Free Shadows Fall by J.K. Hogan Page A

me.”
    Raising my eyes, I concentrated on his. I noticed the little crow’s feet at the corners, the brown flecks within the green of his irises that caused that hazel coloring, and they centered me in the swirling void of the station. Taking a deep breath, I tried to hold the tears back. The boy’s death was tragic, but I hadn’t known him. The tears wanted to come because of the stress, the adrenaline crash, and the overwhelming feeling of apprehension that had settled upon me. Nothing good would come of this, I was sure.
    “I need you to take me through what happened one more time, for the record,” he said in that soothing voice of his. I was so lulled by it that I almost didn’t notice him pulling out a tape recorder.
    During the quick drive to the station, Charlie had woken me and asked me to give him a brief rundown of how I came to find the body. He said it was standard procedure to get an informal statement that would be corroborated later by his on-record report. Still, I came up with the same canned response that I’m sure every other witness did.
    “I told you everything before. There really wasn’t much to it.”
    He gave me a patient smile, probably because he’d expected the response and had heard it often enough. “Humor me. You may remember a detail that you didn’t think was important, but that could be just the thing we need to catch this guy.”
    I sighed and took a sip from the water bottle one of the receptionists had brought me at Charlie’s request. A motion behind him caught my eye and I looked over. That was a mistake. Standing in back and just to the right of Charlie was the young man from earlier—the dead one. Remember , he whispered inside my head.
    I shut my eyes tight and spoke in a quavering voice. “Okay, let’s get it over with.”
    “This is Detective Charlie Hale interviewing homicide witness…” he began, and I tuned him out as he stated a bunch of technical legal jargon and police codes that I didn’t understand, plus the date and time he had arrived at the scene. “Sir, please state your full name, age, and occupation for the record.”
    Hearing his voice in that brusque, formal tone caused shivers to race up and down my spine, and not the good kind. “Titus Finnbar McGinty, twenty-five years old, owner of Uptown Java.”
    He had me say a few more things ‘for the record’ like my address, phone number, and social security number, and then he began the real interview. “Tell me what happened tonight, please Mr. McGinty.”
    “I was walking home from the shop—Uptown Java, like I said. I was coming down Sixth Street and I stopped at the old building that’s being renovated, just on the west side of Hearst Tower… you know the one across from the library? Well, I went in there and I found this guy lying on the floor. It was really dark, and I tried to use my phone for light but then I dropped it… then I found it again, but he was dead. Didn’t need the light to tell me that. So I got the hell out of there and that’s when I called you.”
    The words tumbled out in a rush because my brain didn’t want to touch the sickening, oleaginous memory of being inches from a dead body. I’d been building a nice mental brick wall since I sat down in Charlie’s car, but I could feel it crumbling.
    “Easy, Titus. Take your time. Did you see anyone else around? Pass anybody on the street or hear anything out of the ordinary?”
    The question knocked something loose in my head and I remembered beady eyes and strangely thick clothing for the temperature. “There was a guy. He ran into me on the sidewalk going the opposite direction. It was dark and he had a hoodie on so I couldn’t see his face at all. I remember thinking it odd that he was dressed so warmly, though.”
    “Good. Can you take a guess at his height and weight?”
    “Tall and skinny. Six-two, maybe six-three. I’m not good with weights… one-fifty? I don’t know.”
    “And there were no other