77 Results in the "Burned Cover" category
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“Heya,” Erika said, forcing a smile. “Who’s this?” Daniel walked up to Erika, where she was leaning up against the side of her pickup. He wasn’t alone. At his side, a girl who reminded Erika of a younger version of herself shuffled along. Not in that she looked like a smaller version of Erika, but that she seemed to be going through a phase that Erika had once visited during her middle school years. She wore a black dress with tiny white polka dots, dyed hair in short braids that rested…-
279.2 K • Ongoing
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“Morning, Mom,” Erika said, failing to fight off a yawn. Leah, fake or not, could put on an intense glare when she wanted. “Out all weekend. No calls. Texts ignored. Do you know how worried I was?” Probably would have been a whole lot more worried if you knew what I was up to, Erika thought as she rolled her eyes. That was the wrong move. A familiar look of anger crossed Leah’s face. That pinch of her lips and that slight twist of her mouth to the side, it was exactly as it always had…
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279.2 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
24 – Portents of Impending Doom
The atmosphere in Varn’s arcade felt unusually tense. It didn’t help that, as soon as Erika walked in, Leslie stood, pulled a hefty shotgun out from under the table, and aimed it right at the door. He quickly pointed it up at the ceiling as soon as he saw that it was Erika coming in, but he kept it in his hands, frowning heavily as The Fixer walked in behind her. Maybe she should have knocked. Erika wondered if they thought The Fixer was some kind of ghost, but dismissed that idea. He looked…-
279.2 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
11 – The Hunters
Erika pulled up to the rundown arcade a full hour before midnight, their expected meeting time. The old beater van was still parked around back. Rick’s ride, presumably. Joining it was a motorcycle. Not one of those sleek modern things, but an old-school Harley. The owner clearly took care of it. Most of it was polished up to a shine that gleamed in Erika’s headlights. She pulled up alongside it, hopped out, and was just about to knock on the arcade’s rear door when she heard muffled voices…-
279.2 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
10 – i – Bounty
Noblesse Oblige. Before Sargon of Akkad united his peoples and formed his empire, before the pharaohs of old Egypt erected their monuments to their own demise, before the Romans built their roads, and before humans made the paradigm shift from hunter-gatherers to an agricultural society, man hid in caves and cowered from the monsters that lurked in the night. The apex predator, the tool-using top of the food chain… Those titles did not belong to humanity. They weren’t the dominant species. Not…-
279.2 K • Ongoing
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Finding a hotel in Chicago, even on short notice, wasn’t much of a trial. A few hundred hotels, motels, hostels, inns, and bed-and-breakfasts were scattered throughout the city. Erika had no particular preference, as long as the place was clean and discreet. The kind of place she could get into with cash and few questions asked. Cash was the important bit. Perhaps it was paranoia, but after having been in a massive archive that seemed to catalog everything, from street light patterns to the mayor’s…
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279.2 K • Ongoing
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Erika followed the navigation on her phone, turning down one of the seedier streets in Chicago. It was up north, pretty much the opposite side of the city from where Erika and Daniel lived. It was, nonetheless, the street he had given her over the phone. She drove down, frowning at every building she passed: a video rental place that looked sketchy as shit next to a store advertising clothes, shoes, erotic toys, and lingerie; a hookah lounge; and two separate tattoo parlors with signs so faded they were…
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279.2 K • Ongoing
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It was some small consolation that there was next to no traffic or pedestrians in the area of the Old St. Patrick’s Church at three in the morning. Erika didn’t want to look too suspicious as she stalked around the church, but even a priest would get an odd side-glance walking around at this hour. That said, Erika wasn’t one for subtlety. That nun was in some way associated with this church. Maybe finding Friar Tuck inside would be an acceptable alternative. If Erika could ask a question or…
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279.2 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
06 – A Proper Investigation
“So, I call you on a Friday, and you can just come right out and hang?” Daniel shifted in the passenger seat of the old pickup, looking uncomfortable. “Sorry,” Erika said, not taking her eyes off the road. “Didn’t mean to imply that you had nothing better to do. But… did you not have anything better to do?” “My… family likes to go out on Friday nights,” he said, still looking distinctly uncomfortable. It was probably the worn seats—though the passenger seat wasn’t half as…-
279.2 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
02 – Florence Erika Walker
Erika sat hunched over a bowl of breakfast cereal, watching her mother’s back as the woman washed the range with a rag cloth. The woman in the kitchen wore a plaid shirt with an apron thrown on over the top. The teal and white blouse that was today’s outfit for her job as a hotel clerk hung over the back of one of the counter stools, ready to put on as soon as she had to go in to work. Erika paid attention to every little detail. From the large freckle on her elbow to the way her sandy brown hair…-
279.2 K • Ongoing
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