, I needed to pickup the pace.

The elevator door slid open, and I stepped into the parking garage. Most people cleared out early on Fridays, which made me one of the last to leave at 5:15. Looking like a real overachiever, but the reality was I had been asked—make that ordered—to meet Grimm at the motel and fill him in on the progress of mine and Donovan’s joint venture. Needless to say, I was in no hurry to get home.

I scrolled my phone as I ambled to where I’d parked the Porsche. Besides Grimm’s message and a missed call from Nash, there hadn’t been much activity during the workday. As I repocketed my cell, I heard voices ahead.

The pop and shatter of glass spurred me to dash around the wall dividing this floor of the garage. With so few cars in the lot, it was easy to find mine, and easier still to spot the trio of investigators. Though they’d done their best to avoid me the last week, I remembered Holland’s hostile team members well.

The Porsche was in shambles. It sat on all four rims with its tires shredded and every panel dented. The back window was spiderwebbed with cracks, and shards of glass littered the pavement.

I froze midstride. My jaw flexed a hard bite, too angry to even cuss, as I scanned the group of investigators hovering around my car.

Tobin, the ringleader, stood to one side, leaning against a wooden bat while Vesper aimed a rattle can of red paint at the Porsche’s windshield. Felix had distanced himself from the other two and faced away from my approach. None of them realized they’d been caught until I threw a rope of thought through the air andyanked the bat from Tobin’s grasp.

All three looked my way with varying degrees of shock on their faces. The spray can tumbled from Vesper’s hand and clattered onto the ground.

“Real funny, fuckwads!” I called out.

The bat hovered in midair, level with Tobin’s head and ready to swing away.

No one moved as I continued. “You all really know how to make a guy feel welcome.”

Wasn’t I the villain here? These were supposed to be the heroes of the story yet here they were, up to some petty criminal shit.

I walked forward, hot air swelling my chest. Did they not have the good sense to fear me? I preyed on their kind. I made my name killing their contemporaries. Here, I was a wolf among sheep, and the sheep were too dumb to understand their place on the food chain.

Rather than run or offer meaningless apologies, the head sheep—the one with the baseball bat poised to grand slam his skull—looked me straight in the eyes, raised his hand, and snapped.

They vanished. All three gone. No trace.

I spun a full circle, checking for evidence of escape but finding none. I heard no sounds of retreat and saw no shadows fading from view. Nothing.

The answer was magic, of course, but what kind? Teleportation? Invisibility?

Searching the area once more found the bat also missing. I hadn’t dropped it, and I felt confident I would have noticed someone wrestling it from my mental grasp.

The longer I looked for the investigators, the less Icould keep my eyes away from the disaster before me. The Porsche sagged low to the ground, a slain beast with its taillights shattered and body as crumpled as a crushed can.

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