Page 143 of White Raven
A father.
Rhaena slapped her palms to his chest, pumping mindlessly, and growling curses under her breath. “Come on,” she hissed through clenched teeth. She put more force behind it, ignoring Brandon’s hand on her shoulder. “Come on!” Tears flowed faster, and more blood freed itself from his gunshot wound, flooding over her fingers. “Goddammit! Comeon!” She sobbed, as Brandon softly pulled her away, pleading with her to let him go.
Foster stood quietly next to Wren and Brent, who watched on tearfully…
Foster raised a hand to her forehead in salute.
Brandon held her to his chest, rocking her back and forth among the dozens of bodies on the floor.
And Rhaena’s heartbroken screams echoed down the hallway of her building.
Nearly thirty bodies were counted as Foster signed off with the fire department, and officers from the 12th precinct, permitting only the lower floor residents to return to their homes. All agreed to keep the incident silent until she gave them answers, at the announcement of their captain’s death. Foster had promised them his body to be taken uptown under the condition that the reporters crowding the outside of the building not get a single image of a body bag. Some of the officers were struggling to rein in their emotion—Blakely being one of them—as several, including Foster, gathered around the gurney, blocking sight of him as they moved him into the coroner’s van. It was the least she could do for him.
“This case is considered classified until further notice,” she said, sadly. “I have a team on their way. If you wanna honor your captain…tight lips. Do we all understand each other?” The officers nodded silently, some of them wiping their noses. “I understand that I’m not well-liked around here…but you all have my deepest sympathy. He was a good man.”
Cameras flashed from a distance, and a few of the officers went after the source, daring them to dishonor their fallen comrade. Foster tapped the back of the van, and it started to pull off. She watched it head down the street, a few patrol cars following behind it with their lights on. Her chest felt heavy. Blakely stepped up to her side as the van disappeared from view.
“Northwood? Jenkins?” Blakely asked, hoarsely.
“They’re fine. Shaken, but fine.”
Northwood was anything but fine as Foster made her way back into the obliterated apartment. She stood quietly at the window, staring out of it with her arms crossed around herself, as the others gathered corpses and dragged them into the kitchen. Jenkins offered a solemn nod as Foster approached.
“How are we gonna explain all this?” he asked. His voice was rough with exhaustion, and grief.
“You won’t,” she said, smiling softly. “My team will be here in a few hours. We’ll get this cleaned up and buried. The mess,andthe…mess.”
“And Foley? How do you intend to explainthataway?”
Foster shook her head and sighed deeply. “That gunshot wound was the reason he died. As far as we’re concerned, he fell in the line of duty. It’ll be explained to everyone else like that. His report will be redacted the same way his partner’s was.”
Rhaena turned from the window. “People should know,” she choked. “They should know why he really fell. It’s bad enough my captain died in this place. It’s shitting on his memory to lie about his death.”
“Northwood…you and I both know why they can’t. I know you don’t particularly care for me, but it’s my job to keep the lid on your existence…andtheirs.” She pointed with a thumb to where Vintorri, and Stratford were still silently stacking vampire bodies.
“There’s no honor in this. That coven needs topay. They need to fucking pay for what they’ve done,” Rhaena growled.
The pink-haired girl spoke up from where she stood frozen against the wall. Foster couldn’t even remember her name. “But it was my fault,” she admitted, almost in a whisper. “It was that missed shot that killed that man. I murdered acop.”
It was a surprise to see softness in Northwood’s eyes as she strode across the apartment and laid a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “You didn’t murder anyone. You did what you could. Captain Foley would have likely died anyway.”
It was a lie, and they both knew it. There was a decent chance that the bite may have turned Foley. Or poison him. Foley had been banking on his heart stopping before the venom could do its worst. He didn’t want to be a wolf…let alone something even more unpredictable.
“What do we do with the bodies?” Stratford asked, wiping his hands uselessly on his blood-soaked jeans.
“Save a few that aren’t…dismembered. We’ll try to spin it as a gang attack. There were too many gunshots up here to convince the public of anything else.”
“This is so fucked up,” Vintorri breathed, Stratford pulling her close to him. “Where’s the justice in all this?”
It was the lawyer that had her full respect after that. When he swallowed, and looked between them all and said, “There’s law…and there’sorder. These parasites might be above the law…but we know one thatisthe law. His future wife is one of the strongest people I know. Even they know what has to be done to keep the order. The justice lies with the onesthat still wanna do some good in a shitty situation. We’ve gotta help them do that. Foster’s right. The world can’t know. Captain Foley knew that too. That’s why we’re all still free. He fought for it in service, and he died for it the same way. We honor Foley by keeping the order…and continuing to practice law. Protecting thepeople.”
CHAPTER 27
REYNOLDS
Every step he took felt strange and heavy as the three of them silently walked down ghostly-bare streets towards Edgar Allan Poe’s house. The real one. The place where, somehow, Athan knew Sarah was right about the legend of a man…waiting for them. Athan wasn’t sure if it was his lack of use in his legs for the amount of time he’d been stuffed into that coffin, or the fact that a man they’d always admired so much—a man whose words shaped so many parts of their lives—made his muscles stiff, and reluctant. This would end with someone’s blood. Sarah seemed driven to write him an ending worthy of one of his tall tales. His dark existence. It didn’t seem to matter that he was her father…in fact…if he was being completely honest…he didn’t think either of them had really let that detail sink in yet. He gripped her hand and looked over at her face as they continued to walk.
Sarah stared forward. Her expression was blank, and lifeless. How much could one woman endure? How much death makes a person hollow, and numb? The old townhouse came into view, and a chill went down his spine. They didn’t slow. One foot in front of the other. Poe rode on Sarah’s shoulder like a soldier into battle. No wonder he fell just as hard for her. From the very beginning, that bird knew who she was. Knew he’d found the same counterpart as Athan had. Everything just seemed so…poetic.
