Dane's a Decrypter down on his luck -- after accidentally dispatching the wrong creature, he's sent to a small town where the cryptids he hunts are sparse. Crypt Coffee becomes his business front, but instead of a thrilling new mission on the side, he's stuck sending ghosts back to where they came from. Dane can annoy customers, at least, and tries to scare off Professor Sean Sanderson when he starts poking around too much.<br><br>But Sean isn’t about to stay away. Not when he hears about the murder of a former student, and definitely not if young, exciting Dane has information about it. But the more he allows himself to get dragged into this supernatural world of monsters and ghosts, the more the danger escalates. And if Sean and Dane aren’t careful, tracking down a murderer who can use magic might just get them killed.

Bad Seed

“Bruised. Well done, you got your ass kicked by a tree.”


Sean glared at him and let his shirt fall back down.


“I want to know what’s going on,” he said.


“Can’t you just go the fuck away and sleep it off?” asked Dane. Sean stared at him until he sighed andran a hand through his hair. “Right. What’s going on is this: I’m going to shoot these trees a couple more times, then I’m driving you to my place up the road and you’re getting cleaned up. If you’re not too much a pain in my ass, I’ll give you an explanation. Got it?”


Sean nodded. He was too tired and sore to object.


Dane took a swig from the bottle and capped it as Sean eyed the glass he’d slammed on the counter. He looked a little better after washing up, all his scrapes clean and dirt gone. Almost normal. He was wearing one of Dane’s old hoodies and a pair of pajama pants, and he moved gingerly as he slid into the bar stool at the counter. Dane didn’t have a table.


Chapter 8