Horizon

//ABYSS// part 2

Inside a private office at the The Village Herald, a beautiful girl with a smile I wanted to trust waited patiently as her assistant poured a round of coffees. The brown-eyed beauty behind the desk was Meagan Cadmus, editor-in-chief. She wasn't the person Ethan and I were supposed to be meeting but considering how gorgeous she was, and how well the pencil skirt accentuated her ample curves, I didn't mind at all. Meagan's sparkling sepia skin and the long jet curls spilling down her demurely buttoned dress shirt did all kinds of things for me.

"Thanks, Perla." Meagan waited until Perla closed the door behind her. "So, Eliza, Ethan, how can I help you?"

Ethan passed me a look. "Actually, Meagan, we were hoping to meet with a reporter here, Chandler Sloane--but you're just as great! It's just, Eliza's an old friend and we were kind of hoping to all catch up. The secretary said Chan was on some sort of leave?" Ethan cleared his throat, shifting in his seat and blushing. I hid a smile behind my hand. Either he was channeling my girl crush or Ethan had a thing of his own for Miss Cadmus.

"You're friends of Chandler?" Meagan glanced at the door, biting her lip. "I really shouldn't say this but... Chandler hasn't been to work in weeks. It's not unusual for him to lay low for a story--but he always checks in with me. No one's heard from him. He's one of our best reporters, a great guy--I'm worried about him."

"Well, are you sure he didn't just... leave?" I shrugged in my seat. "Y'know, take a permanent vacation?" Ethan glared at me. "What? It happens."

Meagan shook her head. "Not with Chandler. He takes a lot of pride in his job. He takes even more pride in the Village. This is his home. He wouldn't just leave it behind."

In other words, Chandler wasn't a coward. I swallowed.

Meagan rose from her seat, Red Bottoms clicking as she glided to the file cabinet in the corner. Rummaging in the top drawer, she removed a folder, bringing it with as she returned.

"Chandler doesn't have family--at least not in the Village. I wasn't sure anyone else was around to do it so last week I filed a missing persons with the police. Here's the report. Feel free to keep it." Meagan passed the folder to Ethan, who stood to accept it. "Let me know if you here from him?"

"Definitely." Ethan nodded good-bye and I followed him from Meagan's office, closing the door behind us.

"Well that was a bust. Sorry about your friend."

Ethan's nose was already buried in the file. "He was a son-of-bitch and I'm sorry-not-sorry he's gone."

"Damn. I thought Wolves were warm-blooded not cold." I folded my arms, loving the tension.

Ethan glanced cautiously over our shoulders. "Chandler's an Incubus. And he used his powers on Naomi."

"Ooooh. Kinky."

"The only reason I haven't made Chan disappear is because he was there when..." Ethan sighed. "He was there when Naomi died; he brought her body back. And he was the one who knew to check her grave when we figured out Naomi could be summoned."

"Summoned? Like, from the grave, summoned?" Flesh crawling, I rubbed my arms, imagined taking my first breaths alone in the dark, clawing through worms and dirt to break free. "I didn't realize. I-I guess I haven't thought about funerals and headstones and... caskets." I swallowed. "So I'm guessing it was empty? The grave?"

"That's how we knew you were alive--even when I couldn't feel you."

We both glanced away.

"Ethan, is Chandler missing because of me? Is this my fault?"