Edge of Midnight (McClouds & Friends #4)

Edge of Midnight (McClouds & Friends #4)

Shannon McKenna





Prologue



G ordon watched his videotaped TV soap as he performed his usual calming post-job ritual of cleaning his guns, although he had not used them for today’s hit. Images of blood-soaked bodies from the multiple murder-suicide he’d staged that day appeared whenever he closed his eyes. Stupid soaps worked best for soothing his jagged nerves. Occupational stress. It was a bitch, but he was coping.

Tonight’s evening news had buzzed with the shocking story of the famous Seattle cardiologist who had snapped under the strain of his job, murdered his beautiful wife and two young sons, and then ended his own life. Dreadful. Tragic. Almost jerked tears into Gordon’s own eyes.

Though the bank transfer of the second half of the kill fee would dry them very fast, he reflected. All in all, it had been a satisfying day.

An actress tearfully confessed her secret pregnancy, and Gordon grabbed the remote to fast-forward through the local news piece that began to play. That was how he saw her. By pure, random chance.

A hot-cold rush of shock went through him. He had seen that perfect face only once. Magnified through the scope of a sniper rifle.

He would never forget those big, dreamy eyes. His heart thudded.

The program was a tedious feel-good piece about the revitalization project in historic downtown Endicott Falls. A perky commentator was interviewing his lost girl about her new bookstore café. Gordon picked up the phone, dialed. His fingers vibrated with excitement.

The man who answered the phone did not waste words. “Yes?”

“I found the girl,” Gordon said. “From the Midnight Project f*ck-up.”

There was a startled pause. “You’re sure it’s her?” his sometime employer asked. “After fifteen years? She was just a teenager.”

Gordon didn’t bother to answer the insulting question. “Want to find out what she knows before I take her out?” His eyes explored the lush curves of his lost girl’s body. “I’ll interrogate her. No extra charge.”

The other man grunted. “Forget indulging yourself. It’s been years. Just end it. Get a police file started first. Some dirty letters, a dead pet, and when you finally do kill her, nobody’ll be surprised.”

Hah. Like he needed to be told how to do his job. Gordon hung up, rewound, and studied her face. Just look at her. Fresh as a daisy—or so she seemed. He knew the truth. She was sly. Selfish. Look what she’d done to him; disappearing on him, eluding him for fifteen years, putting a massive dent in his professional reputation. Anger rose inside him like a boil, ugly and inflamed. He reveled in its hot, burning itch. Gave himself up to it. Just look at that bad, bad girl. She’d been laughing at him, all that time. Thinking she’d made a fool of him. Thinking she’d won.

Self-satisfied bitch. She was about to discover how wrong she was.

He freeze-framed, and placed his finger against her throat on the screen. Traced the laughing curve of her scornful pink mouth, imagining its hot moisture. Electricity from the TV screen buzzed against his finger.

This was going to be fun.





Chapter 1



H e had this dream so often, it gave him déjà vu. His twin, Kevin, sat on the rock behind the house, looking as he had right before he died, twenty-one, sunburned, cutoffs, flip-flops. Dirt-blond hair he’d cropped himself with kitchen shears. A dimple carved deep into his face, like there was some big secret joke that Sean eternally failed to get. “You’re supposed to be dead,” Sean snarled. “Would it be asking too much for you to just cut out this shit and leave me alone? Go into the light, or wherever the f*ck it is you need to go. Move on, already!”

I just want to help, Kev said mildly. You could use some help. You’re going down the drain, buddy. Swish, glug, bye-bye.

“You can’t help me!” Sean bellowed. “You are dead! And this bullshit is torture! It does not help me! It will never help me!”

Kev was unperturbed by his rudeness. Stop being a spaz. His ghost voice took on that irritating tone he’d always used when dealing with his more volatile twin. You’ve got to do something about Liv’s car. She’s—

“Forget about Liv! Stop torturing me! Leave me alone!”

Alone…alone…alone… The echo accompanied him into waking consciousness, where there was never any way to brace himself for it.

He had to sort it all out over again. Like it had just happened.

Yeah, it was another f*cking day. Yeah, Kev was still dead. And yeah, Kev was going to keep on being dead. Forever.

It would be so much easier to accept this if his twin would quit it with the spectral visits. But try explaining that to Kev. Stubborn jerk.

Light pried between his gummy eyelids. He ventured a slit-eyed peek. Unfamilar room. A clock on the bedside table read 12:47. Data crunched in his aching brain. Reality settled down, heavy and cold.

Another failure. His annual effort to erase August the eighteenth off the calendar hadn’t worked yet. Pinheaded optimist that he was, though, he just kept right on trying. The clock clicked over to 12:48. Eleven hours and twelve minutes of this goddamn day to get through.

He started to roll over, stopping as his leg encountered a silky thigh. The angle of that thigh to that ass wasn’t anatomically possible.