Free 03 Long Night Moon - Seasons of the Moon by S.M. Reine

foot slipped in the snow and she landed hard on her butt, scrambling back on all fours as if she could escape what she had seen. Her dress bag landed on damp sidewalk and she didn’t even care.
    Fumbling for her cell phone, she pressed the speed dial for Seth. It picked up on the third ring.
    “What?”
    “Seth! There’s a body, someone’s dead, it’s in an alley—”
    “Who is this? Rylie?”
    The voice was too deep and gruff to belong to her boyfriend. She groaned. “What are you doing with this phone, Abel?”
    “Seth forgot it at home. Who died? Where’s the body?”
    She bit her lower lip. She didn’t want to see Abel—ever again, preferably.
    “I’ll just call the cops.”
    “Don’t. We’ll lose the chance to collect our own evidence. Tell me where you are.”
    Reluctantly, Rylie gave him directions to the alley. She didn’t like having to wait near the body. It smelled delicious—oh my God it smelled good, and that was so horrible—but she was afraid it would vanish if she left.
    Every time a car passed, she tried not to look nervous. It was hard to believe that everyone else couldn’t smell it.
    Abel showed up five minutes later. He brought a cheap digital camera, rubber gloves, and sandwich bags. Her stomach flipped at the sight of him.
    “Don’t tell me you’re going to touch that thing,” she said, feeling nauseous.
    “Fine. I won’t tell you.”
    Abel climbed into the Dumpster like it was a totally normal thing to do and started digging around. Shifting the trash made the smell waft toward her more strongly.
    “It’s just like the other ones,” he said. “Her throat’s been ripped out, but there’s no other major injury.”
    “I don’t want to know.”
    He gave a low whistle. “It’s pretty bad.”
    “I said I don’t want to know!”
    The camera clicked as Abel took pictures from various angles. He took long enough that curiosity got the better of her, and she edged her way up the pile of snow to give a sideways peek at his shoulders over the rim of the Dumpster.
    “Definitely just her throat.” Abel jumped out and peeled off the gloves, dropping them in an empty sandwich bag. He had bits of hair and blood in the other ones. It looked like he had taken some kind of tissue sample.
    “Oh my God,” she whispered, covering her nose and mouth with her hands.
    “You think this is bad? This is just the start.” Abel grinned. How could he smile like that?
    “We have to do something,” Rylie said.
    “We could have gotten that Levi kid the other night.”
    Maybe he was right. Maybe the woman would have survived if they had finished the job when they had the chance. Rylie could tell her thoughts were showing on her face because Abel gave a grim nod.
    “What happens next?” she asked.
    He smirked at her. That lopsided smile looked like Seth’s, but so much more sadistic. If Rylie had still been dreaming, she thought his smile would show up in her nightmares.
    “You can call the police if you want. I’m taking these home to do a little more research.” He wiggled one of the bags at her. Something slimy and red slid around the inside of it. “Have to put the evidence on ice.”
    That was too much for Rylie to handle. The sour taste of bile stung her throat.
    Abel’s laugh echoed behind her as she fell to all fours and threw up on the sidewalk.
     

Ten
Levi
    Seth struggled with self-doubt.
    He had done more research on the Riese siblings. He tracked their history back for two years, and found nothing that indicated they were killers. But a big chunk of time was missing. It was like the records for two years had been completely removed.
    That was the kind of thing Seth’s mom looked for when searching for damning evidence surrounding a werewolf, but he didn’t know what to do with it.
    For the first time since she left, Seth wished his mother was there so they could talk about it. His dad had been a werewolf expert, but he wasn’t sure if they ever killed teenage