Erotic Romance Author Cassidy McKay

Excerpt from Variance: The Countdown
Available now at Whiskey Creek Press Torrid
(in both PRINT and E-Book!)

“Dispatch, we’ve got another cow loose on Main Street. Looks like Bessie broke through the fence again. Can you call Drew Brown and have him come get her before she eats the daisies in front of City Hall again?” Officer Martin called in on his police radio.

“Copy that, Bravo Two, you’re in pursuit of a brown cow southbound on Main Street,” she replied over the radio with a laugh in her voice. She picked up the phone and dialed Drew’s number, memorized many years ago when the recalcitrant cow first developed the habit of jaywalking down Main Street.

“Bravo Two, he’s en route, ETA is fifteen minutes. Do you require backup?” Wynne said to the officer over the radio. Her bright blue eyes twinkled as she laughed at the eccentricities of country life.

The phone rang again, someone asking if a lost dog had been found. Wynne gave the caller the number of the county animal shelter, and started collecting routine paperwork to be entered into the computer as she hung up.

Monotony reigned supreme, and her eyelids grew heavy as the phone rang again. She straightened and cut off a yawn as she answered the business phone line. “Chance City Police Department, may I help you?”

“Is this where I report a crime?” a deep, raspy male voice asked calmly on the other end of the line.

“Yes, sir, it is. What are you reporting?” she asked.

“I want to report a murder,” he said quietly.

“Excuse me? Did you say a murder, sir?”

“Yes, I want to report a murder,” he said even quieter.

Wynne sat up in her chair and her weariness was instantly gone. Cops and firefighters lived for these adrenaline rushes, and dispatchers received their fair share, too.

“Sir, what is your name, and where and when did this happen?”

“You will know when the ritual has begun. This is the first of many sacrifices. Start counting, Wynne.” The line went dead.

Damn these back country PDs. No sophisticated equipment yet. It was 1985, for goodness sake! Heck, she was surprised they weren’t still using rotary phones; it was so hard to get new equipment here.

“Bravo One, return to the station ASAP,” she called her sergeant over the radio. Now this wasn’t the usual humdrum call she normally received, even during a full moon.

“What’s up, Wynne?” the sergeant called as he walked in the front door of the station a few minutes later.

“Sarge, I think you need to hear this call I just got.” Wynne rewound the instant playback tape and pressed play.

The sergeant listened quietly, chewing on a knuckle as he heard the raspy voice.“That sounds weird. Has he called back? Must have had too many Thanksgiving blessings, it sounds like.”

“No, the call came in just before I called you in. Something just doesn’t seem right about it. I can’t pinpoint it, Sarge, but I don’t think it’s your run-of-the-mill prank call. Something about his voice, it…” She broke off and shook her head. “I don’t know. And he called me by name. I didn’t tell him my name.”

“Forget it, Wynne. I wouldn’t start worrying about it unless he tosses a body on the doorstep of the station.” The sergeant was a nineteen-year veteran of the police department, and retirement was still a few years off. His ‘been there, done that’ attitude calmed Wynne as she took her cue from the more experienced officer.

Wynne laughed and tried to put it out of her mind. Without a way to identify the caller, or call him back, she was pretty much stuck. She and Sergeant Hanks shared a few jokes and he watched over the phones while she took a quick break to go to the restroom while it was quiet. In this business, she took her breaks while she could. She never knew when her next one might be.

“Thanks, Sarge,” Wynne told him as she returned. He turned around in the chair and smiled as he rose to go back to his office and finish up some paperwork.

“Sure, no problem Wynne,” he said. He’d gotten the promotion to sergeant just before Wynne had moved to town, and had been her supervisor on many shifts. They worked well together and were friends both on and off-duty.

“Hey, Sarge, are you and Tammy going out again any time soon? I’d be happy to babysit those three hellions of yours again while you go to a movie.” Wynne smiled, remembering the times she’d babysat for Chris and his wife in the past.

“I might just take you up on that, Wynne. It’s nice to have a little ‘alone time’ with Tammy once in awhile,” he said, as he walked out the door.

Wynne sat back down, staring broodingly at the phones, haunted by the eerie certainty in that last caller’s voice. Something was going to happen, she could just feel it. God, she hated holidays.

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