Chapter 4

From a quiet corner desk in the precinct office, Ben Delaney hit the print key on his computer. A laser printer hummed to life behind him, spitting out a single page report. He drained the last dregs of cold coffee from his chipped Hornet's mug, rose from his ratty old swivel chair, and casually retrieved the document from the printer.

The station was quiet, emptied out for the evening shift break. But even if it had been buzzing with activity, no one would have paid any attention to the reserved, awkward young cop who kept very much to himself.

That was the beauty of his role.

It was why he'd been chosen.

He wasn't the only member of the force to be recruited. He knew there were others, though their identities were kept secret. It was safer that way, cleaner. For his part, he couldn't recall how long it had been since he first met his Mistress. He knew only that he now lived to serve.

With the report clutched in his hand, Delaney shuffled down the hallway in search of privacy. The break room, which was never empty no matter the time of day, was currently occupied by a couple of secretaries and Gibbs, a fat, loud-mouthed man who was retiring at the end of the year. He was bragging about the great deal he had gotten on some middle of nowhere Florida condo while the women basically ignored him, the two females lunching on day-old, chocolate party cake and washing it all down with can's of Diet Coke.

Ben ran his fingers through his shaggy pale brown hair and walked past the open doorway, toward the restroom at the end of the corridor. He paused outside the men's room, his hand on the tarnished metal handle, as he casually glanced behind him. With no one there to see him, he moved to the next door down, the station's janitorial supply closet. It was supposed to be kept locked, but seldom was. Nothing much worth stealing in there anyway, unless you had a thing for industrial-grade toilet paper, bleach, and brown paper towels.

He twisted the knob and pushed the old steel panel inward. Once inside the dark closet, he flicked the lock into place from within and retrieved his mobile phone from the front pocket of his pants. He pressed speed dial, calling the sole number that was stored in the untraceable, disposable device. The call rang twice, then fell into menacing silence as his Mistress's unmistakable presence loomed on the other end of the line.

"Mistress," he breathed, his voice a reverent whisper. "I have information for you."

He spoke quickly and quietly, divulging all of the details of the Daniels woman's visit to the morgue, including the specifics of her statement about her brother's disappearance. Delaney heard a growl and the soft hiss of breath skating across the mobile phone's receiver as his Mistress absorbed the news in silence. He sensed fury in that slow, wordless exhalation, and it chilled him.

"Keep an eye on her." His Mistress said, then hung up.

Ben stared blankly at the screen for a moment then slunk back out of the supply closet to head back to his desk. He had to keep up appearances, after all, by at least appearing to do his work. Even if he was only here for one reason, to report back to his Mistress about the Daniels family.

"Hey, dude. Could ya open the door for me?"

It took a moment for Delaney to realise he was being spoken to; he'd been so distracted by the thoughts of the Daniels' woman and how to best serve his Mistress in obtaining her. He'd been ordered to keep an eye on the woman's action, and follow her if necessary, then report back if she made any major moves; such as leaving the country. He should go and follow her now, especially after the way she'd stormed from her brother's house this morning.

Even now, as he pulled open the door to let a pizza delivery guy carrying four steaming pizza boxes enter; his attention remained rooted on how best to win esteem from his Mistress. Ben stepped inside the precinct house, his palms moist with anticipation of the glory that awaited him, should he do well in his task. His Mistress had promised him a prize. Head down, optimistic in his capacity to move around unnoticed, he started across the reception area at a hasty clip.

He didn't even notice the pizza guy moving into his path until he had collided with him, head-on. A cardboard box thrust into his abdomen and released a gust of garlic scented steam before plummeting to the grimy linoleum and spilling its contents all over his feet.

"Aw, man! That mess you're standing on was my next delivery. Don't you pay attention to where you're going?"

He didn't apologise, or even pause to kick the greasy pizza toppings off his shoes. Just headed straight for the stairwell that led to the parking lot and his car.

"Hey boy, hold up a sec."

Gibbs, the aging, balding officer, stood in the foyer hollering after him now. Stuffed into his uniform, he had moved on from the ladies in the break room and was now wasting time attempting to flirt with the ditzy blonde behind the front desk.

Ben dropped his chin down, ignoring the cop's booming voice behind him and kept on walking towards a fire exit door, which led to a stairwell located near the public restrooms just off the lobby.

Gibbs puffed out his chest and gaped with palpable disbelief as his self-professed authority was wholly disregarded.

"Oi, bean stalk! I'm speaking to you. I said, get back here and help tidy this mess up - and I mean now, shit-for-brains!"

"Do it yourself, you egotistical, bastard," Delaney muttered under his breath, then propelled open the heavy metal door to the stairs and began a quick trot down to a level below.

Above him, that same door thundered open, striking the opposite wall and quaking the steps like a sonic boom. Gibbs bent over the rail, his jowls corpulent with his ire. "What'd you just say to me? What the fuck did you just call me, asshole?"

"You heard exactly what I said. Now leave me the hell alone, Gibbs. I have far more important things to do."

Delaney took out his phone, intending to get in touch with the only one who really commanded him. But before he could hit the 'send' key that would connect him to his Mistress, the hefty cop was launching himself down the stairs. A large fleshy hand cuffed the side of his head. His ears rang, vision swimming with the force of the blow, as the phone flew out of his grasp and clattered onto the landing, numerous steps below.

"Thanks for giving me something to smile about, on an over-all shitting day," Gibbs taunted. He ran a sausage finger around the front of his too-tight collar, then nonchalantly reached up to stroke the few remaining wisps of hair on his otherwise shiny forehead, back down where they'd been arranged before. "You know, the only reason you're here is because the Chief got you the job. Now, get your scrawny, good-for-nothing ass back up those stairs before I hand it to you on a platter. Ya got me?"

There was a time, before he'd met the one he called Mistress, that a challenge like that - particularly from a jackass like Gibbs - would not have gone unmet.

But the sweating, sputtering cop glaring down on him now was insignificant in light of the duties entrusted to chosen ones like himself. Ben simply blinked a few times, then turned to retrieve his mobile and continue with the task at hand.

He only made it down two stairs before Gibbs was on him again, heavy fingers clamping down hard on his shoulder and forcibly wheeling him around. His eyes lit on the fancy ballpoint pen stuck into the shirt pocket of Gibbs' uniform. He recognized the commemorative service emblem on the clip as he took another hard knock to the skull.

"What are you deaf and dumb? Get the hell outta my sight, or I'll-"

The abrupt choke and wheeze of Gibbs voice snapped Delaney back to his senses. He saw his hand clutching the officer's pen as it came down for a second brutal plunge, the point of it burrowing deep into the fleshy skin of Gibbs' neck.

He struck again and again with the makeshift weapon, until the cop sank down to the floor in a savaged, lifeless heap.

He loosened his fist and the pen dropped into a pool of blood on the stairs, all but forgotten in the instant it took him to dash down and grab up his mobile once more. He meant to place his crucial call immediately, but his eyes kept on drifting to this new mess he'd made, something that wasn't going to get swept away as easily as the pizza in the lobby.

This had been a mistake, and any approval won from informing his Mistress of the Daniels' woman's whereabouts could be lost once it was discovered that he'd acted so impulsively here. Killing without sanction might negate everything.

But perhaps there was an even more certain path into his Mistress's good graces - a path that could be paved by apprehending and delivering the woman to his Mistress in person.

'Yes, ' thought Delaney, 'that was a prize bound to impress.'

Pocketing the phone, he turned back to extract Gibbs' weapon from its holster. Then he stepped over the corpse and hurried out the back entrance to the station parking lot.

As he made his way towards his old beat-up Ford parked towards the rear of the lot, Gibbs phone started to ring in his hand. He flipped it open, speaking into the mouthpiece, "Frank Gibbs phone, Delaney speaking."

There was a disappointed outtake of breath on the other end of the line before the caller identified themselves, "Officer Delaney, this is Clara Daniels. Where is Gibbs?"

Ben's heart started to race, this could be the opportunity to please his Mistress that he'd been hoping for. "Evenin', Miss Daniels. Officer Gibbs isn't here at the moment. I'm afraid he's gone on early retirement."

"Since this morning?" she sounded puzzled, and not a little disbelieving.

"Yes, ma'am. I'm his replacement."

"Oh well, I suppose I'll just tell you then." She paused, sighing again. He heard the sound of broken glass being swept up in the background. "My house was broken into while I was out today."

"Your house was broken into?"

"Yes," she snapped. "What is it with you cops that you always sound like you don't believe me?"

He ignored her question, "What made you come to the conclusion that your house was broken into?"

"Well, it could have something to do with the fact that my bedroom has been trashed! The mirror, the walls, the bed, my clothes, everything!"

He did his best to sound not sceptical, "Your bedroom and only your bedroom?"

"Yes," she huffed out, sounding more than a little exasperated.

"Right, so there was nothing else?"

"No," she hesitated as if deciding whether to tell him something or not. "Well, there was one other thing."

His patience was beginning to wear thin with this phone call. It didn't sound like it was going to help him please his Mistress at all. "Which was?" he said irritably.

"They left a message, ok?"

"They left you a message?" he said incredulously.

"Yes, it said 'one eye is taken for an eye'.

He laughed, he really couldn't help it. "One eye is taken for an eye? As in the line from the Creedence song?"

"Yes," she bit out. "It was written on my mirror in lipstick and Bad Moon Rising was my mother's favourite song."

He stopped his chuckling abruptly. That line was from her mother's favourite song? Suddenly it all clicked into place. His heart swelled with reverence. Oh, his Mistress was so clever. What better way to bait the Daniels' woman than to use something so personal. The line would make her wonder.

"Miss Daniels, with all due respect there are only two conclusions I can come to from what you've told me. Either you have an over-active imagination and think this is an episode of your favourite crime show, or you're making it all up."

There was shocked silence on the other end of the line; he could almost hear the crickets chirping and her mouth dropping open from the audacity of his words. Then, all of a sudden, she exploded, "You've got to be kidding me! You think I'm making this up?"

"I'm sorry ma'am but this is all a little farfetched, even for me to believe. And as a police officer, I've seen many a strange thing. There are also a lot of holes in your story. I'm mean, why would someone trash your bedroom and nothing else? How could someone have left a message on your mirror when everything was broken? Not to mention the fact that you say it was written in lipstick and the message is a line from an old Creedence Clearwater Revival song. Come on, Miss Daniels. You really expect me to believe this?"

"Yes! I don't know why the perpetrator only wrecked my bedroom, or why they left the message in lipstick, or even how the hell they knew that Bad Moon Rising was my mother's favourite song. But it's the truth. Why would I make this up?"

"I don't know ma'am, you tell me."

Something made a pinging noise in the background. It sounded distinctly like a computer. An email perhaps? He heard footsteps, then the sound of leather creaking as she sat down. There was silence for a moment which was soon followed by a shocked gasp. "Oh my god," she whispered then seemed to realise that she was still on the phone to him.

She was clearly distracted as she said, "Look, clearly you don't believe me, Officer Delaney. So, you know what, just forget about it. I have to go anyway."

The line went dead with a harsh click. She'd obviously done her damndest to slam her mobile phone closed. He was left wondering what the hell had happened to change her demeanour so quickly. Only one thing for it. He had to continue on his plan to follow her.