The Wrath Walker (The Wrath Series Book 1) by Matthew Newson (moboreader txt) 📕

be the one to aid me on my assignments, but can he figure out how to save himself before it’s too late?” I quietly said to myself as I stood next to Brandon.

Brandon rubbed the back of his head and looked all around the room before he started talking to himself again.

“If this Wrath person is after these guys, I should just let him kill them. He would be doing the city and the world a favor.”

That didn’t seem like Brandon at all to even let bad guys get killed. I thought him to be more of a law-and-order man.

“Dang it, I can’t even let these scumbags get killed. It would be too good for them. No. They need to be held accountable for all the lives they have ruined.”

That’s it, I knew the Boy Scout wouldn’t be able to live with the deaths of even the guilty on his conscience.

“What time is it?” Brandon asked his phone. “Good God. One in the morning?” He paced. “Tomorrow is Thursday, which means Joey will make rounds to take everyone’s customary bets. That means he’s already turned in for the night since he has to do what he considers actual work tomorrow. He can’t risk being hammered because Skeeter will kill him if he messes up like he did that one-time years ago when he mistakenly paid out too much money after he drank almost an entire bottle of vodka. A lot of people went home happy that night. Skeeter, not so much... I was surprised Joey only had a black eye. Anyway, I can’t wait outside his house because he lives in a gated community, and I’m sure I’d be spotted, and then they would kill me. I wouldn’t be surprised if they think I killed Ron whenever they find out he’s dead if they don’t know already. Either way, I have to warn Joey about what’s heading his way.”

Brandon grabbed his keys. “And why am I having an entire conversation with myself out loud when I have no idea who could be listening?”

He stopped but spoke again. “Wait. That guy is obsessed with time and adhering to doing things in a certain order. Ron said he saw a guy following him, so I’ll go to Joey tomorrow, and tell him about Ron. I might get lucky and see that Wrath guy lurking around there myself and stop him then. At the very least I can warn Joey, and he can tell the others, and then I’m good. That’s all I can do, and then I focus all my efforts on trying to stop Wrath from killing me. I still need to find out what that guys about, and what he’s really after in all these killings. However, I can’t shake the feeling that he really is what he says he is.”

Brandon sat at his desk and reviewed the files in front of him in silence. He opened a drawer and took out a pen and notebook. I stood over his shoulder as he scribbled notes. Wrath said he used a knife to kill Ron because it was Ron’s favorite weapon, and he said Ron killed all those elderly people with a knife. Wrath also said he emptied all of Ron’s safety deposit boxes to stop him from fleeing town, so he had studied Ron and me. He seemed to know all about Ron and myself, and he must know all about his other targets. If he killed Ron with a knife, then he must be planning on killing these other guys in the same way they’ve killed other people. I’ve never killed anyone, so how is he planning on killing me?

I smiled as Brandon pored over his notes, because I realized how much fun I was going to have. He figured out how I would end the lives of those wicked people, and I so looked forward to the game of cat and mouse we were already engaged in.

Chapter EightBrandon Farmer

The City of Black Castle

I STAYED AWAKE UNTIL around three in the morning, refreshing myself on the potential four targets Wrath was going after. Since Joey would be the first, it made no sense to get up early because his restaurant didn’t open until lunch, so I tried to sleep in. I tossed and turned, because every time I closed my eyes, I saw Wrath stab Ron in the chest and him dying while I was helpless to stop it. Wrath was clearly insane and had to be stopped before he targeted innocent people. I had seen that sort of behavior before when I was a detective. Once a person crossed the line of murder to get revenge, they soon viewed everyone as guilty, and their cycle of killing never stopped until the police or someone else ended it. I was terrified of crossing that line, in spite of the times I had wanted to. I feared more what I’d become and what it would do to me if I ever killed someone in cold blood.

After a night of continuously checking the clock, I rolled out of bed shortly after ten and took a quick shower. I ate a frozen breakfast sandwich I had left over in my mini-fridge and grabbed my gun and tucked it in my holster behind my back. I was headed to a restaurant Joey owned uptown. I knew the restaurant functioned as a front to launder his ill-gotten gains, but I didn’t have the evidence to prove it yet. I would have to figure out one day because no one had ever taken him down, but I was sure he had all the right people in authority paid to look the other way. I knew Joey would be running the to-go orders, which was how people placed their bets. He used a special menu for those making bets, and the different menu items indicated what the person wanted to bet on.

It ranged from sports, the stock market closing numbers, to even