"Hey honeybee, you got a minute?" Hurk sauntered out of the bathroom, his tanned skin almost pink from his hot shower and his hair spiked up wildly. The towel around his hips looked just about ready to fall off.
"Yeah." Dressed in just his boxers, Kai looked up from where he was sitting on their unmade bed and browsing reddit on his laptop.
"There's something wrong with my new phone." With a smirk, Hurk picked up the phone from the top of the dresser and tossed it over in the direction of the bed.
Kai raised an eyebrow when the phone landed half a foot short from the bed but leaned over to pick it up anyways. "What is it?"
"It doesn't have your number."
"Really." Kai rolled his eyes as he swiped at the phone's screen and input the password (his birthday, what a surprise).
"Just because we're married doesn't mean I have to stop." Hurk flopped onto the bed next to Kai, his lopsided smile positively radiant as he slid the laptop off his husband's lap to set it off to the side.
"I was working." Kai didn't really bother to stop Hurk from scooting closer and wrapping his arms around him.
"You call trolling subreddits 'work'?"
"It requires time and research, so yes." A warm nose dug into his neck, and Kai sighed as he was basically manhandled into a full-body hug. His face ended up being pressed up against Hurk's chest.
"Boring. We've got…" Hurk paused in his nuzzling to glance at the LED alarm clock to his right. "Two hours before the brats need to be picked up from practice. I say we do something more exciting."
Kai's reply was muffled, but he did manage to wriggle his hands over to Hurk's backside to squeeze out his agreement.
Kai had just finished polishing his violin when his phone rang, the cheery tone of some terrible pop song alerting him to the fact that it was Lynn.
"Hey."
"Did you and Dad have to leave for a call or something? We've been waiting out here for an hour!" Even through the tinny speakers, Lynn's upset was obvious. He could hear the faint sounds of Sylas repetitively kicking a soccer ball at a wall in the background.
"What? Hurk left an hour ago to pick you two up." Kai set down his violin and pulled on his socks.
"Well, he's not here. I tried calling him three times, but all I got was his voicemail."
"Let me try to reach him, his new phone might be glitching out. I'll be over in ten."
"Okay then." With that, Lynn cut the call.
Kai slipped on his casual sneakers and grabbed his keys. While walking to his car (his motorcycle having long since been traded in), he tried calling Hurk.
"Heya, you've reached Hurk's voicemail. I can't answer at the moment so just leave a message after the beep and I'll be sure to call back as soon as possible!"
With a frown, Kai cut the call before it could actually go to voicemail and then gunned the engine. His guts were telling him that something was wrong, but he couldn't quite place what it was, exactly.
Fifteen minutes later, Lynn and Sylas were buckled up in the back seats. The teenaged girl, looking a bit sunburned, had her arms crossed over his chest as she looked out of the window with a pout. The grass-stained teenaged boy, on the other hand, had conked out the moment the car started moving.
"So where's Dad?"
"I got his voicemail too."
It wasn't like Hurk to not take any of their calls or somehow forget to pick up the kids from soccer practice. There definitely wasn't an emergency call-in from the CBDC either, as Kai would've heard of it first.
"Something's not right." Lynn's eyes narrowed as she glared out of the window.
Kai said nothing as he pulled into the driveway of their house. The other car was still missing, so Hurk hadn't returned at all…
His phone rang, this time the standard CBDC company ringtone. Kai answered it as he followed the two teenagers into the house and kicked the door shut behind him.
"Speaking."
"I need you to come in right now." Captain Aodhan's voice sounded tense, as if he was withholding information.
"Yes, sir." Kai held back a sigh as he opened the front door again. First Hurk was missing, and now he was being called in on his day off?
Feeling every part of his body going numb and his mind grinding to a halt, Kai blankly stared not at the nightmarish crime scene (totally wrecked car, scattered broken glass, blood streaked in all directions) in front of him, but at the matching, blood-crusted platinum wedding band he was holding in the palm of his hand.
"We can't be sure that all of the… remains are human, or even fomor, until the lab results come back. That will take at least a week. At the moment, we don't know anything about motives or the possible suspects. I have all of my contacts in the Royal Police working on this case." A gloved hand landed on his shoulder. Kai's gaze tore from the ring and over to Captain Aodhan, the older man looking as if he'd aged more than a decade in the past few years.
Kai's hand curled over the ring tightly. The look in his eyes turned positively chilling.
"Effective immediately, I'm putting you and all of our active agents on lockdown at Headquarters. Your children, as well. Safety is paramount, and we don't know if this was meant to be a one-time incident or a prelude to further attacks."