My breath caught in my throat. I turned and finally deigned to allow Keller to join the conversation. “Oh, God. They took a girl with them?”
Carson put a hand against the wall next to us and breathed deep.
Keller sighed and nodded. “Neighbors placed both girls coming home yesterday evening around nine. Neither of their cars left all night.”
“But only one body?” I asked.
“Only one body. The neighbors went to bed around eleven, so everything had to happen after then. It’s too bad no one knew what was happening. Maybe if someone had said something, this girl wouldn’t be missing.” Rigel’s glance at Keller was tight, disappointed and angry.
“Hey, we don’t want copycats popping up, and the manner in which they died is pretty sensational. Even according to Keller. Don’t blame us for the black out,” I said.
Rigel didn’t argue and accepted my explanation with a sharp nod.
I turned and scanned the gathered group of lookie-loos. This was a small, middle-class neighborhood situated in the suburbs, close to the university. These people knew each other. More information was coming in than ever before. I spotted Lyle in a tree above the group. He shook out his wings in a wide motion, letting me know there were other shifters Rigel placed amongst them. We’d hear everything the crowds and witnesses said, officially and not.
Comfortable to leave the onlookers, I turned back to the two lieutenants and Carson. “All right. Let’s find what we can inside, so Keller’s people can wrap this up and move the investigation away from the neighborhood.”
Together, we stepped in, but I stopped the others at the door to the bedroom. The smell of death permeated from inside. “Give Carson and me a minute to review everything.”
“Don’t touch anything,” Keller said.
“I know how this works.”
Rigel caught my shoulder as I moved inside the room. “I’m asking no one stay more than five minutes. My group needs the scents to stay as pure as possible, and other people muck up the process.”
I studied him. He was serious about what he did. He worked well with others, but relied on his abilities and experience. He protected his own. I found myself liking him more and more.
I winked. “You can time me.”
Stepping inside the room, I stopped when my shoe squelched on the carpet. Bile burned my throat. Eww. I swallowed and moved forward, trying not to let my disgust show on my face. We were walking through pools of blood.
Carson was less successful. He took a step, glanced down, and turned green. He then tried to tip toe through the cleaner spots toward the body while pressing his fist against his mouth to keep from puking.
Like the last, this crime scene had two separate tarps covering body parts. I paced over to the larger sheet. With a steadying glare to Carson, I pulled it back.
The girl’s headless body was covered in a similar, ill-fitting, white gown. Another blade lay near her hands, obviously dropped by her at her death. Squatting, I held the position without dropping my knees into the bloody carpet. I knew I had to check her for clues, but I didn’t want to touch her. She been through so much already, and it just seemed disrespectful, like adding insult to injury. The fact she was beyond caring didn’t matter. Her dignity still mattered.
Taking a strengthening breath, I steeled myself. I couldn’t find the truth by protecting her modesty now. Reaching out, I tugged at the puckered portion of the skin around where her head had been decapitated and found the bottom part of a bite. Same clumsy attempt to replicate the scion ceremony, the same sloppy fuck up. While using my body to shield her neck from the rest of the people in the hallway, I showed it to Carson. He blanched and turned away with tight fists.
I moved to place the tarp back on, but stopped and glanced at her right hand. She wore a ring from the Cup. For participation and completion only, not placing. She’d competed and was proud enough to still wear the ring after five years.
Wait–five years? My stomach plummeted to my feet.
Carson saw what I was staring at. “You all right?” he asked, softly.
I took a deep breath to re-center myself and regretted it instantly. Why the hell couldn’t I get used to the smell of blood? Lord knows I was surrounded by it enough.
“Rowan?” he prompted again.
“Her ring. She was in my year.” Standing up, I surveyed the room. Everything was a mess. Great. “I don’t think we’re going to get much more in here. We have to get out there and find the roommate we can still save.”
Striding out of the room, my mind raced as I put this new information alongside what we’d already learned.
Rigel fell in next to me. “Get what you needed?” he questioned with soft eyes.
“Yes.”
He kept pace with me as I strutted out. “Four minutes, twenty-three seconds.”
I turned and glared at him. “Excuse me?”
“How long you were in there.”
I smiled–as well as I could, anyway–and my shoulders eased a bit. “See, told you I’d make your time.”
“So you did.”
Keller waited outside. “So, what sage information are you not going to give us this time?”
“Well, other than the slight changes in M.O. and the perp upping his game by kidnapping her roommate, there’s not much to tell from in there. What about you, Lieutenant Keller?”
He hesitated, then stiffened. With a large flourish of his hand, he answered, “We’ve got nothing else either.”
I started one of my catchy retorts about his male inability to perform that would make Keller turn wonderful colors right before my eyes, but Rigel stiffened next to me. I turned and glanced at him.
He narrowed his eyes at Keller and leaned forward. Inhaling deeply, more like an animal than a man, he snapped his gaze to Keller’s face and smiled, showing most of his white teeth in the process. When he spoke, his voice was collected, calm, and, if possible, deeper than before. “Don’t lie to a wolf, sir. It’s not a healthy practice.”
I straightened. I’d heard certain shifters worked well as living lie detectors; I had just never seen it in action. Taking a step closer to Rigel, I crossed my arms and waited with a raised eyebrow.
Keller turned those wonderful shades of red then cleared his throat. “Fine. All right. We’ve found a connection between the victims. You would have found it as soon as you ran the names, so I wasn’t lying, Lieutenant.”
“Tell that to your own body’s limbic system. Your scent screamed discomfort and nerves. Ergo: lie.”
I slanted my head and hip at him. “Well, Keller, what is it?”
He stared at the crowd, nearly vibrating. His hatred for us was growing by leaps and bounds tonight.
“If you choose to obstruct justice” –Carson spoke up, boxing Keller against the wall–“we can and will make sure others know about it, and that stress is more than I believe your career will be able to support.”
Keller blew out the air he’d been holding. “Through old fashioned police research, we’ve determined each of these girls were tested during adolescence, even the prostitute, and deemed to have low-level ley line abilities. The first girl was a Level One on the Svendotter-Bishop Scale, barely able to feel the lines. The second, Linda, was a Level Two. The last one, Reagan, and these two tonight were all deemed to be ley-aware. Abigail and Hanna both had been tapped for the Cup, but not strong enough to place anywhere high enough for it to land them any real jobs.”
“Why keep this from us?” Carson questioned.
“He was afraid the case would be taken away from him,” I snapped back. “He was worried they’d be classified Preternatural, and he’d have nothing to show for his hours of work.”
“Hardly.” He sneered at me. “These girls may have had some abilities, but your kind turned their backs on them. They were not classified as anything but human, and I will find who did this and handle human crime without any other help.”
A low growl erupted from the wolf stan
ding next to me, and Keller stumbled backward until he hit Carson. Carson’s head snapped up, but he held his ground without making eye contact with the shifter. Smart man. Rigel was a full Alpha with a capital A. He was not being flippant when he spoke of his pack out there, and he was angry. How far could a wolf’s temper be pushed, especially with so much blood around?
I expected a much less human sound to come from Rigel’s mouth, but he kept control of his temper, and his words were only laced with a dark, guttural vibration when he spoke. “Lieutenant, I don’t care whose case it is. My pack is out there, hunting these murderers down. It is not my ego that needs your information. Let’s remember we’re on the same team.”
To his credit, Keller also didn’t meet the alpha’s eyes, avoiding challenging Rigel’s more canine side. Keller opened his mouth and closed it several times before giving up and shoulder-checking his way around Carson.
Even though it wasn’t pointed at me, the alpha’s anger made me want to give him some room to cool off, but I needed to get us back on track. I couldn’t be weak. Not only for my job, but because I was representing Devon here.
Respectfully, but with force, I turned to Rigel and stared him straight in the forehead, trying not to force a dominance war at a crime scene. “You said ‘guys.’ You’re tracking more than one perp?”
Flexing his shoulders, Rigel shook off the remainder of his agitation. “Yes. Once we were brought in, we determined two, potentially three, different scents that were not repeaters in the house.”
“Repeaters?”
“Everyone has their own scent. It will be made up of everything in their life–foods, shampoos, pets, soaps, fabric softeners. Those who live together have similar scents, but still there is always something which makes each distinctly their own.”
“Okay, I get that.” When my senses were turned up, I’d noticed something similar, but nothing as keen as Rigel did. Interesting.
“People who visit often add to the overall scent of a place and carry just a piece of it with them. But strangers cast a discord in the normal scent of a home,” Rigel continued.
“They don’t mix well? Like oil and water?” Carson interjected.
Rigel thought for a second then smirked. “Not at all, but if it helps, sure. It’s hard to explain to those who don’t live by their nose.”
Carson sighed.
“So you found non-repeaters, plural, in this one crime scene?” I asked the shifter.
“At least two. Their scents are very unusual—normal household stuff coupled with some kind of incense… citrus and frankincense or something like it. Interestingly enough, their scents live together, which is why it’s hard to say if it is two or three.”
“Good to know.” I noticed Lyle making circles in the air, his sign that we needed to talk ASAP. I took a few steps toward him. “I’d appreciate–”
“One more thing, ma’am.” Rigel said formally.
“Please call me Rowan.”
“One more thing, Rowan.” He lowered his voice. “Whether it is two or three, they are all vampires.”
I nodded to him, but continued watching Lyle’s dizzying circles over his shoulder. “Figured that, thanks.”
Rigel cocked his head at me in question.
“If I’d told Keller, the poor man would’ve lose his case completely to the DEC. Excuse me, please.”
Trying not to be too obvious, I left everyone on the porch–including Carson–and made a beeline to my fluttering partner. If I didn’t get there soon, I was worried he’d fly himself into a light pole soon. His tight circles did tell me one thing: whatever he wanted, it was important.
harades had never been my game. I don’t tend to dance around the meaning and make people guess. If I want you to know something, I’m going to straight up tell you and make sure you understand.
Working three years with a partner who spends half his time as a chirpy blue jay, I’ve become somewhat of an expert at the game. You’d be surprised how much can be communicated by wing span, pitch, latitude, and motion. From Lyle’s motions, I knew I needed to speak to the person below him.
Except, no one was there–just a snake. A shifter.
Great. I didn’t speak slither and coil. Especially when it was in the shadows beside a crime scene at night.
The rust-colored snake slithered away from the crowd, and Lyle swooped low with his right wing pitched. What the hell was the creepy little serpent trying to tell me?
Once we were out of sight from bystanders, a rush of ley energy took over the area. Where the snake had once been was now a man over six feet tall, dressed only in low-rise jeans, with copper hair and a body that would make any woman understand why Eve did what she did.
From Lyle, I’d learned shifters don’t need to undress when they become animals. Don’t ask me how. I’m no expert. The ley lines seemed to hang onto the clothes in the same way it held onto the extra mass that made a six foot man turn into a two-foot-long scaled reptile or a three ounce blue jay.
Our contact had to have spent hours slithering hard or at the gym–both equally likely. He had the V-shaped abs that billboards liked to show off and most mortals only dreamed of. Coupling that with his nifty, spiked, rust-colored hair, it took me a moment to find my voice. He smiled at my obvious appreciation and leaned against a nearby tree in relaxed, but modeled pose. Lyle flew down and circled my head in annoyance. I swatted him away, knowing I’d never actually hit him unless I pulled more from Devon.
The stranger laughed then spoke. “Ease off, Jay. Girl’s got a right to look.”
Lyle swooped at him this time then roosted on a branch above us. His frustration showed in his tufted feathers around his black neck cuff.
“Jeez, Lyle, lay off the caffeine,” I snapped.
I’m with the bird. Stop being a dingy sorority girl and work, Devon chimed in my head.
Well, hello to you, too. What’s it to you if I look? Maybe I should take him home with me.
Not under my roof, you won’t. Nadia informs me Carson is surveying the crime scene with the police. What are you doing outside, still ogling the neighbors?
I ignored him and eyed the newcomer. “So, snake boy, why did you need Lyle to drag me all the way out here? What did you learn?”
“Nathair.”
I blinked twice. “What?”
“My name. Not ‘snake boy.’ Nathair. Nathair Karme.”
“Okay. Good to know. So, snake boy, whatcha got for me?”
Cracking his neck and smiling, he answered, “We’ve been keeping an eye out, like you asked. We spread a pretty tight net, though those wolves have started to make that tougher. A couple of our guys live not too far from here. They smelled the blood and decided to check it out. They saw a couple of idiots high-tailing it out of the back, carrying a squirming body bag. The others hauled ass after them, but the dudes were too fast, even carrying something.”
“How fast are we talking?”
“Faster than an ocelot can race at full speed.”
“Ocelot?”
“Yes, an ocelot–you know, a jungle cat.”
I couldn’t help it. “Are ocelots fast, or…”
“An ocelot was literally chasing them–Brandon. Cool dude. Likes burgers and reggae and running. He’s way fast. He might have been able to keep eyes on them if there’d been some air support.” A bitchy squawk sounded above our heads. “No one is blaming you, Lyle.”
I tried to piece together the timeline. “What did they look like?”
“Dark-skinned vampires, but not black. One much taller and leaner than the other.”
“Not much to go on.”
“You can fill in the rest. I brought you over here to talk because the ocelot told me they’re back in the crowd, watching. He’s keeping an eye on them until we return.”
Adrenaline filled my veins. I loved that feeling of everything snapping into place and zeroing in on what I needed to do. We were finally onto something. We might even be able to take them here,
tonight. We could keep the next girl from dying.
Devon, open up. I need the flow.
I’m on my way. Don’t take on an unknown number of vampires yourself.
Can’t take the risk. I hurried toward the house with Lyle over my head and the snake slithering beside me. If Nathair kept shifting back and forth like this, he’d need an army’s worth of food before the night was done. Shifting, I was told, played havoc with a person’s metabolism. Squeezing all that mass in and out of the ley lines must take its toll.
I said no, Devon scolded. Hold your position. He knew better; I could almost feel his sigh when I didn’t stop moving forward. His energy flowed into me.
Reaching the back of the crowd, I slowed and scanned the area again. As the tingle of Devon’s power raced through me, the colors around me brightened and cleared, even in the darkening night. Sounds grew louder and crisper as I pieced together everything my senses told me. Now that I knew what to search for, I easily picked out the lupine shifter pack. Some were on two legs, others on four. They searched the crowd, but they hadn’t zeroed in on anything. That meant our perps had to be downwind.
Carson crossed in a hurry through the crowd to me. “Whatever you’re planning, Nadia says to hold.”
Feeling the slight gust of wind on my face, I moved my gaze to follow the direction of the breeze. “Stay here, then.”
He blocked my view. I pushed him gently to the side in order to peer around him. As he attempted to follow, he squeaked when my rather large, rust-colored snake friend slithered before him and marked his ground with a tongue flick. Chuckling at Carson’s reaction, I continued canvasing faces in the gathering.
Then I found them. Two dark-skinned men. Their gestures were stilted, an indication of vampires who’d forgotten how to move like a normal person. Rare in this day and age–and dangerous. They both had broad noses and faces and thin eyes and lips. They appeared Hispanic, but not quite like any Latino I’d ever run into.
They were staring directly at me.
With a word to his comrade, the taller one winked at me, then they both moved away from the crowd, between the alleyways separating the houses. Taking a step, I tailed them while Lyle flew ahead to make sure I wouldn’t lose them.
Of Scions and Men Page 17
