CHAPTER ONE
Derek Sullivan squinted at Aaron Hopper through the amber haze of the Centaur’s Den, the overhead lights swimming and multiplying before his eyes.
The bar’s shiny surfaces had begun to tilt and sway hours ago, but Derek still had enough motor control to jab a finger toward his empty glass.
One more. That’s all he needed. One more to blur the edges of a day best forgotten.
“Another,” he demanded, his voice rough from cigarettes and hours of drinking. “Double. Straight.”
Aaron wiped his meaty hands on a bar towel, his expression hardening into the familiar mask Derek had seen directed at countless other drunks. Never at him though. Not until tonight.
“Last call was fifteen minutes ago, Derek. You heard me announce it.” Aaron’s voice floated toward him as if traveling through water, words rippling and distorting. “I already shut down the register.”
Derek fumbled in his pocket, extracted a crumpled twenty, and slapped it on the counter. It missed the puddle of condensation by mere inches. “There. Cash. Legal tender. No register needed.”
The bar had emptied around him without his noticing, the usual weeknight crowd thinned to just two other patrons gathering their belongings in the far corner.
Derek’s internal clock had stopped functioning around his fifth drink.
Or was it his sixth? The night had dissolved into disconnected moments.
“You’ve had enough,” Aaron said, not touching the twenty. “Time to go home.”
“I’ll tell you when I’ve had enough.” Derek leaned forward, intending to look menacing. The movement sent the room spinning and he gripped the edge of the bar to steady himself. “Been coming here for years. Since before you owned the place.”
Aaron sighed, his massive shoulders rising and falling beneath his tight black t-shirt. Years as a bouncer before buying the Centaur’s Den had given him both the build and the patience to deal with difficult customers. He’d ejected men larger than Derek without breaking a sweat.
“And I appreciate your business,” Aaron said, his tone deceptively calm. “But it’s closing time, and you’re well past your limit.”
Derek’s sluggish brain registered the warning, but alcohol had dissolved his self-preservation instincts. He reached across the bar, intending to grab a bottle himself, but his coordination failed him. His hand knocked against a row of glasses, sending two toppling with a brittle crash.
“Goddammit, Derek!” Aaron moved faster than a man his size should be able to, snatching Derek’s wrist in a vise-like grip. “That’s it. We’re done.”
“Lemme go.” Derek tried to pull away, but his strength was no match for Aaron’s, especially not with a liver full of whiskey dampening his reflexes. “You can’t—”
“We can do this the easy way or the hard way.” Aaron’s voice dropped lower, a rumbling warning Derek felt more than heard. “Your choice.”
Something in Derek’s alcohol-soaked brain registered danger, but pride overrode caution. He yanked his arm back and swung wildly, his fist connecting with nothing but air. The momentum sent him staggering backward, knocking over his barstool with a clatter that echoed in the near-empty bar.
Aaron rounded the counter with the fluid movement of someone who’d done this too many times before. He gripped Derek by the collar and the belt in one smooth motion, lifting him half off his feet.
“Hard way it is,” Aaron muttered.
Derek’s protests dissolved into incoherent curses as Aaron propelled him toward the exit. His feet barely touched the sticky floorboards, the room a blur of motion and light. He flailed, landing a glancing blow against Aaron’s shoulder that the larger man didn’t even seem to notice.
“You can’t do this!” Derek yelled, his words slurring together. “I’m a paying customer!”
“Not anymore,” Aaron replied, shouldering open the heavy door to the parking lot. “Good thing you’re walking, or I’d have to the cops to pick you up.”
The September night air hit Derek’s face like a slap, cold enough to momentarily clear his head but not enough to sober him.
With a final heave, Aaron sent Derek stumbling into the gravel lot. Derek’s ankle twisted beneath him, and he landed hard on his hands and knees, tiny stones biting into his palms.
“Don’t come back until you’ve dried out,” Aaron said from the doorway. “And Derek? Next time you feel like taking a swing at me, remember I’ve been throwing out drunks since you were in high school.”
The door slammed shut, leaving Derek alone in the dim glow of the parking lot’s single security light.
He pushed himself to his feet, swaying dangerously, his dignity wounded more than his body.
Blood and tiny pebbles clung to his scraped palms. He wiped them roughly against his jeans and tried to orient himself.
The Centaur’s Den sat at the edge of town, a low-slung building with a neon sign that now flickered off as Aaron shut down for the night.
Across the nearly empty parking lot, the main road stretched in both directions—right toward the newer parts of town, left toward the old neighborhood where Derek’s apartment waited, dark and empty.
Left it was.
Derek lurched forward, his legs obeying him only grudgingly.
Each step required concentration, his body moving as if through invisible molasses.
The spinning in his head worsened when he moved too quickly, forcing him to adopt a careful, shuffling gait.
Even so, he nearly fell twice before reaching the street.
The digital display on his watch read 1:47 a.m., though the numbers doubled and blurred when he tried to focus on them. The town slept around him, windows dark, streets empty. Somewhere distant, a dog barked once, then fell silent. His own breathing seemed unnaturally loud in the stillness.
A shortcut. He needed the shortcut through the old textile mill district.
It would shave ten minutes off his walk, ten minutes he wasn’t sure his legs could manage in their current state.
He veered left at the next intersection, leaving the main road for a narrower street that wound between abandoned industrial buildings.
The street lamps here were spaced farther apart, creating pools of yellow light surrounded by deeper darkness. Derek moved from one illuminated circle to the next, his shadow stretching and contracting like something alive. His thoughts drifted, unfocused and meandering.
What had happened tonight? The evening existed in his memory as disconnected fragments, some sharp-edged, others blurred beyond recognition.
He remembered arriving at the bar around nine, already buzzed from the half-bottle of cheap bourbon he’d drained at home.
The first few drinks at the Centaur’s Den stood out clearly enough—the burn of whiskey, the background hum of conversation, the baseball game playing on the TV above the bar.
Then things grew hazier. Had he played pool?
He had a vague recollection of leaning over the green felt, cue stick sliding between his fingers.
And an argument—he’d definitely had words with someone.
Not Aaron, someone else. A man in a blue shirt?
Derek couldn’t recall the man’s face, just the hot flush of anger and the way Aaron had stepped between them, guiding Derek back to the bar.
“You’re cut off,” Aaron had said then. But Derek had somehow gotten more drinks after that. Hadn’t he? The timeline refused to coalesce into anything coherent.
And Brenda. Shit. He’d run into Brenda Drummond at some point. The memory surfaced like debris after a flood—Brenda’s pinched face, her wire-rimmed glasses catching the light as she glared at him.
What had he said to her? He hoped it wasn’t anything that was going to come back and bite him—something she might put on that damn website she ran, TownCircle. The digital bulletin board where neighbors aired grievances and spread gossip under the thin veneer of “community service.”
Had he threatened her? Or had he told her something about himself that he shouldn’t have?
The possibilities sent a jolt of clarity through his drunken haze.
Brenda wielded TownCircle like a weapon, her self-righteous posts ruining reputations and stirring up trouble.
If he’d given her ammunition against him. ..
Derek stumbled on an uneven patch of sidewalk, nearly falling before catching himself against a lamppost. His stomach lurched dangerously, and he paused, breathing deeply through his nose until the nausea passed.
The night air had grown colder, or perhaps it was just his sweat-dampened shirt chilling against his skin.
He pushed off from the lamppost and continued his unsteady journey.
The textile mills loomed around him, hulking shadows of Trentville’s more prosperous past. Most had been abandoned decades ago when the industry moved overseas, leaving behind empty brick shells with broken windows that stared like blind eyes at the streets below.
The town council talked periodically about revitalization projects, but nothing ever materialized. The mills remained, decaying slowly, home to pigeons and rats and occasionally to teenagers looking for a private place to drink or make out.
Something scraped against pavement behind him. Footsteps?
Derek turned too quickly, the world tilting alarmingly. He braced himself against the rough brick wall of the nearest building until the spinning subsided. The street behind him stretched empty and silent, pools of lamplight illuminating nothing but cracked concrete.
Imagination. Had to be. Or maybe a stray cat.
He resumed walking, more careful now, aware of his vulnerability. In his younger days, Derek had been the danger in the dark—the troublemaker, the fighter, the name mothers warned their children about. Now, at thirty-seven, with a body softened by alcohol and inactivity, he felt the tables turning.
There it was again—the unmistakable sound of a footfall, then another. Deliberate steps, not the scurrying of an animal.
“Who’s there?” Derek called out, his voice echoing between the buildings. No response came except the faint rustle of wind through discarded paper.
Paranoia. That’s all it was. The whiskey making him jumpy, conjuring threats from shadows and wind sounds. He’d nearly reached the end of the mill district anyway. Another few blocks and he’d be back in the residential area, with its narrow houses packed close together. Safety in proximity.
The footsteps came again, quicker now, no longer trying to disguise their approach. Derek whirled around, the sudden movement nearly sending him to his knees as vertigo gripped him. He squinted into the darkness, his vision doubling and tripling an approaching figure.
A silhouette had materialized from the shadows between streetlights—human-shaped, average height and build, but featureless in the dim light.
As the figure stepped into the glow of the nearest lamp, details emerged: all black clothing, hands encased in dark gloves, and a ski mask obscuring every feature except for the eyes.
Fear sliced through Derek’s drunkenness, a blade of adrenaline cutting the fog. “What do you want?” he demanded, trying to sound tough despite the tremor in his voice.
The figure said nothing, continuing its steady advance. Derek backpedaled, nearly tripping over his own feet. Fight or flight warred within him, neither option promising much success in his condition. But Derek Sullivan had never been one to run.
“Back off!” he warned, raising his fists in a clumsy approximation of a boxer’s stance. “I’m not an easy target.”
Still silent, the figure closed the distance between them.
In a last, desperate attempt at defense, Derek swung his right fist in a wild haymaker.
His attacker sidestepped easily, catching Derek’s extended arm and using his own momentum to propel him forward.
The world spun in a dizzying arc as Derek’s feet left the ground.
He hit the pavement face-first, the impact driving the air from his lungs in a painful whoosh.
Before he could recover, a weight pressed against his back—a knee digging between his shoulder blades, pinning him to the cold concrete.
Derek bucked and thrashed, but his struggles were as ineffective as a turtle overturned on its shell.
Something thin slipped around his throat—a cord or wire or something, pulled taut with horrifying speed.
Derek’s hands scrabbled uselessly behind him, trying to reach his attacker, trying to loosen the garrote cutting into his windpipe.
Nothing worked. Pressure built in his head, a roaring in his ears drowning out everything except the voice that suddenly whispered close beside him.
“Red is for rage,” the figure hissed in a breathy voiceless whisper, the words slipping into Derek’s fading consciousness like poison.
The pressure increased. Derek’s vision narrowed, darkness encroaching from all sides until only a pinpoint of streetlight remained.
His lungs burned, desperate for air that couldn’t pass his constricted throat.
The last thing he felt was the rough concrete against his cheek, scraping skin as his struggles weakened and finally ceased.
The pinpoint of light winked out, and Derek Sullivan knew nothing more.