Loch Ness Distress

Blue Moon Sacramento

Book 10

By

Alex Gates

Steve Higgs

Text Copyright © 2025 Alex Gates & Steven J Higgs

Publisher: Steve Higgs

The right of Alex Gates and Steve Higgs to be identified as authors of the Work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

All rights reserved.

The book is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

‘Loch Ness Distress’ is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organisations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living, dead or undead, events or locations is entirely coincidental.

Table of Contents :

Departure. Wednesday, January 1st. 1126hrs.

Dirty Habit. Wednesday, January 1st. 1937hrs.

Surprise Visit. Wednesday, January 1st. 2109hrs.

Taking Your Time. Wednesday, January 1st. 2222hrs.

The Train Ride, Part 1. Thursday, January 2nd. 0808hrs.

The Train Ride, Part 2. Thursday, January 2nd. 1217hrs.

Brett Barker. Thursday, January 2nd. 1439hrs.

Local Tensions. Thursday, January 2nd. 1847hrs.

Rupert McLaren. Thursday, January 2nd. 2034hrs.

Nessie. Thursday, January 2nd. 2144 hrs.

New Reports. Friday, January 3rd. 0859hrs.

The Secret. Friday, January 3rd. 1128 hrs.

Near-Accident. Friday, January 3rd. 1201hrs.

So Be It. Friday, January 3rd. 1253hrs.

Invasion. Friday, January 3rd. 1437hrs.

The Reading. Saturday, January 4th. 0937hrs.

Exploration. Saturday, January 4th. 1003hrs.

Return to the Loch. Saturday, January 4th. 1216hrs.

The Trap. Saturday, January 4th. 1457hrs.

The Loch Ness Monster. Sunday, January 5th. 0008hrs.

On the Trail. Sunday, January 5th. 0119hrs.

Return to the Estate. Sunday, January 5th. 0157hrs.

Huxley Castle. Sunday, January 5th. 0224hrs.

The Study. Sunday, January 5th. 0237hrs.

The Basement. Sunday, January 5th. 0245hrs.

Discovery. Sunday, January 5th. 0256hrs.

Showdown. Sunday, January 5th. 0304hrs.

Aftermath. Sunday, January 5th. 1322hrs.

Resignation. Sunday, January 5th. 1341hrs.

Three Days Later. Wednesday, January 8th. 1602hrs.

Six Months Later. Saturday, July 4th. 1921hrs.

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Departure. Wednesday, January 1st. 1126hrs.

Heathrow International Airport pulsed with restless energy—a ceaseless current of travelers dragging luggage, exchanging rushed goodbyes, and weaving through the congestion of bodies and rolling suitcases.

Horns blared in frustration outside the terminal. Exhaust thickened the cold January air. Overhead, distorted announcements droned from the loudspeakers, lost beneath the clamor of the crowd.

I stood with Maya, Alina, and Gerald.

Maya and Gerald had no luggage. Neither had planned to be in London. Their visit had been a forced one—a consequence of the Order of the Veiled Dawn, a deranged cult that had kidnapped them to offer them up to the Watchers, seeking ascension to another realm.

Though Maya’s physical wounds had mostly healed, the real damage lurked beneath the surface, discoloring something unseen. The horror she had endured wasn’t something she dwelled on or dissected. She simply outran it.

She had always been that way—if she moved fast enough, the past wouldn’t catch her.

Gerald was carved from a different mold. He lacked any fortress, any vault to store his pain. His emotions spilled out unfiltered—on his face, in his voice, in the way he carried himself. And now, standing on the edge of departure, whatever storm had been brewing inside him broke loose.

He wept, silent tears slipping down his weathered face, each one rolling like a pebble shaken loose from an eroding cliff.

His sobs made me uncomfortable. I struggled with handling my own emotions most of the time. Knowing how to comfort Gerald flew right over my head.

Alina stood between Maya and Gerald, untouched by the weight they carried. Her skin was flushed from the cold rather than the remnants of trauma. She was well-rested and whole.

Out of the three of them, she was the only one who had come out of this unscathed—at least on the surface.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to hang around?” Maya asked, watching the line of vehicles spitting out passengers like an overworked machine.

I nodded. “Alina needs to get back home. And you… you need to rest in your own bed.” I searched her face for cracks in her impassive expression. “Besides, there’s a certain someone waiting for you to return.”

A sliver of light cut through Maya’s shadowed features. “Who might that be?”

“Does the name Samuel Irving ring a bell?” I referred, of course, to her recent boyfriend.

The brightness in her expression widened, dissolving whatever darkness had settled there. “He’s still hanging around?”

“I couldn’t get him to leave me alone. He insisted on helping with the investigation.”

Maya sighed, long and slow. The exhalation carried away the last of her stubbornness. “Fine.” Her voice lacked its usual bite. She hesitated for only a second before switching gears. “But can I ask you something… for the dozenth time?” She didn’t wait for my permission. “Why aren’t you coming with us? Why stay in London?”

Behind me, a horn blared, long and angry, swallowed by the noise of Heathrow’s congested curb side. Traffic had reached a gridlock. Drivers leaned out of their windows, hurling profanity into the winter air. Nearby, a mother hurried to cover the ears of her toddler, shooting a sharp glare at the offender.

A sharp wind pushed against my jacket, filling my right ear with static. A misty rain began to fall—light, cold, each drop melting on my skin like ice. The forecast had warned of possible snow.

What could I say to Maya? I meant to stay in London to meet Tempest and hand in my resignation. To speak that cold truth aloud would incite a flurry of questions I didn’t have the endurance to brace against yet.

My hesitation lasted just long enough for Maya to double down. “You can’t avoid answering.”

I also hadn’t told Maya and Alina about the case Tempest Michaels had texted me about—the last case I would work under his name. If they knew, they wouldn’t leave England.

That was the problem with Maya and Alina. They were too loyal and too curious. If I gave them the slightest reason to stay with me, they would. And though I loved them both, though I enjoyed their company more than I cared to admit, I needed something I hadn’t had in too long.

Time to myself.

Time to think about my decision to step away from private investigation, and time to consider my relationship with Freya without any external voices offering their opinions.

“I’m staying to meet Tempest Michaels.”

“What?” Alina bounced on her toes. “Really?”

“Why?” Maya was less enthusiastic, more suspicious. She knew what the meeting meant. A job prospect. A mystery.

“He bought Paranormalize from me and let me operate under his Blue Moon franchise. Despite trusting me to represent his name, we’ve never actually met.” I scratched my head, mussing my hair. “So, I’m here. We’ve texted, we agreed to meet.”

Maya gave me a knowing look. “What else?”

Heat pooled on the back of my neck. “What do you mean?”

“You’re not telling us everything. You can’t lie to us. We know you too well.”

“Fine.” I exhaled through my nose and threw up my hands. I don’t even know why I put up a fight. They always wore me down. “He might want my help solving a case.” Before they could insist on staying, I charged ahead. “My help. He didn’t ask for Maya Adler or Alina Moore.”

Maya narrowed her eyes. “He asked specifically for you, like, by name?”

“Yes.”

Alina lifted a brow. “That doesn’t make sense.”

“Why not? I’m the owner of the Sacramento branch.”

Both women spared a moment to laugh.

“I am.”

Alina crossed her skinny arms. “Does he not know you require us to solve all your cases?”

“That’s not true.” The rebuttal felt dead as it left my lips. I could’ve reminded them that I saved Maya, but Alina would’ve immediately countered that she had helped—if not carried me—through that investigation.

Gerald offered his thoughts through stuttered words rich with emotion. “I can attest to what they say.”

“No one asked you, Gerald.”

Alina made a sour face. “You don’t have to be rude to him for speaking the truth.”

I ignored her. “Neither of you are employed by Blue Moon. Alina, in case you forgot, you quit and moved to San Diego.”

Maya raised a hand. “Um, I’m employed by Blue Moon.”

I snorted. “You’re a freelancer. A consultant. I hire you when I need help. Key words… I hire you, because I’m the boss.”

“And you literally have to hire me. All. The. Time. I’m more of a full-time employee than that other guy.”

I rolled my eyes. “Fred actually works for Blue Moon and receives a salary.”

“Well,” Maya said, watching travelers haul luggage from trunks and shuffle toward the terminal, “Fred does less than you, which is impossible to believe. I think we should stay in England and meet with this Tempest guy, inform him that his two paid employees in Sacramento do nothing more than lean on the work of their two young, beautiful, intelligent, female friends.”

I checked my watch. “Well, would you look at the time.”

Before she could press further, I leaned in and hugged Maya, cutting off her inevitable counterpoint. “It was great to save your life.”

“Thank you, but I believe Big Ben saved my life.”

Alina nodded along. “She’s not wrong. When said life was being saved, we were on a plane. Watching Ghostbusters.”

Maya turned, intrigued. “Oh, really?”

“Yeah.” Alina smirked. “August had never seen it.”

Maya spun toward me, eyes wide. “What did you think?”

I hesitated. “It was… fine.”

“Fine?” Alina’s nose crinkled like I’d just insulted her grandmother. “It’s iconic.”

“So was Katherine Heigl. Doesn’t mean either of them stood the test of time.”

Maya recoiled as if I’d just slapped her across the soul. “Did you just compare Katherine Heigl to Ghostbusters? Also, who just throws out Katherine Heigl’s name like that?” She studied me like she was reconsidering our entire friendship. “You know what? You’re right. You need time alone. Time to reflect.” She crossed her arms. “Did you know—and I know this will be difficult for you—that you’re allowed to enjoy things? I get you have this whole brooding complex because of your past, and I know you’re making strides to be a better, more involved, more intentional friend, son, sibling, et cetera.” She lifted a brow. “But it’s not always about pleasing others.”

Alina, ever the translator, tilted her head. “I think what she’s trying to say is your past doesn’t have to be who you are.”

Gerald, of course, delivered the cherry on top. “Only your present provides insight into your character.”

I grimaced with irritation, not asking for the self-help advice.

Maya stepped forward and hugged me, though. Then Alina took her turn. Gerald tried to sneak one in. And maybe their little intervention had wriggled its way into my conscience, because I let him. Not only that—I reciprocated the embrace.

“I love you, brother,” Gerald murmured.

I nodded, smiling as I watched them disappear into the terminal.

Turning, I spotted Big Ben still parked at the curb, his arm resting lazily on the open window of his truck.

He stared at me, wearing an easy smile. “I love Katherine Heigl. Twenty-Seven Dresses was iconic.”

“One of her best.” I slid into the passenger seat. By the time I had my seatbelt on, Elton John filled the cab.

We pulled away from Heathrow, singing along to Bennie and the Jets.

Dirty Habit. Wednesday, January 1st. 1937hrs.

The Dirty Habit sat nestled on the corner of the main road in a quiet village just outside Maidstone. Its weathered sign swayed slightly in the night breeze, creaking on rusted chains.

The pub was old and beautiful, the kind of place that had survived eras, not just decades. The stones holding up the roof had stood longer than the American Constitution, watching empires rise and crumble, wars begin and end.

And yet, through all the spilled blood and ink scrawled across treatises, beer had continued to slide across the bar top.

Inside, dim light flickered against thick wooden beams. The murmur of conversation wove through the air, punctuated by the occasional clink of glassware.

Big Ben and I claimed a table in the far-right corner, near the stone hearth where the fire had burned down to smoldering embers.

“You know the origin of the name?” Big Ben asked. The low lighting cut across his sharp features, highlighting a face that would’ve looked right at home on a Viking warship—if Vikings had ever used hair gel.

I smirked at the image. “What name?”

“This pub. The Dirty Habit.”

I shook my head, venturing a guess. “It’s a pub, and people drink. Dirty habit.”

Big Ben clicked his tongue. “It’s a play on words. There is a friary about a mile down the road. It sits between this village and the next.” He grinned. “Dirty habits.”

Before I could decide whether I was amused or irritated, our server appeared. She was one of those ageless women—somewhere between thirty and fifty, carrying the kind of bubbly yet comforting presence that made it impossible to tell.

“Can I grab you a drink?” Her gaze snagged on Big Ben and didn’t let go.

“Two pints of Kronenberg, my lovely.”

I wasn’t sure whether it was the gravel in his voice or the sheer force of his confidence, but the server blushed, tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear.

“And you?” Though she directed the question at me, her attention never strayed from Big Ben.

“Water. And do you have a food menu?”

She reached into her apron and set a laminated one in front of me without breaking eye contact with him.

After she practically tripped over herself heading back to the kitchen, Big Ben leaned forward, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Let you in on a secret.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“The waitress, her name’s Leslie. And between you and me …” Wrinkles stretched from his eyes as he grinned. “She’s got a dirty habit, too.”

“Emphasis on the word dirty.” The new voice came from beside me, carrying an effortless charm.

I recognized it immediately.

Straightening, I turned to find Tempest Michaels.

He was roughly my size, though leaner, more compact—built like someone who had spent years training for efficiency rather than brute force. Where my eyes were heavy from too many sleepless nights, his were sharp, constantly assessing.

Even before he spoke, he had a presence—controlled and steady—the kind of authority that didn’t need volume to command a room.

I didn’t know much about Tempest Michaels, other than the fact that he signed my pay checks every month, but looking at him, I’d bet money he had either served in the military or worked law enforcement.

He was the kind of man who never sat with his back to the door.

Immediately, he demanded my respect.

Big Ben chuckled. “Well, well. If it isn’t the man himself.”

Tempest extended a hand, and I took it. His grip was firm, assured.

“So,” he said, glancing between us. “You must be August Watson. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”

“Likewise.”

Before I could say more, two dachshunds attacked my ankles, their snouts pressing into my jeans as if they’d never caught the scent of an American before.

Tempest tipped his chin toward them. “Apologies for their forwardness.”

I kneeled, scratching behind their ears. A sudden emptiness hollowed out my chest. They reminded me of Bagley—my dog, or rather, Alina’s dog now. He now lived with her in San Diego. A fleeting ache settled in my ribs before I pushed it aside.

“What are their names?” I asked.

“Bull and Dozer.”

The two of them leaned their full weight into me, trying to bulldoze me.

I huffed. “The names fit.”

Tempest snapped his fingers, and the dogs immediately peeled away.

I slid back into my seat as Tempest took the one beside Big Ben.

Before we could dive into conversation, Leslie returned with a tray, expertly balancing two pints of beer and an iced water. “Any food, gentlemen?”

We must have been famished. Without hesitation, we all ordered something greasy, battered, or fried.

After ordering, I filled in the finer details of my visit to England. Tempest already knew I’d flown out to save Maya from the Order of the Veiled Dawn, but he only had the bare bones of the story.

So, I colored the picture for him.

I told him how I’d tracked her down, how the investigation had hit a dead end at Sacramento Airport, how I’d sat at the terminal—knowing I wouldn’t make it in time to save her from certain death.

When I reached that part, Big Ben took over.

“Me, the bull.” Big Ben hammered his fist against his broad chest. “China shop—that’s what that cult was.” He frowned, tapping his chin as if in deep thought. “How many of them were there? Two dozen?”

I shrugged. Having been on a plane while the proverbial bull rampaged through the cult’s china shop, I could neither confirm nor deny the numbers.

“Two dozen at least,” he said. “Odds like that, you’d think a gaggle of toddlers could’ve put up more of a fight. Honestly? I felt bad. But that feeling lasted about half a second.” He motioned toward his ear. “Someone landed a punch right here.”

He finished off his pint. “Then I was angry.”

Tempest listened the entire time, offering no interruptions, no opinions—just taking it all in. Finally, he inhaled, tilting his glass toward me. “You don’t drink?”

I glanced at my water glass, then shook my head. “Long, dark story.”

“Probably better for your midsection.” Tempest raised his pint and, like Big Ben, drained it in one long swallow. Then his expression shifted from casual to something sharper. “I have a contact in Scotland. He’s developing a resort on Loch Ness.”

“Scotland?”

“There’s been a contingent of concerned citizens and environmentalists opposing the construction since the permitting stage.” His jaw tensed briefly before he continued. “A few days ago, whenever it was that I texted you, he discovered some of his heavy machinery in a state of ruin.” He let that linger for a beat. “Claw marks.”

I blinked, scratching at the soft skin behind my ear. “Claw marks?”

He gave a slow nod. “They suspect from Loch Ness.”

“Like ... Nessie?”

Tempest offered a flat smile. “Not Nessie.” His tone was even, like he’d had this conversation before and knew exactly how it would play out. “The Loch Ness Monster doesn’t exist, as I’m sure you’re well aware. However, there is a Loch Ness Monster vandalizing equipment to postpone construction.”

I drummed my fingers on the table. “And you want me to unmask that monster?”

“I’m too busy to tackle the case myself, but I have full confidence that you can handle the mystery.”

I tilted my head, probing for more details. “A contact of yours?”

Tempest’s jaw twitched—the slightest flicker of something unreadable. “Just a bloke. Though, I suppose some women might find his good hair, strong jaw, and muscular athleticism attractive.”

I scoffed. “The gall of those women. I thought dad bods were in style?”

“The client,” Tempest continued, “is the stupidly rich, stupidly handsome ex-boyfriend of my girlfriend.” I noticed Tempest fiddling with something in his pants pocket when he talked about his girlfriend. When he moved his hand away, my eyes lingered and I could see the outline of a ring beneath the material.

I nodded, fighting back a smirk, now fully understanding why he was too busy to tackle the case. “I see.”

“I half-wished I could’ve been the Loch Ness Monster throwing a wrench into his development plans.”

Beneath the table, Bull and Dozer exchanged low growls, snapping at each other. Tempest gave them a quiet reprimand, and they immediately rolled back into obedient, compact shapes.

“Once you confirm the assignment,” he said, returning his focus to me, “I’ll book you a morning train ride to Scotland. So, what do you say?”

Tempest’s offer should have felt routine—another job, another case.

But instead, the offer hit differently.

For the first time since I was offered a paranormal mystery, I had a simple, powerful realization that cemented my newfound thoughts.

I was happy with my life.

The pub’s dim lights cast elongated shadows against the wooden walls. The music playing over the speakers was unfamiliar, just another nameless melody lost in the hum of low conversation. I was in a different country, on a different continent, worlds away from everything I had ever known.

Except for monsters. And ghosts. And mysteries.

That part of my life remained constant—and though that should’ve felt like home, it only made me miss home even more.

A small frown curled the edge of my lips.

Maybe that was what happiness was—the realization that home, not a career, and the people who populated the interior of those walls were all that mattered, were all that brought joy.

I had a loving family, a supportive friend group, and a drop-dead gorgeous, intelligent, funny, and capable girlfriend.

Since taking on the work for Tempest, I had done more than unmask fabricated monsters. I had faced my own ghosts. I had identified and defeated the demons darkening my own life.

But what more did the supernatural have to offer me?

Still, Tempest hadn’t just given me a career. He had given me purpose. I owed him more than a yes, but that’s all I had to give.

One last time.

I leaned back in my chair, locking eyes with him, the decision already made. “Assignment confirmed. Let’s find the Loch Ness Monster.”

Surprise Visit. Wednesday, January 1st. 2109hrs.

An invisible force punched me in the gut, knocking the air from my lungs. My brain lagged reality, struggling to process what I was seeing.

Freya.

Here.

In England.

At Big Ben’s apartment complex.

As I reeled, Big Ben kicked into action, fueled by three pints of beer and an untamed libido. He licked his pinkies and smoothed down his eyebrows.

Running a hand through his long, luscious hair, he let out a dramatic sigh. “I once saw the Northern Lights reflected off a black ocean. That looked like something a toddler scribbled with a crayon compared to the masterpiece draped on that wall.” He strutted forward like a man on a holy mission. “How have I never known beauty like you before?”

Freya stood still, carry-on luggage pressed against her legs and an oversized bag hanging off one shoulder. Her wavy blonde hair spilled from beneath a knitted beanie, framing high cheekbones and full lips, and her eyes were locked on me—not Big Ben.

Undeterred by the uncommon lack of attention, Big Ben came to a halt a step from her. “I’m Benjamin, but you can call me Big Ben. Obvious reasons.”

Freya hesitated before reaching out, and his enormous hand swallowed hers. “I’m Freya.”

“The Norse goddess of war, beauty, fertility, and love. A name that befits you, my lady. Your beauty has waged a war within my heart, a battle between love at first sight and the lustful thrust of fertility.”

I crossed my arms, interested to see how the scene played out.

Freya’s gaze remained fixed on me, her silent expression screaming for help. Save me.

Donning my shining armor, I closed the distance in a few strides and positioned myself between her and Big Ben.

She let out a small breath and bit her lip again, this time slipping into a half-smile. “Hi, you.”

I didn’t respond—not with words, anyway. My hands found her hips. Instinct kicked in before thought, and I pulled her toward me. Her lips—soft, warm, tasting of strawberry balm and cinnamon gum—met mine.

Big Ben cleared his throat.

The gruff, deliberate interruption forced us apart, and I turned, finding him exactly where I’d left him.

He was smiling. “My apologies, Freya. And to you, August. You should have told me your lady was on her way to meet with you.”

“I had no idea she was.”

Freya bobbed her head. “That’s right. I didn’t tell him.” Her fingers tightened slightly around my coat sleeve. She hadn’t let go since I pulled her in.

Big Ben clapped his hands together. “Right. Well, I was planning to go out tonight, anyway. Don’t wait up for me, I won’t be back until the morning.”

“Wait,” I shook my head. “My train is supposed to depart tomorrow morning. Will I see you before then?”

“Nah.” He wrapped his thick arms around me and hoisted me into the air, my feet dangling like a kid being tossed by a bear.

Though he nearly crushed my ribs, I wheezed out a few weak words. “Thank you… for your… hospitality. And… for saving… Maya.”

Big Ben released me, and I swallowed the crisp air, relishing the ability to breathe again. “Don’t mention it, old sport. Just treat this woman here… well, like a woman.” He gestured toward the penthouse towering above us. “You’re in my home tonight, and that stadium, that bed—which is the playing field—expects a certain level of performance.”

I stared at him, my closed-mouth smile failing to erase the doubt that had undoubtedly painted my face.

Freya and I had been dating for two months. Initially, she had wanted something fast, sweat-filled, and purely physical. But our undeniable chemistry had taken us into something else, into something we weren’t willing to ruin by rushing into bed.

So, despite our initial ideas, we hadn’t taken that step yet.

Big Ben clapped a hand on my shoulder, likely holding back some of his strength, but with enough power to nearly send me stumbling sideways. “Have fun.” With that, he turned and disappeared into the thickening fog, his broad frame buried by the mist like a specter retreating into legend.

A light drizzle clung to the night air.

Freya hugged her long coat tighter around her body and tiptoed up, peering around me, watching as Big Ben vanished down the street.

To describe Freya in a physical sense did her an injustice. Yes, she was beautiful—stunning. But her beauty was just the surface. She was intelligent and observant and independent and capable and generous and strong.

“Do you have his number?” she asked, rubbing her hands together.

I frowned. “Would you like it?”

“I would.”

I chuckled, shaking my head.

“August, I’m serious.”

“Seriously?”

She raised an eyebrow. “Unless you’ve managed to obtain a spare key to his place in the few days you’ve spent with him.”

I sighed, pulling my phone from my pocket. “You’re sure this isn’t because, after watching him leave, you now have this unbridled desire to have him back?”

“That’s exactly why.” She shivered against the chill. “My unbridled desire being for the warmth of his home, because I’ve been standing out here for two hours.”

I froze mid-dial. “Two hours?”

Her lips curled into a smile, her shoulders lifting into a casual shrug. “Alina gave me the address. I wanted to surprise you.”

I exhaled, shaking my head as I scrolled to Big Ben’s contact.

Thankfully, he answered. “Women like that one, they don’t want a prince. They want the beast. I’ll be there to take care of her soon.”

“No, Ben… we’re locked out of your apartment.”

Silence.

Then, his voice took shape in the mist.

A behemoth emerged from the fog. Or rather, a berserker. He looked like a Viking jarl come to claim his shield maiden, only instead of drawing a battle-ax, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a set of keys. “Leave them in the kitchen drawer nearest to the fridge. I have a spare set in my car.”

Then, another slap to my back—nearly relocating my spine to the front of my body—and he disappeared again, swallowed by the night.

I exhaled, turning back to Freya, who watched me with amused eyes.

Without another word, we stepped into the warmth of the apartment complex, leaving the cold behind. We rode the elevator up to Big Ben’s penthouse suite. The ride was silent, but not empty. Our bodies seemed to vibrate—like a phone rattling on a nightstand, begging to be answered and not ignored.

I unlocked Big Ben’s front door and pushed it open for Freya.

She swanned into the entryway, spinning across the hardwood floors, taking in the apartment like a traveler stepping into a foreign palace.

The penthouse was impressive, lavish in an almost violent way. Dark leather furniture occupied the massive open floor plan, which ran into the sleek, modern kitchen.

I grabbed her luggage and carried it to the guest bedroom, a barren, soulless space with nothing but a bed stripped of sheets.

I had slept on the couch during my brief stay. Freya wouldn’t go for that, though. And there was no way I was risking disease in Big Ben’s primary bedroom. So, the guest bedroom was our remaining option.

My stomach fluttered at the idea of us sharing a bed.

After offloading her things, I found Freya in the living room, standing in front of the floor-to-ceiling window overlooking Maidstone. The River Medway cut through the city like a silver ribbon, its waters barely visible beneath the thickening fog that curled over the streets. The streetlights burned golden through the mist, casting eerie halos.

I walked up behind her, wrapping my arms around her waist, my lips brushing against the soft of her neck. “I can’t believe you’re here.”

Freya turned in my arms, her gaze searching my eyes instead of the view the window lent. “Are you happy that I’m here?”

I didn’t hesitate. There was nothing to consider. “More happy than I could ever remember being.”

Rising onto her tiptoes, she kissed my cheek. “I’m sorry for crashing your case. I didn’t know you had work.”

I tilted my head. “How did you know about the case?”

Freya tucked her hair behind her ear. “Alina called me when I landed. Updated me on the situation. Said you wouldn’t admit to the fact, but Tempest has a case for you. Anyway, I wanted to surprise you.”

“I’m surprised.”

Her phone buzzed. Instinctively, her hand shot to her pocket, pulling it out just enough to glance at the screen. A flicker of something pained—or maybe uncertain—crossed her face. Then, just as quickly, she tucked the phone away, as if nothing had happened.

I narrowed my eyes. “Who was that?”

“No one.”

“No one?”

She slipped from my arms and crossed to the couch. “I didn’t realize you’d be working while I was here.”

Avoidance. Textbook deflection.

“You sure you’re not avoiding the question?”

She threw me a look. “Would I do that?” She sat, sinking into the leather. “Should I go back home?”

I sat beside her. “No.”

“You’re sure?”

I nodded, leaning forward to kiss her forehead.

She raised her face upward. “I won’t get in your way. And I swear I’m a great helper.”

“I’m sure you are.”

Her lips brushed mine as she whispered against them. “Except, I haven’t had any dinner yet, and I’m starving.”

My body responded to the word starving in a way that wasn’t about food. I had other appetites in mind. I pulled her closer, my hand sliding to the small of her back. “I think I can help with that.”

She chuckled. “I’m sure you can.” Her gentle fingers skimmed my jawline before she leaned back. “But I’m starving. In the literal sense.”

That snapped me out of my fog. “Oh.”

“Airport and airplane food don’t sit well with my stomach. So, I haven’t eaten in fifteen hours.”

“Fifteen hours?”

She shrugged.

“Well, lucky for you, I know a place.”

Taking Your Time. Wednesday, January 1st. 2222hrs.

After Indian cuisine for dinner, Freya and I strolled through Maidstone’s cobbled streets. The night air was cold and damp.

Aside from the restaurant Big Ben had introduced me to—the place where Freya and I had just eaten—I hadn’t spent much time exploring the city. Knowing I would take a one-way train to Scotland in the morning, I decided to make the most of my few remaining hours in England.

The rain had finally relented, leaving the streets slick and shining like black glass. The streetlights burned golden, their glow reflecting off the damp stones like stars buried beneath the surface of a calm ocean.

Freya wasn’t the kind of woman who held hands during a romantic stroll. Instead, she skipped ahead, spinning on the wet cobblestones, her silhouette illuminated by whispers of moonlight sneaking through the cloud cover.

She laughed, and the sound was like bubbles rising in a warm jacuzzi. She turned back to me and waited until I caught up. “Can I tell you something?”

“Anything.”

Her sharp blue eyes twinkled with something playful. “I think you’re cute.”

“Do you?”

Freya tilted her head, pretending to consider the idea. “Not as cute as Big Ben. My god.” She laughed again, this time like rain on a summer day—sudden, warm, and fleeting. “I’m kidding. He has nothing on you.” She pecked me on the cheek, her nose tapping mine, the tip of it cold from the night.

I wrapped my arms around her waist, pulling her toward me. “Can I tell you something?”

Freya looked up, her beauty enough to make me pause. In my silence, she slipped in a few words. “I’ve thought about the last time you had to tell me something.”

A nervousness, a touch of embarrassment flushed my cheeks warm. My heart pounded in my ears, my vision tunneling.

She was, of course, referring to the night I had blurted out that I loved her.

I did. Or, at the very least, I had intense feelings for her, and I cared for her deeply. But we had only been together a couple of months, and I feared those words had come too soon. A part of me hoped she had forgotten I had said anything.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “For saying that.”

“Why are you sorry? Did you not mean what you said?” Her breath carried the lingering scent of curry and white wine. “I hope you meant what you said, Mr. Watson.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Why’s that?”

Freya scrunched her nose. “Because I might feel the same way about you.”

My pulse kicked up a notch. Freya’s admission rendered me momentarily speechless—it was that rush of excitement like a kid finding out his crush liked him back.

But I managed to keep my composure, just enough to poke at her a little. “And what feeling is that?”

Her smile widened, bright enough to reach her eyes. “I love you.”

My lips found hers, and we kissed there, in the middle of the quiet street with the moonlight’s fingers running over our skin. “I love you, too.”

She exhaled, her forehead resting against mine. “August.”

“Yeah?”

“Those aren’t light words for me.” She pulled away, just enough for me to see the weight behind her eyes. “The last man who said that to me—the last man I felt that way for—he left me. And I have a five-year-old son I need look out for. To share those words with each other… for me to say them to you…” Her voice trailed off, and I could see her grappling for the right words.

I reached up, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear. “I won’t hurt you.”

“It’s not just me you have to love and worry about hurting. I’m going to allow you into my life, and that means you’re going to form a connection with my son. You can’t hurt him no matter what. Are you prepared for that?”

I didn’t answer right away, because she didn’t want an easy and thoughtless answer. She wasn’t looking for platitudes or reassurances given in the heat of the moment. She wanted me to weigh our relationship, to consider her question.

Could I handle serving as a male figure for a five-year-old kid? Was that even a responsibility I wanted?

“You don’t have to answer now. But I think when we fly back to Sacramento, you should know where you stand. You should know what you want of this. It would be better to end things now… well, after our work vacation… than to end them a year from now.”

“I don’t ever want this to end.”

She studied me, her breath like smoke in the cold. “Ever is a big four-letter word.” Before I could respond, she softened, tilting her head. “Think about everything. But, until that moment, we can enjoy our time here. Together.”

I wondered if this was her way of ending things. Though we hadn’t consummated our relationship, we had originally come together with that as our singular goal. To have fun. To enjoy each other. Now, after two months, she once again proposed that same situation. Why, unless to end things where they began?

Why wallow, though?

If these were my last days with Freya, I planned to make the most of them.

A grin tugged at the corner of my mouth. “Did you have a specific something in mind on how we could enjoy our time?”

Red tinged her cheeks, and she skipped ahead again, spinning in front of a fogged window displaying ice cream flavors. “August, we have to get some.”

The mist had thickened by the time we stepped back onto the streets, our ice cream consumed and enjoyed.

I reached for my phone, scrolling through my messages. Earlier, before dinner, I had texted Tempest Michaels about Freya joining me in Scotland. He had responded with confirmation.

Train tickets confirmed. Departure is at 08:15. Edinburgh arrival by midday.

Freya looped her arm through mine, pulling me closer for warmth. “What did he say?”

“You’re coming with me.”

As we strolled back to Big Ben’s apartment, I noticed a man leaning against a streetlight, bundled against the cold, his face partially obscured by the shadow of his hat. He lit a cigarette with his left hand.

Our eyes met for the briefest of seconds, and a chill rattled down my spine.

Then, as quickly as he had registered, we moved past him. The acrid stench of his cigarette smoke lingered in my nostrils.

Not long after, the front door to Big Ben’s apartment clicked shut, the city now sealed behind us.

Freya’s jacket pooled onto the entryway floor, and she let out a sigh, lips chilled from the vanilla ice cream and the night.

I wrestled off one boot, then the other, hopping slightly as I did.

Freya toed off her sneakers, smirking as she watched me struggle.

Then, in an instant, we were on each other. I was the bee, she the flower—her warmth, her scent, her body melting into mine.

I slid her blouse over her head and unclipped her bra. She mirrored the motion by tugging off my shirt. Her skin was warm against mine, feverish despite the cold air seeping through the cracks of the apartment.

She jumped up, wrapping her legs around my waist, and I carried her through the living room, both of us wearing nothing but our jeans.

We didn’t get to sleep until the small hours of the net morning.

The Train Ride, Part 1. Thursday, January 2nd. 0808hrs.

The train station buzzed with the chaotic energy of morning travel. Travelers moved with purpose and urgency, wrapped in winter coats, balancing suitcases or briefcases as they sipped coffee from takeaway cups and raced to their trains.

Freya and I navigated through the crowd, holding hands. The morning was brisk, and I kept shoving aside the self-conscious thought of having cold palms.

We stepped onto the platform where our train idled, steam aproning from beneath the carriages. A line of passengers climbed up the steps, disappearing inside.

I pulled my coat tighter against the crisp air, my gaze flicking over the thinning sea of passengers—then pausing on a dime.

A man leaned against a cement column near the far end of the platform, half-hidden by fog and the haze of cigarette smoke smogging from his bright-red lips as he worked the lighter with his left hand.

Dark coat. Dark cap pulled low.

Left-handed.

My stomach tightened.

Cutting my teeth in law enforcement, I quickly lost any illusions of coincidence. What were the odds of seeing that man last night—then again, here, at my train?

“August, you’re hurting my hand.”

I’d gone tense, clenching my jaw and squeezing Freya’s hand in mine.

“What’s wrong?” She followed my line of sight and scowled. “Is he someone you know?”

“Probably not.”

“Well, that’s reassuring.”

“Come on. Let’s get in line.”

We stepped onto the train, and the warmth of the carriage was an instant relief from the cold outside. The inside was cozy, almost muggy, upholstered in faded navy fabric with gold accents. Large windows framed the morning, streaked with condensation. A white table separated our seats from another pair of chairs—empty and directly across from us.

Freya slid into the window seat, stretching her long legs. “Okay, I see the appeal of these things. Rustic and romantic.”

I settled in beside her after loading our luggage on the overhead shelf. She had an oversized purse, which I wedged between my suitcase and hers.

Once everything was secured, I eased into the seat beside her.

A few minutes later, the train jolted, then began its slow, steady roll forward, slipping out of the station and into the open countryside.

The rhythmic clatter of the wheels against railing, and the endless stretch of rolling British landscape outside the window, rocked me into a state of complacency.

For a moment, I allowed myself to drift—to sink into a rare sea of unconcern.

The comfortable silence sat between us, stretching for an undetermined amount of time.

“He got on the train.” Freya broke our reverie, her attention pinned over her shoulder.

“Huh?” I turned my head, letting my gaze sweep the length of the carriage. “Who did?”

“Your friend.”

My pulse ticked up as I scanned the train car, moving past business travelers buried in their tablets, couples murmuring over coffees, and a few students tapping away at their laptops.

And then I saw him.

He sat in the last row, facing forward, still wearing that same dark coat despite the humid temperature inside the train. His left hand rolled an unlit cigarette between his fingers, the same way he had the night before.

His eyes were locked on us—or just past us.

“How do you know him?”

I blinked a few times. “I don’t, but I recognize him.”

“From where?”

“After ice cream last night. He was leaning against a streetlight.” I pictured him now as he had been then—shrouded in shadow and mist, half-hidden behind a canopy of cigarette smoke. “It felt like he was staring right at us as we walked by.”

“You’re sure it’s the same guy?”

I took Freya’s hand, still staring at the man, and I lied to prevent her from feeling afraid. “No.”

My mind ran through every possible reason why the man from the night before was now sitting in the back of our carriage, eyes seemingly fixed in our direction.

Had Tempest hired someone to follow me? Unlikely.

What about Daniel Quinn? Was the man in the train car an extension of that psychotic psychopath? A possibility, though I doubted it. My trip to London had been spontaneous, purchased at the last second to save Maya from the cult. I hadn’t even known I was flying out. How would anyone else have known? 

Freya nudged me. “So, do we act normal or do we give him something to stare at?”

I smirked, impressed by her audacity and devil-may-care attitude. “That depends on what you mean by something.”

She grinned, opening her mouth to respond.

Then, out of nowhere, Freya’s purse slipped loose from where I’d wedged it overhead and tumbled from the compartment.

The shoulder strap caught on a metal knob, flipping the bag upside down. The clasp must not have been securely shut. Papers scattered, tumbling through the air like fallen leaves, followed by her wallet, cash, makeup, and a handful of other knickknacks.

They crashed like hail pellets and rolled in every direction.

I reached down to gather what had landed near me.

Across the aisle and a row ahead, a bearded man did the same. He was in his early forties, with bright red hair and a weathered tweed jacket, a crooked pink bow tie tucked beneath his collar. “Here, let me help.” He leaned over, scooping up some of the loose pages that had drifted near him.

As it happened, I recognized the man.

Gordon Lively.

His name had popped up late last night, in the early hours of the morning, as I’d conducted some preliminary research on the protestors. Gordon Lively was one of the most vocal environmentalists fighting against the Loch Ness development.

Gordon’s presence unsettled me further. What were the odds of he and I, two people connected to the development, riding the same train? The man with the cigarette only exacerbated my unease.

“Bit of bad luck there,” Gordon said, his accent carrying a distinct Scottish lilt. “You heading up north?”

I cleared the shock from my throat. “Yeah, I am.”

He handed back a thin stack of documents.

Before I could say anything else, Freya’s hand shot across my lap, reaching for the loose papers. “Thank you.”

Then, a pair of wrinkled hands appeared across the aisle, reaching toward us with a few more loose pages. The hands belonged to an elderly couple seated directly across the narrow aisle from us, both wearing matching knit Gryffindor scarves.

The woman smiled kindly. “We picked these up, dear.”

Her husband nodded, his thick brow furrowing slightly. “Strange, though. I feel like I’ve heard that name before.”

Freya stilled for a fraction of a second. “What name?”

“The estate listed on one of the pages.” The old man adjusted his small glasses as he peered at her. “Lord Malcolm Huxley, wasn’t it? I remember reading something about his recent passing. What was it? Heart disease? After he passed, his only son was found drowned in the loch.”

His wife patted his liver-spotted, bandaged hand. “Sad business, wasn’t it?”

The old man turned his sympathetic gaze toward Freya. “You wouldn’t happen to be family of his, would you?”

Freya’s grip tightened around the papers, the pages slightly crinkling beneath her fingers. “No.”

The woman sighed, offering a gentle, knowing smile. “Well, I do hope the trip isn’t too difficult for you, dear.”

Freya murmured a quiet “thanks” and tucked the papers back into her purse without looking at them. She sat back in her seat, hands gripping her bag a little too tightly.

I let the silence stretch, gathering the last of her scattered belongings.

Once I returned them to her, I studied her for a moment. She was stiff, tense—her eyes distant, staring at nothing. “Freya.”

“Hmm?”

“What just happened?”

“Nothing happened.”

“What are those papers?”

“They’re nothing.”

“Who’s Lord… Huxley, was it?”

Freya exhaled through her nose, tilting her head back against the seat. “No one.”

I chewed on my tongue, debating whether to push or let it go. She obviously had a secret.

I thought back to the night before—to the way she’d glanced at her phone, hurriedly slipping it back into her pocket.

What was she hiding?

“So, we’re not talking about those papers?”

She rubbed at her temple before glancing down at the bag lodged in her lap. “It’s just… boring legal stuff.”

“Boring legal stuff connected to a dead aristocrat’s estate in Scotland?”

She shook her head. “It’s not a big deal, August.”

I thought of last night again. The way we’d finally closed the distance between us. The way she’d said she loved me. The way I’d said it back.

She had wanted to use this trip to figure us out—to decide if what we had was real, if I should get to know her son, if we could make this work.

But now, she hugged a world of secrets against her chest and stared out the window.

I sighed, resigned for one last push. “What aren’t you telling me? Are you saying you have no idea what’s in that bag?”

Her jaw tensed. “I didn’t say that.”

“Then say something.”

She turned toward me, her voice low. “August, I promise, there’s nothing sinister going on.”

“Then why can’t I know?”

She hesitated. “Please, just… not right now. Okay?”

I tapped my fingers against my knee, letting that sit.

She nudged me with her foot. “Can we just enjoy the train ride?”

I studied her for a long moment, but I knew I wasn’t getting anything else out of her. “Yeah.” I reached over and held her hand.

Freya relaxed, leaning her head against the window, watching the countryside roll past.

But my mind kept turning over the little she had told me.

What was Freya holding back?

The Train Ride, Part 2. Thursday, January 2nd. 1217hrs.

I was wide awake, leaning slightly forward to see past Freya, watching the landscape roll by.

Freya had drifted into sleep, the rhythmic clatter of the train’s wheels lulling her under. Her head rested against the cool glass, breath fogging the window in faint bursts. Her arms lay folded in her lap, weighing on her purse, slack with sleep.

My mind churned, refusing to settle.

I’d tried drowning it in a mindless phone game—swiping at colors, chasing distraction—but Freya’s words from earlier clung like moldy rot.

Why keep her secret?

Why couldn’t she tell me?

I exhaled, rolling my shoulders to shed the tension and forced my focus elsewhere.

That’s when I overheard snippets of conversation from the elderly couple who had helped earlier.

They sat across the aisle, facing the rear of the carriage, while Freya and I faced forward. I only had to watch them from my periphery to see them clearly.

The woman spoke in a hushed tone. “…a curse, I tell you. You don’t dig up land like that and expect peace.”

I shifted, tilting my head just enough to get a better look at her.

She was in her late seventies, gray curls framing a face carved by time. Small-frame glasses teetered on her nose as she patted her husband’s gnarled hand, her gold rings glinting under the train’s dim light. “It’s no coincidence. They started digging up that ground, and now this.”

Her husband—thin, with a thick mustache that belonged in a history book—gave a dry chuckle. “Come off it, love. You don’t swallow that old rot, do you? Curses and the like?”

“It’s not about what I believe. It’s about respect. The land’s got history, and history doesn’t like being disturbed.”

“So a monster, then? That’s the assumption? Stomping about, smashing diggers with its paws?”

The wife glanced around the train and lowered her voice another notch, making it almost unintelligible. “I’m not saying it’s a monster. But something’s out there.”

“Yeah. We call them vandals.”

She clicked her tongue, not buying his rationalization.

The old man ran a hand over his stubbly head. “You think there’s some… ancient spirit protecting the loch?”

His wife didn’t hesitate. “I think people shouldn’t dig up graves unless they want ghosts.”

I processed for a moment.

I didn’t get the sense they were locals—probably just travelers heading up for sightseeing. Yet, they spoke like they knew more than just rumors. And if even half of what they were saying was true, then this case was already turning out to be a lot weirder than I’d anticipated.

Was the developer digging up hallowed land?

When Tempest had assigned me the task, possibly my last investigation for him, I had figured an easy case and a lot of sightseeing. After eavesdropping, I wondered how much I would get to enjoy Scotland.

I kept my expression neutral and continued to half-listen to the older couple’s quiet conversation.

“…in the water. Strange noises at night,” the woman murmured. “And no one ever sees where it comes from… or where it goes.”

“People see what they want to see.”

“That’s the problem. They’re not seeing anything.”

“Because there’s nothing to see.”

The woman raised her voice slightly. “Then what about the bite marks?” She tapped a weathered finger against her husband’s sleeve. “You read the same article I did.”

“Machines break all the time. And if someone wanted to cause a fuss about the development, what better way than making it look like a monster’s involved?”

“Or maybe,” the woman said, “it’s because they dug up something they shouldn’t have.”

I wasn’t sure what intrigued me more—the claim or the certainty in her voice. Most of my clients had that same adamance when they presented me with their supernatural mysteries.

The couple’s conversation might have continued uninterrupted if not for the man sitting across the aisle from me, one row up, directly behind the elderly couple. He leaned into the aisle and comically craned his neck, making himself visible to them.

Gordon Lively smiled. “I’m sorry if I’m overstepping boundaries, but I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation, and I’d be inclined to agree with the young lady.” His Scottish accent was unhurried, the words rolling out smoothly.

The elderly couple turned toward him, startled by the floating head curled around the backrest separating the two parties.

Gordon offered a polite nod. “Hi, I’m Gordon. And you’re correct, ma’am. People dismiss these things too quickly. Say it’s vandals or old legends, but something’s happening out there. And me, for one? I’m glad. This development should’ve never been approved. I say Barker has what’s coming to him.”

The woman gave a knowing look to her husband. “See?”

The old man, not entirely convinced but too polite to argue, turned to Gordon. “And you would know, would you?”

“I might.” Gordon left it there, an open-ended suggestion.

But I knew who Gordon Lively was—the loudest voice opposing the Loch Ness development. He’d made dozens of public statements, organized protests, and filed multiple legal complaints to stop construction.

As their conversation drifted and seesawed, I kept one ear tuned to Gordon, curious about his position—and his involvement in my case.

There was something about him.

He had an authority that made people listen without realizing they were being led. His words were calm and deliberate, but beneath them, simmering just out of sight, was frustration—an untamed anger.

“It’s the same story every time,” Gordon said, shaking his head. “Rich men with no connection to the land think they can carve it up, build their monuments to greed, and walk away without consequence.”

The old woman hummed in agreement. “And this resort fella—what’s his name again?”

“Brett Barker,” Gordon said, his voice tightening around the name.

The husband adjusted his glasses. “And you’re against him?”

“I’m against everything he stands for.” His fingers tapped idly against his knee, but there was an edge to the motion—restless energy. “I’ve fought developments like this before. Tourist traps disguised as investments, selling off Scotland piece by piece.” His lips curled in disgust. “But this one is different.”

The older woman tilted her head. “Different how?”

Gordon exhaled. “Because Barker doesn’t care about anything but profit.” His fingers stilled against his knee. For the first time, his easy demeanor cracked—just a little. “We have to stop him.”

The words landed heavy, edged with something feral.

My pulse ticked up.

That wasn’t bravado.

That was a promise—unshakable, unhinged.

The old man shifted in his seat. By his expression, he had come to the same conclusion as me. “Peacefully, I’d hope.”

Gordon offered a small smile. “Ideally.”

The old woman frowned, but before she could press further, the train conductor walked through the aisle, checking tickets.

When the conductor passed, Gordon retracted back into his seat, staring straight ahead, relaxing—as if he hadn’t just suggested he’d do whatever it took to stop Brett Barker.

But I’d heard his threat.

I wasn’t sure if Gordon was just a man passionate about his cause or a man with a lot more to lose than he was letting on.

Either way, he harbored a genuine hate for Brett, and it seeped from his pores.

In the newfound silence, the train cut through the countryside, rolling past vast fields and distant hills that disappeared into the gray horizon.

My thoughts had graduated from Freya’s omission to Gordon Lively.

I chewed on the way his calm confidence had cracked—just enough—to show something sharper beneath it.

Something dangerous.

When he spoke about Brett Barker, it wasn’t just anger. Righteous conviction ran in his blood.

I had met plenty of people who claimed they would do anything to stop the thing they hated.
Some of them meant it.

And those people were dangerous.

Was Gordon behind the vandalism, then?

And if he wasn’t—did he know who was?

It wouldn’t be the first time someone had used a legend or myth to push their agenda.

Outside the train window, obscured by Freya’s slim frame, Scotland spread out before us.

Brett Barker. Thursday, January 2nd. 1439hrs.

Freya abandoned my hand to hug herself. I shoved mine deep into the lined pockets of my coat. We hiked the bank of Loch Ness, where the development was underway.

Rain flittered from the sky like pollen clouding a spring day. It was there—almost static—wetting the air but never quite forming into drops. The dampness hung heavy, seeping into fabric, making everything colder, weightier.

Despite the reported vandalism, construction hadn’t ceased.

Heavy machinery tracked through the mucky ground, carving into the earth. Engines roared, sensors beeped as vehicles reversed, and gruff voices barked orders over the constant racket of shovels scraping stone.

The whole site was a parade of noise and motion.

Brett Barker had situated himself inside a modular office.

We knocked on the door, and his voice called from within. “Come in.”

Soft music played from his computer as Freya and I stepped inside.

He looked up from behind his desk, and I finally understood Tempest’s description of him. Where Big Ben was large, strong, bestial, Brett was composed and civilized—but I saw the appeal women found in both.

Upon my entrance, Brett stood from his swivel chair, offering me a tired smile. “August, I presume?”

“Brett.” We shook hands. “This is Freya.”

His intense gaze lingered on her a moment longer than I liked. A warm smile played across his lips as he extended a hand for her to shake. Then, with an easy movement, he grabbed the jacket draped over his chair and strolled toward the door. “Care for a tour?”

Freya and I followed Brett back into the brisk afternoon.

As he led us through the development site, he spoke, providing rehashed details about the mystery. “I’ve, of course, contacted the police. Someone showed up, inspected the damage, jotted a few notes, and left. Not many locals have approved of me or my project, so I doubt the authorities will offer much help.”

We crossed a slick stretch of untouched mud. My boots sank half an inch with each step, leaving distinct impressions.

Freya, unprepared for our muddy affair, had worn tennis shoes—not that she had packed anything appropriate for this kind of terrain. She moved cautiously, stepping lightly, her attention fixed downward. The idea of ruining her shoes didn’t appeal to her.

Brett glanced back at us as he led the way. “That’s when I had the idea to contact Tempest. I almost dialed Amanda, his fiancé. My ex. Though I’m not the brightest star in the sky, I’m also not the dullest.” He glanced over his shoulder again, flashing a grin. “Tempest, thankfully, answered. And he agreed to offer his help.” His smile widened. “You.”

A sharp sucking of air was followed by a sudden weight on my jacket, yanking me off balance.

Freya, in her deliberate, careful attempt to avoid sinking, had stepped wrong. Her foot slipped in the slick mud, and she instinctively grabbed onto me to stop herself from falling.

Problem was—I was mid-stride.

The sudden force at an opposing angle sent me reeling.

My back foot kicked out. My front foot never had a chance to steady me. I wheeled my arms, fighting for balance—

Fighting a losing battle.

And then I back-flopped straight into the mud.

Freya fared much better. By grabbing me, she had reasserted her balance and managed to step away before I toppled onto her.

She covered her mouth with one hand. “August, I’m so sorry.”

I appreciated the apology, but— “Then why are you laughing?”

Her other hand shot up to double her efforts to hide her amusement. “I don’t mean to. I’m sorry for that, too.”

Brett appeared above me, hand extended.

I accepted his help.

A suctioning sound kept me stuck to the mud for a moment before I finally popped loose. Once on my feet, drenched in muck, I just stared at Freya and shook my head. Then, despite myself, I smiled.

And through that small crack of amusement, laughter spilled out.

Freya joined me.

Brett, however, looked concerned. “Er, if I may suggest… maybe we keep this incident from Tempest Michaels. I’d hate for him to have any reason to sue me, including any harm to one of his employees while they visited my construction site.”

“I won’t sue,” I assured him, brushing a chunk of mud from my sleeve. “But I would like a change of clothes.”

He nodded eagerly. “Yes, of course. Uh, I have a change in my office. Would you like to head back now, or after you’ve seen the… vandalism?”

A shiver ran through me as the wet turned cold, and the wind did nothing but stoke my discomfort. “Afterward is fine.”

We trudged to the beach, where a miniature excavator sat parked.

Loch Ness lapped against the rocks and sand, its surface dark and restless. Wind rustled through the overhanging trees, carrying the distant scent of damp earth.

Brett lingered a dozen feet away, letting Freya and me examine the machinery without interruption.

I circled the excavator, taking inventory of the damage before turning to Brett. “Tempest told me there were claw marks.”

Brett frowned. “Is that what I told him?”

“I don’t know what you told him. That’s what he told me.”

A pause. “Yeah… he wouldn’t mess that up. I must have told him incorrectly.”

I turned back to the excavator, running my hands over the deep punctures in the metal.

The marks weren’t scratches. They were bite marks. Something big had clamped down on this steel siding like it was a crisp, yellow apple.

“How did you mess up this? Seems obvious.”

Brett shifted. “It’s… I mean, I’ve had a lot on my mind. This attack freaked me out. I misspoke, if anything.”

I flagged the inconsistency for later evaluation. My attention remained fixed on the jagged punctures, my fingers trailing over the torn edges. It wasn’t that I didn’t believe Brett was shaken and had misspoken. But when you worked cases like I did, I learned to keep books open as long as possible.

Including Brett as a suspect.

Why was he changing his story? Why had he missed this detail? And if he had sabotaged his own construction, what would he have to gain?

I banked those questions for now. If he was lying, I needed more than a gut feeling.

After taking a moment to process everything, I returned my attention to Brett. “So, you’re theorizing that your development has somehow offended the Loch Ness Monster? That she’s come out of retirement, emerged from centuries of hiding, just to… what? Stop this construction?”

Though his mouth stayed closed, I could see his tongue working his gums. “Obviously, there’s no such thing.”

I turned my head deliberately, gesturing toward the damaged machinery. “And this?”

“Anything, really.”

Freya folded her arms. “Anything? Really?”

Brett shrugged. “I mean, there’s machinery that clamps or bites.”

My gaze swept the area. The construction site sat on a narrow stretch of flat shoreline, with the loch stretching out behind it—dark, deep, and impossibly still. The equipment—mostly excavators, bulldozers, and a few heavy-duty cranes—was coated in a slick layer of moisture from the mist rolling in off the water.

“Do you have cameras set up out here?” I asked.

“Only near the modulars.”

“Any other incidents leading up to this one?”

Brett exhaled. “Mechanical failures, mostly. Fuel tanks mysteriously emptied. Hydraulic lines severed. Like something feral and angry just… ripped through them. Then there were the electrical lines. Cut clean.”

Those smaller incidents were news to me. Brett either hadn’t reported them to the media, or the media hadn’t bothered to report them to the public.

After filing away that information, I took a few steps back, pulling out my phone and snapping some photographs of the damaged machinery, the shoreline, and the deep grooves in the steel.

Then I rejoined Brett near the edge of the beach. “Why call Tempest about this? We deal in the paranormal, and so far, there’s nothing paranormal about this.”

Brett rubbed the back of his neck. “Just because I don’t believe in the Loch Ness Monster doesn’t mean I’m right. The locals seem convinced. They think my development has ‘awoken’ the creature—or the spirit of it. Some claim the site is cursed.”

“Are you building on burial or hallowed ground?”

Brett stuck out his lip, shaking his head. “Not that I’m aware of. No. That would’ve come up in the permitting stages. Environmental surveys, council meetings, archaeological assessments. We had to go through all of it before breaking ground.”

“But the locals still think you’ve angered Nessie?”

“That’s what I keep hearing.”

Freya tilted her head, glancing at the loch. “Why not?”

Brett frowned. “Why not what?”

“Why not believe them?” She gestured toward the water. “Maybe Nessie is real, and maybe she’s pissed off and punching back.”

I raised a brow. “You’re saying the Loch Ness Monster committed industrial sabotage?”

“I’m saying, I assume there weren’t any tracks coming or going?”

Brett nodded. “Police searched. Found nothing.”

Freya straightened, looking pleased. “There you have it. Whatever struck—or bit—this piece of expensive machinery, it came from the water.”

“Do you have any other evidence suggesting Nessie played a role?” I asked.

Brett inhaled through his mouth. “Just a supposed eyewitness. Claimed he saw her emerge from the dark water and come onto shore.”

I squinted. “Who was the eyewitness?”

“A local kook. Rupert McLaren.”

I barely stifled a groan. Local kooks always made things more complicated.

The mud on my back had begun to dry, hardening into a stiff crust. The cotton of my shirt clung uncomfortably to my skin. “I’m ready for that change of clothes.”

We returned to Brett’s modular—incident-free.

As we rounded the back to the front, stepping onto the ramp, Brett came to a grinding halt.

Waiting by the door, wearing a chipper smile, stood Gordon Lively. His red, curly hair burned against the gloomy afternoon, an unnatural brightness in the muted light. “Welcome back, Mr. Barker.” He uncrossed his ankles and stepped forward.

Brett, noticeably less than enthused, squared his shoulders. “Why are you here?”

Gordon continued his slow, deliberate approach, the unsteady ramp rattling with each step. When he came within a foot of Brett, he leaned in. For a strange moment, I thought Gordon meant to kiss him. But he came up short. “I’m just here to remind you to cease what you’re doing.” His voice was smooth, unhurried. “It’s in the best interest of the loch, of my people… and of your safety.”

To Brett’s credit, he didn’t shrink away. “Is that a threat, Mr. Lively?” His voice hardened. “Because I would love nothing more than to file a restraining order against you. Are you planning to cross the line from protesting to… vandalizing and harming?”

Gordon tilted his head slightly, his smile never quite fading. “You’re digging yourself a hole, Brett. And I don’t think you can pay your way out of it much longer.”

Brett’s jaw tensed.

Gordon’s words had hit a nerve.

“You’re trespassing.” Brett’s voice dropped an octave, the weight behind it clear. “Leave. Now. Stay off my property. Stick to your little sidewalk with your little signs.”

Gordon’s nostrils flared. He held Brett’s stare for one long, simmering beat, then gave a terse nod. Without another word, he shouldered past Brett, brushing by Freya and me without so much as a glance.

I wasn’t even sure he knew we were there.

I changed clothes, asked Brett a few more questions, then Freya and I took our leave.

We planned to swing by the hotel. I needed a shower, and Freya wanted to change.

As we made our way back to the hotel, my mind replayed the confrontation.

What had Gordon said? I don’t think you can pay your way out of it much longer.

That had struck a chord with Brett.

My mind drifted back to the excavator, to the teeth marks punched into the siding—not the claw marks Tempest had originally mentioned.

“What are you thinking about?” Freya asked as we undressed back in our room.

I tossed my shirt onto the chair. “Why Brett fumbled that detail in his story.”

She perched on the edge of the bed, kicking off her shoes. “You think it matters?”

I shook my head. “Not sure. But you heard what Gordon said about Brett not being able to pay his way out. What if he can’t? What if Brett’s burned through all his budget?”

“You think Brett could be a suspect? Like he’s damaging his own property to what… cash in on an insurance claim?”

“It’s not ridiculous.”

She gave me a look, manipulating an earring from her ear. “Um, yes it is. I don’t think they have ‘Loch Ness Attack’ insurance policies.”

“No, but if he reports the vandalism, and it officially goes on record—well, everyone knows the project is being protested. He wouldn’t have to claim Nessie. Just general sabotage.”

“So you’re saying he bit a chunk out of his own excavator with another piece of equipment, called the police, called Tempest, did everything to make himself look like the victim, just to evade suspicion? But in reality, he’s committing insurance fraud.”

I stepped into the bathroom, cranked the water as hot as it would go, and called over my shoulder as the steam rose around me. “All I’m saying is… Brett Barker may not be innocent.”

Local Tensions. Thursday, January 2nd. 1847hrs.

Freya and I sat in a back corner of the dusty pub. She wrapped her hands around a pint of Guinness, her fingers idly tracing the condensation on the glass. I chewed on a chapped lip and surveyed the crowd.

A gaggle of locals had trickled into the small, quaint establishment, their conversation growing louder and sharper. They weren’t just discussing the resort’s impact on Loch Ness—they were passionately debating it, throwing out ideas on how to stop the development altogether.

And on the fringes of the conversation, in the wings of the crowd, Gordon Lively listened. He sipped from a pint of something golden, and he twisted the arm of his eye glasses between his fingers.

Then, the dynamic shifted.

What had been passionate conversation turned heated.

Two men shot to their feet, their chairs clattering against the wooden floor. They bumped chests, like bulls tangling horns, their voices colliding in a chaotic mess of shouted insults, obscenities, and spittle.

I crossed my arms, leaned back, and watched the show.

Freya leaned forward, eyes locked on the unfolding brawl, her expression caught between fascination and concern. “We should probably stop them,” she said, “but I can’t look away.”

The two men were red-faced, veins in their necks straining, their words fighting for dominance, but neither willing to back down. Their shouts melded together—a discordant note of pure chaos.

Then, Gordon unfolded from where he perched. He sauntered forward—not as if he were coasting toward a storm, but as if he were strolling through a warm day. With a deliberate touch, he planted one hand on one man’s shoulder. His other hand mirrored the action, pressing firmly onto the second man.

As if he had pulled a hidden cord, they went silent.

The suddenness was like a screeching crash.

Gordon let the silence settle before speaking. “We are all on the same team. We do ourselves no favors by arguing over what we already agree on.” He turned in a slow circle, his gaze sweeping the room. “The land should remain untouched. Whether Barker’s intrusion has stirred spirits, riled the monster, or whether some other force torments him, our response should be the same.” A measured pause. “We finish him.”

His words hung in the thick, ale-scented air.

Then he continued. “We continue to protest. We make his life a living torment. And all the while, we’ll bury him in lawsuits—economic, ecological, geological. It doesn’t matter. We have solicitors, don’t we? We’ll file until he can’t breathe under the weight of litigation.”

The crowd grunted in approval, their passion reigniting like a rekindled fire.

The two men who had been at each other’s throats just moments ago now stood shoulder to shoulder, nodding along with Gordon’s words.

His voice lowered but intensified. “We attack Brett Barker from every angle. He’ll be afraid to close his eyes long enough to sleep. We have to make him see that there’s no profit in building here. We’ll sabotage his construction now. And if he succeeds? If he dares to finish…” His lips curled. “We’ll sabotage his business then.”

The crowd roared their approval. Glasses raised, drinks sloshed, and cheers erupted. Their collective energy shifted from anger to a shared, dangerous purpose.

Freya leaned back in the booth and let out a low whistle. “They seem pretty… radical, I think is the right word. Aggressive, for sure.” She tilted her head at me. “Do you still think Brett Barker is a suspect after that little speech?”

I rested an elbow on the table, pinching my chin between my fingers. “I think it’d be wise if we split up and spoke to some locals. We need to ask about the project—how they feel, what they think is going on over there.”

Freya’s gaze flicked around the pub, noting all the eyes currently noting her. Her voice dropped. “I don’t want to split up in here. It’s nothing but men with bad hygiene, worse haircuts, and terrible teeth.”

From across the room, as if to prove her point, a man winked at Freya, flashing a gummy smile.

She shuddered. “Or a lack of terrible teeth.” She turned back to me, eyes pleading. “August, please don’t leave me alone.”

I exhaled, glancing around at the crowd. “That… yeah. That seems best. We’ll conduct the interviews together.”

Freya perked up. “Am I on the clock right now, or can I have another beer?”

“I’m not paying for this.”

She winked. “Last night was an upfront payment. I now expect daily installments to compensate me for my investigative services—rendered by you, in the form of sexual acts.”

I smirked, shaking my head. “Well, if that’s the case, you should definitely have another beer. And we should finish these interviews as soon as possible.”

Together, we approached the bar.

Freya placed an order for another pint, while I turned my attention to a gentleman nearby.

His gray hair curled from his nostrils and ears, wiry and untamed. He was small-framed, with narrow shoulders and delicate hands. An ancient metabolism had allowed his stomach to bulge over his belt, and pale skin peeked through the gaps in his sweat-stained shirt.

Time to get some answers.

I flagged the man down and introduced myself, playing the part of a curious tourist. “What’s all this for?” I asked, making a point to glance around the stuffy pub.

He lifted a narrow finger, barely missing the tip of my nose. His words carried the syrupy lag of someone a few drinks deep. “New resort being developed out on Loch Ness. No one asked for it. No one wants it.” He took a deliberate sip from his pint before continuing. “Besides, the man’s some foreigner from England. What’s he want with Scottish land, aside from profit? We won’t stand for the business.”

“And neither will Nessie?”

He shrugged, his avian shoulders pinching his neck. “Nessie. Curses. Witchcraft.” He exhaled sharply, his breath thick with malt. “Breaking ground out there without our warrant, without our approval. He may have stirred up any number of terrors.”

I flicked a glance toward Gordon, nodding subtly in his direction. “And what about him? Could he have been a terror stirred up?”

The man’s cloudy eyes lingered on Gordon for a long moment. “Aye, he’s a terror.” His voice was quieter now, more certain. “Gordon Lively comes from a family of solicitors. Friends in high places. He can make Brett’s life a living nightmare well beyond the construction phase.”

I leaned in. “But would he have… vandalized the site?”

The man let his too-small tongue poke from between his lips, dragging it over his bristly gray mustache. Then, he burped. “My friend, it’s my belief, even of a sober mind,” he gestured broadly, wobbling slightly, “which I’m clearly beyond, that Nessie has emerged from her shelter to ally with her homeland in this affront.”

I scrunched my nose, worried conversation with anyone in the pub wouldn’t lead anywhere.

Freya arrived, a fresh beer in hand.

I thanked the man for his time, and together, she and I preyed on our next target.

That person promptly refused to answer any of our questions.

As did the next.

And the next half-dozen attendees after that.

I caught Gordon Lively watching me as I moved through the crowd, his gaze steady, assessing. He had retreated to the perimeter, speaking in a hushed tone to a table of three other people.

For a moment, I debated marching over to him. But I refrained.

He had too much at stake in this fight. As the face and voice of the opposition, he wouldn’t offer anything useful. If I questioned him, all I’d get were platitudes and soundbites.

So instead, I tried my luck elsewhere.

My next target was a hefty, broad woman with wild orange hair and freckles dotting her pale skin. And the most striking eyes I had ever seen. They were two orbs of pale-blue light trapped in white fire.

“Hiya,” I said, cutting in beside her.

Her smile was a scythe. Before I could react, she snaked out a calloused hand, snagging me by the arm like a fisherman landing a prize catch. I barely had time to tense before she reeled me in, locking me in the crook of one arm. With her other hand, she knuckled my head in a noogie. “Oy! The man who met with the devil, eh?” She laughed, rough and full, her grip steel-like around me. “What brings the soulless into this soulful place?”

I blinked, working through the ciphers buried in that sentence. It wasn’t hard to figure out. She must have referred to my meeting with Brett. To them, I’d sold my soul the moment I agreed to work with him.

Without much effort, I wrested myself free of her grip. “I was hoping to ask a few questions about what’s going on.”

She folded her strong arms, tilting her head. “Seems you know quite well already, eh?”

I shook my head. “Only what Brett told me, and what I’ve heard here. I don’t buy Nessie, or some kind of curse.”

Her lips curled, eyes glinting. “You buy into the idea, then, that someone… say, someone like me, had to vandalize the equipment?”

“I’m not saying anything. Just asking questions.”

The bar had gone silent.

Every eye was on me.

The woman let the moment stretch before finally glancing around the room. “Well,” she said, “you have the attention of us all. Ask away.”

I had never been the kind of student who soaked in attention. Public speaking had always been a nerve-wracking affair, and I feared stages about as much as a child fears the monster in their closet.

Now, a dozen faces were locked onto me, their heavy gazes crushing me, making me feel small.

So instead of playing the crowd, I focused on one person. Gordon Lively.

I imagined speaking only to him, shutting out the rest of the room. “I’m August. And yes, it’s true. Brett hired me to investigate what’s happening to his construction site. My goal is to find the truth. To do that, I need to know a few things.” I let that statement settle before continuing. “First, was the vandalism the first violent incident, or have there been other, smaller episodes?”

A beat of silence.

“How would we know?” Gordon asked.

I wasn’t sure how much of the tampering Brett had reported. But if Gordon had answered my question too certainly, he might have tipped his hand.

Instead, he played dumb.

I racked my brain for a question to throw him off-balance. “Do you know a man named Rupert McLaren?”

Before I could gauge Gordon’s reaction, Freya’s fingernails dug into my wrist. “August.” Her voice was tight, almost strangled. The blood had drained from her face, her eyes opened wide.

I followed her gaze.

And froze.

There, buried in the crowd, stood him. The man who had leaned against the streetlight. Who had stood by the column at the train station. Who had sat in the last row of our carriage.

His hat was low, his collar high, his details obscured.

But I recognized him anyway.

The signature accessories. The casual posture. The way his presence sent a ripple of unease through me.

“It’s him, isn’t it?” Freya whispered.

I stepped forward, my attention locked onto him.

He must have sensed it, because he stepped back. Slid to the side. And disappeared into the shadows.

I bolted forward, dragging Freya with me, shouldering through the crowd.

But when I reached where he had been, he was gone.

The door to the pub’s entrance stood just a few feet away. I dashed for it, pushed through, and landed on wet cobblestones and an empty street.

Well, almost empty.

A cloud of bitter smoke curled into the air, white against the dark sky. An old man, at least eighty years young, leaned against the pub’s stone wall, watching the road with a quiet, knowing gaze.

His gnarled fingers worked a cigarette, his voice slow and amused. “He ran down that way.” He gestured across the road, pointing toward a narrow alley swallowed in darkness. “Quick bugger.” Then, he worked on a wry smile. “Or, if you’d rather, young man, I could point you in another direction.”

I stared at the dark alley.

Who was this man? Why was he following us?

My voice came out measured. “What direction is that?”

The old man’s smile widened. “Toward Rupert McLaren. I know where you can find that crazy old man.”

Rupert McLaren. Thursday, January 2nd. 2034hrs.

My boots crunched along the gravel shoreline as the boathouse came into view.

The structure crouched at the water’s edge. A curved slate roof sagged, held up by darkened wood, weathered and warped, the grain rough where the varnish had peeled away. Moss crept along the stone foundation. The iron railings of the balcony bore rust. Arched windows were clouded with grime and streaked with rain, and a single pane carried a spiderweb fracture from some impact.

Below, the boathouse yawned open—its lower level a dark mouth where water lapped against the rotting dock posts.

Beyond, Loch Ness stretched into the mist. The trees lining the shore huddled together.

Freya and I ascended the ramp leading to what appeared to be an unstable upper structure. A door stripped of its color barred our entrance. My knuckles rapped against the rough, worn wood.

A few seconds passed.

I raised my fist again, when I heard a grumble from inside. “You still there?”

Freya shrugged.

I cleared my throat, raising my voice to penetrate the door. “Mr. McLaren, I’m—”

“I ain’t got no time for a visitor! You can go on now and get gone.”

“This will only take a moment of your time. I’m investigating the incident at Brett Barker’s development, and I was told you might—”

The door ripped open. A man who must’ve been old when automobiles first touched pavement presented himself. He was skinny, nothing but sagging skin draped over knobby bones. He wore only a pair of long johns, socks riddled with holes, his big toe punching through one of them. A heavy, unkempt beard covered his sweaty face and tickled his bare chest, intertwining with tufts of gray hair across his torso.

“Mr. McLaren—”

“Call me Rupert. My father was Mr. McLaren, and I hated the man.”

I peered past him into the disarrayed interior. Blurry photographs were pinned on every inch of spare wall, along with maps and scans of the Loch. “Do you mind if we come inside to ask a few questions?”

“What?” He touched his hairy ear. “Sorry, ears don’t work like they once did. You need to speak with your chest, son.”

I took his advice. “Can we come inside?”

He looked over his bony shoulder, as if seeking permission from someone not there. Then he pulled the door fully open and gestured for Freya and me to enter. “Don’t get too many pretty women frequenting my place these days. It’s a nice change of scenery.”

Freya offered a closed-lipped smile.

Rupert trundled into the open space that served as his entire residence.

He had a cot in one corner, a stove in the other, and a few odd pieces of furniture—a leaning bookshelf, a tattered sofa, a table with a small deck of cards beneath one leg, and a cabinet with no drawers housing his plates, pans, and utensils. Every wall bore a grainy photo of Loch Ness, along with a patchwork of maps.

I hadn’t visited Rupert to question his personal life, so I kept my business professional. “I was told you saw the Loch Ness Monster near the new development.”

“Aye.”

“Can you tell me exactly what you saw?”

“And who are you again?”

“I’m August Watson, a private investigator who specializes in the paranormal. Brett Barker hired me to investigate what’s happening to his development.”

“Ah.”

“What did you see?”

“Brett Barker can take two smooth stones and suck them until they turn to dust, if you know what I mean.”

“You’re against his development, then?”

Rupert spat—a literal spit inside his home that landed thickly on the floor. “The man has awoken and challenged forces he’s ill-equipped to handle. I’ve said it for years now. Nessie is a protector of the Loch. She’s not a mammal or reptile or some prehistoric creature. She’s a force. Charybdis and Scylla. Leviathan. She’s drummed into materialization when she’s needed.”

“And she’s needed now?”

“More than ever.”

I scratched my neck. “Why?”

“Because we’re not supposed to taint this sacred land through industrialization. Loch Ness is a sanctuary, a temple housing the spirit of Scotland. To turn it into something capitalistic is a serious affront.”

“An affront to Nessie?”

“To Scotland. And by proxy, Nessie. Yes.”

“And you believe the Loch Ness Monster exists?”

“She’s not a monster, lad. She’s a spirit. A protector. A guardian. And her mere legend brings in all the tourism we need. Why build a resort, a scar on this land?”

“You saw her?”

Rupert nodded. “Aye.”

“When?”

“I’ve searched my entire life to catch a glimpse of that majestic spirit. To spy a shadow gliding across the surface.” He stared at a section of pictures pinned to his wall. “My entire life, I’ve dedicated to finding proof of the nature deity, and for my entire life, she has eluded my efforts. Until a few nights back.”

I leaned in, enraptured by his whistling tone and erratic charm.

“I was on my boat, you see, late at night. Later than it is now. I had heard rumor that the development had caught Nessie’s attention, or had unleashed a curse. Me, I’m of the mind that awakening Nessie is equivalent to unleashing a curse. Anyway, I don’t take those rumors lightly. So, I went in search of my white whale.”

“You saw her?”

“I saw her. Majestic as a flaming lion, she was. Beautiful as the star in a morning sky. She appeared as a light at first. Why wouldn’t she, the deity or spirit that she is? A hundred yards from where I was. She moved in the direction of the resort. Then she emerged from the depths, emerged from the light surrounding her.” He paused to smile, offering an unbelieving laugh. “She swam toward the beach and emerged from the water as a human.”

“A human?” I hadn’t expected that twist. “What kind of human?”

“What kinds of humans are there but humans?”

“Male, female? Short, tall? Anything.”

“My dear friend, Nessie isn’t made for us to perceive. She moved with the shadows, blended into the night. I only saw her silhouette, dark against the darkness. Then she vanished into the trees. Thirty minutes later, she returned to the shore, to the water... and she didn’t resurface.”

“Did you see the light again?”

“No.”

I chewed on my tongue. “Was this the night the excavator was destroyed?”

“Before that night. I drank too much Scotch the night she destroyed the excavator, and I never made it onto the loch. However, I learned my lesson. Alcohol’s never been a friend of mine. I’ve been on the water every night since.” His strange eyes widened. “You two... you should join me tonight. I’m going on an excursion in hopes of seeing Nessie again.”

Reactively, I looked out the window caked in grime and algae, a crack running diagonally through it. The glass gave view of the black water, choppy from the windy night, burdened with dark clouds.

Naturally, I wasn’t fond of boats. The impending threat of a storm didn’t encourage me either.

In my doubtful contemplation, Freya made our decision. “That would be incredible.”

“It would?” I stared at our reflections in the glass.

“We would love nothing more than to join you.”

“We would?” I thought of the payment Freya had requested of me earlier—and how that likelihood seemed to slip further away.

Rupert clapped his gnarled hands together and showed a smile, which, notably, lacked his dentures. “Excellent. Excellent. Shall we prepare the boat, then?”

“Wait,” I said, chopping my hand through the air like a physical wedge in the burgeoning plan. “I don’t know the first thing about boats, and I’d only get in your way. I’m sorry, but I’m not sure our attending your adventure will be beneficial to either of us.”

He waved my concern aside. “Nonsense. I do this alone most every night. A couple extra eyes would help an old man with astigmatism.”

“Besides,” Freya said, “I grew up on a boat. And, also, I grew up dreaming of charting an expedition in search of Nessie.”

I narrowed my gaze and flattened my expression. “You did?”

“My dad has family in the country, and I latched onto that as a girl. Scotland felt so old-world and rustic and romantic, with its castles and hills and Celtic mythology. Then there was Nessie.” Her face warmed, reddened. “I became obsessed.” She grabbed my hands and stared at me. “What do you say? Help make true the dream of my younger self?”

In all honesty, I would’ve crumbled and agreed to the trip after that. But she kept digging.

“Also, you never know, we might see something. Maybe not Nessie, but some evidence to help our case.”

I shook my head, smiling. “You had me at making your dreams come true.” Though I had agreed, mostly for Freya, a shudder of dread rippled through me. I didn’t much enjoy the idea of spending the night on a boat in search of a monster. Too much could go terribly wrong. Still, I faced Rupert. “What do we need to do?”

Nessie. Thursday, January 2nd. 2144 hrs.

I followed Rupert and Freya down the rickety, soft steps leading into the boat parking. My preference with boats started and stopped with recreation on a lake. Even then, I preferred the feel of hot sand on my butt and the cold water lapping at my feet.

Rupert didn’t have a ski boat, though. In fact, he barely had a boat of any kind. In comparison to the nautical vessel in his possession, his ruinous boathouse seemed state-of-the-art.

The ship rocked gently in the dark water, the once-white hull now colored by rust and grime. The wooden deck was worn, rubbed almost smooth from usage, bearing the tattoos of countless scratches and stains. A small cabin rose like a sentinel above the tangle of ropes and other out-of-date equipment.

I paused on the dock and scratched my forehead.

Rupert, reaching out a hand to assist Freya onto the unsteady deck, glanced my way, his expression screwed into amusement. “Like any old girl, she’ll purr to the right kind of touch. She’s reliable and loyal. You have nothing to fear, boyo.”

On the contrary, I had drowning to fear. Hypothermia, too.

But Freya, her presence a warm light against the cold dark of the night, beckoned me forward.

How could I say no?

I stepped onto the deck, holding the rusty railing for support as the boat rocked with the gentle wake. “Looks like the Orca.”

A smile like a lone flower in a field of snow colored Freya’s face. “Did you just make a Jaws reference?”

“Contrary to what Alina might think, I’ve seen some movies.”

“I heard you just watched Ghostbusters for the first time.”

“I’ve seen Jaws. Multiple times.” I stared at the water responding to the wind, and I wondered if my life was about to take a Spielbergian turn.

After a little nudging, the Loch and Key’s engine sputtered to life. Rupert howled with excitement, as if he hadn’t expected his old boat to agree with him.

At a slow pace, we glided out of the boathouse and onto the loch.

The wind was the first of our antagonists. Like an open palm, it slapped at our clothes and exposed skin, throwing sharp beads of rain into us. The edge was coated in a razor cold, and the mist drawing off the water didn’t help anything.

Above us, a waning crescent moon glowed a dull yellow as a heavy cloud allowed it to glimpse at us. Loch Ness spread around, seemingly endless from our vantage.

We crowded inside the cockpit, our accumulated body heat creating a muggy shield against the night.

Rupert wore a manic grin. “We’ll navigate toward the development. If we’re to see our girl, we’ll see her around that area.”

The Loch and Key didn’t move like a speedboat, but like the tortoise against the hare. It moved with purpose and persistence, taking us the better part of half an hour to reach our destination. Once there, we trawled the general vicinity for over an hour, alert to every strange sound or movement of shadow in our periphery.

Then, as the hands of time crawled their way to midnight, and Freya yawned and shivered against me, and as Rupert snored across the deck, bundled in two layers of thick blankets, and I willed myself to wake him to return to his boathouse, the water ten yards away brightened and churned.

Jets of bubbles disturbed the surface, as if from an unseen jacuzzi.

My fingers tightened around Freya’s hand, and I sat straighter, staring directly at the phenomenon. “Are you seeing this?”

She turned, then shot straight up. “Rupert!”

The old man snored on an inhale, whistled on an exhale. He rested near the bow, where the water crashed against the hull. All that, and, as he explained on numerous occasions when he had failed to hear us, ‘My ears ain’t what they once was.’

Freya scrambled over to him and shook his shoulder.

He awoke with a fright—thankfully, a nonviolent fright. “My dear, you about sent me to my wife. Now what’s the matter?”

She didn’t have to say anything, but merely looked in my direction, past me, at the bubbling, illuminated water.

I hadn’t taken my eyes from the screen of my phone, which I held up to record the entire affair.

A dark outline filled the strange illumination. It wasn’t yellow, either, or white, or anything else in the spectrum of headlights or spotlights or flashlights.

The color was a neon green, almost something mystical—something a sailor of old would note before disappearing forever. It appeared like ghost light, like the shimmering of a portal not meant for this world.

The coloring distorted the shape of whatever hid beneath the surface, as well. I could determine a rough size, but I couldn’t discern a consistent shape. One second it looked rectangular, the next tubular, the next like a whale—complete with fins and flukes.

“That’s her!” Rupert threw off his blankets. The wind grabbed one of them and skipped it across the loch until it settled on the surface, soaking until it became heavy enough to sink. The old man never noticed. He bounded toward me, leaving Freya at the opposite railing, and he stared at the light, at the disturbance of water. “You see her? A guardian spirit. I told you.”

I won’t lie. Freezing cold, wet, exhausted, and uncomfortable being out on the loch that late at night, while in such a vessel as the one we used, I half-believed the old man. It was easy to.

It was easy to understand how explorers of old had believed the myths of the kraken or mermaids or sea serpents—or any number of legends. The night plays games with the mind. When in a strange place, in a dangerous situation, facing an unknown obstacle, the night terrorizes the imagination.

I swallowed hard. “What do we do?”

“We can’t do anything. We can only watch, and we can hope she doesn’t turn her wrath against—”

The behemoth rose, punching through the glassy water.

The force and sheer size of the monstrosity created a sizable and powerful wake that crashed into the boat.

For a terrible moment, I thought the momentum might pick us up and topple us upside down. The boat righted itself, slamming against the water.

Freya released a piercing scream, one that sliced against the wind and rain and burping water, becoming the prominent and only important noise.

I wheeled around just in time to see her flip over the bow.

The suddenness of the boat correcting itself must have rocked her off-balance and chucked her into the water. She hit with a minute splash, one muted and insignificant compared to what emerged in front of us.

The neck was long and thick, headed by an abnormal jaw—large and spiked with thick fangs. Opening her maw, Nessie screamed at us, the howl a grinding, grating war cry.

At any other time, I would’ve stared in utter, flabbergasted disbelief. However, at that moment, my fear for Freya’s life had occupied all of me. I had no room to allow Nessie residence.

I bolted toward the bow of the boat, abandoning Rupert and my cell phone and diving blindly into the loch after her.

Luckily, she was a strong swimmer and a capable fighter. She hadn’t panicked, hadn’t flailed herself into exhaustion. Freya bobbed along the surface of the frigid waters.

I swam to her, my body quickly numbing from the temperature of the loch. “You okay?”

“Yeah.”

Seeing her alive and hearing her voice had dispelled the fear of her being injured or worse. However, that allowed room for the knocking fear of the monster lurking beneath us, rising above us.

“We need to get out of the water before hypothermia sets in.”

Freya nodded in agreement. “Unfortunately, my knight, in your chivalry, you forgot to grab a buoy or drop the swim ladder.”

“We’ll need to find a way to climb, then. You call for Rupert to drop the ladder. I’ll see if I can figure another way up. I don’t want to wait on him to have a moment of clarity.”

The conversation ended there. We didn’t have to discuss a fully-fledged plan. I didn’t know what had shown itself, but I didn’t like the thought of that creature diving back beneath the water and opening its gaping maw to swallow us whole.

Also, the water was so cold, it arrested my breath. If we lingered any longer, we seriously risked death from exposure.

Freya and I swam to the boat. She found something to hold onto, and from there she screamed for Rupert.

As I could have predicted, the old man had other concerns to busy himself with. His inability to hear probably didn’t help matters.

A knotting of rope looped low on the side of the boat, just within my reach. I grabbed the thick hemp, my fingers numb from the cold, and I used the knots like footholds to climb over the railing.

My sudden emergence caught Rupert’s attention. “Sonny, where you been? She followed you back beneath the water. I thought she ate you.” He laughed, as if the idea of me serving as a snack for Nessie was quite hilarious.

Ignoring Rupert, I sprinted and slipped to the swim ladder, dropping it into the cold water. Then I climbed down and braved the depths again, swimming to Freya and guiding her back onto the boat.

Rupert talked and talked, but I didn’t hear what he said.

I draped a blanket over Freya. Her entire body shivered. Her mouth chattered.

“She needs warmth!” My voice rose, as I made sure Rupert heard what I had to say. “Turn around now! She needs to get inside to get warm!”

The old man greased his old, arthritic bones and snapped into gear. He helmed the cockpit, steering his vessel until Loch and Key pointed back in the direction of his boathouse, and he pushed the old boat for all she was worth.

As he navigated, I held Freya against my body. I shivered, too—the constant mist, the constant breeze, the constant cold, all a constant torment to my sodden state. But any warmth I mustered, I willed toward Freya.

“Stay awake,” I said. I repeated. “Stay awake. For just a little longer. Freya?”

“Hmm?” Her voice was so weak.

“Tell me something. Just talk to me. Tell me anything.”

“I’m sorry.”

That lent me pause. “About what?”

“For lying… or not telling you the truth.” As she spoke, she shivered. Each word was hard-pressed to leave her purple lips. “Lord Malcolm Huxley. I’m related to him on my father’s side.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, breathless.

“I didn’t know until recently. Those papers… they were an invitation for me to attend the reading of his will.” She spoke through chattering teeth, her sentences broken, her delivery weak. “At first, I declined. I never knew the man. I never knew we were related. What would I want with his money or estate? The solicitor representing the family responded to my rejection with another letter, one insisting I attend.”

“Then, you flew to England.”

She smiled, but it seemed forced. “I thought, why not surprise you and then swing by the reading.” The smile turned into a humorless laugh.

I didn’t feel anger, not quite. Maybe a touch of frustration. Maybe anger would come in time. At that moment, though, I only felt scared.

With each passing breath, Freya’s eyes got heavier, her voice lighter. I feared if she slipped into unconsciousness, that would mean hypothermia had taken hold.

But I had to keep her talking and awake. I had to do something. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“This was supposed to be a test for us. I wanted us to enjoy each other, and our time together. And I didn’t want the idea of a potential fortune to stain… us. I wanted to believe you loved me for me, not for an inheritance.”

Those words hurt me. They clawed through the chitinous armor of fear, deep into my vulnerable heart.

I forgot how to breathe.

How could she see me as so shallow that I would revolve my feelings for her around her assets and financial situation? Did she see me as someone so greedy, so desperate, so selfish?

For a moment, I reverted to the August I had shed—the brooding, self-centered, depressed version of myself who wallowed in my grief. I thought I had evolved, that I had grown.

Did she see me as I was, though, not as who I aspired to become?

Freya must have read my thoughts. “My decision didn’t reflect you, but my insecurities. I’ve been loved primarily for a singular reason. My physical appearance. Most men don’t care to learn about me, about who I am. To love me for that person. You were different. When I received the invitation, I became afraid. Not from anything you have done, but from what I’ve experienced repeatedly.”

I held my jaw tight, unsure of what to say.

Despite her words, her decision to keep me in the dark stung.

Still, I held her tightly, doing my best to keep her warm.

Thirty minutes later, we sat cross-legged on the floor by the crackling fire which Rupert attended. We were covered in blankets stripped from the old man’s bed.

When we thanked him for his kindness, he shooed our gratitude away with a hand. “I won’t sleep tonight, not after what we experienced. Speaking of, do you have the video? Can I watch it?”

I scrolled to the video on my phone and handed the device to Rupert.

He settled into the sofa as my hand settled into Freya’s. She leaned her damp head on my shoulder and exhaled, her body melting against mine. The fire warmed our backs, and the burning filled the night, competing with the wind and the rain outside.

Rupert must have watched the video five times, and with each viewing, he grew increasingly convinced that we had captured the mythical, the legendary Loch Ness Monster on film.

Then, his bearded face soured. He leaned forward, squinting his eyes for a better look. “Lad, you mind taking a look at this?”

I readjusted, stretching forward far enough to accept the phone. He had the video paused. The frame showed Nessie’s neck and head fifteen feet out of the loch, water streaming off her oily skin.

Frowning, I studied the image, wondering why he had paused there, wondering what he wanted me to look at. Nessie herself was nothing more than a dark smudge against the night—my shaky camerawork no better than the most amateur cryptid hunters.

“What am I looking for?”

“Behind her,” Rupert said. “On the shore.”

After he offered me direction, the subject in question became frightfully clear.

I pinched the screen, zooming in for a cleaner view of the person standing on the bank of the loch.

Freya craned her neck to look. “Wait. Is that—”

I cut her off, finishing her sentence. “Yeah, it is. Gordon Lively.”

New Reports. Friday, January 3rd. 0859hrs.

Sunshine rushing through the grime-caked window drew me awake. Sleep crusted my eyes, and a tightness existed behind my forehead—an axe stuck in the knots of a log. With a little help, a little coaxing from some caffeine, the pain would relent.

I narrowed my eyes, squinting against the sudden and unexpected brightness illuminating the morning.

Where had the wind and the clouds and the rain run off to?

Freya lay on her side next to me, her back flat against the wall.

Like two oversized sardines, we had squeezed into Rupert’s undersized cot made for one person. The old man, in his whistly, loud voice, had insisted we sleep in his bed. The only other suitable piece of furniture was his sofa—a wide, single cushion not quite a couch, but not quite a chair, either.

I had offered to sleep on the floor, not minding in the least.

He heard none of my protesting, and not because he couldn’t hear well. He flatly refused, citing hospitality and us deserving the comforts of a bed after what we had gone through.

In full transparency, I should’ve called a ride to drive Freya and me back to our hotel. Tempest had purchased a room for us, after all. Why allow a big, cozy, warm bed to go uninhabited?

The truth... I feared if I moved Freya from the warmth of the fire, the hypothermia would return with a vengeance. Not only that, but fatigue had latched onto me, and I couldn’t shake the scrappy beast.

Freya sat up straighter, wincing as she stretched her neck from one side to the other. “What time is it?” Her voice was congested with sleep.

I reached for my phone, which I had left on the floor, not plugged in. Hopefully, it had kept a charge throughout the night. My hand happened upon it. I groaned, seeing the late time stamp. “A little after nine.”

No wonder I had a headache. By nine on most mornings, my body was accustomed to three cups of coffee running through my veins.

Freya rolled out her neck with her knuckles. “The side effects of being over thirty. I’m not going to be able to turn my head for a week.” The sunlight caught in her morning hair, turning it almost gold. “How did you sleep?”

“Honestly, much better than I expected.”

“Running into Nessie and then nearly dying of hypothermia has its perks, huh?”

“I guess so.”

Freya glanced around the small residence and frowned. “Where’s Rupert?”

I scanned the open space, not finding any trace of the old man.

Standing, I braced against the wall for support. When the dots faded from my vision and the blood drained from my head, I ventured forward, searching for a note explaining Rupert’s absence.

The abundance of papers pinned to every inch of wall didn’t help. I skimmed a few dozen scribblings before I stumbled on one that said, Angus, I didn’t want to wake you and Freida. I’m heading to town, to the Kelpie Café for some breakfast.

I turned to Freya, who remained seated on the bed, and sighed. “Well, two things. I’m highly doubtful Rupert knows our names. Also, he went to the Kelpie Café.”

“You think we should head there?”

I nodded. “We should talk to him about what happened, what we saw, and how we should proceed with that information. We were a little rattled last night to draw any meaningful conclusions. Also, I don’t want Rupert mentioning to anyone that we saw someone on shore. Even if he doesn’t name Gordon Lively, I don’t want that rumor spreading. The less our suspect knows about what we know, the better.”

If Gordon learned that we knew he stood ashore on the bank of the loch last night, he could jump ahead and start erasing any tracks he may have left. Our discovery needed to remain our secret.

Freya bit her lower lip and twisted a strand of hair around her finger.

I tilted my head. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Your payment. It’s late.”

I looked around the boathouse—the yellowed pages pinned to the walls, the sparse but dusty furniture, the grimy windows. “You’re serious?”

She nodded once.

“What if he comes back?”

She lifted her shoulders.

It was beyond my power to tell her no.

Later that morning, as the clock flirted with ten, Freya and I arrived at the Kelpie Café. A bell jingled as we opened the door, announcing our entrance.

I pinched the bridge of my nose and shook my head.

A gaggle of people had gathered around a central figure—a short, skinny old man with a comically large gray beard. He spoke in a whistle, with a slight lisp, recounting our encounter with Nessie. He added flavor and dramatic flair, and he colored in the details he knew little of, like our names.

“Angus dove into the black water to save Freida. Nessie, though, she didn’t take kindly to his brazenness. She darted toward him. It became a race then. Angus dragged Freida as he swam one-armed toward me. I, of course, lowered the swim ladder and extended a hand. With strength I had only known fifty years ago, I pulled Angus and Freida to safety just as Nessie’s jaw clamped shut where they had dangled a heartbeat before.”

Someone from the crowd—a young man with a fuzzy face—had obviously heard the story once before. “You forgot about the man standing on the shore. What of him?”

When had Rupert left the boathouse? How long had he been generating an audience at the Kelpie Café? How many times had he retold the same story?

The headache behind my eyes deepened.

I pushed into the crowd, wading through them as I made my way to the counter.

Rupert caught sight of me. “Ah! The hero himself arrives with his damsel. Everyone, welcome Angus and Freida.”

A quiet applause rose like a gentle wave from within the café. Then the questions came like the tide crashing against stone.

“You saw the creature?”

“Did you really dive in after Freida?”

“How did you out swim Nessie?”

They came in a torrent I couldn’t keep up with. Instead, I offered a pained smile and touched Rupert’s bony shoulder. “Do you mind a word... alone? After I order some coffee.”

The showman addressed his audience with a performer’s grin. “Excuse us, my friends. I shall return.”

Freya placed our drink orders, and Rupert and I slid into an empty booth. I ran a hand through my hair.

“You’re upset,” he said. “What did I do, but enhance your reputation with the locals?”

“First off, my name’s not Angus. So, there’s that. Secondly,” I leaned forward, lowering my voice, “do you think it’s wise to be sharing all the details of what happened last night?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“We’re investigating. Discretion is paramount. We don’t want the person responsible for this to know that we know something.”

“Do we know something?”

I gritted my teeth. “We know who was on the shore last night during the attack.”

Rupert leaned back in his wooden booth and crossed his skinny arms. He looked smug. “I’ve been investigating Nessie, amongst other cryptids and paranormal phenomena, for most of my life, sonny. If you want information, unguarded information, you must appeal to the very people you wish to squeeze that very information you seek from.”

He wasn’t entirely wrong. Yet, we couldn’t tip our hand to Gordon.

Freya appeared with my morning elixir. I thanked her as she settled in beside me.

“So,” Rupert said, eyeing us both, “should we go again tonight?”

Before I could answer, a hunched man using a cane limped to our table. He had peach fuzz left for hair and thick eyebrows. “After Nessie ran you out of the area, she refocused her attention on her natural mission.”

No one had prompted him to speak. No one had offered a greeting.

The newcomer had just shared his mind.

Rupert scratched his dirty beard. “Why do you say that?”

“There was another attack.”

The coffee cup warmed my hands. “What happened?”

“A bulldozer. Ruined.”

“How?”

The man licked his lips and nodded. “Same as the excavator.” He hesitated to admit what weighed on all our minds, but he said the word. “Nessie.”

I raised the coffee and drank. The placebo of ingesting the caffeine immediately muted the pain in my head.

The unnamed older man leaned heavily on his cane. “That’s not all I heard, either.”

“What else did you hear?” I asked.

With his free hand, he thumbed a mole on his neck. “Well, that man you saw on the shore, Gordon Lively, he was noticed lurking in the vandalized area early this morning.”

I turned to Rupert. “Did you tell them the man’s name?”

“I did no such thing. I told a story, providing hints through context clues. If they conjured up a name and drew themselves a face, they did so through their own imaginative means.”

Freya massaged her stiff neck beside me and stared at the foam artwork in her cappuccino.

I glanced between Rupert and the old man standing at the edge of our table. “Do you two have anything against Gordon?”

Rupert chuckled. “My friend here, Rory,” he gestured to the old man leaning on his cane, “serves as my ears, since mine no longer work to par. We want nothing more than to prove the existence of Nessie, or any other creature of lore. I have no gambit against Brett Barker, as offensive as his project stands, or against Gordon Lively. My stake lies in my life’s work, and that work has brought me between those two men.”

I believed Rupert, too. In the short time I had known him, he never once came across as dishonest. Maybe slightly unhinged. But not dishonest. “Alright.” I pressed my palms into the table. “Well, I’ve some work to do, then.”

The Secret. Friday, January 3rd. 1128 hrs.

The sun held any inclement weather at bay, a mild relief from the constant drizzling we had experienced since our arrival in Scotland.

The construction site was a mud pit, though. Freya had the foresight to swing by a shop to purchase us some rubber boots. We stomped through the slosh to the portable office.

Brett beckoned us inside after I knocked. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days. His curly hair was puffy and frizzy, standing on end. A darkness drew a half-circle under his eyes, and his face had lost the natural tan he sported, becoming pale and bloodless.

“Morning,” he said, not bothering to stand from his seat. His voice was a rattle. “I suppose you heard, then?”

“Would’ve been nice to hear from you.” My tone bordered on accusatory. I didn’t try to hide my suspicion. Him not calling, not informing me of what transpired last night, cast him in an unflattering light.

We were on the same team, after all. Tempest had hired me to help Brett. So, why had he not reached out with the latest vandalism?

Was he trying to erase evidence? Was he trying to finalize his story?

“I meant to call.”

I raised my eyebrow but allowed him to speak.

“Arrived a little after eight this morning, after the foreman called to update me on the latest development. I immediately called the police.” Brett thumbed through his phone, then slid the device across the desk. “You can check my call logs.”

I stepped forward. He had accepted an incoming call at 0732 hours from Cameron Stewart. They had spoken for seven minutes. At 0739 hours, immediately after ending the call with Mr. Stewart, Brett had made an outgoing call to the Police.

“A uniform arrived on scene about the same time I pulled up. We saw the vandalism together. Bulldozer this time. Bite marks again.”

“Not claw marks?”

“Never claw marks. I misspoke before. Anyway, the officer only left fifteen minutes ago, after taking inventory of the scene and interviewing the workers present. She still won’t call it a crime scene. Says there’s no evidence of a crime.” Brett rubbed his thumbs against his eyes. “I don’t understand that. I have expensive, heavy-duty machinery ruined. How does that not warrant a crime scene?”

“What does she say?” I asked.

“Well, we don’t have evidence of tracks, human or otherwise, which is impossible given the amount of damage the vehicle sustained. Something would’ve had to transport whatever was used to inflict such destruction. In that mud out there…” He paused and shook his head. “But there’s no evidence of anything.”

I scratched the stubble irritating the skin on my neck. “You had the bulldozer parked down by the beach, then?”

Brett nodded.

That explained the lack of physical evidence, and the heightened and continued belief that Nessie had ruined the equipment. She would have swum from the loch, extended her neck to munch on the steel vehicle, then disappeared back into the deep waters.

The idea was ridiculous.

But had I not seen the monster with my own eyes? Had she not appeared before us and driven us away?

I stared at Brett, again finding his actions either suspicious or moronic. “After what happened with the excavator, why would you leave the bulldozer down there? Do you have nowhere else, maybe somewhere further from the beach, to park your equipment?”

A wicked smile energized his drab features. “I planted a camera in the trees.”

I froze, cowed by his words. “Did you tell the police?”

“After the footage I recovered…” Brett shrugged. “No. This matter falls well beyond their jurisdiction. I doubted before. The idea that my breaking of ground had angered an ancient creature or spirit, had released some kind of curse... it amused me. Now, I don’t know what to think.”

What did that mean?

Nothing he said made sense. To me, it seemed as if he’d spiraled, reaching for any straw that appeared for him to grab.

I needed to press him. “Brett, when you and Gordon got into it yesterday, he mentioned something along the lines of you not being able to pay your way out of it this time. What did he mean?”

He hesitated, pressing his tongue against his cheek. “I don’t know.”

“I need you to be honest with me. What’s the budget look like on this project?”

He looked at his hands folded on his desk. “Alright. We’re, uh, as you can imagine, we’ve met a lot of resistance from the community. Permitting was lengthy and expensive, and nearly impossible. We’ve had environmentalists fighting us tooth and nail. The locals don’t want this. Even the tourism council voted this project down. But I hired top-tier solicitors, and we’ve found a way to build, despite the opposition. The construction and legal costs and the permitting fees and the silly fines imposed on us, the lawsuits...” He laughed, a defeated sound. “We’ve moved equipment here, and we’ve moved some dirt around. The real construction hasn’t even begun, and, August, I won’t lie to you. We’ve run out of money.”

The admission hit like a heavyweight uppercut. “You’re telling me you don’t have the money to continue?”

“I can reach into my personal pockets, but that seems like a foolish investment after what I now know, doesn’t it?”

“Brett, do you know how this looks?”

“Of course I do. If I continue the development, I must do so at a personal cost, which will ruin me. If I make an insurance claim, they’ll investigate me for fraud. My only option is to leave now, admit defeat, walk away having lost all my investment. I’m in a lose-lose-lose situation.”

His avowal smoothed my wrinkled brow for the moment. “I’ll shoot straight with you. Are you sabotaging this project for financial gain, or to recoup the investment you lost?”

“No. Absolutely not. I like money, even if that means ruffling a few feathers within this community. This development would’ve made me and my investors a massive profit. Because of that, I can ignore complaints from locals. But I would never stoop to illegal activity. Never.”

I couldn’t just take his word. Any criminal will insist on innocence, no matter how much evidence is stacked against them. I needed proof that Brett wasn’t involved.

He must have read my mind, interpreted the conflict warring on my face. “Come and see for yourself.” He pointed at his computer.

I rounded the desk to stand behind his chair. Freya took position beside me, her fingers finding my dangling hand.

Brett’s screen showed a paused image of the bulldozer, the loch in the background.

He tapped the keyboard, and the recording played.

After a few seconds of a still loch, the water displaced, and a terrifyingly familiar head rose from the depths. Of course, at night, the footage was gray and grainy, obscured by raindrops on the lens and an irritating leaf that the wind kept pushing into the frame.

Despite the interference, a prehistoric creature slid onto the shore, her body like that of a seal, but ten times the size. Her neck long, her jaw massive.

She craned forward and clamped her maw over the bulldozer, slightly lifting the immense vehicle off the ground, shifting its position. Then, as quickly as she appeared, the monster dipped back into the loch.

I didn’t need to compare Brett’s footage to the video on my phone.

The creature was the same.

There were now two separate recordings capturing the Loch Ness Monster.

My heart hammered against my chest. For a moment, I forgot how to breathe.

“Does that mean Nessie is actually real?” Freya asked, her voice nothing more than a whisper.

“You didn’t show this to police?” I asked.

“No, and that’s how you know I’m innocent of any crime. If I showed them the footage, I could walk away from this disaster without consequence. Maybe even regain my lost money through an insurance claim. But I didn’t go to the police.”

“Why?”

“Because they would shut this entire site down immediately.” He sighed and stared at the door leading out of his modular, his face turned away from me. “I’m not ready to admit defeat. We’ve almost exceeded budget, but if we can get this thing rolling, maybe I can convince a few more people to invest.”

Though I wanted to trust him, I didn’t entirely buy his story. He could still stand responsible for sabotaging his equipment. What if he lied about his budget? What if he persevered, happened upon some extra money to finish the build?

Who wouldn’t want to come stay at the resort where Nessie, captured on camera, had appeared?

People would flock in droves to stay there.

Had he generated the story, created the actual evidence, not for an insurance claim but to churn public attention toward his build? What if all of this was nothing more than an elaborate marketing scheme?

Of course, if I asked, he would deny, deny, deny.

I needed evidence.

Brett spoke into my contemplation. “Do you believe the creature exists?”

How did I deny what I had seen with my eyes, what we had framed in a video?

“I don’t know.” I circled around the desk to face Brett eye to eye. “I do know that I need to speak to the foreman who first saw the vandalism. Do you know where I can find him?”

Near-Accident. Friday, January 3rd. 1201hrs.

I stomped through the mud, approaching Cameron Stewart. Brett had described him, so he wasn’t too hard to identify.

He sat on the bed of an old, beat-up truck, eating a sandwich from a sack. Cameron wore a thick flannel jacket that widened his already broad frame. He had light-blue, angry eyes that had no patience for anything or anyone but watching Freya, and a jaw sculpted from chewing on rocks.

Another worker sat beside him—a short, chubby man about ten years younger than Cameron, sporting a few wispy bristles on his chin.

“Cameron?” I asked, stopping a few feet from him. “You have a moment?”

“Who might you be?”

“August Watson, private investigator. I’m looking into what’s happening here.”

He nodded at Freya. “Who’s the lass?”

“I’m Freya, girlfriend to August Watson. He doesn’t speak for me.”

Cameron twisted up his mouth as if he meant to spit, but he took another bite of his sandwich and chewed, speaking through a mouthful of food. “What you want to talk to me about? Don’t you coordinate with the police in the matter? I already talked to them earlier. Not a man to repeat myself, either.”

“What do you think is happening around here?” I asked.

He swallowed. “Excuse me?”

“I mean, what’s going on, in your opinion? Nessie? Strategic sabotage? Something else?”

Cameron scratched at his scruffy face. “What do I think?”

“Yeah.”

“I think this is a damn circus. That’s what I think. We show up to work, and we ain’t got work to do. So we sit around, make ourselves look busy while Barker figures out how to proceed with construction. Equipment getting ruined. Protestors showing up every day. Us laborers, we’re locals, you know that? I look at the gathered crowd,” he turned his gaze to the sidewalk separated from the construction site by a chain-link fence, “and I see men I went to high school with. I see women I dated. Family. When I clock off, guess who I go home to? Those same people. I get to hear them at work, and at home.” He wasn’t shy about finishing his meal, taking yet another bite. “Some of my crew can’t handle the strain. They quit like that.”

He painted a picture of something I hadn’t considered. A majority, if not all, of the laborers probably opposed the construction. Yet they had families to feed. They couldn’t afford to refuse work over an opinion.

But what if they could sabotage the construction?

They had access. They had means. What if one of the workers had devised the scheme to thwart the development? They would still receive payment for their time, and they would halt construction.

I appraised Cameron, digging into him to see what I could find. “You’re still here every day.”

He shrugged. “My wife is Catholic, and she doesn’t believe in birth control. We have five kids already, one on the way.” He covered his upper lip with his lower, taking the appearance of a bulldog, and shook his head. “I can’t afford to feel one way or another about this build.”

I turned to the younger man beside Cameron. “What about you?”

He pointed at himself, shocked that I had addressed him. “Me?”

“Why are you still hanging around?”

“Ma’s sick, and I have three younger siblings in school. I’m the sole provider for our family. I do what I’m told, and I don’t ask questions long as I’m getting a paycheck.”

I clicked my tongue and stared at the tree line guarding the shore. “You two believe in Nessie, then? Or curses, for that matter?”

The younger man shrugged. I had the impression he didn’t believe in much, other than earning money.

Cameron stared at Freya, though—drank her in. He sniffled. “Before I came to work this morning, I stopped by a café for some coffee and a pastry. There was this old man there. Rupert. We call him Scotland’s Shakespeare. He can spin a tale, that old man. He was there, reporting about an incident that happened last night. What did you say your name was again? Angus?”

The corner of my mouth twitched into a subtle smile.

“Tell me, Angus, what do you believe? You saw her, right? You witnessed Nessie firsthand? Do you believe she exists?”

I inhaled deeply. “You care to show me the bulldozer?”

Cameron crumpled the empty sandwich bag and tossed it behind him into the bed of the truck. “I saw you around here yesterday, looking at the excavator. You don’t need me to show you around. Besides, my lunch is over.” He hopped off the tailgate and walked the opposite direction from the beach.

The wind had kicked up over the course of the morning, sweeping off the loch. It pushed against me and Freya as we hiked down to the beach.

We came through the trees and stepped onto the rocky shore.

Parked like bait was the bulldozer.

Like with the excavator, puncture marks formed the perfect image of a bite. Holes were punched through the siding, into the gas tank, puncturing the hydraulic lines.

I circled the ruined vehicle, snapping pictures with my cell phone.

Freya drifted to the water’s edge and stared across the choppy surface. “What if we’re just denying the truth? What if Nessie does exist, and she’s retaliating against the destruction of this land?”

The sun warred with the wet breeze, warming me in the wind’s silence.

Before I could respond, Freya turned to me. “You have video evidence of the creature. Brett has video evidence of her. We saw her with our own eyes, August. Look at the damage dealt to the bulldozer. What else could’ve done that?”

Again, I didn’t get the chance to answer her question.

Voices cascaded from the construction site down to the beach where we stood—loud and combative.

“Let’s go.” I spurred into action, moving quickly but carefully—slow enough to not slip in the slick mud again, but faster than a cautious walk.

Freya hustled after me.

We punched through the tree line.

A hundred yards away, Gordon Lively competed with Cameron Stewart in a yelling contest.

Now, I haven’t yet taken the time to describe the site beyond the mud pit that it was. However, just because they hadn’t begun construction in earnest didn’t mean there weren’t hazards. Supplies had arrived, piles of gravel and sand, stacks of lumber and steel and conduit. Water dripped from the frames of scaffolding. Steel beams, wrapped in plastic that had been shredded by the wind, rested in neat stacks beside unopened pallets of bricks and lumber.

That was our obstacle course as we hurried toward Gordon and Cameron.

As we scuttled along, careful not to slip or trip in the mud, an aggressive gale gusted against our backs, propelling us forward with lumbering, balancing steps. At the same time, the wind must have ripped through whatever security held a stack of lumber together.

Two-by-fours rained down. The first form hit the mud with a wet slap a foot from me.

I startled, leaping away.

Freya froze.

Another form fell. That one teetered midair and impaled the mud with its blunted butt inches from Freya.

I lunged forward, grabbed her by the waist, and dived backward, landing, once again, in the mud. Freya lay atop me, relatively dry and unscathed.

The lumber clattered like thunder, falling from a neat stack into a capsized Jenga pile.

My heart percussed in my ears. My breath came like I had finished a sprint. My arms squeezed Freya, holding her tightly. I refused to let her go.

“I’m okay.” She placed her hand on my wrist, unbuckling me from her. “I’m alright.” She stood, careful not to muddy herself. “How did that happen?”

How had it happened? Could the wind have blown over a stack of lumber like that? I doubted as much.

Freya swallowed hard. “That’s the second time in twelve hours you’ve saved my life. If I didn’t know any better, I would say someone had it out for me.” She laughed, but the sound was hollow.

I pried myself from the mud, soaked and filthy once again. “Saving your life is going to cost me a fortune in clothes.” I stood, sodden and dripping once more.

Freya looked at me and covered her mouth, hiding her smile.

“You think this is funny?” I asked.

“It’s a little amusing.”

On the bright side, we didn’t have to continue our trek to intervene between Cameron and Gordon. The two of them, likely witnessing what had occurred, came running toward us.

Cameron, a decade younger than Gordon and more accustomed to navigating in the slick terrain, arrived first. He was out of breath. “What the hell happened?” He didn’t ask if we were okay—barely even looked at us. Instead, he went to the spilled lumber and kneeled. The man reached into the mud, into the rubble, and pulled out a broken metal strap. He turned to us, frowning. “Steel strapping. These things don’t just snap. Someone had to have cut it.”

That made much more sense than the wind toppling the stack. But who had cut the bracing?

Gordon arrived.

Perfect timing, considering I was angry and confused and wanted answers, and he was the main person I needed to speak to.

So Be It. Friday, January 3rd. 1253hrs.

Mud slimed the back of my shirt and jeans. It sludged down my legs and into my rubber boots. The constant wind swirling around the construction site allied with my soaked clothing, and they worked in tandem to render me frozen.

To make matters worse, the brief tease of sunshine faded as an army of dark clouds marched across the sky, pitching the early afternoon into a premature darkness.

Freya stood beside me, half-trembling as her body recovered from nearly getting crushed beneath a stack of fallen lumber. Her attention fixated on Cameron, or rather what he had scavenged from the debris and now held—a ribbon of steel strapping that moments prior had bundled the forms securely.

The implication was clear. Someone had cut the straps and toppled the lumber.

But why?

Had someone directed an attack at me for investigating the recent destruction caused by Nessie? If so, did that mean I was closing in on an answer?

That idea was laughable, considering I felt like I knew less at that juncture of my investigation than when I had started a day before.

So, why attack me?

Easy.

The culprit didn’t want me pursuing the case.

Did that mean there was a culprit, not a mythical monster? Or did that mean the supposed curse worked against me as efficiently as it worked against Brett’s development?

My potential answer to all those questions stood before me.

Gordon Lively wore a rain-wet tweed jacket with a pastel-purple cotton bow tie. His thick-framed glasses drowned his inconspicuous, flaccid face. “Are you okay? What happened?”

I shook the mud off my hands, then wiped my palms across my sodden pants. “I’d like to ask you the same thing. What happened here, Mr. Lively?”

The wind tousled his thick, red hair. “I... don’t know. I heard the crash, but I didn’t see what might have caused it.”

“I’m not talking about this.” I gestured to the pile of lumber, then retracted my hand, wiped my fingers clean on my pants again, and removed my phone from my pocket. After a few swipes, I stepped forward and shoved my phone at Gordon. “What’s this?”

I had screenshotted him standing on the bank of the loch last night from the video I had recorded.

He stared at the image, rain-smeared across the lens and obscured as it was. Despite the lack of clear visibility, his shock of red hair stood out like a flame on a stormy night, and his signature bow tie was clear as the pastel painting a new day.

Maybe he could contest the photograph in court, but not there in front of me.

Still, he tried to dismiss my evidence. “Can’t make much out there. Image seems a little unfocused.”

Cameron dropped the steel strapping to the ground and stomped to us, the mud grasping at his construction boots. He leaned over my phone, stealing a glance at the image and releasing a low whistle. “If that ain’t you, Lively, then I’m the king of Scotland. How do you defend yourself now? You’re a dirty little rat, eh? And I saw you this morning, too. Here. On site. Trespassing. You can’t deny that now.”

I remembered the hunched old man from the café making mention of Gordon being seen near the latest occurrence of vandalism. “You’re the one who saw him?”

“He didn’t see anything.” Gordon took a single step back.

“You can’t talk your way out of this. I showed up here early this morning,” Cameron said, his eyes on fire. “Forgot my wallet here last night, so I came to grab it before heading back into town for a coffee and pastry. Well, when I showed up here, though it was still dark, a little after six, maybe, I saw you sneaking around. Red hair bright as a damn flashlight.”

Gordon pointed an angry finger at Cameron. “I’m not the only person in Scotland with red hair.”

“You’re the only one with a mug that ugly. Thought I saw a damn troll this morning.”

I massaged my temples. “Enough!”

“All I’m saying,” Cameron continued, ignoring me, “is that he has something to do with all that’s going on. If he’s putting my livelihood in danger, I’ll throttle him until his buggy eyes pop out of his skull.”

Gordon didn’t have a rebuttal.

Cameron crossed his immense arms. “Exactly. Silence is the loudest admission of guilt. You were there last night when Angus—”

“August.” I couldn’t help but make the correction.

“When August saw Nessie. And you were here this morning. You’re hard to miss. Even a blind person can spot you. Your voice rises above all others in protest against this construction. Who else, huh? Who else but you?”

Gordon spread his arms wide, his palms facing the sky and accepting the drizzle. He smirked. “Say it is me.”

“I do say so.”

“Well, pretend I’m guilty, and pretend that my plan, whatever I’m accused of doing, happens to stop this unholy destruction of the loch. Then so be it. I will protest and have my voice heard. I will coerce your laborers to leave, convince them that their involvement is a grievous infraction against our history and our country. But if I somehow cursed this development, if I somehow drew Nessie from the depths of the loch, then I will bear the responsibility and the consequences that come along with it, if it means this hellscape ceases.”

I stepped between Gordon and Cameron, facing the site foreman. “I need to speak to Gordon alone. Could you be so kind as to give us a moment?”

A spattering of rain bled down the big man’s hard face, and for all the heat coloring his cheeks, I’m surprised the water didn’t steam against his skin. “I won’t be far.”

With that, he stalked away, leaving me, Freya, and Gordon alone.

Once more, I wiped my hands on my pants without thought, collecting a layer of mud on my palm for the effort. “Gordon, I’m not here to point fingers or make any accusations. I’m here to collect evidence. To hear testimonies. Consider all sides. And I’m extremely interested in hearing yours. Why were you on the shore last night? Why were you on site this morning?”

He watched the foreman walking away. “Like Cameron said, I’m behind it all.” The confession held little weight and no passion—a throwaway statement to appease my curiosity and free himself of my presence.

In his mind, I would probably take his confession to the police. They would question him, find him innocent after some hard questions and investigative work, and then set him free.

A waste of my time, the local constabulary’s time, and Gordon’s time.

“You’re behind it all,” I said, shifting my tactic to agreement. Cameron had tried combativeness, and the strategy had failed. I opted to take Gordon’s side. “So, why were you on the shore last night?”

Freya, without the proper training, chimed in with a leading question. “Were you controlling Nessie?”

Gordon coughed a low laugh. “Controlling Nessie? Like, what? Some kind of druid or witch?” He sucked on his cheek for a moment, then nodded. “Yeah. You know what? That’s exactly what happened. I’m controlling Nessie through magic.”

I went along with his charade for the moment. “Then why were you on the site this morning?”

“To lay out more curses on the place.”

“What do you know about Brett Barker’s financial situation in regards to his project?”

Gordon shifted his irked attention to me. “He’s about broke. Any small mishap could send him over the edge. Without money, he can’t continue to build. He can’t develop. So, he abandons the project, recoups what he can, and skips town. Good riddance to him, too.”

That admission actually shed some light onto the matter.

If Gordon had orchestrated the vandalism, he did so knowing his actions would hamstring Brett’s efforts to continue building.

Maybe I had interpreted his confession incorrectly.

“Am I done now?” Gordon curled his lip, impatience turning his face sour.

I glanced at Freya, who looked back at me with a blank expression. She didn’t have any more questions for him.

Neither did I. Or maybe my state of discomfort, soaked and freezing, played a role in my desire to leave the muddy site and head back to the hotel for a hot shower. “We’re done. But, Gordon.”

“Yeah?”

“Stay on your side of the fence.” I meant the warning to come off as friendly, as cautionary advice. I didn’t want to see Gordon, or anyone else, hurt by whatever strangeness plagued the development.

He flinched, though, as if struck by my words. From the look in his eyes, I knew he had taken my sentiment as a threat. And I knew he now saw me as having sided with my client in this matter. Him pitted against me, him seeing me as his enemy could further complicate an already unfocused investigation.

Invasion. Friday, January 3rd. 1437hrs.

The room Tempest had reserved for Freya and me was small, paneled with wood on the lower half and terrible wallpaper on the upper half. A window overlooked the gothic landscape of Scotland. A bed lay on the small square footage of floor, which spilled into a bathroom fit with a small sink, a small toilet, and an impossibly small shower.

That was where I stood—a giant squeezing into a tiny square. The faucet went to my shoulder blades, spraying scalding hot water against my back. I had stood there for a time, acclimating to the temperature, gradually increasing the heat every few minutes. Steam filled the bathroom and breathed out into the entryway.

My thoughts wrestled with the investigation.

I thought of Brett Barker. He could’ve orchestrated everything to escape the construction costs without losing a dime by making an insurance claim. Or he could have planned all this commotion to generate attention and buzz for when the resort opened. Hiring me, contacting the police, going through the motions only served to paint him in an innocent light.

Then there was Gordon Lively. I didn’t know what to make of him. His ideology directly opposed Brett’s. Where he wished to preserve, Brett envisioned progress and profit. To complicate his presence in the case, I had seen Gordon last night after the Nessie attack, and Cameron had spotted him this morning at the construction site. When questioned about his appearance in either location, he provided a confession—one that rang hollow to me.

So, was he hiding something? Protecting someone?

Or, quite possibly, he didn’t want my investigation to go anywhere, so he riddled my path with roadblocks. With the Loch Ness Monster still a monster, with the curse a curse, he had more weapons to wield in his fight against Brett.

Then there were the construction workers, those who silently loathed the development but needed to work for a pay check.

I turned off the water and stepped out of the stall. Steam curled around me as I dried my body. With the towel wrapped around my waist, I entered the bed area.

Freya lay tangled in the sheets. A bare leg stretched across the bed. “I thought about joining you. Took off all my clothes and everything. Then I remembered there’s probably not enough space for the both of us.”

“Seems like there’s plenty of room in that bed.”

“Seems like it.”

After decompressing, I sat against the headboard and rewatched the footage I took of Nessie the night before. Though I had watched it around a dozen times last night, my mind was still on that boat, in that frigid water.

As I replayed the video in bed, with a day of separation from the incident, I saw everything from a brand-new light, with the clarity of distance and time.

“I know it’s not quite dinner yet, but we missed lunch, and I’m starving.” Freya played footsies with me. “Want to grab some food?”

I leaned forward, squinting for a clearer look. “Check this out.”

“What is it?”

“Nessie.”

Freya leaned over, her warm skin like heaven against mine. “What am I looking at?”

I rewound a few seconds and played the video from when Nessie emerged from the water. “See her neck? See how stiff it is?”

“I can relate. I still haven’t recovered from sleeping on the cot.” She massaged her neck to emphasize her point.

“Do you see how it moves? Almost mechanical, right?”

“It does look jerky.”

“Look at the jaw,” I said. “There’s no flexibility in that, or in the neck.” I stuck a thumb between my teeth and chewed, contemplating what I saw.

“You know what the neck almost looks like?” Freya asked.

“What?”

“Like the arm of a backhoe, or an excavator.”

I tilted my head, studying the movement further. She wasn’t wrong. But how would someone get something that unwieldy and heavy and non-amphibious into the water?

I didn’t have that answer, but I had another.

Clicking my phone’s screen off, I turned to Freya, kissing her on the forehead. “Let’s grab some food.”

We dressed, me donning the last clean outfit I had packed, and walked through the town of Inverness.

The January air brushed against our faces as we stepped out from the warmth of our cozy room into the quiet streets. Evening had already settled. The cobblestones, slick from the earlier drizzle, shimmered faintly under the golden glow of the wrought iron street lamps.

Walking hand in hand, Freya and I wandered leisurely along the River Ness. The dark waters mirrored the city’s lights, and rippling constellations danced with the current.

We turned onto Church Street. Quaint storefronts were decorated with lingering holiday garlands and twinkling lights. A few locals hurried along, bundled against the chill.

One caught Freya’s attention. “August.” She released my hand and grabbed my arm, leaning into me. “He’s here.”

“Who?”

“That guy.”

I followed her gaze and saw immediately who she meant. The man with the long coat, low hat, and cigarette. He stood across the street, using a storefront as a footrest. A cigarette burned orange on his lips, and white smoke plumed before his face.

“Why’s he here?” Freya asked.

I ran my tongue around my gums, debating if I should confront him right then and there. The decision was easy. “Wait here.”

“What? No.”

I stepped onto the street, my attention locked on the man.

A blaring, sudden horn, followed by a rush of exhaust and wind, rooted me in place. A delivery truck raced by, missing me by a whisper. I stepped back onto the sidewalk, allowing my nerves to settle.

When I glanced up, the man had vanished.

We reached the restaurant’s doorway, the windows glowing, and we stepped inside.

We enjoyed a candlelit meal.

The flame’s halo burned against Freya’s face, casting dancing shadows across her skin. Her blue eyes stood in contrast to the orange fire, and they caught ablaze, and her look burned me to my soul.

For a moment, I felt like Icarus, flying so high that the sun burned my wings.

What had I done to deserve her?

“What are you thinking about?” she asked.

I blinked, offered a smile, reached across the table and held her hands in mine. “When this trip ends.”

“What about it?”

“How I’ll feel.”

“You’re already drawing conclusions?”

I nodded.

“Well, keep your thoughts to yourself until that time.”

I squeezed her hands. My phone vibrated in my pocket, and I wanted to resist the urge to read the message. However, I offered her a decompressed smile and released her grip, retrieving my phone.

Guilt burned through me. “I’m sorry about this, but I’m here for work.”

“You don’t have to explain yourself. I know this. Do your thing.”

I opened the message from Brett Barker. He had shared the security footage of Nessie assaulting his bulldozer. After I viewed the video once, I looked at Freya. “Come watch this.”

She rounded the table and squatted beside me. Her dangling hair tickled my face. “What is it?”

“Security footage.”

I tapped the screen, and the recording played.

We had watched it earlier on his computer, but now we observed with intelligent eyes, comparing the video to the one I had taken. Sure enough, the monsters in each recording aligned. The body remained submerged in the water, but the neck reached forward, extending like the stretching of an excavator arm. The jaws mechanically opened and clamped around the bulldozer parked just within reach.

However, despite the odd, jerky movements, the neck and head were, by all appearances, real. The monster had eyes and nostrils, a tongue and teeth.

There in the restaurant, Freya crouched beside me where I sat, and we watched the video a half-dozen more times, our food cooling on the table.

Eventually, we ate and paid the bill, then made the long walk back to the room.

A couple hours later, the pillow swallowed my head, and the mattress leached onto me, refusing to let me go. The past two days had proven taxing, and my body melted into the idea of rest.

Freya attempted to read—she enjoyed smutty romance and Ernest Hemingway—but sleep dragged her into its prison. Her e-reader slunk onto her chest. Her arms fell limp.

I relieved her of the book, placing it on the nightstand, and turned off my lamp. Darkness crashed around me.

Despite my reeling thoughts, fatigue weighed heavier, and it pushed me into sleep.

Until my phone clattered on the nightstand, vibrating with an incoming call. My first thought was to ignore it, but I couldn’t.

What if Brett called to inform me of another incident? What if Rupert went on the loch again and saw something new?

But Maya’s name flashed across my screen.

I almost silenced the call and returned my phone to the nightstand. The clock showed a little past one, though. Had she forgotten the time difference? Knowing her, unlikely. She didn’t forget much.

So, why call me so late?

At the last second, I swept my feet off the bed and padded out of the room into the hallway. Her call went to voicemail, but I called her back as soon as the door closed behind me. I didn’t want our conversation to wake Freya.

“Hey,” she answered, completely unaware, as was I, at the time, that her untimely call would save mine and Freya’s lives. “How’s the case coming along?”

“You know it’s one in the morning here, right?”

“Yeah, and? Since when do you sleep? I thought you had insomnia, or something like that. That you work all hours of the night. That you’re Batman.” She spoke the last in a gruff, Christian Bale voice.

“Hold on.”

There were other doors leading to other rooms in the hallway, and my voice felt loud in the tight corridor. I navigated to the elevators, wearing nothing but shorts, and I sat on a cushioned bench placed before a window overlooking Loch Ness.

“You there?” I asked.

“I’m here.”

I updated her on the case, painting a picture of my suspects, my suspicions, and my findings. Truth be told, it didn’t take too long to debrief her. I hadn’t uncovered too much information.

“And you’re thinking that Nessie is some kind of fake? A machine, or something?”

“That’s my best guess. She doesn’t move naturally.”

“She’s not natural, but supernatural.”

I rolled my eyes.

“Freya okay?” Maya asked. “After falling into the water?”

“She’s tough.”

“So I hear.” A moment passed. “Send me those videos of Nessie. I’ll look at them and give you my thoughts.”

“Right now?”

“You doing anything else?”

Sleep called to me. Under any other circumstance, I would’ve ignored the temptation. The prospect of working the case, of hearing Maya’s opinion, would’ve energized me. But I missed the warmth of Freya’s body beside mine. I missed the smell of her hair.

“I’ll send you the videos, but take your time watching them. We’ll discuss your observations tomorrow, because I’m going back to bed now.”

After ending the call, I took a second to shoot over the video I had recorded and the one Brett had saved from his security camera. Then, I silenced my phone and padded back to the room.

When I opened the door, I froze.

Something felt off.

The air displaced. A stench that didn’t belong.

Darkness reigned, and I had trouble seeing much of anything—the closed blackout curtains didn’t help. However, I didn’t care to turn on a light and risk waking Freya. Instead, I tapped my phone’s flashlight on, illuminating a swath in a pale-white glow.

I quietly closed the door behind me and waded deeper into the small room.

That’s when I saw him—the man in the long coat and low hat, a cigarette glued to his lip. He was in our room, a room now bedazzled with chaos. Clothes strewn about. A chair toppled. The television facedown on the floor, having fallen from a dresser.

He had his gloved hands wrapped tightly around Freya’s throat.

She gasped, her breath weak and harsh.

All that registered in nanoseconds.

I acted without thinking. The hand holding my phone shot forward, and I chucked the phone, throwing a fastball. The device connected square in the man’s shoulder. He flinched from the impact.

I followed the flying phone, moving as fast as I’ve ever moved. Fred would’ve applauded my tackling form as I lifted the man off the ground and slammed him into and half through the wall.

The force pulled him from Freya.

She scrambled to the other side of the bed, heaving for air. Somehow, she kept her wits, though, and she grabbed her phone, calling the police.

The man and I wrestled on the ground. I was bigger and stronger, but he was like holding a snake. He writhed and snapped, and somehow he slithered away from me, breaking free with a heel kick to my face.

My head whiplashed against the wall. Stars burned across my out-of-focus vision.

The door creaked open, slammed shut.

Freya appeared above me, cursing under her ragged breath, her voice hoarse. “You’re bleeding everywhere. Did he break your nose?”

I was, too. Blood gushed from my nose, puddling in my lap and soaking my shorts. In a nasally tone, I responded, “Freya, he was trying to kill you.”

Her fingers graced her neck, which already bore the bruises of his hands. She skittered away from me and clicked on the bedroom light. Then she marched to her overturned purse and sifted through the detritus.

After a moment, she turned to me. “He stole my invitation to the will reading.”

The Reading. Saturday, January 4th. 0937hrs.

Our ride share’s tires crunched along the winding gravel driveway leading to the grand estate perched above the dark waters of Loch Ness. Huxley Castle was not the towering, battlemented fortress of old, but a stone manor with pitched roofs, weathered turrets, and ivy spreading along its walls. Rolling gardens stretched toward a pond.

Freya rested her head on my shoulder as we rolled forward. The light pressure and gentle warmth of her against me were enough to shape me into a diamond.

We hadn’t slept last night after the incident, and she tried to steal a little rest before attending the will reading.

I made no such attempt. Though my eyes were heavy, my head thick with exhaustion, a sharp-edged energy held me upright, kept me focused.

Ten minutes after the man had escaped our room, the cops arrived. We told and retold our story to them a half-dozen times. When I had a moment, I stepped away and called Tempest Michaels—despite the absurd hour. He answered, though, and I updated him on the situation.

After a brief conversation, I convinced him that Freya and I would be okay, though I couldn’t persuade him not to come out to Scotland.

“Though I’m not likely to arrive until late Saturday night, or early Sunday.”

After ending the call, I considered calling Maya and updating her on what had happened—on thanking her for saving our lives. If she hadn’t called me, and if I hadn’t stepped out of the room, Freya and I would’ve both been asleep when the assassin attacked.

But I had pocketed my cell phone to return to Freya. To be with her.

The car came to a stop in the gravel driveway.

Freya, not truly asleep but merely resting her eyes, sat straight and pawed at her face.

We stepped from the car. The outside air was cool—the stint of sunshine found unproven against the Scottish winter. Rain and wind swirled around us, kicking up a thick scent of damp earth.

We strolled forward, braced against the weather, and walked up the front entry steps.

The heavy oak doors groaned as they opened.

In the entry hall, a chandelier of wrought iron hung from the rafters. Stone walls were adorned with faded tapestries and portraits whose eyes seemed to watch us.

A gaunt man with a sharp gaze stood at the door, holding a wiry smile. His beady eyes lingered on me, likely on my bruised face where the assassin’s foot had made a lingering impact.  “Welcome to Huxley Castle. I’m Bernard Schaefer. Everyone calls me Bernie, though. Can I take your coats?”

Freya shyly shook her head.

I offered a flat, passionless smile. “Thank you, but I’ll keep mine.”

“As you will,” Bernie said, sliding by to close the door. “Do you have an invitation?”

Freya swallowed. “I... it was stolen. Last night.”

Bernie frowned. “Stolen?”

Her hands touched the bruises around her neck.

Bernie’s sunken face darkened. “I see, and I’m sorry. You must be Ms. Freya Wilkins?”

She remained stiff, her jaw tense. After a moment, she raised her purse, fumbled through the contents, and offered her passport to the man. “I am.”

“Well, I’m sure the solicitor will understand your situation, Ms. Wilkins.” He returned her ID. “Please, follow me.”

We walked past a grand staircase and down a narrow passage lined with bookshelves.

As we made our way through the castle, the high ceilings and the stone walls and the expansive, labyrinthine passages made me feel small. Though I had anticipated a castle to be sprawling, the sheer size still astounded me. That came in part from the abandonment of the place. We passed by rooms absent of furniture, or with tattered sheets covering the furnishings.

The portraits of bitter old men and stoic old women watched our progress as we dove deeper into the bowels of the manor. Everything was empty, quiet aside from the echoing of our footfalls. No staff, beyond Bernie, and no sight of anyone beyond Freya and me.

I leaned over, lowering my voice so only Freya could hear me. “I feel like I’m in a castle from a horror story. Have you ever read Shirley Jackson?”

She nodded her head.

At the end of the corridor, Bernie pushed open a wooden door, revealing a private reading room absent of anyone else. An oak table sat at its center, its surface scattered with documents. Velvet drapes were drawn partially aside, offering a glimpse of the loch through tall, narrow windows.

The man cleared his throat. “The solicitor will be with you shortly. I’m going to grab refreshments from the cellar in the kitchen.” He stepped away, leaving us alone.

I slipped further into the room, toward the window, and I stared at the loch, curious if Nessie would breach the surface. “You’re an heir to all this?”

She shook her head. “I guess so.”

I glanced over my shoulder at Freya. She hugged herself, standing where Bernie had left her, looking alone and cold and afraid.

Stepping to her, I held her close so she knew I was there, present and available. “You didn’t know Malcolm Huxley or his son?”

“I never even heard of them until recently.”

“Are you the only surviving family of theirs?”

“I don’t know. I just... I received a letter.” She chuckled, though it felt like an intentional act to buy herself time, to gather her thoughts. “I thought it was a scam and tossed it. Then I received a phone call, and an email, and another letter. I didn’t answer the call, obviously, but I read the email, which had an outgoing link. Again, thinking it was a scam, I didn’t click that, either. But the contents of the messages all shared the same details. So I Googled Lord Malcolm Huxley.”

I had Googled him, too, during a stint on the train after Freya’s papers had spilled and I learned the name.

Lord Malcolm Huxley, the title received through birthright alone, built his eight-figure fortune on the back of a construction equipment brand. He was the only child of parents without siblings. The Huxley family tree was stunted and clipped. Freya, a distant relative, was nothing but a sapling—a growth part of the tree, but separated from the trunk.

“After Lord Malcolm Huxley passed from natural causes,” Freya said, repeating the same information I had read a few days ago, “his son, Lord Malcolm Huxley the Third, who stood in line to receive his father’s entire estate, washed ashore on the banks of Loch Ness, having drowned.”

“And you’re related how?”

“According to the letters and messages, Lord Huxley’s—the father, not the son—grandpa had a brother, who had a son. My dad.” She shrugged. “My dad was an only child, as am I.” She looked behind her at the closed door, then around the room vacant of anyone but us. “Apparently, I’m the last remaining heir in the Huxley line.”

I returned my gaze to the window riddled with raindrops. The gardens gave way to a cliffside, which plummeted to the loch’s dark waters. I thought of the assassin last night, of the falling lumber yesterday. “This is yours, then? All of it?”

She shrugged. “Possibly. We’ll have to hear what the solicitor reads.”

On cue, knuckles rapped on the closed door. A moment later, the old hinges creaked. A man made of all stomach and hair, except for any on his head, waddled into the room. He carried a black leather briefcase with gold latches and wore a cheap suit that fit him too loose in the shoulders, too tight in the torso.

He rumbled forward without a word of acknowledgment, working his way to the large desk, looping behind it, and plopping onto the crimson-colored chair. The briefcase slammed onto the desk, sending loose documents fluttering like shed feathers.

As he worked the gold buckles, he cleared his throat, and his jowls wobbled. “I am Stewart Mullen, the Huxley family solicitor.” He looked up, his forehead damp, though I wasn’t sure if that came from the rain outside or personal perspiration. “Freya Wilkins?”

She drifted forward a couple of feet, extending her passport. “Hi.”

“Who’s he?”

“August.”

Stewart scowled. “Husband?”

“No.”

“Obviously not a brother. I would’ve learned of him sooner.”

“No. A...” She trailed off and looked at me.

Though we had dated for a few months, this trip was the catalyst to defining our relationship.

What were we to each other? Boyfriend and girlfriend? Less? More?

“I see.” Stewart didn’t need further explanation. “Well, since he’s not on our invitation list, he can’t stand present during this reading.” He turned to me, boredom dripping from his face. “Sir, could you please step outside during the extent of this reading?”

I glanced at Freya, seeking her permission. If she didn’t want me to leave, I would stay.

She licked her lips, her hand glued to her neck—maybe keeping a touch on her lingering pain, maybe a poor attempt to disguise her bruises. Her eyes flicked to the solicitor. “Will it only be you and me in here?”

“No.”

“Is there more family we’re waiting for?”

Hurried footsteps stamped on the ground, hustling toward us.

Bernie appeared with a pitcher of iced water, a bottle of scotch, and three empty glasses. “Apologies,” he said, slightly out of breath. The butler placed the tray on a cabinet set against the wall opposite the window. “I can’t help myself. Water, or scotch, if you please.”

The solicitor offered a slimy grin. “Now everyone is here.”

Freya studied the solicitor, turned her assessing gaze to the butler. “He’s family?”

“Oh, no, no, no.” Bernie coughed into his arm. “I’ve been with the Huxley family for over forty years now.” He scratched at his forehead, his pale skin reddening under the attention. “And, well—”

“He received an invitation to the reading,” Stewart interrupted. “Now, Freya, once your paramour leaves, we can begin.”

Again, I held her attention. “Are you okay? I’ll stay if you wish. I don’t care what they say.”

She shook her head. “I’ll text you when I’m finished.”

Before leaving the room—the attempted murder from last night still bright in my mind—I shot a hard look at Bernie and Stewart.

Freya must have sensed my hesitation. “Gus, I’ll be okay.”

Still, I couldn’t shake the memory of last night. I crossed to her and leaned forward, kissing her cheek. In a low voice, I whispered, “There’s pepper spray in your purse. Keep your hand on the canister. If either one of these men tries something, spray them, scream, and run.”

“I’ll be okay. Explore our new home. This might take a while.”

I hated to leave her. It took every ounce of my will and strength to close that door behind me. But I closed the door.

Exploration. Saturday, January 4th. 1003hrs.

As I waited in the hallway full of old, gold-framed photographs covered in dust, my instincts split in two directions. The protective half of me demanded I anchor myself just outside the door, staying near and alert in case something went wrong inside the room. But the more curious part of my nature sat on my left shoulder and spoke temptation into my ear.

What had Freya said before asking me to leave?

Explore our new home.

At first, I had understood the sentiment as sarcasm. But what if she had prompted me to meander and investigate, to pick up clues and evidence, to learn more about the Huxley family than Google had allowed?

I raked my fingers through my hair, wanting to satisfy my inquisitiveness, but unable to shake what had happened last night. What if they planned to hurt her? Why would they? What did either man have to gain? Neither of them were family.

Then my phone rang.

Reactively, I wandered forward, separating myself from the closed door. No need to interfere with their meeting as I spoke to—

I glanced at the screen.

Fred.

I had to take the call no matter what. Though I had snuck away from the office in Sacramento, Fred remained stationed at his desk, fielding requests from potential clients.

But, then again, it was two in the morning in Sacramento.

“Fred,” I answered, worry knotting my stomach. The big man loved three things in life: his incredible wife, food, and sleep. If he were awake at two, something had to be wrong. “What’s going on?”

“Gussy!” His voice was loud but sticky. “Say hi.”

“Hi?”

“No, not you. Rachel, Jake! Say hi! Adam!”

A chorus of hellos rattled through the phone, voices syrupy with alcohol.

I frowned, confused why Fred would be out with my sister, who had a two-month-old baby, her husband, and my little brother. “Where are you?”

“Your mom’s house!” He guffawed. “But seriously. Oh, look. Here’s Daphne. Babe, say hi to Gussy.”

Static blew through the phone, then the line went clear. “August?” Daphne asked.

“Hey, Daph.” In my communication with Fred, I had wandered my way through a kitchen and out a back door, stepping into the cold morning.

She sighed. “I’m sorry about that idiot.”

“Is he drunk?”

“Yes.” The confirmation came with annoyance in her voice.

“What’s the occasion?”

“Jake’s brother’s birthday. Your mom offered to throw the party at her house. She’s drunk. Your dad’s drunk. Fred, Jake, Rachel—all drunk.”

“Where’s Jane?” I asked, worried about my infant niece.

“Asleep in the nursery your mom put together in her house. Rachel didn’t start taking shots until Jane went down.”

I turned my palms skyward, perplexed. “And what if something happens? Is anyone sober enough to respond?”

“Yes. Me. Alina is here too, with Rhett. They’re both sober.”

I exhaled, feeling my body’s tension bleed out.

“How’s it going in Scotland?” Daphne asked.

“You talk to Maya?”

“Me? No. Fred did, though. He grilled her. She filled us in on what she knew, which was relatively little.”

I braved the wet weather, venturing onto the estate grounds. The lawn was soft, squishy underfoot, but I made my way to the cliffside overlooking the loch. “Investigating Nessie. Just another day.”

Daphne chuckled lightly—a sound of agreement.

“How’s the office? Any leads?” I asked, turning along a gravel pathway and following the trail on the outskirts of the property.

“Fred doesn’t talk too much about work when he’s at home, not unless I ask. But we’ve been busy at PhilanthroPub, and, well, I haven’t asked.”

A force of pride filled me. Daphne had always dreamed of owning and running a food truck. Instead, she had found herself operating a pub in Sacramento. A large percentage of the proceeds were funneled into community programs for underprivileged youth, and she often served the unhoused population free meals. Five-star meals, I might add. Daphne was a world-class chef.

The pathway I followed forked—one direction leading further along the perimeter of the property, following the cliff’s edge, the other veering back toward the manor from an oblique angle.

I opted to head back toward the manor, not caring to distance myself further from Freya.

“I’m so excited for you guys,” I said, responding to her restaurant’s increasing popularity. “For you specifically.”

“Thank you. And I’m excited for you. I hear Freya flew out to visit.”

“She did.”

“Were you surprised?”

“Stunned.”

Daphne’s laugh was like the purring of a cat. “How’s that going? Her being there, while you perform an investigation?”

The gravel walkway forked again. One direction led toward the gardens I had come from. The other narrowed, the rock bedding giving way to mud, and it led toward an old garden shed the size of a two-car garage. Fresh bootprints appeared on the wet ground and led into the shed. But they didn’t leave.

I frowned, staring at the one-way trek.

“August?” Daphne asked. “You there?”

“Hey. Yeah. What did you ask?”

“How’s it going with Freya?”

“Great. She’s great. Hey, Daph, I’m going to call you back. Something just came up.”

Before she could offer a goodbye, I hung up the phone and padded through the mud toward the shed.

The structure was made of brick overlaid with moss. The door had a padlock left open, hooked through the latch, which confused me further. A pair of fresh footprints marched into the garden shed. There weren’t any matching tracks leaving the structure.

“How did they get the deadbolt on?” I mumbled. The question didn’t require a genius to answer, just a little critical thinking.

Someone had entered the shed.

Another someone had come along, saw the deadbolt removed from the latch, and had secured it.

I stitched my brow together. “That doesn’t make any sense, either.”

A virus of suspicion spread throughout me. I stuffed a knuckle between my teeth and stared, befuddled.

If someone had entered the shed, and if someone had noticed the deadbolt removed from the door, wouldn’t they have peeked inside to see if there was anyone there?

Also, after they replaced the lock, wouldn’t there be tracks moving away from the shed?

Not so much a critical thinking proposition as an absurdity.

I circled the shed, searching for an explanation—cement, high weeds, gravel, anything that could erase imprints in mud. There was gravel behind the shed, but no door. No one had exited through the back. Weeds grew along the base of the structure, up the brick siding, but not far enough out to swallow any footprints.

“Then why aren’t there more tracks?”

Freya and the reading of the will, the Loch Ness Monster and Brett Barker’s development all fled my mind. The conundrum of the absent tracks absorbed my attention. My interest. And I didn’t need a key to discover my answers.

The deadbolt was opened, hooked through the steel latch.

My bootprints intermingled with those already stamped in the mud.

I removed the securement and rolled the door open.

Thunder rumbled across the cloud-heavy sky—a distant battle of the gods.

I exhaled and stepped through the bay door into the oversized garden shed.

Despite the antique fashion of the exterior, the interior was lined with modernity. The shelves were clean, at least for the standards of an equipment shed, and they held battery-powered tools. A row of 56v lithium-ion batteries sat ready to power any of the equipment—lawn mowers, trimmers, blowers, hedgers, and chainsaws. Smaller tools piled inside canvas carry bags. There were dozens of paint buckets. Bags of seed and mulch, enough to cover acres’ worth of lawn.

In short, I had found myself in a toolshed built to house the equipment that maintained an estate.

There was also a pair of muddy boots—one stood upright, and the other toppled, as if someone had tossed them into the corner. I knelt beside them, tapping my index finger against my lower lip.

They seemed out of place.

The interior of the shed was nothing short of immaculate. Except for the boots. Except for the mud broken and spread around them. To me, a skeptic, it seemed as if someone had spent a lot of time cleaning the outpost building, then, in a hurry—or as an afterthought—tossed in the boots.

The mud seemed out of place.

I moved forward a foot and leaned over, shining the flashlight on my phone over the boots. My heart about dropped into my stomach. A heat washed over me, somehow making me colder than anything.

Blood covered the boots, had soaked into the light-brown material.

“Strange.”

Blood on the discarded boots was strange, but my mind remained fixated on the lack of prints leaving the shed.

It was almost as if whoever had last entered hadn’t left.

More alert, more focused, I stood. Using my phone’s flashlight as a guide, I exhaled light into every corner suffocated by darkness.

Then, I nearly suffered cardiac arrest from fright.

A voice like thunder boomed from behind me. “August.”

It took a second for me to register the familiar edges of that voice, took longer for my nerves to settle. I turned.

Freya stood framed in the yawning opening of the shed, the violent sky and the wet gardens and the dark loch stretched out behind her. “What are you doing in here?”

“Just,” I clicked off the flashlight, “exploring.”

What else could I say? I saw a set of tracks moving in a singular direction. I investigated.

With her scrutinizing gaze on me, my suspicions felt so unfounded. Even the blood on the boots seemed less nefarious and more accidental.

Freya frowned. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

“How did it go?”

“I’m ready to leave. I called a ride, and they’ll be here in three minutes. You coming with me?”

It was a rhetorical question. Of course I was going with her.

“You okay?” I asked, sensing that Freya seemed on edge.

“I’ll be fine.”

“You want to talk about it?”

She shook her head and stared at the floor. “Not here.”

I padded toward her, wrapped her in a hug, inhaled the scent of the motel-grade shampoo in her hair. “Let’s go, then.”

The rain slanted into us as we exited the tool shed. I took a second to reestablish the deadbolt, keeping it unlocked but securing the rolling door to the latch as I had found it.

Freya continued ahead, but I paused, lingering a moment to stare at the fresh, departing footprints she had left behind.

The thought came to me again:

Whoever had entered that shed hadn’t left.

I shivered, then caught up to Freya.

Return to the Loch. Saturday, January 4th. 1216hrs.

Freya and I sat across a table from each other, our lunch plates cleared. An instrumental melody swept through the café, intermingling with the hushed conversations of the other patrons. In comparison, we hadn’t said much.

The ride to the café had been laced in aggressive percussion from the driver’s music selection, filled with the lead singer’s screaming, indecipherable lyrics.

Words still eluded me, as my mind couldn’t shift from the garden shed. Freya chewed her lip and stared out the rain-pocked window.

In the café, we had exchanged a few words, placed our orders, and eaten.

Only when the server cleared our table, and nothing stood between Freya and me but an empty surface, did my thoughts drain and focus clearly on her. Her hair was frizzy from the rain, her skin blotched with rash. But her sharp blue eyes conveyed all of her—bright, intelligent, keen. They emanated a pure energy and possessed a gravity, a magnetism, that drew me in.

“What?” she asked.

Her question caught me by surprise. “Huh?”

“You’re staring at me.”

“You’re beautiful.”

“I’m a mess.”

“A beautiful mess.”

That elicited a disbelieving eye roll and a soft laugh.

“You ready to talk?” I asked. “No pressure, but I’m here if you want to.”

She rubbed her neck and exhaled. “There was one surviving immediate relative to Lord Malcolm Huxley’s fortune. His son, who was found dead a week ago. Through a strange twist of fate…” She trailed off again, laughing lightly.

Her speechless amusement meant one thing. “You’re a distant relative, but a relative?”

“It doesn’t make sense. How can a family tree be so sparse? Anyway, the will clearly stated the fortune was to remain with family. If no family remained, the fortune would fall into the hands of the next closest person to family.”

I cocked my head and turned my lip over.

“Bernard Schaefer,” she said.

“Bernie the butler?”

“He’s been with the family for decades. He knows the estate, the business. Everything. Already, he’s to receive ownership of the land, the castle, and the construction company.”

And what if Freya wound up dead? What would he receive then?

I wanted to ask what she was in line to inherit, but I withheld. If she wanted to share, she would. Though I doubted that moment would arrive during our time in Scotland. Freya wouldn’t want a hefty monetary delineation to define our relationship. Even though I wouldn’t care if she inherited debt or a hundred million dollars, she might always wonder if I’d chosen to stay for her, or for her money.

Silence consumed us again.

She drank from her water glass. I stared across the café at the barista preparing drinks.

“I’m scared,” Freya said after a moment.

I reached across the table and held her hand in mine. So much probably weighed on her mind—most of all, the collection of recent events that had nearly culminated in her death. Falling into the loch. Avoiding the falling construction material. Surviving the assassin.

Bernard Schaefer was in line to inherit everything if no family remained.

I continued to hold my tongue, even as I held her hand, waiting for her to fill the quietude, if she wished.

Eventually, she strained beneath the weight of her concerns. “What if he’s trying to kill me to inherit everything? I don’t want the... I don’t need it. The inheritance. What they proposed. If I just gifted everything to him, would he leave me alone?”

Freya didn’t have to define who she meant. We both knew she and Bernie were the sole benefactors of the will.

“Whatever you received, it’s yours. You can do with it as you wish.”

Freya lowered her gaze. “But I don’t want to enable his behavior. If I fold, I’ve rewarded him for attempted murder.”

I glanced at the paneled ceiling, exhaling a sigh rather than speaking my mind.

We had absolutely zero proof that Bernie had hired an assassin to kill Freya. Was the timing strange? Very much so. However, correlation didn’t equate to causation. Had we informed cops, they wouldn’t be able to do anything.

Yet, that didn’t make Freya wrong. It definitely didn’t invalidate her fears.

“What do I do?” she asked.

“We tell the police what’s going on. I’m not entirely sure about their procedures out here. They might not be able to do anything at all. But they’ll have the information on record. From there, we stay aware of our surroundings. Once your inheritance processes, whatever assets you received belong to you. After that, he’ll have no reason to hurt you. Not when he has no avenue to the inheritance.”

“Monday.”

I narrowed my eyes. “That’s when it will go through?”

Freya nodded.

We had to survive until Monday.

Twenty minutes later, we climbed the rocky incline to Rupert McLaren’s boathouse. The detour to the castle had allowed me a moment to decompress from my task, though it hadn’t allowed any chance to rest. Between the incident in the hotel, the reading of the will, and the strange phenomenon at the shed, my thoughts played tug-of-war for attention.

Yet, I had to lean toward the case. At least for the moment.

As we ascended the beach to the boathouse, I broached the subject of flying Freya back to Sacramento. She and her son could stay with Fred. I could contact Detective Kyle Vanek of the Sacramento Police Department and have him pull some strings to make sure they had a detail on Freya until Monday. I would even pay for an off-duty officer to take the position.

Freya would hear nothing of my recommendation. “I’m not going anywhere without you. This is where I’m the most safe. With you.”

Having worked in law enforcement, or around it, for all my adult life, my forecast often turned darker. Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.

Ernest, Freya’s young son, crossed my mind.

If Bernard had hired someone to go after Freya, would he try to get to her by getting to Ernest? That wasn’t a question or a concern I could stow away.

Freya only laughed when I brought up the topic. “He’s with my ex-husband, who has served multiple tours as a Marine. Though I hate the man, if I trust Ernie’s safety with anyone, it’s with my ex.”

“Still,” I said, “you should text him just in case. Make sure he’s extra vigilant these next few days.”

“Ah! My friends!” Rupert opened his front door and stepped into the brisk wind and driving rain. He wore nothing but a frayed and stained bathrobe, the hem whipping around his stick-thin ankles. “Welcome, welcome back. Come in. I just finished brewing a pot of fresh coffee.”

He closed the door behind Freya and me. I settled onto the cot where Freya and I had slept two nights ago. Freya sat on the lounge chair, slumping into a slouch.

Rupert poured us coffee, delivered the chipped mugs bearing the stenciling of a cartoonish Nessie, and plopped himself onto a wicker chair at his wobbly table.

He blew on the steaming coffee. “Didn’t know if I’d see you again, though I’m glad you stopped by. Did you learn anything new?”

I sipped and nodded. “Maybe.”

He crossed his leg, preventing any accidental glimpses of what he wore, or didn’t wear, beneath the robe.

“Freya and I believe the Nessie we witnessed is a deception.”

“Deception?” Rupert asked, frowning. “You saw what I saw. You have a recording. How can you deny what emerged before you?”

“Because of that recording,” Freya said. “We watched the video, along with the surveillance footage at the construction site of Nessie destroying a bulldozer. She’s not natural.”

Rupert threw back his head and guffawed. “Natural? My dear, of course she’s not natural. She’s a spirit. Nothing natural about her. The old girl is supernatural.”

I set the coffee mug on the ground. “There’s no fluidity to her movements. She’s jerky. Her neck and jaw are hinged so they move only in one direction.”

“I’m not following.”

“Someone constructed her to appear like what we believe Nessie would look like.” I stood, slipped my phone from my pocket, crossed the room, and pulled up the videos. I handed my phone to Rupert. “Watch, and pay attention to her neck and jaw.”

I tracked his expression as he played the recording, watching as his features went from disbelief to softening like mud. He glanced up at me. “I don’t understand what I’m watching. How would someone begin to construct something like that?”

“I don’t know.”

“Why?”

“That depends on the who,” Freya said.

Rupert curled his lip. “Then who?”

I collected my phone and returned to the cot, taking a seat and enjoying a sip of coffee. “We have a few names, but we’re not certain. That’s why we came back here. We need your help.”

“Help how?”

I smiled behind the mug. “We’re going to set a trap.”

The Trap. Saturday, January 4th. 1457hrs.

I stood, staring out a rain-drenched window covered in algae. “You’re sure about this plan?”

Rupert took too long to respond.

Turning away from the view of the storm-raged loch, I faced Rupert, who remained seated at the kitchen table. He plucked a scraggly strand of gray hair sprouting from his ear, his gray-blue gaze holding me.

“You’re sure?” I asked again.

“Hard to be sure when I believe Nessie isn’t some mechanized creature, but actually exists. So, the plan, based on my belief of the situation, is bound to fail. Which means you’ll probably,” he snapped his fingers to emphasize his next word, “die.”

“Well, let’s pretend I’m right. Does that make you any more optimistic?”

“In terms of success or survival?”

My face went flat. “Is there a difference?”

Rupert waved away my question. “You’re right. I give you...” He glanced upward, clicking his tongue. “I don’t know. If you’re right about everything, a coin flip.”

“Fifty-fifty?”

“More or less.”

“I don’t like those odds,” Freya said. She sat on the lounge chair, shaking her head. “There has to be some other way, right?”

I pivoted again to watch the storm rile up the black waters. Not only did we have to execute our plan, but we had to navigate the weather. Rupert had brushed my concern of the wind and rain aside, as if I’d insulted his ability as a captain.

Freya’s concern wasn’t unfounded. We had cobbled together a strategy in minimal time, working on a hunch more than anything. However, we had no other recourse. We didn’t have any evidence to persuade law enforcement to aid our endeavor. We didn’t have the cash resources to hire a professional team. And we didn’t have the time to dally over details and different options.

Brett Barker had almost depleted his budget. Once that happened, as he’d said, he would cut his losses, collect any insurance he could claim, and not look back.

When that happened, I had a strong feeling Nessie wouldn’t show her face again, and according to Brett, his bankruptcy on the project would happen sooner rather than later.

So, to solve the case, to bring a criminal to justice, we had one coin to flip, and we could only hope it landed on what we called.

My heavy silence answered Freya’s question.

“We’re doing this, then?” she asked.

“We’re doing this.”

Shortly after our decision, Rupert left for town. Using his orating talents, he would plant false information in pubs and cafés to anyone who would listen. Together, we had written the outline of his story, but I doubted he stuck to many of the established details. The content didn’t matter, though, as long as our message remained loud and clear.

We fabricated a story that Brett Barker had received funding from another investor. To prevent any more unwanted attacks on his property and equipment, he would work the land at night, with a hired security team to patrol the perimeter of the site and the shore.

Of course, none of that was true.

However, we wanted the town to believe our fib. We wanted them incensed. Angry. Desperate enough to attempt a third attack.

To sweeten the pot, we also added a fictional research team hired by Brett Barker to hunt and capture the Loch Ness Monster. That idea was more of a shot in the dark on a suspicion. If our culprit used Nessie as their cover, they would likely want the public to believe, or at least consider, the idea that Nessie was real. A research team, fabricated as they were, could help prove the existence of the monster, but only if they caught a glimpse of Nessie.

So Rupert would spread word of a team drawn to the loch. They would come with sonar equipment and underwater drones to capture the creature in 4k. He would describe the research team as eccentric, well-funded, and arrogant. They were the kind of outsiders who would rile the locals and set off anyone with strong feelings about protecting the loch, or preserving the illusion that it held something sacred.

We hoped our imagined team of scientists would conjure the interest of Nessie, either to establish credibility of her existence, or as an enraged reaction. Whatever temptation she stuck her neck out for, it didn’t matter to me. We only needed her to make a public appearance for our plan to kick into action.

As Rupert made his rounds through town, Freya and I collected the equipment we would need, cleaned it, prepared and loaded everything onto Rupert’s boat.

“How do you feel?” Freya asked.

We had settled into the cramped cockpit to ride out a flushing of rain before we finished our last few hauls. The small area provided us a nice shield from the biting wind, but offered little in the way of warmth. Still, we had nothing to complain about. We were dry for the moment and that was saying a lot considering the past few days.

“Honestly?” I asked.

“No. Lie to me.”

“Seriously?”

“Yes, honestly.”

I exhaled a trickle of light amusement. “Well, based on that exchange, not my best.”

“We don’t have to do this, you know?” Freya’s cold hands crawled over the top of mine and rested there.

Incredible, really. She, who had nearly died on three separate occasions in as many days, rested her hand on mine to comfort me. What had Big Ben said about her name? She was the Norse goddess of love, beauty, and war. A name had never fit anyone better. She was full of love and beauty, and constantly fought for those she cared most about, even if it meant sacrificing something of herself.

Though multiple attempts had been taken on her life, Freya somehow found the strength and courage to comfort me in my time of fear.

I turned my hand over, clasping my fingers with hers. Squeezing. Her soft-blue eyes were the preview of a spring sky against the darkness outside the window. “I love you.”

“I thought we were abstaining from those words until after this trip.”

“Why?”

She paused for a moment. “So that we can come up with a—”

“It was never anything I doubted. Never anything I needed to explore. I love you. Not like fire, which can be extinguished or suffocated.” I shook my head and looked out at the loch. “I love you like that. Like those waters. They’re deep, and they’re terrifying, and they’re cold, and they’re violent. But also, they’re calm and beautiful and constant.”

“And filled with monsters?” She leaned into me.

“I mean, what’s a body of water without any monsters?” I leaned toward her.

We kissed. The wind crashed against the cabin, the rain pelted the siding, and a roll of thunder shook me to my bones.

Freya pulled away. “You know, deep and terrifying and cold and violent, those aren’t always bad things.”

I shook my head, the tip of my nose brushing against hers. “They’re often the things that make everything else all worthwhile.”

“You just love me for my money, don’t you?”

“You never said how much you inherited.”

“And I won’t. But I will say this much. I love you, too.” She dropped her voice, the words a whisper in the storm.

We sat in silence for a moment, her head on my shoulder, my hand running through her hair. After a while, when the rain abated and the wind hushed, she broke away from me. A glint of dying sunlight pierced through the foggy glass.

“Back to work?” I asked.

“Heigh-ho, heigh-ho.”

We emerged from our shelter, Freya humming the song to Disney’s classic story. As she carried the tune, I carried the silent fear that the night would end in tragedy.

The Loch Ness Monster. Sunday, January 5th. 0008hrs.

I stood in the cockpit of Loch and Key, half-shielded from the raging waters that assaulted us from every direction. The sky bled. The wind churned the loch into a frenzy, and Rupert’s rickety ship crashed through the walls of rising waves, breaking crests that shattered into droplets like debris.

Despite my somewhat sheltered position, my wetsuit was drenched. Freya and Rupert had no need to wear wetsuits themselves, but the storm rampaged against their clothing. The midnight chill only worsened their condition. Both of them shivered.

Not that I fared much better. Rupert stood six inches shorter than me and weighed seventy pounds less. Though he owned a wetsuit, it didn’t come close to fitting me. With such short notice, we couldn’t secure a 5/4-millimeter skin, a thickness that would defend against the mid-forty-degree water temperature of the loch.

For my size, we had found a 4/3-millimeter suit from a secondhand store, rated for temperatures above fifty degrees. With the storm riling the water and the windchill a detrimental factor, I third- and fourth-guessed the plan and my success at survival.

I stood in the cockpit doorway that didn’t have a door, protecting Freya from the brunt of the storm. She stood in front of me, her blonde hair darkened by water. Strands plastered her face, hanging limply like greasy strips of bacon. She hugged herself tightly and shivered.

The ship lurched violently, slamming hard against the choppy surface. I questioned how long the compromised integrity of this antique boat could endure such a beating.

That night, I questioned a lot about what we had planned.

But Rupert manned the helm and laughed defiantly into the storm, taunting the wind and rain. That skinny, diminutive man was our sole hope of survival, and he stood like a giant against the elements, fearless and resolute.

At one point in our journey, he shook a fist at the raging tempest, howling back at the thunder like he could out voice it. A madman—or a hero. I wasn’t sure which.

We navigated toward the beach leading up to Brett Barker’s construction site, the exact spot where he had seen Nessie a couple of nights before.

“I’ve never been so thankful in my life that I don’t get motion sick,” Freya shouted over the storm.

Neither did I normally, but my stomach roiled, nausea creeping into my head from the relentless rocking of the waves—and from my nerves.

Rupert trawled the area, repeatedly covering the same stretch of water before turning and navigating back the way we had come.

We moved back and forth like that for what felt like an eternity, each of us on edge, waiting for Nessie to appear.

Nearly an hour later, a faint, eerie light flickered beneath the surface of the dark water.

I chewed my lip in silence.

Freya gripped my numb hands, matching my silence.

Only Rupert had the audacity—the reckless nerve—to throw back his head and laugh aloud, his voice slicing boldly through the stormy night. “She’s here, folks! She answered our call, and she’s come to play our games!”

We waited.

The rain hammered against the ship’s deck, against the roof sheltering us. The wind howled, whipping the water into greater chaos.

We waited.

Our trap required perfect timing. Nessie couldn't be too deep beneath the waves, otherwise I would never reach her. Neither could she be close enough to sense our plan.

So, we waited and watched that glowing light beneath the turbulent surface, glimpsing the shadowy silhouette framed by that ghostly illumination—the unmistakable outline of some ancient beast.

Rupert vibrated with excitement, murmuring to himself. His words were indecipherable, yet his tone made his feelings clear—he doubted our strategy because he believed the monster legit, not a hoax.

“Are you ready?” Freya’s voice cut through my thoughts, carrying a light of its own, warm and bright against the darkness and violence of the storm, steady against the uncertainty surrounding us.

Her voice anchored me firmly back in the present moment.

“I’m ready.”

But words weren't enough. I had to act.

So, I pulled Freya toward me, kissing her. For a moment, fire raced through my veins, banishing the bitter cold. Her touch became a hearth, and warmth flooded my body. For that brief, stolen second, I didn't want to move away from her. Yet, I had no choice.

As I reluctantly broke our embrace, the biting chill reclaimed me. The emptiness surged back, freezing as a tundra.

Freya stood just an arm’s length away, yet that short distance felt impossibly vast, the promise of her warmth lingering like a distant dream.

When the job is done. When the job is done.

The phrase repeated itself like a mantra in my head, driving me forward.

I exited the cockpit and steadied myself on the slippery railings as I crossed the deck.

Rupert flicked a switch from his post at the helm, and a powerful floodlight exploded into the darkness, overwhelming the eerie glow beneath the surface.

And in response, Nessie emerged.

Water cascaded off her neck and face. Her eyes burned with an unnatural glow, monstrous and fierce. The storm screamed louder, as if outraged by her presence. She was leviathan reborn, risen from hell's depths, and I was nothing beneath her gaze.

Yet, under the stark glare of the floodlight, her truth stood exposed. Fraudulent. Constructed. A gimmick. But the revelation didn't quell my fears. I stood trembling on the bow of the ship, doubting the next stage of our hastily assembled plan.

We had had only mere hours to prepare and limited resources at our disposal. Scotch tape, glue, and desperate prayers held our strategy together. The weight of uncertainty pressed down, cementing my feet to the deck.

What had we been thinking? Had we really believed ourselves equal to legends, heroes capable of slaying a creature from myth? Were we truly that arrogant?

As if mocking my doubt, a fierce gust of wind struck, slamming rain and icy lake water against my skin. I flinched from the sudden shock of cold.

The floodlight held Nessie motionless.

How long could this standoff last? How long would she remain frozen, allowing us to capture, document, and prove her as a hoax?

I had to act right then, in that exact heartbeat.

Closing my eyes, I climbed onto the railing.

A lot of thoughts could have sprinted through my mind. I had lived a lot of life, and I had loved a lot of people. But as I stared into the darkness of the water, into the violence of the storm, I didn’t think of Fred or Maya or Alina. Aaron Brooks didn’t even touch my mind. I didn’t conjure the faces of my family.

Instead, one name hung clearly in my mind. One face anchored me in the stormy chaos.

Freya.

I didn’t know what the future held for us—not with any level of certainty. But I knew I wanted a future with her. I wanted mornings of hot coffee and trashy novels, and rain on our windows, and Ernest’s toys on the floor, and her head on my chest.

No matter what happened, whether or not we succeeded, I decided at that moment.

I was done with these excursions.

I knew it as surely as I knew water was wet. I felt it with all my heart, with my very soul.

I was finished putting myself in harm's way, done risking my life chasing ghosts. This entire journey had begun because I'd accidentally taken a life. I had become desperate to find some proof of an afterlife so I could reach out and apologize to Aaron Brooks’s soul.

Yet, in this perilous moment, with the cold wind battering my body and certain death lurking below, a simple truth finally crystallized within me.

I didn't need Aaron’s forgiveness.

I needed my own.

And I had already done that.

Not long ago, I had been lost in my own storm, and Freya had rescued me. She had plunged into the depths where I drowned, and she had dragged me to the safety of the sturdy shore.

All those realizations flashed through my mind in mere microseconds.

This was it. The very last time.

After tonight, I would settle down with Freya and her son.

Taking one final breath, I settled my nerve and dove into the water.

Crossing the threshold from air to the liquid depths hit me like a wall of ice, stealing the breath from my lungs. The thin wetsuit did little to combat the incredible chill. Panic seized me as the frigid and thrashing water enveloped my body, and for a terrifying moment, I believed I had gone into shock—that hypothermia had claimed me, and I would sink helplessly to the bottom of the loch.

But with pain came adrenaline, and adrenaline brought heat.

A sudden burst of warmth and energy surged through me, and I opened my eyes beneath the dark water.

The glow emanating from Nessie wasn't ethereal or supernatural at all. The luminescence radiated from lights attached to a submersible vehicle.

Just as we'd suspected, a mechanical arm extended from its hull, breaching the water.

Holding my breath, I kicked and swam toward the underwater vessel costumed as Nessie. A tracking device meant to attach to the hull was tethered to my belt. I had also attached a head camera to document my approach toward the mechanical Loch Ness Monster.

After I placed the tracker on the machine, my lungs began to shrink and simmer, begging for oxygen.

I kicked desperately upward, breaking the surface and gulping for air. Water crashed into my face, shoving me back under.

My entire body had grown numb from the intense cold.

As much as I longed to gather more footage, more evidence for Tempest and the police, I couldn’t withstand the chill any longer. And the weaker I grew, the less likely I could navigate the amplified strength of the loch.

With trembling muscles, I swam toward the boat, fighting against the wind and the chaotic currents. I grasped the cold rung of the ladder that we had lowered in preparation of my dive. My limbs shook uncontrollably as I dragged myself onto the deck. I was a miserable mass of shivering skin and clattering teeth.

Freya was by my side in an instant, wrapping herself around me, draping a blanket across both our shoulders.

Her voice was gentle and warm against my chilled skin. “We need to get you inside the cockpit. Can you move? Please. I need you to get yourself inside.”

She was right. The wind was merciless, rain still battering us without relenting. I had to shield myself from the elements, but I doubted whether I had the strength.

“August, please stand. For me. Please.”

I couldn’t refuse her.

I couldn’t fail her.

Summoning every shred of will and strength I had, and even some I didn’t, I forced myself onto shaking legs. Freya pressed herself against me, her smaller frame supporting my bulk. Somehow, miraculously, she held me upright.

Together, we stumbled into the cabin.

Freya and Rupert helped me into the corner farthest from the open doorway. Towels were already waiting. Without hesitation, Freya stripped away my soaked clothes, rapidly drying me off. She had prepared dry clothing, dressing me before wrapping a fresh, dry blanket around my shivering body. A battery-powered space heater hummed softly nearby, directed at me.

Still, my teeth chattered. My shoulders trembled.

“Is he okay?” Rupert asked.

Freya’s face hovered close, concern heavy in her voice. “August, are you okay?”

I didn’t know if I was or not, but I forced a shaky nod. “I’ll be okay.”

Freya looked over her shoulder toward the open doorway. “Good, because you need to hear this. When you were in the water, I saw someone on the shore. They ran as soon as you dove.”

Fighting through the chills, I found my voice again, urgency returning despite my weakened state. “Take us ashore. There will be tracks. We need to follow them.”

On the Trail. Sunday, January 5th. 0119hrs.

The figure on the shoreline had fled into the forest, and the tracks he left on the shore vanished with him. Though the torrential weather had ebbed, the constant rainfall had washed away any leads.

I had recovered from my dive, but chills thrashed through me every few moments. I plopped down on a large boulder half-buried into the ground and removed my phone, my hands quivering from the cold.

Freya sat beside me. "Did you capture any evidence?"

"Nessie is as we thought. Fake."

Despite the disturbed water lashing against the stony shore and the rain drumming against the ground, despite the agitated wind screeching through the night, despite his inability to hear, Rupert heard me.

From twenty feet away, he navigated the slippery stones to where Freya and I sat. "A fake?"

I turned my phone around, turning the screen to Rupert, not needing to look at what I had documented. I knew what I had seen, what I had recorded.

Rupert's eyes went smaller and smaller as each passing second played on the video. When the recording ended, he dropped into a deep squat and raked his fingers through the wet earth. He said nothing, and that said enough.

I had shattered his illusion—his dream.

That didn't make me feel victorious or proud. I hurt for him, having known how it felt to lose everything I had ever worked for.

"Can I see?" Freya also stared at Rupert, her voice almost stuck in her throat.

I handed her my phone and watched the video from the corner of my eye as she replayed it.

The camera I had held sent a direct feed to an application on my cell phone, which Freya now watched. White bubbles filled the screen for a few seconds, giving way to a liquid darkness pierced by the sharp glow of Nessie beneath the water.

As it turned out, the Loch Ness Monster was nothing more than a submersible equipped with an excavator arm, retrofitted and wrapped to appear, at least in the dark and from a distance, like the mythical creature.

Freya's eyebrows knitted together, and she leaned forward as she brought the phone closer, tapping on the screen, pinching it and spreading her fingers to zoom in on the still. "August."

I angled toward her.

She had zoomed in on blurry letters at the base of the excavator arm, just above where it attached to the submersible.

I squinted, straining to bring the word into focus. "Is that an H?"

"Huxley," she said.

"Huxley?" Then the importance dawned on me. "Huxley! As in Lord Malcolm Huxley?" The family had accrued their wealth through a massive construction equipment business. "Holy smokes."

"Why would Lord Malcolm Huxley want to sabotage Brett Barker's development?"

I shook my head. "Maybe his son did, the one who washed up on shore dead. Or maybe someone commissioned the build, then killed Huxley to cover their tracks." My heart raced, and with the acceleration, a warmth pumped through my veins. "Either way, we need to head back to the estate and ask Bernie the Butler a few questions about his late employers."

Freya turned toward the docked boat rocking on the wake. "If we ride back to Rupert's, that'll take an hour from here. Then we'll have to backtrack this way, either driving or walking, which will take more time."

Her unspoken conclusion didn't go over my head.

As we were, the figure who had fled into the trees toward the Huxley estate had a twenty-minute head start. Though that was a lot of time, it was nothing compared to the two hours we would allow if we returned to Rupert's boathouse.

To have a chance at tracking the figure, we had to go by foot through the mud, braving the treacherous elements of the night.

My body had already accepted enough punishment for the night—the dive and the hypothermic conditions. My limbs felt too heavy and sluggish. The idea of trudging through mucky terrain in a downpour seemed less than wise.

But allowing our possible suspect to escape because of a little discomfort and danger was out of the question.

"You're right," I said after taking a moment to consider our limited options.

"Duh." The moonlight peeked through a dark cloud and caught Freya's smile. She was haunting, but in the most beautiful of ways.

The forested area where we sat lacked cellular service. I turned to Rupert. "Head back to the boathouse and..." I trailed off.

And what?

Call local authorities? What would they do, if anything? We encountered a mechanical Nessie. Then during a storm at night, a hundred yards away, we had spotted a figure on shore. He slipped into the coverage of the trees, moving toward the Huxley estate.

The police would, at best, entertain our report by pretending to take a note.

Without any cell service, I couldn’t send the video evidence to Rupert, either.

So, instead, I gave him my phone and provided the four-number password to unlock the home screen. I exhaled, rainwater misting off my lips. I scrolled to my contacts and showed him Tempest Michaels' number. "When you get back to the boathouse and have service, call him. Then go to the police and show them the video.”

As I spoke, Rupert looked at me. “What do I say?”

“Tell them everything that we learned tonight.” I hardened the edges of my face, hoping the gravity of my expression would bleed through. “Rupert, not a story. The truth. Exactly what we saw. What we recorded.”

The old man nodded.

“Then you tell him where Freya and I went. To the Huxley mansion to follow a…” Again, I allowed my voice to stumble and falter.

To follow a… what? I reshuffled the facts in my head as reported by Freya—a figure a hundred yards away, observed through the panic of our situation, through the driving rain, through the dark of the night. No tracks remained on shore or in the forest where he had supposedly vanished.

We had nothing but Freya's word.

I looked at her. She chewed on a nail and stared into the darkness of the trees.

Did I trust her?

That was the entire point of her surprise visit. For us to test our relationship and decide if we had any momentum to fly back to Sacramento. Well, as we hunched in the rain, rubber met road.

Did I trust her?

“Follow what?” Rupert asked.

“Someone who ran that way. We believe that person is responsible for what's happening. And they're somehow connected to the Huxley estate, as proven by the name on the excavator arm.”

“Then what? What should I have Tempest do?”

I turned over my lip. “You can't have him do anything. But he'll know what to do. Now go. We'll be okay.”

Rupert hesitated, studying Freya for a moment. Then he took a long blink and pivoted, navigating the slick rocks with expert footing back to his boat.

The wind and rain and lapping waves built around Freya and me.

I wanted to ask if she was sure about what she saw. But to what end? We had made our choice.

“You're sure about this?” At first, I feared I had spoken my doubt aloud. Then I realized Freya must have read my mind, asking the question for me.

But when she asked, the answer arrived clear as a sunny day. “I trust you.”

Together we abandoned the shore for the inky darkness of the forested land. Though the trees created a wind barrier, the rain seeped onto the ground, soaking the carpeting of leaves and stones and broken branches. Every uneven step we took proved dangerous. If we succeeded in not tripping, we still risked twisting an ankle or falling.

Freya hugged herself. Though she wore layers of warm clothes, along with a rain jacket, the wet and cold were too much to defeat or prevent.

My recent flirtation with hypothermia had my body on the fritz. I flexed every muscle within me, a desperate attempt to pump blood through my veins.

As we hiked, we said nothing for a long while.

Then Freya stopped on a dime, her stalled momentum causing her to sink slightly into the soft ground. Her shoulders shivered without end.

I stepped beside her. "You okay?"

"Do you smell that?"

Freya, like Maya and Alina, had the nose of a hound. I could hardly distinguish the stench of a public restroom from a candle-scented bathroom. "I don't smell anything. What is it?"

"Smoke."

"Like a fire?"

"Like a cigarette."

My immediate thought was the man we had constantly spotted—the man in the dark cap and dark coat. The man who had broken into our hotel room and attempted to murder Freya.

As the connotations ballooned in my mind, and as I processed how to interpret Freya's observations, a twig broke.

The sound came directly to my right, maybe twenty feet off—distance was an impossible metric in the dark and the rain.

I wheeled in the direction of the sudden noise. My heart beat loud between my ears, or maybe it had lodged itself in my throat, making it difficult for me to breathe.

"I heard that." My voice barely registered above the driving rain.

"He's here."

The cold no longer bothered me. I was tense, adrenaline burning through my veins like a stream of fire racing along a trail of oil.

Behind me, close behind me, mud sucked and slapped as something broke free of its grasp—the proven sound of a boot releasing.

I turned just in time to greet a hand holding a stone.

My face was planet Earth, and that stone was the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs. Though I didn't have enough time to dodge, my reaction allowed me to flinch, to turn my head with the blow. Had I not heard the slurping of mud, I wouldn't have spun around. The strike would've hit me clean in the back of the skull, likely cratering my cranium.

Instead, I only suffered a fist-sized rock straight to the cheekbone.

Pain like a nuclear explosion erupted in my face.

And I dropped into a puddle on the ground, half-dazed. I was conscious and aware, but the rock had shattered the synapses that connected the commands of my brain to the obedience of my limbs.

I blinked.

Time and motion devolved into the flashing, shuddering movements of strobes. A slideshow presentation rather than a live video.

The man in a dark coat and dark hat teleported past me. One moment he stood above me. I blinked. He stood a step nearer to Freya without having taken a single step.

She backpedaled.

I blinked.

She was on her butt in the mud.

I blinked.

The man stood over her, his arm raised high, the wet rock tight in his grasp.

I blinked.

Freya was on her hands and knees, scrambling to stand. The man hunched over, holding his groin, the rock half submerged in the mud between his feet.

I blinked.

Freya stood, holding a stick as thick as my thumb, as long as her arm. She yelled something at the man, though her voice fought a losing battle against the ringing in my ears. The man staggered away, slipping and falling to his knees. He hurried back to his feet and disappeared yet again.

I blinked.

"August." Freya was kneeled beside me, her cold fingers touching the wet warmth on my face. "Hey, August."

"I'm right here." Speaking hurt, and the words I spoke came out thick, as if they were coated in the mud I lay in.

"You're bleeding bad."

"He got away?"

"Not before I introduced my knee to his balls."

I closed my eyes. Exhaustion carried me away like a terrifying current. I didn't have the energy or strength to swim against it, either. All I wanted was to drift into that promised nothingness.

But the assassin was out there.

He had lost the element of surprise, and he had fled.

But he hadn't surrendered.

Once he regrouped, he would return. Freya couldn't be caught tending to me when he came back.

"Help me sit," I said.

With more effort than I believed possible, Freya and I adjusted me into a seated position. The heat in my face made it so I didn't even register the cold mud soaking my pants.

"Rupert is gone," Freya said. Fear unsteadied her tone. "We're out here alone. What do we do?"

Before taking a job as a police officer, I had fought in my fair share of fights. Working in law enforcement left me no stranger to physical altercations. Throughout my life, my nose had been broken a half-dozen times, and I had suffered twice as many concussions. I knew how to take a punch, a hard punch, and keep pushing forward, keep throwing punches myself.

Though the rock to my face wasn't ideal, I had rolled with the blow, lessening the maximum damage. He could've caved in my face. Instead, I was left with a nasty gash, ringing in my ears, and some nausea sloshing in my head and stomach.

I inhaled deeply. "We finish what we started. We head to the estate."

Return to the Estate. Sunday, January 5th. 0157hrs.

The estate sprawled before us as we hid in the tree line, observing the wind-ravaged landscaping and wet stones forming the face of the castle.

After we resumed our trek, we hiked for another thirty minutes, the distance probably a little less than a mile, considering my physical state and the conditions we navigated. I ventured that the assassin, after recovering from Freya’s knee, had separated himself by about ten minutes. That put him anywhere—hiding in a shadow, waiting to spring another trap.

My head throbbed, but my face had gone quite numb. The swelling was so severe, my left eye was nearly forced shut. When Freya looked at me, she visibly shuddered. I didn’t blame her reaction. She wasn’t accustomed to violence of that degree.

“What now?” she asked after a moment of quiet.

I didn’t turn to Freya but stared at the shadowed lawn. “Over there. You see the shed?”

“The one I found you in after the reading?”

“That one.”

“What about it?”

I ran my hand through my wet hair. “There were tools.” The last word stuck on my tongue, for though technically accurate, it was the wrong word. “Weapons.” We needed to better equip ourselves for a fight, especially since we had a shadow gunning for us.

Not only weapons, though. When I investigated the shed, the details had left a sour taste in my mouth—the tracks leading into the shed but not out, the bloody and muddy boots tossed inside the otherwise immaculate structure.

With our newly obtained knowledge about the mechanical Nessie bearing the Huxley name, I wondered if the strangeness of that outbuilding connected somehow. Maybe I was grasping at straws. At that moment, straws were all I had to grasp for.

We skirted the property line, moving deliberately and with caution, careful not to give away our position. Once our cover ended, we lowered our shoulders against the wind and rain and hustled across the stretch of property to the shed.

The door swung outward, and we stepped into the darkness.

I borrowed Freya’s phone from her and shone the flashlight around the interior, highlighting the clean shelves holding an assortment of tools.

“What do we do now?” Freya asked. She stood a pace behind me, her arms wrapped around her body in a self-hug.

“Arm ourselves.”

I thought of Aaron Brooks, the young man I had shot and killed a few years back, and I couldn’t convince myself to reach for a tool that would deal lethal force. Though someone had gunned for Freya and me, had attempted to murder us—her, in particular—on multiple occasions, I couldn’t convince myself to retaliate with equal or greater measure.

A hammer wouldn’t do, nor a saw, nor an axe.

Neither would a shovel.

Freya had no such qualms or moral objections. Using her phone’s light to guide her, she claimed a three-pound sledgehammer about a foot in length.

My stomach curdled as she pressed the flat of the head against her palm, as I imagined the devastation she could enact with such a blunt object.

I found a flashlight with more lumen intensity than my cell phone, an old bottle of spray paint, and an eight-foot length of chain. After wrapping the chain at a diagonal around my shoulder, I turned to Freya and offered her back the phone.

“August.” She bounced on her feet, staring at me. “I’m scared.”

Behind us, the wind slapped the door. The rain ripped against the roof. Lurking somewhere in the darkness hid a man who wanted us dead.

“Me too,” I said, meaning that. I was scared.

My face felt like someone had taken a low-powered, rusted reciprocating saw to it. Every time I blinked, pain simmered behind my eyes. Every word I spoke, agony burst along my jaw. If I took another strike to the face, I wasn’t sure I could handle it. Mentally, maybe. But physically, my body seemed at its outer limits.

Yet, someone hunted us. He had the advantage of likely knowing the terrain, of knowing the estate’s secrets, of taking the offensive. He could remain invisible until the opportune moment presented itself.

Or, more terrifying, what if he had retreated to the estate to retrieve a more effective weapon? A rifle or shotgun? As we shuffled through the darkness, searching for him, he could have had us in his sights, in his crosshairs, with each step we took—just waiting and waiting for the perfect shot.

We should’ve turned tail. At the estate, Freya had some cellular service. We should’ve hailed a ride. Or called the authorities—reported that someone had attacked us and fled toward the Huxley estate.

In retrospect, we should’ve done a lot of things differently.

However, fear warped our judgment. And though I had the necessary experience to combat my fear, to hone it into something useful, the pain—like a supernova in my face—seemed to blind me from rationality.

At least until we stumbled into the shed.

Before we stepped into that dark structure, that was when we should’ve veered in another direction, seeking help from those better equipped to handle the situation. But we were too concerned with protecting ourselves in the moment, and we became short-sighted.

Equipped and armed for battle, I nodded at Freya as she expressed her fears.

I asked for her phone and checked the signal. She didn’t have service. “The metal on the roof could be jamming the signal.” I remembered speaking to Daphne just outside the doors. “I’ll step outside. I know there’s service there. And I’ll call the emergency number, get the police out here.”

“Then what?”

Her question was valid. Even if they responded in record time, the Huxley estate was a drive from town. We would likely have to survive at least twenty minutes before they arrived.

“We wait in here. We’ll barricade the door. I’ll inform dispatch of our plan, so when they arrive, they can announce themselves. Maybe they’ll allow us to establish a code word or something.”

Freya nodded, her wet hair matted across her forehead. “Okay.”

She stood between me and the door. I walked to her, embraced her, and rested my forehead against hers. “I promise you with my life, I’ll get you home to your son. No matter what, you’ll get back to Sacramento.”

“I know. But promise you’ll come back with me.”

“I promise.” The oath croaked off my tongue, barely audible. It was a promise I wasn’t sure I could make, and it broke me to lie to her in that moment. But I figured she needed the comfort.

She must have sensed my hesitancy, or my doubt. Her cold palm touched my inflamed face with a gentleness I could only describe as healing. “Whatever happens, I love you.”

I kissed her forehead.

She tiptoed up and kissed me on the lips.

For the third time in the past week, the second time in the past day, I had a strong, overwhelming urge to just walk away from the case, from my private investigation practice.

I had gone into the business to find evidence of the supernatural, and I had wrung out that excuse for every drop it was worth. But as I had stood on the boat, ready to jump into the depths of the loch, and as I stood holding Freya in that shed, I knew one thing with absolute certainty, something that had slowly made itself recognizable over the past year.

Life wasn’t meant to be lived alone, or in the company of ghosts.

Life was meant for the moment, for the right now, and for the future.

Chasing my past was nothing more than running backward. And a career as a paranormal investigator was structured around the very idea of chasing my past, of hunting ghosts.

But in that moment, I held my now, and I held my future, and I held everything I had ever wanted.

Freya was my fire, my light, my purpose. She was tangible and real.

“Can I tell you something,” I heard myself saying.

“Anything.”

The words came far easier than I ever imagined they would. They came off my mouth like honey, tasting sweet. And they felt right, like my off-kilter existence had just fallen square. “I quit.”

Freya angled back, her face scrunched with confusion. “What do you mean?”

“After tonight, I’m done with Blue Moon. I’m done with investigations.” Daniel Quinn crossed my mind, as did all the other monsters I had brought down. Each of them had threatened me. Some had gone after those I loved, had hurt people I cared for. “There’s no reason for me to constantly put my life, and the lives of those I care most about, in danger.”

“August.”

I shook my head, the motion silencing her. “This job gave me everything I had searched for, and so much more. But it has nothing left to offer but uncertainty and pain and danger.”

“What will you do, then?”

I almost made a joke about enjoying the riches of her inheritance. The timing felt off, though. Instead, I shrugged, and a smile blossomed on my face, fighting through the pain. I had no idea what I would do, but that didn’t concern me in the least. “We’ll figure that out together.”

Though I couldn’t read her mind, it didn’t take a telepath to sense her excitement at my decision. She bounced upward, kissing me hard, forgetting my injury in her zeal.

I hissed as fire raced across my face.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay.” My entire face was molten lava. “Let’s get out of here.”

Without another word, I opened the shed door and stepped back into the storm and the night. The wind hit me like a battering ram, but I pushed forward. The rain stung me like innumerable wasps.

I hunched over Freya’s phone, shielding it from getting wet. Two service bars popped into existence, and I immediately dialed emergency services.

A flat, robotic voice answered. “Emergency. Which service?”

“Police,” I said.

“Thank you. Connecting you now.”

I waited all of three seconds before a sleep-drunk voice came on the line. “Police emergency. Go ahead, caller.”

“I’m at the Huxley Estate. There’s someone trying to attack, possibly kill, me and my girlfriend.”

“Has anyone been injured?”

I nodded. “The attacker hit me in the face with a stone. You should have me on record. August Watson.” I gave her the name of the hotel Freya and I stayed at. “We were attacked last night, too.”

“Is the person an immediate threat now?”

I spun a slow circle, searching for any sign of the assassin. The wind and rain and the darkness did a number toward obscurity, though. I couldn’t see much. Though, I noticed Freya had closed the shed’s door when I exited, likely to keep out the storm.

Wouldn’t she want to keep an eye on me, though? In case something happened?

That singular thought constricted around my chest. She wouldn’t have closed the door.

So who had?

“Sir, are you there?” the police call handler asked.

“I’m here.” I edged back toward the shed, moving as if in a dream.

“Is your attacker an immediate threat now?”

“I don’t know.” My voice was distant, existing on another plane.

“Can you describe your attacker?”

I opened the door and clicked on the flashlight I had taken. The wide beam exposed a shed complete with tools and equipment and materials for managing a sprawling estate. The bloody boots remained toppled near the door. Everything was the same.

Except Freya’s stolen sledgehammer lay on the ground.

And she was gone.

My heart beat in time with the throbbing in my face—a singular percussion keeping time of that dreadful moment.

“Sir?”

“Send someone out here. Now.” I hung up the phone, my focus having narrowed from being saved to needing to find Freya without pause.

The phone buzzed in my hand as they called back, but I clicked it to silent and shoved it in my pocket. I kept replaying what I had discovered yesterday morning while investigating the shed—a set of tracks leading in but not coming back out.

That implication made me dizzy with worry.

Huxley Castle. Sunday, January 5th. 0224hrs.

I stood there for a moment, my flashlight cutting through the darkness, searching for what now seemed so obvious.

The assassin hadn’t snuck into the shed when I spoke on the phone, abducted Freya, and snuck out.

Though it was possible Freya had slipped away, I refused to believe she had stranded me. Unless she was an accomplice to everything happening, why would she sneak away? And she wasn’t an accomplice—at least, I couldn’t convince myself of that alternative.

Someone had taken multiple attempts on her life.

The single set of tracks leading into the shed but not away provided me with the answer—one that I should have realized yesterday morning.

The shed had some kind of tunnel leading into it. A false door or hidden hatch.

That left me with two options: waste time searching for the metaphorical book that would open the revolving door, or charge into the castle and conduct a blind search through the tens of thousands of square footage.

Neither option seemed advantageous.

And each second I wasted was a second not dedicated to saving Freya.

So, I made a gut choice.

I would sprint to the castle and search every room. Wasting time searching for a lever that might not exist from the shed side wasn’t an option. I couldn’t just pull on objects and push on random patches of wall, hoping to get lucky.

Besides, what if a door did open?

If I went through it, the assassin could be lurking just around the corner, waiting for me to rush forward. At least using the castle, I wouldn’t be contained to a singular hallway, walking straight into the killer’s line of fire.

I would have options.

I would be the one doing the hunting.

Or so I convinced myself.

With my nerves firing to the point of numbness, I exited the shed once more and raced across the expanse of yard to the castle.

Not bothering with the front door, knowing it was likely dead bolted, I opted for the window key—a rock found in the planter. I threw the stone through the glass, then used the shaft of my flashlight to clear away the sharp shards that remained.

Once I no longer risked a gash, I climbed through, landing in a great room on the broken fragments. They crunched beneath my boots. I could barely breathe, and I couldn’t see anything in the soupy darkness. It was like I had submerged into the loch once more.

Carefully, I crept forward, exiting the room into a vast hallway. The flashlight I had stolen led my way, my other hand wrapped tightly around the spray paint canister.

In that ethereal moment, where the brightness combatted darkness and the storm raged outside and within me, the hallway extended like something designed by Daedalus. A thousand doors stood on either side of the endless corridor.

Details I had missed yesterday morning, distracted while speaking to Fred and Daphne, now became abundantly clear. A row of old photographs of old white men filled the stone wall of the hallway. They stared at me with hard eyes and deep scowls, their gazes tracking each step I took.

I opened the first door I came to, revealing a bathroom. A certain dread hammered into me. Though I knew who I looked for, I hadn’t the first clue what I was looking for to find them. Still, I didn’t believe that staying in the shed would’ve been any easier—let alone wiser.

My exploration took me to a second door, which opened into a spare bedroom. I spared a few minutes to search the room for any recent signs of someone coming through.

Freya was sharp, and she would’ve done something to clue me into her whereabouts.

However, no sign of her existed in that bedroom.

The sixth door opened to another empty room.

I stepped forward, and the floor creaked. Then it gave way, bending and snapping as if the boards had rotted. Somehow, I managed to leap forward at the last moment.

Though I fell, my body slammed into the ledge on the opposite edge, and I held my dangling legs up by my elbows. I dropped the flashlight and spray paint as I caught the ledge. They rattled along the solid floor inside the barren room.

After I quit drinking, I’d needed another outlet to exhaust myself and fall asleep. I’d opted for weightlifting. Thankfully, my conditioning and strength training served a purpose other than knocking me out at night.

I pulled myself over the ledge and into the empty room.

After I recovered the flashlight and canister or paint, and I shined it into the hole I should’ve fallen through. My heart nearly skipped up my throat and out my mouth.

Two dozen metal spikes—like tiny, sharp stalagmites—stood like a death trap. Had I fallen, I would have been impaled twenty different ways.

My breath became ragged, as if I had just finished a sprint. I not only had to evade the assassin, but I had to avoid booby traps scattered throughout the castle.

Time worked against me—against Freya.

Yet to reach her, I had to move with extreme caution.

As my jelly-like legs steadied, I took an extended step back over the pitfall and into the hallway.

I checked another door on the opposite side, then turned the corner. Another corridor stretched before me. A stairwell curved to the second floor on my right. To my left was another row of doors, each adorned with a mounted head of some animal—an elk, a zebra, a bear, a boar.

Straight ahead, at the end of the hall, was another door, above which hung the stuffed head of a male lion.

If I checked each door and they all proved dead ends, that left me with backtracking and exploring the opposite direction from where I had turned out of the great room, or venturing up the stairs to the second floor.

The castle was a maze.

I allowed myself a moment to close my eyes. Fear spawned by the impossibility of my circumstance seeped into my mind. The memory of Cambria in Santa Cruz, of her dying because of her involvement with me, returned, crashing into my thoughts like a battering ram.

Freya, from her proximity to me, now faced a similar fate.

As I stood, lost in the labyrinth of the castle, clueless to her location, I had no means to save her.

Defeat weighed heavily on me, cementing me in place. I had to do something, but I couldn’t do anything. After everything I had overcome—in my career, in my life, in my soul—I was reduced to a piece of furniture in the hallway.

Another head to be stuffed and mounted and placed on the wall.

I allowed the fear to wash over me, to paralyze me for a moment. Then I grabbed hold, honed it, sharpened that feeling. I used that dread as unwavering energy.

The delirious words she had uttered after falling into the loch filled my head. I wanted to believe you loved me for me, not for an inheritance. Had I shown my devotion? If I couldn’t save her, would she doubt in her final moment how I truly felt about her? Did she know how much I loved her?

My eyes snapped open, a newfound clarity hot in my gaze.

I had made her a promise earlier. Promise you’ll come back with me. And I didn’t mean to break that promise now.

The lion’s head was my target. I moved like a man on a mission, bypassing the stairwell on my right and the four doors on my left. My fingers wrapped around the brass handle and twisted.

A smile touched my face. The door was locked.

That was a good sign.

A locked door deterred people from entering, from coming across something valuable, something preferred hidden.

Well, it barred most people.

Not me.

I raised my foot and kicked the door like they taught me in law enforcement—right beside the doorknob. The wood splintered at the jamb, and the door burst open.

The Study. Sunday, January 5th. 0237hrs.

Lightning slashed across the dark sky, illuminating the picture window overlooking the loch.

I stood in the doorway for a moment, feeling the proceeding rumble of thunder roll through my bones.

The room behind the locked door was an office, though one different from the study Freya had attended for the will reading. This room was dedicated to the Loch Ness Monster. Pictures hung on the wall, and books on the creature filled the wooden bookshelf. Atop a display table stretched a serpentine replica of the cryptid.

With heavy feet, I plodded toward the bulky desk against the far wall. I pulled the string to the table lamp and diffused my flashlight. The dull glow illuminated a mess of paperwork strewn across the black-stained surface—a surface not unlike that of the body of water outside the window.

I steadied my hands against the desk and craned forward, surveying the documents. My periphery darkened and blurred as my focus settled solely on what lay before me.

I swallowed hard as some of the pieces to my mostly incomplete puzzle fell into place. The hoax had a scale far more complex than I imagined.

The paperwork presented blueprints and schematics and briefs of a mechanized Loch Ness Monster. There was a folder with a record of names and invoices for engineers and laborers. I shuffled through photographs chronicling the progression of the monster’s creation.

At first, they had nothing but the long arm of an excavator painted bright yellow, along with a prefabricated submersible. Though I couldn’t begin to comprehend how they had built Nessie, I understood the idea behind their creation.

The engineers had connected the excavator arm to the submersible, a vehicle no larger than a half-ton truck. The documents detailed how they had engineered the machine to not sink, despite the out-leveraged weight of the arm extending whenever Nessie emerged from the water.

Not having the time to sit down and fully understand the concept, I skimmed over that part.

I reserved my attention for the photographs.

They evolved from the prefabricated submersible, to a strange contraption with the arm attached, to a prop in a big-budget Hollywood film. Even beneath the bright light of the warehouse, the mechanized creature looked like a vision of Loch Ness Monster.

Somehow—through some process—the team had layered skin over the metal, had set a realistic head atop the neck, affixed a mouth with fangs, and inserted eyes. It was no wonder the machine had passed for the real deal. The attention to detail, the realism, defied anything I thought possible.

And Huxley Construction had commissioned the build.

Why, though? What did they have to do with Brett Barker’s development? How did that tie into the deaths of the Huxley lords—into Freya and her inheritance?

My skin tingled, like a thousand hot needles pressed into me.

Not from my discovery, either, but from a sixth sense that someone now shared the room with me. To accompany that sense, footsteps drummed across the floor.

I inhaled deeply, centering myself.

My head pounded from where the assassin had struck me with a stone, and the pain had taken its toll on my body. Fatigue reigned supreme.

If the intruder wanted a fight, I didn’t have the strength to engage in anything fair. I had to fight smart, and I had to fight dirty.

With a heavy exhale, I lashed my arm forward and scooped up as much of the paperwork as I could manage. I wheeled around, throwing the flurry of documents.

Though the leaves of paper didn’t pose any real threat, they served their purpose—creating a distraction.

Not only that, but the assassin sneaking up on me flinched.

The moment of hesitation allowed me the initiative in the fight—an advantage I desperately needed.

I drew the can of spray paint and pointed the canister at the assassin.

The man brought his forearm over his eyes and barreled toward me.

I sprayed, but the stream was a wide and the mist weak, a flaccid effort to harm my attacker.

He crashed into me with his shoulder, and we landed on the desk. As I fought to scramble away, the man seized the chain looped diagonally around my right shoulder to my left hip. He bunched up the metal links, tightening them around my throat, pushing down with all his weight.

Luckily, he didn’t have the correct angle to suffocate me. But he realized that. The man switched tactics, raising the fistful of chain and grinding it into my face—right into the spot where he had aimed the stone earlier.

I howled from pain like nothing I had ever experienced.

But more often than not, pain provided strength and resolve.

The metal-against-bone agony spurred an inferno of energy and adrenaline within me. Desperate power poured into my limbs. My howl turned into a leonine roar.

Though the assassin leaned over me, I was bigger than him by twenty pounds. Not only that, but I was flat on my back, and he leaned forward to inflict his damage. He was off-balance. The pain he induced allowed me that clarity.

Though I hadn’t served on any police force for years, I made sure to stay up to date with my combat training. Fred and I would often spar. Him being much larger than me and far stronger allowed me to hone my technique. To take him down and restrain him, I had to employ precision, not brute force.

My muscles acted on pure memory. I drew my leg upward, driving my knee into my attacker. Already off-balance, the power of my thrust threw him forward, draping him over me.

He no longer had leverage.

I hugged him, and we rolled. Now I had the advantageous position. My flexed fingers wrapped around the soft malleability of his throat. “Where is she?” My voice was broken glass rubbing together.

The assassin spat in my face.

I lifted his head a degree off the table and slammed him back down. “Where is she?”

“You kill me, you’ll never know.” He paused to smile. “Never know where I hid her body.”

My fingers became compactors, crushing with the strength of a clamp twisted too tight. He choked, and his face turned purple. Spittle bubbled off his lips.

I released the tension a fraction, enough to allow him a narrow passage to breathe, though he had to work and struggle for that breath. “You’ll tell me now.”

My anger, hot and fiery, burned at my vision, creating a cloud of smoke that distracted me, that obstructed observation. I didn’t perceive the man’s hands. My sight had tunneled, and I only saw the desperation in his face.

In my distraction, he had conjured a knife.

The blade bit into my thigh, ripped free, dug into my hip, ripped free, buried itself into my oblique and stuck there.

I grunted. My fingers slackened from his throat.

Blood wetted my skin, soaked into my clothes.

Before he could stab me again—higher up, possibly puncturing something vital—I staggered backward.

He stood and rubbed his throat with the hand not gloved in blood. Then he dipped that same hand into his pocket and removed a lighter. He flicked the flame into existence and touched the fire not to a cigarette, but to the edge of a document still on the desk.

The evidence connecting Huxley Construction to the Loch Ness Monster darkened and crinkled as it burned.

The flashlight lay at my feet. I crouched to pick it up, to wield it like a small baton, but I never removed my attention from the assassin.

We stared at each other, and between us, the desk and the paperwork that had remained atop the surface during our scuffle blazed.

Whatever surge of energy I had benefited from seconds before now leaked with the blood draining from my body. I leaned against the wall for support, then sank to the ground. The heat from the flames warmed my cold body. My free hand applied pressure to the wound in my side where the knife handle still jutted.

“You should’ve stayed away.” With that, the assassin stepped toward me, brought back his foot, and kicked me square in the stomach.

The room faded in and out.

I rolled into the fetal position, gasping for air.

He must not have cared to take the time to finish the job, suspecting my wounds and the growing fire would relieve him of the task.

The man turned from me and exited the study.

And all around me, my world burned.

The Basement. Sunday, January 5th. 0245hrs.

Embers snowed around me, and the flames rose and spread, chewing through the desk, crawling along the rug, racing up the curtain, devouring the bookshelf.

The heat, though overpowering, was warm against the cold seeping into my bones.

If I remained seated on the floor, the fire would wash all my sins clean. I would no longer have to live with the guilt of what I had done to Aaron Brooks and his family, of how I had treated my friends and family in the aftermath of that incident. For years after my recklessness, I had driven them away and isolated myself. I had hurt them by ignoring them and hurting myself.

As if the flames could hear my fading thoughts, a shadowy figure flickered within them.

I couldn’t see his true form, but I could feel his presence, and I knew without a doubt who stood on the other side of that blazing wall.

The reason I pursued a vocation in the realm of the paranormal spoke, his voice like cool water flowing on a sweltering summer day. “I forgive you.”

The flames twisted toward him, licked his presence away.

Another shade stood behind him, and I recognized her.

Cambria Parker—a girlfriend who had died by the deranged plotting of Daniel Quinn. “It wasn’t your fault.”

Her shadowy form blurred, stretching at every angle and snapping back in place, and a broader, heftier silhouette stood in her stead. James Conners, one of my first clients, hovered amidst the flames. “It wasn’t your fault.”

So the timeless moment went.

Souls from my recent past appeared, those affected by my grief and regret from having shot Aaron—clients and victims I had failed to save. Each one represented my brokenness, and each one offered a simple truth.

“It wasn’t your fault.”

Their voices, each of them individual and distinct at first, blended, swirling around me from all angles. “It wasn’t your fault. We forgive you.”

Then they snapped into a singular, crisp sound, and that voice shared a striking resemblance to my own. “It wasn’t your fault. I forgive you.”

Only after I spoke that aloud in the burning room did I believe the sentiment.

A heaviness like water being wrung from a towel drained from my soul. For the first time in years, I took a breath, and I felt life fill my lungs.

Obscured by the fire, only Aaron remained—no longer a shadow, but a bright light and a warmth that made the conflagration feel dull and cold. “Freya needs you. Ernie needs you.”

A blinding glare filled the room, forcing my eyes shut.

When I opened them, I was alone again, accompanied only by the expanding fire.

The metal chain looped around my shoulders had grown hot, the links searing against my skin, spurring me into action. I removed the chain wrapped around my body, allowing the length to coil on the ground like the body of a steel snake. I tightened my grip around the flashlight, leaned forward, and collected a scattering of documents strewn about the floor and untouched by the flames. Hopefully, one of them would have incriminating evidence. I didn’t have the time to flip through what I had garnered, though.

With monumental effort, I rose to my feet, my body hunched over. The stab wounds were paralytic, numbing and stiffening my leg and hip and torso. Yet, I staggered forward, stumbling out of the burning office.

Once I had smokeless air to breathe, I swallowed oxygen in greedy gasps, allowing a few beats for my heart to steady and my mind to settle.

I folded the collection of documents and stuffed them into my pocket. Afterward, I peeled off my shirt and ripped the fabric into strands.

The unaccounted expense of clothing during that trip boggled my mind.

My past training had informed me of basic field medicine practices. Any penetrating wounds to the limbs required a tourniquet. Anything to the shoulders or groin needed packing with gauze. Anywhere else called for direct pressure.

With the steps in mind, I used one strand of my torn shirt to wrap around my upper thigh as a tourniquet to suppress the bleeding. Next, I ripped smaller strips, stuffing them into my hip wound, then wrapped thicker ribbons around the area to secure the pressure.

I kept the knife embedded in my torso, knowing better than to remove the blade.

The blood loss combined with the pain of shoving fabric into my open wounds about knocked me out. As I finished tending to my injuries, a wooziness made me dizzy. The hallway teetered back and forth like the deck of Loch and Key during the storm, threatening to topple me.

I closed my eyes, squeezing them shut, and pictured Freya in my mind.

I imagined our life together back in Sacramento—a life fat with smiles and laughter. Of Freya and me dancing to old country songs in the kitchen while Ernie played in the backyard.

That vision grounded me. It pushed back against the pain tightening the right side of my lower body.

My eyes popped open.

I gritted my teeth and moved forward through the castle.

The fire that had burned away my demons, had cleansed my mind, had centered my focus and clarified my thoughts. If a trapdoor existed inside the shed, and there weren’t any connected buildings to the structure, that meant the hatch tunnelled beneath the ground.

I had to make my way to a lower level, to a basement.

Yesterday morning, Bernie the Butler had mentioned a cellar in the kitchen.

That was my destination.

I’m not sure how much time passed as I wandered blindly through the winding, labyrinthine halls of the castle, but it was too much.

With each passing second, my hope of saving Freya dwindled—burned like the desk and bookshelf and curtain and papers within that office.

But I eventually found the cellar, down a rickety wooden staircase descending from the kitchen.

Mildew and mold covered the stone walls, and an overpowering musk filled the damp air. Bottles of wine lay at a precise angle on wooden racks. A floor-to-ceiling shelf held a lifetime’s supply of Scotch.

My flashlight cut through the darkness, searching desperately for a hidden door or a false wall—for a gimmick straight out of Scooby-Doo.

Luck graced me. Finally.

The door was carved into a rectangular shape in the back of the cellar. I didn’t have to summon the entrance by pulling a lever disguised as a bottle of alcohol, or any other such trick. The door was just there, already partly cracked and revealed.

The door ground against stone as I pulled it fully open. I leaned against the frame, spent from the effort of moving the heavy door, from flexing the muscles around my injuries.

The bright beam extending from my flashlight exposed a narrow passage that took a hard angle to the left.

I took the corner, turning into another passageway.

Arched openings checkered the stone walls on either side, some shielded by steel-braced wooden doors, others barred by iron.

I hadn’t stumbled into a basement, but a dungeon.

Through one set of rusted bars, the spacing only a few inches apart, my flashlight illuminated a room filled with rotted straw, with manacles anchored to the wall, with dark stains splattered everywhere.

The Huxley family weren’t strangers to violence.

I tried the brass handle of a solid wooden door. The latch clicked, the hinge creaked—a desperate scream piercing the quiescence. I held my breath and froze where I stood, wondering what danger I had summoned.

The flashlight’s beam snuck through the crack made when I pushed the door open, a swath of light erasing the darkness. With my heart pounding in my face, I peeked into the room.

The bruising of decay, the graying of death, colored the bloodless skin of the corpse lying in the corner.

Before I could enter and inspect the body, another desperate shriek, one that echoed like the rusted hinges of a door, pierced the halls. The sound raced toward me, bouncing off the walls—the origin of the sound lost in the ricocheting.

However, I recognized the organic nature of the scream.

I could hear the strength and defiance in her voice.

Freya was down here.

A jolt stronger than adrenaline pushed me back into the hallway.

The corpse wasn’t going anywhere, so I  continued down the dark passage to find Freya, to defeat her captor, to escape this nightmare, and to solve the mystery of the Loch Ness Monster.

Discovery. Sunday, January 5th. 0256hrs.

The wounds in my leg and hip prevented me from running. I didn’t have the flexibility I usually had, with the punctures stiffening my muscles. However, I hobbled down the cobbled hallway, chasing Freya’s scream.

A dreadful silence filled the passage, though.

With each closed door or barred entry that I passed, my heart sank a little further, my hope diminished a little more.

Where had her scream come from? What was the origin? Had she heard the rusted hinges and responded, hoping she alerted me to her location? Or had the assassin made good on his promise to kill her?

Had I heard her final breath?

The thick fog of quietude that stuffed my ears and muted my steps convinced me she no longer had a voice to scream again.

I could barely breathe. The terror sapped my resolve, forced cracks into the defiance holding back the assault of my injuries, and pain and fatigue crawled back to the forefront of my existence.

Then, like lightning flashing across the darkest of night to provide a brief glimpse of the world, she screamed again. “August!”

That was followed by a heart-twisting thud and a grunt.

The sounds came from behind me. Close.

I had hobbled past her in my blind pursuit, which meant the assassin had her stowed in a closed-door room.

Excitement mixed with doubt. She was alive, for now, and nearby; however, the wooden doors were thick and heavy. If the assassin had locked the one they hid behind, I wasn’t sure I could simply kick it open.

But what other choice did I have?

Above me, a thunderous rumble rattled dust from the rafters of the corridor. I ignored whatever had happened a floor above and focused on the present dilemma—saving Freya.

I came to the first closed door and tried the brass handle. The door opened into an empty room with another whiny creak. The second door I opened revealed a similar room, though less empty and more filled with old, dusty furniture.

With the third door, a dull, flickering light bled from the gap between the ground and the bottom of the door. Heavy breaths exhaled through that thin gap, as did the light clicks of feet pacing the ground.

How had I missed the stream of light before?

I powered off my flashlight, adjusting my grip to hold the shaft like a baton. Allowing myself three seconds, I took a deep, calming breath.

The assassin would have Freya. He would be waiting for me to enter. He had the upper hand, and I had to proceed with that in mind. I couldn’t hesitate. Once I opened the door, I had to act. That was my only recourse. He likely anticipated me entering with caution, knowing that he held Freya’s life in his hands.

As my hand reached for the knob, the man spoke.

And I froze, my fingers a hair's width from the brass.

“He’s not coming for you, my darling. Euan told you that he drove a blade through his femoral artery and left him to burn in the flames.” The voice behind the door had a familiar ring.

I closed my eyes, forcing myself to place it. Welcome to Huxley Castle. I’m Bernard Schaefer. Everyone calls me Bernie, though. Can I take your coats?

The butler.

“August isn’t dead.” That was Freya, and her voice was a raging river, full of power and depth. If she were afraid, her tone didn’t betray her.

“My dear, he’s dead, and you must die, as well. However, I’ll spare your son’s life. All you have to do is decline your inheritance before the money lands in your account tomorrow morning. Sign this form here, and Ernest will live to see another birthday.”

I bit the inside of my cheek to stay quiet, to keep myself from doing something rash and desperate.

Most people would’ve screamed and flailed at such a threat to their child. Not Freya. When she responded, her voice was a glacier—icy and massive and slow. “Bernard, my ex-husband served as a Marine. When he came home from his tours, he didn’t sit on the couch. He trained. He kept himself battle-ready. And I went with him. You better pray these ropes don’t slacken or fail. Because if I have just a single limb available, I will end your life.”

Bernard must have believed her. He said nothing.

“Why?” Freya asked after a moment.

“Why what?” There he was, his voice now weary. Despite Freya having, as she mentioned, all her limbs restrained, the butler feared her.

“I’m assuming you created the Loch Ness Monster, that you attacked Brett Barker’s development. Why? What did you have to gain by destroying that?”

Out of instinct, I removed Freya’s phone and tapped the video icon to record Bernard’s response. My heart hammered against my chest as I waited outside the door, allowing Freya to retain control—as I waited for Bernard to make a mistake.

The butler hesitated for a moment before speaking. “What does the truth matter? You’ll be dead soon, anyway.”

“You cooperate with me, maybe I’ll cooperate with you and sign your papers.”

Bernie sighed. “I changed Lord Malcolm Huxley’s heart medication. Made his death appear natural. Same with the younger Lord Huxley. He had a little too much to drink, grieving his father and all. And he happened to slip off the cliff and onto the rocks below.”

“And you did that to inherit their fortune?”

“I already ran their business. Had done so for the better part of a decade now. I’ve done more for the progress of that family than any patriarch could’ve dreamed of. Without me, they were nothing. And what did I receive? Nothing. At least, not until their line died out. By then, what was the use? I would be dead myself.”

“That doesn’t answer my question. Why target the development?” Freya asked again.

“To distract the public and media from the deaths of the Huxley family. Especially during the reading of the will, when I was set to inherit their vast fortune. The police couldn’t prove I had done anything wrong. But if the media started poking around, they might convict me through the court of public opinion. So I distracted them. I turned their attention elsewhere.”

He hadn’t just killed. He had orchestrated an entire mythology to cover his crime.

For a long time, Freya said nothing.

Neither did Bernard.

I debated trying the handle again. But if I found it locked? That would give the butler a hefty advantage. Also, alerting him to my presence might make him skittish. What if he reacted out of fear and hurt Freya?

She had control, from what I could tell. I had to trust and ease my way into the room.

But how?

After another beat of debating my options, Freya provided me with a window. “Hey, Bernard.”

“What?”

“Have you ever seen Ghostbusters?”

I went cold. That was the movie I had most recently watched, and Freya knew that. Did she know I stood behind the door? How?

“I’ve seen it,” Bernard said.

“Do you remember that ballroom scene where they’re hunting the ghost, and they’re sneaking through the room, hiding behind the curtains?”

I swallowed hard. She was delivering a coded message to me.

Freya continued. “They see the ghost in the chandelier, and they just burst forward and shoot it?”

“No. It’s been a while. Why?”

“No reason. I was just thinking of it.”

Except, she had a reason. Freya knew I stood behind the door, and she used the movie reference to communicate with me. Her question wasn’t meant for Bernard, but as a coded direction to me.

The Ghostbusters had hid behind a curtain in that scene, as I now hid behind a door.

“I still remember what they said,” Freya continued. “Before they shot.”

“What’s that?”

I went stiff, anticipating the quote. I knew what she should say, and I knew what it would mean.

Bernard hadn’t locked the door.

She was signaling that I had the opportunity to enter the room.

“I don’t remember who said it, but I remember them saying, ‘Ready. Throw it.’”

I threw the door wide open, shoving my shoulder into the thick, heavy wood and bulldozing into the room.

Showdown. Sunday, January 5th. 0304hrs.

I staggered into the stone-walled, stone-floored room. No furniture cluttered the ground, and no windows allowed in any light. A single torch sat in a wall-mounted sconce, the fire a fat ball that burned away the immediate darkness. Shadows swayed with the movement of the flame in the corners of the room.

Freya lay on her belly in the center—hands bound, feet bound, all four hogtied together behind her. No blood stained her clothing. No bruises colored her skin. Bernard had yet to touch her beyond stringing her up like livestock.

She must have been ripped straight from the pages of Norse myth. The goddess, Freya, personified. Despite her situation, she wore a stony mask that revealed no emotion other than coldness. She refused to allow Bernard a glimpse of the slightest victory, including any fear or pain she felt.

Her face was turned, staring at the door. In an instant, I realized how she knew I stood in the hallway. She had seen my feet beneath the gap, had likely gambled that it was me and not the assassin.

In response to my sudden entrance, the butler hoisted an air rifle and pointed the dark barrel directly at me. A sharp snap filled the room, and an invisible force punched me directly in the left shoulder, immobilizing that entire half of my body. The round was like a leaden weight hooking into me, the other end attached to the floor.

I dropped to a knee.

The gunshot shattered the mask Freya wore.

She screamed, but the restraints prevented her from doing much of anything.

My right palm pressed against the wound in my shoulder.

Once again, Aaron Brooks crossed my mind.

How fitting of a death would this be for me?

Some would hail it as poetic justice.

Bernard pulled the trigger again, releasing nothing but a dry click. He cursed and, thinking on his feet, rotated the rifle so he held it by the barrel, wielding the weapon like a club, cocking it back to swing.

From my kneeling position, I lunged at his knees.

The stock of the rifle made interrupted contact with my back—a mild pain in a forest of wounds riddling my body. My shoulder made contact with the softness of his stomach, and I could feel the air deflate from his body.

The butler was five-eight in shoes but built like a bowling ball. He had to weigh over two hundred pounds. Despite my towering size and more muscular physique, he had the lower ground and better leverage. He absorbed my takedown. Instead of falling on his back with me atop him, we ended up in a far more awkward position—him still on his feet, me still on my knees. My arms wrapped around his waist. My face rested on the curvature of his belly.

Bernard raised the rifle like a pile driver, and he drove the butt of the weapon into the base of my neck, directly into my left shoulder. The pain was an explosion that incinerated my senses. Sound became nothing but a high-pitched ring. My vision was reduced to a veil of glittering whiteness. Physical touching sharpened into a world of nothing but pain.

I tasted smoke, and I smelled smoke.

The butler must have perceived something similar. As details emerged from the fog covering my eyes, I could see Bernard. He didn’t club me across the face and finish the job. Instead, he sniffed the air like a curious dog and padded toward the door I had thrown open.

A string of curses popped out of his mouth. “The castle is burning.”

I lay on my back, my body refusing to obey my mind. Though I wanted—needed—to stand and fight, my brain no longer had any control. So I watched Bernard turn away from the door, a thin haze of smoke trailing after him and entering the room.

The pudgy man took an awkward hop toward me, pulled back his leg, and kicked me square in the ribs—right above the area where the assassin had left his knife.

I had become the embodiment of a well-used punching bag.

After his brief tantrum, Bernard cooled himself enough through some breathing technique that inspired a fit of coughing. Apparently, he had inhaled too much of the creeping smoke.

Freya remained hogtied.

I was our only hope at escaping this inferno alive. Or at least allowing her to escape, to return home to her five-year-old son. If I had to sacrifice myself for Freya to live, I would do so in a heartbeat—with my last breath.

The room was empty of anything except our three bodies.

To fight back, I would have to overpower Bernard and confiscate his weapon. There was my flashlight. But through everything, I had relinquished my grip, and I no longer had a sight of it.

I wondered if it had rolled into the shadows along the perimeter of the room thrown by—

The torch in the sconce.

It was real—not something placed there for a mood or a theme—probably constructed a century ago from black iron and set at an angle into the wall mount.

All I had to do was stand, slide the body of the torch free, and use the flaming club as a weapon to defeat Bernard and free Freya.

Simple, right?

Except my body was obstinate. It had taken enough of a beating that night—from the frigid dive into the loch, to getting my face battered with a stone, to three stab wounds, to a gunshot, and a kick in the ribs. I had reached the limit of my endurance.

“Sorry.” Bernard loomed over me like some kind of reaper summoned to harvest my soul. He cocked the rifle high over his head, a lumberjack righting his aim on a stubborn stump. “Nothing personal, lad.”

The rifle whistled as it arced through the air.

I released a war cry—or so I imagined. Maybe I squealed. Either way, the sudden exhalation of air at the threat of death sparked a surge of adrenaline through my body.

I rolled away.

The rifle splintered against the stone where my head had rested a split second earlier. The reverberation must have been intense. Bernard grunted and dropped the gun.

I rode the wave of momentum, shooting to my unsteady feet and lurching toward the sconce. The black iron was cool in my palm as I slid the torch free.

Blindly, I pivoted and swung, using the iron like a backhanded tennis racket.

Bernard had remained stagnant, holding his hand from the shock of the gun against the ground. I’m not sure if the impact broke the brittle bones in his wrist, but he held his right hand with his left, his limp fingers curled inward like the legs of a dead spider.

He never saw the flaming head of the torch as it streaked through the darkness and made hard contact with his face. Something cracked. Something gave way.

For a second, an impossible thought crossed my mind—the fire from the torch had melted all his bones.

The man puddled onto the ground.

I had rendered him unconscious.

Before my body could completely fail me, I stumbled to Freya. I drew the knife from my flesh and cut through the knots binding her wrists and ankles.

She rubbed the raw skin and rolled into a seated position. “Hey, you.”

Breath grated out of my teeth in something that may have resembled words. “Uh.” My hand pressed hard against my wound, doing a poor job of holding in the warm plasma flooding out.

“You’re bleeding.”

“Uh.”

Her gaze dropped from assessing my injuries to the unconscious form of the butler. “We can’t leave him here. If this castle burns down, we can’t leave him here to die.”

I nodded.

She, of course, was right. We couldn’t leave Bernard alone in a room quickly filling with smoke. No matter what he had done, no matter who he was, we weren’t the arbiters of his fate.

In that moment, as Freya rubbed the rawness of her skin after escaping her binds, as she studied the man she professed to love who was checkered with bloody wounds, she set her fear aside and thought of the man who had orchestrated everything against us.

She thought of his well-being and safety.

That was when I knew, without a doubt, there wasn’t a better woman in the world than she.

Maya had served as a light who guided me from the darkness of my depression. She had offered me something I never could’ve obtained without her, and for that I would always love Maya. However, we were incompatible. I was too reserved, and she was too impulsive. I preferred roots, and she preferred the wind.

Without Maya, though, I never would’ve met Freya.

Maya brought me back to life.

Freya inspired me to live.

“What do you suggest?” I asked, glancing at his prone body.

“Strip him of any weapons. Wake him up. We can all lean on each other as we hobble out of here.”

She looked at me. “You heard his confession about Nessie?”

I patted my pocket. “Recorded everything he said.”

We no longer needed the firelight from the torch. Freya’s smile lit the entire room.

As I kneeled to wake Bernard, voices and footsteps swirled outside the door in the hallway. I tensed, my fingers finding the butler’s air rifle and tightening around the barrel.

I turned to Freya. “Assassin?”

She shrugged. But she now held the torch and sidestepped, slipping behind the open door, hiding there to spring an attack.

The footsteps came closer.

A moment later, a firefighter appeared in the doorway.

Aftermath. Sunday, January 5th. 1322hrs.

I rubbed the crust of sleep from my eyes. My mouth was sticky and tasted like I had smoked a cigar. My head ached, a fissure zigzagging along my skull.

Freya slept curled in a stiff chair beside me.

Where was I?

I scanned the area, identifying my location within a hospital room.

Closing my eyes, I recalled the last thing I remembered—the firefighter had found us in the dungeon and escorted us outside the castle.

Red and blue emergency lights had colored the witching hours at the Huxley estate. The mist of light rainfall adopted an auroral glow, pitching the night into an ethereal atmosphere.

The blue hue covered Freya’s face as she sat on the back ledge of an ambulance, watching the firefighters combat the blaze leaking from the window and dancing atop the roof.

As for me, I had lain on a gurney in the back of the ambulance, tubes hooked to my body and fresh bandages wrapped around my wounds. The paramedics tended to me, preparing me for transport to the nearest hospital.

One ambulance had already rushed Bernard to the emergency room.

The police had stalled our progress toward treatment, wanting to ask a few clarifying questions before we zoomed away from the crime scene. Though Freya provided them with answers, I had insisted she accompany me in the emergency vehicle. So, the first responders had to wait for the officers to finish their quick interview.

I lay only a few feet away, so I heard most of the exchange.

The officer—an older gentleman with gray hair and a strong chin—asked her what had happened. After Freya recounted the night, beginning with the trap we had set for Nessie, the officer referenced the notes he had taken during her debriefing and asked more probing questions revolving around the assassin, Bernard, and the fire.

After about five minutes, a paramedic put a hand on the officer’s shoulder and convinced the older man that we had to get to the hospital to treat my extensive injuries. The officer nodded and stepped away but promised to visit me once I was feeling a little more peppy.

Grunting, I sat straighter in the hospital bed, wincing from the stiffness of my body and wounds. Staring out the window into the overcast day, I wondered about the time, then scanned the room for a clock on the wall.

“You’re awake.” The rustling and creaking as I adjusted my posture must have pulled Freya from her sleep. She grimaced, bringing her fingers to massage her neck. “Hi.”

“Hi.” If my throat had felt sticky and dry before, speaking was like dragging my feet through a desert in the dead of summer. “Water?”

“Yeah, of course.” Freya untangled her legs, planting them on the floor, and leaned forward to grab a cup of water off my nightstand.

I accepted and drank through the flexible straw. The icy liquid was ambrosia—the nectar of the gods. For a moment, I felt divine. But only for a moment. With my waking, my injuries also surfaced, reminding me of my mortality.

The pain had dulled, likely from a drip of pain medication, but it remained present—the pounding of fists and the muffled screams of someone buried alive.

“How you feeling?” Freya asked, knotting her legs back into a pretzel.

I turned to study her. She had her hair in a sloppy bun, and she wore the same clothes as she had during our confrontation at the castle. She appeared dirty and sooty. Though she hadn’t sustained any serious injuries, dark bruises burdened her eyes, and her face was puffy. If I had to guess, she hadn’t slept at all.

I ignored her question—or rather spun it and threw it back at her. “How are you?”

“Hanging in there.” She smiled.

“What happened? I don’t remember anything after the ambulance ride.”

“That’s because you knocked out quick once you found yourself horizontal with a pillow behind your head.”

“The concussion?” I asked.

Freya snickered and nodded. “Yeah, you suffered a pretty nasty concussion from the rock. Luckily, no facial fractures. Not sure how you pulled that off. I’m sure the doctor will provide you with all the medical mumbo-jumbo when she comes back. All I know is, you’re alive. That’s all that matters.”

“Bernard?”

“Alive. I wanted to visit him earlier, but he has an officer outside his room, and they wouldn’t let me inside.”

I inhaled deeply through my nose. “The assassin?”

Freya shook her head and placed the tip of her finger in her mouth to chew her nail, then removed it just as quickly.

For a few moments, we sat in silence, processing all that had happened—processing all that would happen.

Then she scooted the chair forward and touched my hand, curling her fingers into mine. She had tears in her eyes.

“What’s wrong?” I squeezed her hand.

“I just…” She trailed off, a raspy laugh finishing her unfinished thought. “I’m not used to happy endings, so I’ve been torturing myself with thoughts of how this will fall apart.” Her glittering gaze met mine.

“This won’t ever fall apart.”

Her thumb brushed against my knuckles.

A gentle knock rapped against the door to my room. Before I could invite anyone in, the officer who had spoken to Freya earlier that morning appeared. Despite his chiseled face, he had soft eyes and a gentle demeanor. Though he opened the door, he didn’t enter the room.

“He’s awake,” Freya said, never taking her attention from me. When she spoke again, she had lowered her voice to address me. “He keeps checking in, waiting for you to wake up. I’ll send him away if you want.”

“I’ll talk to him.”

The man glided across the floor, moving on legs better suited for dancing than enforcing the law. “Mr. Watson, I’m not sure if you remember me from last night, but I’m Detective Stewart. Is now a good time?” His gaze flickered to Freya, who sat in the only chair within the room, then back to me. “Do you mind if I remain standing?”

“Whatever you’re most comfortable with.”

“I need to use the restroom anyway,” Freya said, rising to her feet. “If you wish to sit, I’ve warmed the seat for you, Detective.”

He shared a warm smile and a subtle nod. “Thank you, Ms. Wilkins.”

Freya released my hand. “I’ll be back.” She leaned forward and kissed my hand, then left the room.

Detective Stewart sat, crossing one leg over the other. “I looked you up, Mr. Watson.”

“August, please.”

“And I’ve spoken to Tempest Michaels, who vouched that you were investigating the Nessie sightings on his behalf.” The detective flipped open a notebook.

“Yes. That’s true.”

“Says here that there was an attempt on Freya’s life, and yours, the other night. An unidentified killer snuck into your hotel room. You fought the man off.”

I nodded.

The detective touched his cheek. “Your injury. From the same man?”

“I believe so. Also, before he attacked us in the hotel, he was following us in London and Scotland. We spotted him on a few occasions, and I believe he made an attempt on our lives before the hotel.” I thought of the stack of lumber that had suddenly fallen toward us.

“In your investigation of the Nessie sightings and the destruction at Barker’s development, did you come to any conclusions?”

I shook my head. “I had Gordon Lively and Brett Barker on my persons of interest board, but nothing definitive to take any kind of action against them.”

The detective drew his pen straight across the page. “I spoke to both Gordon Lively and Brett Barker. Both men have alibis for their whereabouts last night. Also, after questioning them separately, I’ve come to the clear conclusion that neither had anything to do with what happened.”

I had been distracted by their proximity and direct involvement with the development, and I hadn’t focused on external forces being responsible for the crimes. After last night, though, I knew Bernard Schaefer and his assassin had orchestrated everything.

“I know,” I said, reaching for my phone on the nightstand. Freya had collected it from Rupert, who had come by the hospital to visit. I scrolled through my videos and played Bernard’s confession. During the ambulance ride, before I had knocked out, I reminded Freya to share the video with me.

Detective Stewart frowned after he listened to the recording. “Helpful, but not incriminating. He doesn’t state his name, and you didn’t provide any clear image of him speaking. However, I’m sure we can have a vocal analysis done to match the voices.”

“If you scroll through my library, you’ll see another recording. It’s of me diving into the loch last night. I caught Nessie on camera, or the hoax of Nessie. She was nothing more than a vehicle created by Huxley Construction. That detail will align with Bernard’s confession. Also, I placed a tracking device on the submersible. I’ll share the signal with you, and you can track the mechanical creature.”

“You did some solid work here. You ever consider rejoining the force?”

I looked at the old man, who seemed only a few years from retirement.

For a moment, an existential crisis crashed into me. Without investigating, what would I do with my life? Everything I knew was tied to law enforcement or crime. Had I been delirious when I made that decision to quit?

But thinking about returning to the field made me tense.

“I’m thinking I’ll write a book. Maybe a series, about all the craziness I’ve experienced.”

“Oh yeah?”

I shrugged. “Better than keeping everything up here.” I pointed at my head.

“Well, August, I wish you the greatest of luck with whatever you choose to do.” He grunted, and his knees popped as he stood. “Oh, and one more thing. Stay wary. Euan, the assassin, he’s still out there as far as we know. Without the promise of a pay check from Bernard, I’m not sure he’ll act, but I wouldn’t gamble my life on that.”

With that, the detective exited.

Freya must have waited for him to leave, for she entered immediately afterward.

And on her heels was Tempest Michaels.

Resignation. Sunday, January 5th. 1341hrs.

Freya sat on the edge of my bed, reclaiming my hand in hers.

Tempest Michaels carried a plastic bag that radiated the scent of fried sustenance. He sat in the chair the detective had vacated and untied the knotted handles to the takeout bag. “Since I would rather fast than eat hospital food, I thought you might like a decent meal to help recover. Chinese.” He raised a box.

Until that moment, I hadn’t known I was hungry. But saliva filled my mouth, and my stomach acted like a caged and starved predator.

I accepted the food. “Thank you.”

He offered me a utensil, and I opened the box and dug into the chow mein.

He allowed me a few bites before speaking. “Congratulations on solving another supernatural mystery. You’re becoming quite adept at this.”

I nodded my thanks to him, my mouth filled with stir-fried noodles and chicken.

“You plan to hang around these parts a while longer? You deserve the vacation.”

I looked at Freya, who remained on the edge of the hospital bed. “It’s whatever she wants.”

A small smile touched her face. “Well, with Bernard arrested, I’m not sure what that means for his inheritance. I’m thinking we should stay here for a few more days. Enjoy Scotland—at least until we hear from the Huxley family solicitor again.”

A momentary silence filled the room, the only sounds my chewing and the utensils securing my next bite. Outside the window, the clouds that had defined our time in Scotland departed, allowing an outpouring of sunlight to flood the land.

“After what happened at the hotel the other night,” Tempest said, “I understand if you want to stay somewhere else. Let me know where, and I’ll book the place for you.”

I cleared my throat, knowing I had to rip off the bandage of my plan to quit sooner rather than later. “Thank you. Truly. But, Tempest.”

The announcement of my resignation came harder than I anticipated. It stuck in my throat.

That man sitting beside my hospital bed had provided me so much healing by allowing me to operate under his umbrella. Before I had contact with him, my life was darkness, and I had no light leading me out of that misery.

His Blue Moon agency had served as a guide in the darkest moments of my life.

I had him to thank for everything healthy and bright in my life. For Freya, and for our future. For Alina. Without Blue Moon, she never would’ve worked for me, and I likely never would’ve grown to love her like a little sister.

Tears burned in my eyes.

A lump the size of a softball clogged my throat. I chuckled—a futile attempt to clear some airway to speak.

Tempest just cocked his head gently, patience written across his face.

“Thank you.” The spoken gratitude was a small croak, but it pierced through the blockade preventing me from speaking. “I owe you a lot. More than you could possibly know. But in short, you gave me my life back.”

He narrowed his eyes.

I drove forward, not risking an interruption now. “But I am… quitting.” Though getting to the admission proved difficult, speaking that final word tasted like something cold and refreshing on a scorching day. It felt natural. And that proved to me I had made the right choice.

“Quitting?”

“Leaving Blue Moon Sacramento.” I inhaled sharply, exhaled slowly. “Without me at the agency, Fred will leave, too. He’s only stuck around this long to support me. Or, rather, as he would say, protect me.”

Tempest wore a ponderous expression. He said nothing.

“Honestly,” I said, “though I might be the face of the company, I’m not the heart.” I chuckled. “I’m not even the brains. Maya Adler and Alina Moore—they’re the true geniuses behind every single one of my investigations. Without them, there would be serial killers and monsters still roaming the streets of Sacramento. With a little persuading, I’m sure you can convince them to step into my role, if you wish to keep the branch alive. They’ll do much better than I ever could.”

He leaned back and crossed his arms. “You’re sure about this?”

I turned to Freya, and I thought of our lives without the danger of hunting monsters who preyed on the weak in the dark. I thought of a future filled with warmth and light, with dancing and laughter, with more than one set of little feet running through our halls.

She nodded at me, as if reading my thoughts and agreeing with my vision.

“I’m sure,” I said. A moment of quiet built between us—not quite uncomfortable, but one that forced me to say something out of character. “If this were a movie, it would be the part where I turned in my badge.”

Tempest nodded, and with each subtle bob of his head, his smile stretched further across his face. “Maya Adler and Alina Moore?”

“Fair warning—they’re a lot to handle.”

He waved away the comment. “They’re far across the pond. I’m hoping they can handle themselves.”

“Don’t hope too hard.”

With that, the three of us enjoyed the rest of our lunch together. The conversations were easy and comfortable.

For me, Tempest was that dim light from a blue moon, and Freya was the sturdiness of shore. I was the shipwrecked passenger they had saved from drowning. While secure, while steady on solid ground, I would build something to be proud of.

Three Days Later. Wednesday, January 8th. 1602hrs.

Freya and I strolled along the perimeter of the Huxley—now Wilkins—estate. Well, she strolled. I hobbled. With bandages wrapped tight around my body, I felt like a half-mummy. The stab wounds remained stiff, becoming tighter as they healed, and pain lingered.

Atop the cliffside, we overlooked the gentle lapping wake of Loch Ness.

For a long time, neither of us said a word. For me, the past collided with the future—the aftermath forming that beautiful present moment.

I’m not sure what Freya thought of.

We had made our best efforts at enjoying the rest of our time in Scotland together. My injuries prevented me from doing much exploring, but I found the necessary tolerance for pain to compensate Freya for assisting in the investigation.

Tempest Michaels had stuck around for a day, tying up the loose ends I couldn’t reach from the hospital bed. He had a meeting with Brett Barker. Not long after that, Brett’s development shut down for good.

Without anything left to protest, Gordon Lively disappeared—likely off to fight his next battle.

Rupert McLaren visited me in the hospital. He didn’t say much, other than he wouldn’t quit his search to find Nessie or prove the existence of other cryptids. He also promised that the legend of Angus and Freida, the warriors who defeated the Loch Ness Monster, would spread through Scotland faster than a cloudy sky.

Just like that, everyone I had met in that beautiful, haunting country sank back into their lives—and they vanished from mine. A twinge of longing touched me. I wouldn’t miss them, but I would miss what they represented.

My short career as a paranormal investigator had brought me into contact with a lot of strange, wonderful, and wonderfully strange people. Now that I had stepped out of that role, an emptiness ached within me—one that would miss the oddity of that field and those people.

I had realized that the common and ubiquitous could make someone feel safe, could make life predictable—but that also lulled us into complacency. Imperfections, oddities, sharp and rough edges: those are what formed exhilarating, unique experiences. Those are what made people and things and situations stand apart, become memorable, color a drab landscape like a single flower in a field of snow.

Freya sighed beside me—one of those long exhalations that usually signals a conversation.

I turned away from the view of the loch and looked at her.

She had her gaze directed over her shoulder, toward the ruined castle.

Though smoke no longer rose into the sky, the blackened skeleton stood like a brittle corpse. Windows had shattered, and the stone frameworks had collapsed where the wooden bracings had burned away.

I matched her stare and studied the remains of the hollowed-out castle, waiting for her to speak.

“We leave for Sacramento tomorrow.” She turned to me. “And—”

I leaned forward and kissed her, not allowing her to finish. After a few heartbeats, I pulled away. “I love you, and I want to reset my life to start over with you. That’s what I learned this trip.”

Her expression wavered between tears and laughter, and she settled for a teary laugh, resting her head on my chest as she shook from the combination. “I knew you would say that, but I couldn’t believe it. You know?” She leaned away, wiping her sleeve across her cheek. “I was scared for the worst.”

“You don’t have any reason to be afraid anymore.”

“I know.” She stood on tiptoe and kissed me.

The sun bathed us. The water below hummed a romantic song. I’m unconvinced whether an afterlife exists. But for a moment, we enjoyed a glimpse of heaven.

We walked back to the castle—to what remained of the castle. As she matched my slow progress, Freya updated me on her inheritance. I hadn’t asked, allowing her to decide when and how to tell me.

“They’re charging Bernie for a litany of crimes, including the murder of both Lord Malcolm Huxley and his son.” she said. “That bloody boot in the shed belonged to the son. Anyway, as a result, Bernie’s half of the inheritance defaults to me.” A stretch of silence built between us. “Before, I only had access to the liquid cash. He received all the properties and business accounts. Now, I have everything. Including this.”

We had come to the once-expansive front entrance, now reduced to charred wood.

I continued to hold my tongue, allowing her to speak without any kind of influence—even subtle—from me.

“I’m selling everything. This estate. Won’t even bother to rebuild. I just want to wash my hands of all that happened here.” She licked her lips. “I’m liquidating Huxley Construction. Turning everything I’ve inherited into cash, and I’m donating ninety percent of it to Scottish foundations centered on nature preservation.”

I tilted my head, seeing Freya yet again in a new light. How could someone constantly surprise and impress me?

“Don’t worry, though,” she said. “You won’t ever have to work again, if you choose not to—with the ten percent I keep.”

“One more walk-through?” I stared into the yawning maw of the double entrance. “Just to feel like a king again?” I added with a touch of volume and gusto.

We stepped around the rubble and into the estate, walking without direction, moving through the endless halls like Theseus wandering the bewildering home of the minotaur.

I favored my left side, often stopping for a break, complaining loudly about how much my leg and hip and side hurt.

What predator doesn’t leap with stupid eagerness to attack their prey?

The assassin, dressed in his low hat and long coat, appeared from the shadows and detritus. He held another knife—different from the one he had left inside my body. That one now lay in my suitcase in our new hotel room.

“Euan,” I said, recalling the name Bernie had uttered to Freya when she was hogtied—when he referenced the assassin.

My mention of his name staggered him. He stuttered another couple of steps and stopped, his eyes narrowing into slits. Revelation came too late, though. His grip tightened around the knife handle.

I stared at him, and he stared at me.

With him fully attuned to what little danger I posed, Freya had a lot more room to operate.

The plan we had generated with Tempest was simple: return to the estate without a police escort and play up my injuries. Everything else would fall into place. We just had to remain vigilant and prepared.

As I had advised Freya the day of her reading, so I had reminded her earlier that day: “Keep your hand in your purse, on the pepper spray.”

The assassin never saw her draw or raise or aim the canister. The stream caught him square in the face. The backsplash cross-contaminated me, but I had dealt with pepper spray on more than one occasion, and I knew how to tolerate the burning.

Not our pursuer, though.

Even if he had anticipated our counterattack, if he had avoided the direct stream into his eyes, I was on him faster than he could blink. Pain was an old friend of mine, and I knew how to use and ride the beast.

As the assassin grabbed his face to wipe away the capsicum, I leapt forward and drove my knee into his groin. He collapsed like a sack of gravel. I was on him, exercising my law enforcement training once more by manipulating his arms behind his back and restraining him with a pair of handcuffs.

The police waited on the periphery of the property. Once we had the assassin detained, Freya called them, and they immediately arrived, officially arresting Euan.

Detective Stewart sat us down an hour later in his office at the police station. “Euan Lowry. Apparently, Bernard offered him a portion of your inheritance.” The detective looked at Freya. “He attacked today out of vengeance—angry you spoiled his early retirement.”

“So he followed me in London, too?”

“From what he said, Bernard had tracked you for quite a while. He wanted Euan to meet you in London. Finish the job there. Except you hung out in front of an apartment—right in front of a security camera. He didn’t dare take the risk. Then August showed, and that complicated things more. So he followed you, waiting for the right moment to strike.”

“The construction yard?” I asked.

The detective nodded. “And the hotel room. Also, the Loch Ness Monster. He operated the creature from the bank.”

That brought back a detail I hadn’t inquired about. “What about Gordon Lively? We spotted him one night standing on the bank after Nessie appeared.”

“According to him—and we have no reason to doubt his claims—he would spend most nights on the shore, recording the water, hoping to catch a glimpse of Nessie. He thought if he could capture her on camera, he could destroy Barker’s construction.”

“But he confessed,” Freya said.

“Falsely, to buy time.” Detective Stewart glanced at his watch and stood, signaling he had other affairs. “Apparently, he needed to verify the creature, but he didn’t want anyone else to know about the evidence he possessed. Turned out, he had only photographed the mechanized version.”

Our conversation fizzled after that, and the detective showed us out of his office.

The next morning, Freya and I flew home together.

Six Months Later. Saturday, July 4th. 1921hrs.

I stood on the periphery of the party happening in my backyard.

When my foray into the supernatural world had begun, I was miserable and alone, consumed by grief and self-pity. I shut out my family and friends. I refused to meet anyone new. My mindset convinced me that no one would want anything to do with me—with my baggage, with my sins.

Not my oldest friends.

Not my sister or brother.

Not my parents.

Why meet someone new? Why draw them into the dark, heavy orbit of my life?

So, I isolated myself. Worse, I forced my opinion and my decisions for others onto them. I stole their free will, shredded their autonomy. Though they wanted to love me, I refused. I believed I didn’t deserve their love or support.

How could I, after what I had done?

How could I deserve anything good after murdering an innocent person?

What I didn’t realize then—but understand now—is that I don’t have the power to make decisions for other people. No matter how hard I pushed them away, they continued to choose to lean into me.

What an incredible thing persistence proved to be.

Because they refused to listen to me—because they insisted on breaking down my walls—I’m surrounded by everything I could have ever wanted in life.

Easy conversation intermingled with the scent of burgers on the grill.

My mom and dad sat with Ernie at the patio table. Rachel and Jake were across from them, Jane at their feet, sitting in the grass and drifting. It was about her bedtime, and she’d had a busy day. Alina lay on her belly, talking to my niece. Adam and Rhett stood together, likely carrying on a conversation about some sports team.

Daphne was by the barbecue, tending to burger patties. Fred chugged beers between running errands for her and skipping through the eccentric playlist.

Samuel and Maya stood with Freya on the corner of the patio, the three of them wearing smiles as they carried on a conversation.

And Bagley lay in the evening sunshine, sprawled on the warm concrete.

It always stunned me how much my family had grown. A year ago, the scene unfolding in my backyard was an impossibility. It was something I never dared dream of. Now, I couldn’t imagine my life without these people.

Tempest Michaels and Blue Moon had sent me on a crazy, whirlwind of a ride—one that had altered the course of my life forever, in the best of ways.

I stuffed my hand in my pocket, making sure the ring hadn’t wiggled out of there. My gaze locked onto Freya. The sun caught her golden hair, and she buzzed with a pure energy that emanated from her body.

My initial plan was to wait until the fireworks later that night to pop the question.

But I had been waiting for six months.

I couldn’t wait another minute, let alone another two hours.

So, I held the ring in my fist and strolled over to Freya, placing my other hand on her back. “You mind if I cut in for a second?” I asked Maya.

With the pressure of a potential relationship taken off the table between us, Maya’s and my friendship had blossomed into something beyond beautiful. Fred was my oldest friend, and Freya was my best friend. But Maya was an extension of me. She was everything I wasn’t, and we completed each other—in a very platonic, non-romantic way.

Maya also knew of my plan, though she didn’t know about the audible. However, she must have read the intention written all over my face. She bit her lip, sealing her excitement, and nodded.

The corner of my lip twitched. “I just need to ask Freya a quick question.” My heart beat like a hummingbird’s wings in my throat. My stomach was an empty pit, filled with nothing but a whirlwind of twisting air.

“What’s going on?” Freya asked. She looked concerned—probably because I looked so concerned.

The backyard had gone silent, except for the music. Fred had changed the song again.

To Heart Boner by Ninja Sex Party.

Of course Fred had played that song. And it would forever be the song I associated with Freya’s and my engagement.

Every eye settled on me, as we all sank into a moment that seemed to weigh so much more than the one just before it. Freya shifted on her feet, clearly aware of the change.

I dropped to one knee.

The song filled the emptiness—I’ve got a heart boner for you.

“Freya Wilkins.” I didn’t have a pretty speech prepared, because I’m not a man of many words—just a man of words that matter. “I love you, and I want to spend the rest of my life making you as happy as you make me. Will you marry me?”

Her smile was the greatest sight I had ever seen.

As Freya and I danced that night, fireworks exploding in the sky, I realized something about life.

Ghosts exist.

They live in our past as mistakes and regrets, and they haunt us if we allow them the power. The trick is standing still and facing them—even when it hurts. Even when it’s scary.

But once I stood still—once I cemented myself in the moment and stopped running from a past or chasing a future—that was the moment I finally danced.

THE END

A person in a garment AI-generated content may be incorrect.Other Series in the Blue Moon Universe

A coven of witches bent on murder, a cult of hidden figures raising a leviathan to smite the city … sounds like a regular Wednesday morning for Boston PD’s supernatural division.

Chloe Mayfield is a career cop, but when a high-profile bust goes spectacularly wrong, she finds herself assigned to the losers in Boston PD's supernatural division …

… and discovers a world she never knew existed.

Tasked to investigate a drowning far from water in a high-rise building, the symbol carved into the victim’s chest defies explanation. Until she begins to pry, and a coven of witches show up with a threat to stay out of their business.

With a wise-cracking dwarf and a senior-citizen claiming to be a descendent of Joan of Arc at her side, she’ll need to uncover the truth and stop the killer. And she’d better do it soon, because the tides are rising, and one single misstep is all it will take to leave the city, not to mention her career, in ruins.

Get ready for high-stakes supernatural action.

Books by Alex Gates

Doryan Miller's life takes an otherworldly turn when he finds himself smack dab in the middle of a team of supernatural misfits.

Meet Doryan, a medium with a gift for chatting with the dearly departed. His usual day job? Construction sites and ranching. But now, he's thrust into a world where werewolves roam, ancient magic exists, and the dead aren't exactly resting in peace.

He's recruited by Project Phoenix, a secret squad of individuals led by the enigmatic Haller. Their mission? Hunt down things that go bump in the night and keep humanity safe from the forces of darkness... but their first gig is no simple paranormal pest control. They're tracking a werewolf, and this shapeshifter isn't your average furry friend.

As the boundaries between reality and the supernatural blur, it's a race against time for "Project Phoenix." Can Doryan and his crew stop the beast before it sinks its claws into more victims?

Think Suicide Squad meets Odd Thomas, but with a twist of dark humor and a dash of horror.

A reluctant hero is poised to rewrite destiny itself.

Meet Joseph Hunter, a man once renowned as a fearsome monster hunter, now shattered by grief and drowning his sorrows in the bottom of a glass. But within his veins pulses a power beyond imagination.

As the echoes of his wife's unsolved murder haunt his every step, Joseph's life takes an electrifying turn when his daughter, Melanie, is ruthlessly kidnapped. With a heart burdened by pain and vengeance, Joseph teams up with his steadfast friend, Xander, embarking on a high-stakes pursuit that leads them through shadows teeming with supernatural beings and secrets waiting to be unearthed.

A tingling blend of spells and sarcasm, "Shadow Born” transports you into a dangerous world, where courage is forged in the crucible of loss and where redemption beckons from the depths of despair.

Dare you enter the shadows and awaken the sorcerer within.

Books by Steve Higgs

The paranormal? It’s all nonsense but proving it might just get them all killed.

When a master vampire starts killing people in his hometown, paranormal investigator, Tempest Michaels, takes it personally …

… and soon a race against time turns into a battle for his life. He doesn’t believe in the paranormal but has a steady stream of clients with cases too weird for the police to bother with.

Mostly it’s all nonsense, but when a third victim turns up with bite marks in her lifeless throat, can he really dismiss the possibility that this time the monster is real?

Joined by an ex-army buddy, a disillusioned cop, his friends from the pub, his dogs, and his mother (why are there no grandchildren, Tempest), our paranormal investigator is going to stop the murders if it kills him …

… but when his probing draws the creature’s attention, his family and friends become the hunted.

Today’s tasks:
1.Escape from underground cell
2.Recruit snarky d-bag werewolf to help
3.Invade demon realm and rescue a girl

For wizard detective, Otto Schneider, magic has always kept him out of trouble. Now it’s working in reverse …

… and he’s just started the fight of his life. There’s an ancient secret buried in the Earth’s past and he just uncovered it.

Magical beings once ruled over us until their betrayed leader made a death curse with his final breath. Banished from the realm of man for over four thousand years, the curse is weakening, and these beings, these … demons, are coming back to rule the Earth once more.

They are powerful, immortal, and unstoppable, but they don’t know everything.

They left some of their magic behind and their return has sparked an awakening.

Heroes will rise …

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