by J. R. Ward
No expense had been spared. No efficiency underutilized.
No bodies out on the slabs, either. Thank God.
“She is over here,” Havers murmured.
“Over here” turned out to be a wall-sized refrigerator unit with two dozen three-by-four-foot doors stacked two high across its stainless steel face. And as Butch went forward, Boone hung waaaaay back while Havers unlatched a compartment on the top tier.
The physician pulled out a stainless steel slide, and Boone stopped breathing.
The naked female was lying on her back, her head propped up on a block positioned at her nape, her arms tucked into her sides, her legs stretched out with her feet lolling to the left and right. She had dark hair that was matted flat to her skull, and her skin was a mottled gray with bruising in places. Blood, dried and caked, covered a lot of her torso, and the meat hook that had made him so nauseous when he’d been looking at the pictures on Butch’s phone was still in place, supported by that block.
As if it had been something intrinsic to her skull all along.
Boone dropped his eyes out of respect. And also because his gag reflex was beginning to do push-ups in the back of his throat.
“We have the wig and the mask she was wearing,” Havers said softly.
“Yes, we saw the pictures of her at the scene.” Butch made a hmmm sound as he bent in closer. “Come over here, Boone. You can see here where her throat was sliced. Bilateral cuts on her wrists, too. She must have been still alive when she was hung up, given the amount of blood loss on the concrete floor below her.”
“I would have to agree with that assessment,” Havers said. “I have not done an extensive examination of her remains, but the entry of the hook is very clean—which suggests she was likely not conscious or in shock when that was done to her. She did not fight back. But you are correct. For the volume of blood displaced, her heart was still pumping for a while after she was hung.”
“Down this side,” Butch commented as he shifted position, “you can see where she was dragged across a rough floor.” The Brother straightened. “So he cuts her. Drags her. Inserts the hook and grips her here . . . and here . . .” Butch made like he was putting his hands on her upper arms—exactly where there was a series of bilateral, fingerprint-like bruises. “To lift her up. After which she continues to bleed out.”
As Boone focused on those clusters of black-and-blues, that rage he had felt when he had first heard Helania’s recorded call came back to him. The idea that someone had done this to this female . . . had hurt her like this . . . killed her like this . . . made him positively furious.
“Do you know if she’d had sexual intercourse?” Butch asked.
Havers inclined his head. “I believe she had, but I don’t know at this point whether it was before or after her death. As I said, I’ve only performed a cursory examination of her.”
“I need you to answer that question for me.”
“I’m afraid that until we find the family, I do not feel comfortable performing an autopsy.”
“You may have to get over that.” Butch looked across the body at the doctor. “We can’t wait long because the trail of her killer is growing cold as we speak.”
Boone had coughed at the mention of sex . . . but as the doctor and the Brother continued to talk, he began to look at the body differently, seeing the marks on her skin, the wounds, the swollen places, as sources of information, rather than—
“What’s that under her skin?” he asked as he pointed.
On the female’s upper arm, there appeared to be a splinter of something dark beneath the gray of her skin. It was only a half inch long at the most and thin as the lead of a pencil—and it seemed to be angled into the flesh.
“I don’t know,” Butch said as he leaned down. “Havers, can we get whatever this is out of her?”
“But of course. One moment.”
Butch took out his phone and snapped a series of photographs, not just of that discrete spot but of others like the meat hook, the bruises on her upper arms, the abrasions on her side, knees, and shins. Meanwhile, Havers returned gloved up with a scalpel and a tissue-collection jar. After cutting into the skin, he teased the object out with the tip of the blade.
“It appears to be a tiny nail,” he remarked as he put whatever it was into the plastic container.
The thing made a soft impact sound, a plunk, as it landed.
“Looks like it,” Butch said as he stared inside the jar. “Maybe it was from the scene, as he dragged her over to where he was hanging her up. There was a lot of debris in that storage room.”
“Would you prefer to keep this?” Havers asked as he screwed a blue top on. “I need to label it first, but you are collecting all the evidence, aren’t you?”
“I am. And I’ll take it, yes. I’m going to set up a de facto investigation room for the case at the training center.”
“Very good.”
After Havers put the scalpel down and marked a label up with a gold pen, the container changed hands and Boone was aware of an awkward silence.
“However is my sister?” Havers inquired softly.
“She’s perfect in every way.”
“Good. That is . . . very good.”
The Brother nodded at the body as if he wanted to redirect the conversation. “You’ll let us know if anybody shows up to ID her.”
“Yes, I will.”
“If no one comes forward in the next twenty-four hours, I’m going to order you to do the autopsy. And even if someone does, we’re going to get that done with or without family consent.”
“I shall request the King’s signature. On either account.”
“I will make sure you have it.”
“Thank you.” Havers looked at Boone. “And now, would you care to sign for your father’s urn?”
Boone swallowed his honest answer—because he’d rather just leave the remains here. Forever. Accepting them meant he couldn’t avoid the Fade Ceremony, and the last thing he wanted to do was get social with a bunch of glymera gawkers. Or, to use another term, his extended family.
Undoubtedly, they all knew how his father had passed by now. And every one of them was going to want to warm their cold hearts before a crackling blaze of gossip.
“Yes,” he forced himself to reply. “I’ll take the urn home with me.”
NINE
As sunlight threatened in the east, Boone walked through the front door of his sire’s house and closed the heavy weight behind himself. All around, the blackout shutters on the insides of the windows were coming down, the subtle whirring in the formal rooms a familiar sound, the soft clicking as they locked in place barely audible over the heat that whistled up through the old grates set into the floor.
The fact that he had a brass urn with his father’s ashes in it under his arm—like the thing was a newspaper he’d picked up in the front yard—was yet another bizarro-world distortion of the way his life should have been going.
Not that coming through this door after a long night in the field to face his sire had ever been a party. But familiarity didn’t just breed contempt. Sometimes it formed the bookends of your life, buttressing your novels and nonfictions alike so that they stood up straight and didn’t fall off the shelves.
When those confines were suddenly and unexpectedly removed, even if they had been unpleasant, you ended up with a case of out-of-order that made you rattled.
On that note, he braced himself and looked across the foyer. The doors to his father’s study were open, and the walnut walls glowed in the buttery light of the fire that glowed in the marble hearth. Heading over, he leaned against the entrance’s doorjamb, his eyes traveling across the leather books that filled shelves. And the oil paintings of horses that Altamere had owned in the Old Country. And the brass sconces and the two brass chandeliers that threw illumination in a complementary fashion to that which emanated from the fireplace.
“Did you require something.”
The words wer
e technically a question. The tone was a suspicious demand.
Boone looked over his shoulder. Marquist had materialized from out of nowhere, although given the fact that there were security cameras throughout the house, his perfectly rotten timing was not a surprise. The male was also back to SOP. In contrast to the night before, when he had been clearly shocked by the news, the butler was in proper form, his pressed suit buttoned up, his starched shirt white as fresh snow, his tie knotted so tightly at his throat, it was a wonder he could breathe.
No more shaking hands. This time, the perennial polishing cloth was as steady as ever.
“No,” Boone said. “I do not require anything.”
Entering his father’s study, he pulled the doors shut on the other male, very aware that it was tantamount to a declaration of war. But like the pair of them hadn’t always locked horns? Some things, death did not change.
Some things, death made worse.
Crossing the Persian rug, Boone placed the urn on the corner of the Jacobean desk, right beside a Tiffany dragonfly lamp and a rock crystal sculpture of a rearing stallion. Maybe the ashes could just sit here for a while, like any other vase-ish thing in the room. It wasn’t like there was anything to rot inside the container.
Unlike the refrigerated corpse of that female.
With a heavy feeling in his bones, Boone went around behind the desk and sat in his father’s leather chair. Placing his hands palm down on the blotter, he stared out into space.
Where was the will?
The question had been brewing in his mind for the last twenty-four hours—no, wait. Longer than that. He had been wondering, for at least the last decade, but especially the previous twelve months since he’d made that paternity threat, whether his father was going to cut him out of things. Leave the money and the house and the personal effects to someone else.
Or a cat. Not that they had any pets.
But Altamere always had been a huge Karl Lagerfeld fan.
Tilting to the side, Boone tried to pull out the top drawer on the left. Locked. Same with the rest of them. As he straightened, he wondered what was more important to his sire, his supposed posthumous propriety or revenge for his first shellan’s possible mistake with another male—
The knock on the door was sharp.
Speak of the devil.
And Boone debated not answering it just to see how far Marquist would push things. But goddamn, he was tired. “Come in.”
The butler yanked the doors apart, and as the male saw Boone sitting at his sire’s desk, the anger that flared in that face could not be hidden.
“Tell me something,” Boone said as he took care to settle back into his father’s chair and cross his legs comfortably at the knee. “Where are the keys to this desk?”
A mask of professionalism slammed down on the butler’s hostility, closing off the emotion. “I do not know.”
“You’ve been in charge of this entire house for how long? You were my father’s right-hand male—and you don’t know where the keys are?” Boone indicated over his shoulder, to a painting entitled Grand Champion Altamere’s Bespoke Beauty. “How about the safe that’s behind here.”
As the butler registered surprise, Boone smiled coldly. “Yes, I know it’s there. Are you going to tell me you don’t know the combination?”
“These are private areas of your father’s—”
“My father is dead. They are mine now. Everything under this roof is mine.”
There was a possibility that that was a lie. It was a good idea to test the butler to see if he knew anything, however.
Marquist’s eyes narrowed. “This is still my master’s house.”
Boone gripped the arms of the chair, ready to get to his feet and throw the butler out. But he stopped. Until he found that will, he needed to keep the male around—and there was a larger reason to lull Marquist into a false sense of security: Boone had never understood the relationship between his sire and this butler. The two had been closer than master and servant should ever have been. With Altamere gone, there was finally an opportunity to get to the bottom of it all. And if there had been any improper transfers in favor of Marquist? Gifts? Benefits?
Then Boone was in a position to find that out and get the shit back. Not because he cared about the monetary value, but as a matter of principle.
There was also a part of him that hoped the butler did something really stupid.
Easing back again, he drummed the blotter with his fingertips. “I’m doing the Fade Ceremony two hours before sunrise tomorrow.”
Marquist’s brows flared. “However is that possible? The post does not work that fast and the guests will not—”
“Email invites are instantaneous. One click and they land in people’s inboxes. Just like magic.”
The butler’s evident horror made Boone think of being in the morgue and standing over the dead female’s battered body. Now that was horrific. How invitations to a party went out to a bunch of people? Even if it was for a Fade Ceremony? Not even close.
But try telling that to someone who enjoyed using social propriety as a cudgel.
“You cannot be serious,” Marquist stammered.
“There’s no reason to wait on the ceremony.”
“Where is the body now—”
“Ashes.”
“What?”
“I had the remains cremated and the ashes are right here.” He leaned across the desk and plinked the urn with his forefinger, a little tinny sound rising up. “This is what we’re going to do the ceremony with.”
Marquist stared at the container in disbelief. And when his eyes finally returned to Boone, the vile rage in them was a shock. Who knew the male had it in him?
“Your father never approved of you.”
Boone gasped and put his hand over his sternum. “No . . . really? Oh, God, I’m heartbroken. All these years I thought I was his model son.” Dropping the act, he leveled his stare across the desk. “Do you think his opinion matters anymore?”
“He did not deserve you.”
“Nor I him. We were a curse to each other, but that’s over now.” Boone made a dismissive motion with his hand. “Go. I’m done with this conversation—”
“You are not your father.”
“And you can leave this house anytime. Aaaaanytime. Matter of fact, keep this attitude up, and I’ll lock you out of this place so fast, it’ll make your goddamn head spin.”
• • •
Across town, in a suburban neighborhood of seventies-era apartment buildings, Helania sat in her two-bedroom, basement-level flat by herself. Overhead, the humans who lived above her were starting their day, the muffled footfalls making a circuit between what she imagined was their bathroom, their bedroom and their kitchen.
Same layout she had. Except one of her bedrooms hadn’t been used in eight months.
The sofa she was parked on was old and worn, and to mask the age, she and Isobel had put a king-sized duvet cover over the cushions and the arms. Homemade needlepoint pillows of flowers and plants crowded where you could sit, but none of that was permanent. Her Etsy store did fairly brisk business, so there was always turnover here in her own apartment. Always bolts of velvet and boxes of batting and bowls of tassels, too.
But the side hustle to her main online editing gig wasn’t just a nice supplemental income. It had kept her sane after her sister’s killing.
Sometimes, the only thing that kept her in her skin during the daylight hours was filling in blocks of color with wool yarn, the repetitive nature of her box stitch forcing her mind to focus on something other than the murder of her blooded next of kin, her roommate, her best friend.
Her only friend.
Twisting around, she looked at the closed door to the left of the bathroom. On the far side of it, there were twelve cardboard boxes of various sizes, all of which were filled with Isobel’s clothes, and toiletries, and mementos, and books, and . . .
Helania had taken Isobel’s things off t
he walls in there, off the shelves, off the bureau, too. She had emptied the closet, emptied the drawers, emptied the blanket chest at the foot of the bed. She had stripped the bed, packed up the sheets, folded up the blankets. But that was as far as she had gone. She had intended to give it all to charity. She still did.
Not yet, though.
Maybe . . . not ever.
It was hard to part with the inanimate objects her sister had chosen and worn, collected and kept. As much as Helania told herself that none of it was Isobel, and as much as her logical side believed that, her heart would not budge.
She might as well have been giving away parts of the body.
Rubbing tired eyes, she leaned back into the sofa cushions and closed her lids. It didn’t take her long to picture that male, the one with the dark hair and the black clothes and the aristocratic inflection to his voice.
The image that persistently invaded her thoughts was of him standing in that cut of illumination between the two buildings, his breath leaving him in puffs of white, his big body poised, his eyes staring into the darkness.
Directly at her.
When they had gone back into the club and sat on those folding chairs with the Brother, he had looked at her the whole time. Part of her wanted to believe—needed to believe—that it was just part of the questioning, the investigation, the job he had been sent by the Brotherhood to do.
A professional obligation.
But another, deeper, more worrisome side of her . . . wondered about things that should not have been on her mind at all.
Things like maybe he had stared for another reason.
“You have got to stop this,” she said out loud.
Upstairs, there was a resounding thump!, which was good news. That was the outer door to the humans’ apartment shutting. Things would quiet down now.
