size? How did she obtain a carrying permit so easily?
Why did the FBI let a blind civilian help them solve their cases? What did she do
for the FBI anyway?
Cris didn’t realize he had asked the questions aloud.
Arie quickly began to answer all of his questions. She felt like since she had already
opened the can she might as well let all her secrets spill out, well, at least the
ones that answered Cris’s questions. She told them about how her father had her continue
her boxing, Aikido, and Krav Maga training. How she was at her Uncle Brandon’s house,
who was a FBI agent at the time, when she overheard him and his partner going over
a case. Ideas began to flow through her head of how she could help them as she closely
listened to them recount all the evidence and they went over how their prime suspect
was going to get away. Even though they knew his alibi wasn’t as airtight as they
were led to believe, there were holes in the alibi but not enough for them to be able
to disprove it in court. After helping them solve a few cases, she was brought into
the department as an intern to help the whole department.
“Why aren’t you still interning there?” Cris asked.
“I stopped after my uncle was killed while undercover a few weeks before my parents
died. His partner wanted me to continue and eventually move up to become his partner,
but I couldn’t continue so soon after my uncle’s funeral,” Arie answered.
Arie couldn’t believe she had told them everything.
Cris sat there and let everything Arie said settle in to his mind. She was changing
his mind about a lot of things in the past he thought were impossible.
Chapter Six
He slammed the palms of his hands onto the dashboard when he noticed it was only six
a . m. He gripped the steering wheel until the blood drained out of his hands . H e noticed it was still six a . m as he glanced back at the clock on his dashboard just a few seconds later. His
body rocked back and forth , as he continued with his strong hold on the dashboard.
“Just fifteen more minutes and she will be stopping for her stretch , ” t he Daytime Killer mumbled about his latest victim ’ s routine.
He had been watching his latest victim for the past two weeks since he had seen her at the Nameless bar for the first time. She was one of those creatures of
habit and he loved that about her. Every morning , no matter what , she left her house for her run at five - thirty a . m. By six - thirty , she was stopping for a water break and to stretch again right in the very spot where he was waiting . Leaving him just enough time to snatch her , bring her back to one of his lairs, and get to work by eight.
Just thinking about how he was going to snatch her lit a fire in him that he had been
missing since his last victim. He was tired of pretending as if he was in control of himself while he really wanted to hunt. Darkness was starting
to cloud his mind and he couldn’t see which way h is mind was going , leaving him feeling weak, powerless, and unconfident , not in control of his mind or body. He knew if he didn’t get her soon he would
snap on some one and maybe , just maybe , kill them since his control was overpowered by darkness. If he was going to lose it , without a doubt , it would be at work when one of those assholes he worked with fucked with him again.
His mind began to drift back to those times he really felt powerless as a child.
He and his brother had the best time of their lives for the last three months. It felt
as though they were finally free and didn’t have to be afraid of their own shadows any more.
When he was a ten - year old kid, he woke hurriedly as his mother ’ s painful screams penetrated his dreams. He jumped out of bed and made his way to
the living room where the screams were coming from. Without having to look , he knew his mother was runnin g around the living room screaming as she ran from his
C. J. Cherryh
Learning to Kill: Stories
John O'Riley
Brenda Sinclair
Christopher George
Stephen Lloyd Jones
Karl Iagnemma
Celya Bowers
Jill Gregory
Aria Cunningham