Novels by WREN GRAY

KAII stared at those three words for so long they stopped making sense.She's not breathing.Unknown number. No name. No explanation. Just those three words sitting on my screen in the dark of my apartment like a grenade with the pin already pulled.My brain did this thing where it just refused to process it. Like it looked at the message and went: no. Not that. Pick something else to understand.She's not breathing.My mother.I was on my feet before I made the decision to stand. Grabbing my keys off the counter. Phone in my hand. Jacket left behind because there was no time, no thought, nothing in my head except those three words and the door and the stairs and get there get there get there.I don't remember the drive to the hospital.I remember traffic lights. I remember running one of them. I remember the parking lot, leaving the car crooked across two spaces and not caring. I remember the automatic doors of the hospital entrance sliding open and the smell hitting me—that specifi

KAI.I walked home.I don't remember the route. I don't remember the lights or the turns or how long it took. I just ended up back at my building somehow, climbing the stairs on autopilot, unlocking my door, sitting down on the floor against the couch because I didn't have the energy to actually get onto it.Kind eyes even when they're trying not to be.I put my head back against the couch cushion and stared at the ceiling.She'd called me a good boy. This woman whose daughter I had spent a week planning how to murder. She'd handed me her groceries and called me a good boy and told me her daughter would like me.And the worst part—the part that was sitting in my chest like a hot coal—was that she was right about something. Detective Yun did stay because of her. She'd bought a house ten minutes away. She called every morning before work. She'd been sitting in her mother's kitchen laughing about something, and her mother had watched her go from the doorway with that particular look pare

KAII went out around ten because staying in that apartment alone with my thoughts was going to drive me insane.I didn't have a destination. Just walked. Let my feet take me wherever. The neighbourhood was doing its usual morning thing. People heading to work. Kids being walked to school. The halal cart on the corner doing steady business, the smell of something good drifting down the block. Normal city sounds. Buses and horns and someone's music playing too loud from a window above.I walked for almost an hour before I realized where my feet had taken me.Detective Yun's mother's street.I stopped at the corner. Looked down the block at the row of houses. Neat. Quiet. The kind of street where people knew their neighbours. Potted plants on front steps. One house had a little American flag by the door. Another had wind chimes.I didn't know why I'd come here. Habit, maybe. I'd spent so much time the last week following Detective Yun's routine that parts of it had embedded themselves i

The timer hit zero at 3:42 in the morning.I was awake when it happened. Sitting on the edge of my bed in the dark, still in my jacket, still smelling like cold night air and cheap diner coffee. I hadn't slept. Hadn't even tried. I'd just been sitting there since I got back, watching the system clock in the corner of my vision count down like a bomb I couldn't defuse.[NEXT MISSION IN: 00:00:00]And then it just... stopped.No alarm. No explosion. No dramatic thunderclap. Just silence. The number sitting there like it was waiting to see what I'd do next.I exhaled slowly.Okay. It was done. The window was closed. I'd let it close.I hadn't killed Detective Malia Yun.I sat with that for a second. Waited for relief that didn't come.Instead what I felt was dread. Cold, heavy dread settling into my chest like concrete hardening. Because refusing was one thing. Living with the consequences was another. And the Seven were not the kind of beings who let disobedience go quietly. They didn't

KAIThe other detective said something I couldn't quite hear. Detective Yun nodded. Made notes."—if there's a serial killer operating, we need to find them before they kill again—"Serial killer.That's what I was. What I'd become.And Detective Malia Yun was hunting me.I sat in Ricky's car across from the diner. Watching her work. Watching her try to find me.Trying to stop me from killing again.She was the good guy. The hero of this story.And I was the monster she was hunting.The Seven wanted her dead because she was close. Because she might figure it out. Might expose their operation, my operation and now I have to kill her to stop her from exposing me? No, no no, this was not how this shit was supposed to go. I can't kill her based on that alone, how can I save her from myself and from them? I know exactly wha the consquence of my disobedience was and with this detective a part of me still insisted on taking the risk. If I do that now, who or what would the seven be taking fr

KAIMy phone buzzed.Ricky: Where are you? We were supposed to meet at the gym an hour ago.Shit. I'd forgotten. We'd planned to celebrate the Chen Wei win properly. Dinner with the guys. Normal friend stuff.Me: Sorry, something came up. Can we reschedule?Ricky: Everything okay?Me: Yeah. Just dealing with some family stuff.Ricky: Your mom?Me: Yeah.The lie came easy. Too easy.Ricky: Okay. Let me know if you need anything.Me: Will do.I put the phone down. Looked back at Detective Yun's window.She was eating dinner. Alone. Just her and the TV.Did she have family? Friends? Someone who'd miss her when she was gone?Of course she did. Everyone did.Just like Victor's kids missed him. David's daughter missed him. Marcus's wife missed him.I'd created that absence. That grief. That hole in people's lives.And I was being asked to do it again.To someone who might not deserve it.Day two of following her.Danny called while I was sitting outside her apartment at 7 AM."Yo! Where you