Subterfuge

Chapter 1: Prologue

A pool of blood. That was the first thing Hugh Everhart saw when he entered the hallway outside the small apartment. He grimaced, following the blood to its source—the dead bodies of David Artino and his wife, collapsed together right outside the open door.

We failed, Hugh thought numbly. We failed to protect them.

This was Ace's work. Ace Anarchy, the most feared villain in the world, number one on the Renegades' Most Wanted list. He had done this. Maybe not the actual killings—he had most likely sent some hit man to do that. But there was no doubt about it—this was his doing.

He was who David had asked the Renegades for protection from.

Hugh stepped closer, forcing himself to look more closely at the bodies. David Artino's nimble fingers, which had crafted so many beautiful, powerful objects, now stilled forever. His wife, whose small, thin frame looked almost childlike in the ever-expanding pool of blood.

We failed. They came to us for protection and we failed to deliver.

"Captain! You're here." A thin man clad in a white forensics uniform was standing just inside the apartment, looking up from a pad of paper. "We've drafted up a report."

It took Hugh a ridiculously long amount of time to process what the man was saying. A forensics report. On the murders. Right.

Bracing himself, Hugh stepped over the bodies and into a room that appeared to be a living room-turned-makeshift-bedroom of sorts, with a small table near the entrance to the kitchen, and a full-size mattress tucked away in the corner. The tangled wad of blankets and pillows on the mattress immediately caught his attention, because they also seemed to be covered in blood. And there, mostly obscured by the tussled bedding—

Hugh felt his stomach clench. "Is that..."

The forensic followed his gaze and grimaced in apparent sadness and revulsion. "Their baby."

Hugh reeled with horror. A baby. Ace had killed a baby.

You couldn't get more villainous than that.

Struggling to maintain his composure, Hugh asked, "Any leads on the killer?"

The forensic nodded and gestured for Hugh to follow him. They walked past a tiny kitchen into a room that looked like it had belonged to a child, with a few toys strewn around the floor, and a little girl's shirt draped over the foot of the bed.

A man was lying on his back in what looked like the remains of a dollhouse, his eyes closed, blond hair sleeked back in a ponytail, blood pooling out from a gunshot wound to his forehead.

"There was a gun next to his hand when we first arrived," the forensic informed him. "We think this man was responsible for the deaths of the man, woman, and child, but we don't know whether he killed himself afterwards or if there was someone else involved. We do know that all four deaths were caused by direct gunshot wounds, no prodigy interference."

"What about the other child?" Hugh asked, afraid to hear the answer.

The forensic blinked at him. "There was no other child. These four are the only bodies we found in the apartment."

"David Artino had two children," Hugh insisted. "My guess is this was the older child's bedroom."

The forensic shrugged. "We're going to interview the neighbors, get the family members' names and ages and whatever information they have about them, and about possible motivations for the murders. It might be that she was staying with a friend or a family member tonight."