A scream ripped through my ears, and I fell to my knees. The body of a woman was lying on the street in front of me, her blood soaking into my jeans. There was a knife in her chest, but the blood was running from her back...
Running, running, running...
I woke up with a gasp.
"Amber?" Alex tightened his hold on my waist, pressing his face into the crook of my neck. "It was just a dream."
We were so close to Ruby.
Alex peppered kisses up to my earlobe. I wanted to relax in his arms, but the nightmare had left me tense and cold, and light was slipping beneath the curtains. I pulled away from him. "Why hasn't the alarm gone off? It must be way past seven."
"Because you set it." Amusement crept into his voice. "I'll never know why, but that probably has something to do with it."
I snatched my tabphone off the bedside table and tried to unlock it. The screen didn't even light up. "Oh, great. It's broken."
"Or just dead?" he suggested. The mattress moved as he got up.
Just dead. I swallowed and put it on the charging pad. "Right."
Alex went straight into the bathroom while I got dressed and trudged into the kitchen, where I'd finally removed the punch bag and replaced it with a table. I'd also replaced my broken coffee machine with Alex's.
I fed Mitzy, then put four slices of bread in the toaster and started making coffee. My mind wandered as I worked. We needed to crack Ethan today and find out who Iberia had been sleeping with. Maybe the mysterious woman would connect the dots between the bride and Ruby. Maybe she was even the murderer.
The toast popped up just as the coffee started to brew, and I grabbed a random knife to butter it. We needed to grill the others properly, too. None of them but Jade had admitted that William Sharpe had hated Iberia, so what else were they hiding?
The coffee finished brewing, and I grabbed the pot. After we'd spoken to Ethan, we'd talk to Jade. Much of everyone's attention yesterday had been on Iberia. Perhaps if we got the maid of honour alone today, we could have a thorough discussion about Ruby and the darker corners of her life. I wanted to know if there was anyone other than Iberia who would have been angered by the affair --
Something sliced my palm open. My fingers loosened around the coffee pot, and it fell to the floor and shattered. The large knife that I'd accidentally squeezed went with it. Mitzy, who'd been watching me from the other end of the kitchen, shot out the door.
Broken coffee pot. Knife on the floor. Blood streaming down my palm. I stared at it all, wondering which danger to sort first. Dead bodies, I could do. I wasn't sure about a catastrophe in my kitchen.
Alex filled the doorway, his hair damp and his shirt unbuttoned. "What was that?"
"I've broken the coffee pot." Finally coming to my senses, I picked up the knife and tossed it in the sink. Then I waved my bleeding hand beneath the tap. "Watch the glass."
Cold water hit my palm, stinging the wound. It was a long, ugly gash, but I didn't think it was too deep, just very painful. And cold.
I gave up as Alex reached me. His fingers latched onto my wrist and tugged it back under the water. "How did this happen?"
"I was thinking. With a knife in my hand. Now we can't have coffee and there's blood on our toast. Sorry."
"Never mind the coffee or the toast." His grip on my wrist tightened. "You might need stitches."
"Or an amputation. I'm going to get frostbite."
He released me, and I tugged my hand away from the sink. In the blink of an eye, blood welled up between the ragged edges of my flesh again. I sighed. "Can you get me a plaster, please?"
Alex found the ancient first aid kit, his jaw tight. He removed the largest variety of plaster, then cleaned away the fresh blood with a tea towel and tenderly pressed the sticky pad onto my palm. "I'm not sure how much this is going to help."
"It's not that deep. It's fine." I stood on my tiptoes and kissed his cheek. "Thank you."
His brows lifted, and a wry smile flickered across his lips. "Stay there while I sweep up the glass. I'm not trusting you with anything else sharp today." He looked down at the remains of our coffee pot. "Then I suppose we'll have to make a trip to Rise & Grinder."
***
Rise & Grinder hovered above the city on one of the highest metal walkways. Marked by nothing but a battered door and a lopsided sign that flickered, its looks were deceiving from the outside...and perhaps from the inside, too. Paint peeled off the walls while dust clung on, and the steel tables were scratched and dented. But the coffee and the food tasted amazing, and the view across Socrico was almost as good as the Alps.
Two teenagers were standing behind the counter. They were Indigo and Emz, twins of opposite genders who always helped their father at the shop on weekends. His other son, Cadium, was a few years older and currently training to join Socrico Police.
The twins smiled as we approached the counter, far too used to seeing us here. Emz, with the better set of social skills, was standing at the front to serve us. Indigo lingered by the coffee machine, pleased to make our orders as long as he was allowed to be quiet. They took non-identical to the extreme in their looks, too: Emz had long, dark curls, while Indigo's hair was short and blond. Indigo was dressed in a hoodie and jeans; Emz was wearing a blazer.
"Good morning." Emz flashed us a sunny smile. "Would you like your usual?"
"Just one double espresso," I replied, "and one medicoffee, please. Plus the muffins."
While Indigo made the drinks, Emz scooped up two chocolate muffins from the counter and put them in a paper bag. Alex moved to the eye-scanner and paid before I could reach it, leaving me to twiddle my thumbs.
"How's Cadium getting on?" I asked.
Emz put down the tongs. "Great! He's really enjoying police academy, and he can't wait to become a proper officer." She handed the bag over.
Indigo brought our coffees to the counter, and I took mine, wincing as I stretched my sore palm to its limits. "That's good. Are you two enjoying college?"
"Yeah, loads. It's great to finally be doing subjects we like. Plus we go into the city at lunchtime instead of just staying on campus! That's cool, isn't it, Indigo?"
He nodded.
"Great." That was largely where my conversation skills with teenagers ended. "Well, keep working hard. We'll see you around."
We left the coffee shop, and I pulled a chocolate muffin out of the bag before passing it to Alex. I needed a chocolate hit almost as much as I needed caffeine. In fact, I was so absorbed in consuming my muffin that it wasn't until we were on ground level when I realised Alex was unusually quiet.
"So," I said as we hit the high street. "We should go straight to Ethan's. He's had some time now, and I want to crack him. We need to know who Iberia was sleeping with. Do you remember his address?"
