Miles—scarab beetle and humble photojournalist—strained to listen. He glanced at the surrounding trees, spectral colossi in the moonlight. A fallen log sat rotting, just ahead.
“I don’t hear anything.”
Calvin—atlas beetle and journalist—stood stock still. His three horns curved upward in a graceful silhouette against the dark horizon.
“My Sam.” Aba strode in waving pieces of paper. “Look!”
I peered up from my desk. Being such a slow day, not a new case to be had, I longed for an excuse to stop shuffling papers and paying bills. My hubby was the best possible distraction. “What, love?” I stood up to kiss him,
I revved my motor and slipped out of park, checking the glowing digits of the clock on my nightstand. 2:59 a.m. I’d woken just in time. It’s tough to be a crime-solving teenage car. Sometimes you have to sacrifice a little sleep.
But I had a mystery to solve.
She had always been imprisoned inside the stone walls of the tower. She did not know why. It was just how it was—the way it had always been. The darkness of the place was part of her now.
Her favorite place was the windowsill. She loved to sit with her back pressed
Always last to everything.
Jonah is the last of his class to change, both physically and developmentally.
He hears the cries from out in the hallway. The scuffling playfights, the macho name-calling. Everything he seeks to avoid as he slinks from the dressing room into the whitewashed cubicle, towel tight around his waist,
His brother used to make voice memos every night, and now, three months after Justin’s fatal accident, Colbert still couldn’t sleep without them.
The time glared at him from the lockscreen of Justin’s old phone. He scrolled through a year’s worth of recordings until he found the one he’d left on last night.
My eyes are transfixed by the rhythmic pulse of the red blinking light. On. Off. On. Off. On. Off.
It calls out to me, signaling me to press the button. Daring me. Taunting me. But I can’t. Not yet.
The weight on my chest stills my breath and my hand.
Doyle glanced around and nudged the fishmonger.
“Do you have the… goods?”
The fishmonger nodded. “Aye.” He slipped Doyle a parcel wrapped crudely in brown paper. “And, there’s a fine whiting,” he bellowed, pointing to a large, white fish lying on the table.
Did the man have to be so obvious?
“Final meal choice, Dunbar. What do you want?”
Vic Dunbar lifted his head. He’d thought long and hard, trying to decide between steak and spaghetti. “Got anyone who can cook a good steak?” Nothing beat Lady Love’s cooking, but beggars couldn’t be too picky.
Kate, his prison guard, narrowed her eyes at him.
Darkness hangs around me in the twelve-by-twelve-foot room like the sour coating of lemon on my tongue.
“Can you tell us who did it?”
Detective Smith motions toward the glass pane, the only source of light flooding the room. A chalky film grits against my teeth.
I lick my lips and assess the five men
Abe could feel the waitress’s eyes creeping toward the case notes as she hovered over the booth.
“Milk or sugar?” she offered.
“Just the coffee.” Abe snapped the folder shut in an aggressive motion. He had long since lost any patience for nosy onlookers and saw no need to treat them with tact.
Gossip shouldn’t feel like a responsibility.
I didn’t want to be the one to tell Stephen, but duty came in odd packages, and he needed to know. So, I squared my shoulders and pushed open the touristy saloon-style doors.
Pausing just inside, I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply.
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