by Dannika Dark
The van suddenly took off and flipped me onto the floor.
Gem slid down the bench and almost fell on top of me. “Claude, slow down!”
I climbed beside Niko and studied my elbow for a cut. The van continued making sharp turns, and I locked my knees together and anchored my feet in opposite directions to stay balanced.
Gem gripped the edge of her seat. “I’ve told Viktor nine hundred times he should put some handles in here like they have on subway trains.”
“Why not just get an SUV with extra seating?”
Niko leaned forward. “Sometimes we need the room to lay someone down if they’re injured.” He suddenly looked toward the front of the van. “Seems there’s a change in plans. This doesn’t feel like the way home.”
“You have the drive memorized?”
He inclined his head. “Every turn. I also know the detours when we stop to pick up food.”
The van didn’t have heat in the back, so I tugged my cardigan a little bit tighter.
When we finally stopped, Viktor and Claude got out and opened the rear door. Country music was playing in the distance, and I could detect the faint odor of grilled meat combined with earthy woods. There was a bar on the far side of the parking lot to the right, but we weren’t in the heart of the city. The land surrounding it was a mixture of open field and trees, with the main road behind us by the sound of the traffic. The sun dipped below the horizon, taking all the light with it.
Claude wrapped his hands around Gem’s waist and set her on the ground.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
I hopped out behind her, the sound of car doors slamming as Shepherd, Blue, and Wyatt headed over from the Mini Cooper parked next to us. Niko squatted inside the rear entrance of the van.
“Gather around,” Viktor said, pulling us into a huddle. “This is a crime scene, so sharpen your senses and look for evidence. The higher authority believes there’s a link between some recent murders. A detective has been assigned these cases to assess if they’re connected, and we have permission to view the crime scene before he calls in the cleaners. I don’t know this man or if he’s going to have a problem with us invading his territory, so let’s keep this professional.”
“What about the other murders?” I asked. “No leads?”
“We can only take the cases they give us. I want you to put all your focus on this crime scene and see what you can come up with.”
Christian strode up after parking his bike. “No need for a recap; I heard everything.”
Viktor nodded at Christian before looking at everyone else. “We’re on the human side of town, and we don’t have much time. You know what to do.”
Blue shifted into her grey falcon and swooped over to a lamppost near the bar to keep a lookout. We were a good distance from the building, although we could still hear raucous shouting over the music.
Wyatt raised his hand. “I didn’t ask to be here.”
Viktor gave him a curt look. “Perhaps if the deceased is still meandering around, you can ask her who the murderer is and we can all go home. Let’s go.”
As we crossed the empty parking lot and headed toward the edge, I glanced over my shoulder at the building in the distance. The outside lights had just switched on, and there weren’t many cars.
“Isn’t Northern Lights a human bar?” I asked Christian.
“Aye.”
We neared a black Mercedes and slowed our pace. A woman’s body lay just off the concrete by a grove of trees, and it dawned on me that I’d never seen a dead woman before. The victim had radiant locks of blond hair that must have once caught the eye of every man, but now it fanned over her head, stuck to the wet soil beneath it. A short gust of wind lifted the hem of her long green skirt, revealing porcelain skin.
“Jaysus wept,” Christian whispered. He fell back a step and slowly turned to survey our surroundings.
A tall man approached us, his long grey coat flapping behind him. He was close to Claude’s height, and his golden eyes and blond hair gave away his Breed.
“I’m Detective Glass.”
Viktor bowed. “Viktor Kazan. This is my team.”
Glass gave us a quick appraisal, hands dipped in his pockets. “It’s pretty evident what happened here. We’ve got ourselves a Vampire problem in this city, and this is just another example.”
Viktor rubbed his nose. “What’s her Breed?”
Glass shrugged. “I checked her eyes, and she’s not a Chitah. Without an identity, it’s hard to tell once they’re deceased. Probably a human, given our location.” He glanced at his watch. “The bar has a live show tonight, so you need to wrap this up before the crowd begins filling the parking lot.”
Shepherd squatted next to the body. What he did next made me bow my head respectfully. He first closed her eyes. Then he reached in his back pocket and draped a bandana over her beautiful face.
Glass scuffed the bottom of his shoe against the concrete. “It looks like he drank his fill and left her to die.”
Viktor led Glass away for a more private conversation.
“What are they saying?” I whispered to Christian.
His black eyes flicked down to mine. “You’re a nosy one.”
I cocked my head to the side. “Like you’re not eavesdropping.”
He shook his head. “They’re just discussing prior cases.”
“Why are we investigating a human crime?”
He clasped his hands in front of him. “She has two holes in her neck. If she’s not the only one, then that’s the kind of detail that doesn’t escape the FBI’s attention. Take in as much information as you can. Once the cleaners arrive, they get rid of all the evidence.”
“Doesn’t it go to a storage facility or special lab?”
“They usually assign these cases to a single detective, but they’re more concerned about cleaning up the evidence so humans don’t find it.”
“So basically no one cares.”
“People die every day in our world. Death is a consequence of life.”
A breath of frosty air appeared when I sighed. “She looks so young.”
“To be sure. Bloody shame.”
I lowered my voice. “She wasn’t killed here.”
Christian penetrated me with his obsidian eyes. “And how do you know that, Sherlock?”
I stepped closer to him, and we faced the scene. “Where’s her jacket? It’s thirty degrees out here. Look at the way her hair is arranged. She sure didn’t drive here, or we’d see an abandoned car. And why is she way over here away from the bar? If he killed her here in broad daylight, there would have been witnesses. She would have screamed.”
“A Vampire could have scrubbed any witnesses.”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. If I were a human driving in my car and saw a murder, I wouldn’t get out. I’d also start filming it on my phone and call the police.”
Gem walked past us, wiping a tear from her cheek as she headed back to the van. Niko strode behind her like a shadow, a look of concern on his face.
“See any ghostly apparitions?” Christian asked Wyatt, humor edging his voice.
Wyatt stalked toward us and growled, “Keep it down.”
Christian plucked a piece of candy from his pocket and popped it into his mouth. “If we have a freshy lingering about, then you better ask her some questions. Might save us a little time.”
Wyatt lifted the collar of his green jacket to block the wind. “She’s nowhere to be seen, but there’s someone else hanging out by my car.”
Christian laughed and clapped his hand on Wyatt’s shoulder. “The dead seem quite fond of you. Must be the aftershave.”
I approached the victim and felt a wave of sorrow. “I wonder who she was.”
Shepherd’s hands were on the body. A Sensor could pick up emotional energy, but I didn’t know if it worked with dead people.
“Can you feel anything?” I asked. “I thought the person had to be alive.”
&nb
sp; He spoke without looking up. “Strong emotions leave behind imprints.” Shepherd lifted up the back of her skirt. After a few seconds, he straightened it out and stood up. He dusted off his hands and circled around her. “She didn’t die here.”
Christian pointed between us. “You two should work together.”
Shepherd zipped up his leather jacket. The tips of his ears were red from the cold air. “Even with Vampires, blood never completely drains out. Livor mortis tells me she died on her back, but notice how her body is shifted slightly on its side?”
I frowned. “Don’t you mean rigor mortis?”
“Rigor is body stiffness. Livor mortis is where the blood settles.”
I glanced at Viktor and the detective talking in the distance. “Doesn’t the higher authority have morticians or forensic experts who look at this kind of stuff?”
Christian scratched his beard. “You watch too much television. The higher authority isn’t going to waste their money on someone to cut open bodies and try to figure out why their head came off. Most deaths aren’t a mystery, and bodies turn up all over the city because of crime. You should know that better than anyone.”
I never did give much thought about who might have found the bodies I’d left behind. Had there been a detective assigned to the case, or had they just wiped down the floor and called it a day?
Christian glanced around. “Usually they send out a couple of Regulators, but it looks like they assign a detective when there’s a pattern. We have to fly under the radar so the humans don’t catch on. It’s hard enough concealing a Breed jail, but a police station wouldn’t go unnoticed. That’s not how we do things.”
“Then how do we do things?”
“When there’s a murder, cleaners usually show up and take a report before destroying evidence and getting rid of the body. Like I said before, most murders aren’t a mystery. When there’s a pattern, they call in a detective to handle those cases.”
“What do they do with the bodies?”
His lips eased into a grin. “Curious about what happened to your previous lovers?”
I folded my arms and shivered. “I’m just curious how it all works.”
“If no one comes to claim the body, the remains are either cremated or buried. It depends on whether or not there’s enough space in the Breed cemetery. They’re not likely to waste good real estate on a John or Jane Doe. If they don’t have an identity or believe the victims were human, they’ll cremate them.”
I stared at the puncture marks in her neck. “Why would a Vamp dump the body in front of a human bar?”
Christian glared. “There’s a word I’d like to snip from your vocabulary.”
“Vamp? I’ve heard it come out of your mouth, so spare me the lecture.”
“Aye, but I don’t use it as freely and fondly as you seem to do.”
Shepherd wiped his hands on his pants. “I’m going to walk around and see if I can pick up anything else.”
As he veered away, I approached the body and studied it for a quiet moment. There weren’t any signs of struggle like in a typical fight. Her nails weren’t chipped, no scratches or bruises, no busted lip, and her clothes weren’t torn. Those were things I expected to see in a violent crime.
Christian eased up beside me, his tone skeptical. “The detective says a number of unsolved murders have been linked to a Vampire, but he’s not convinced that it’s just one killer.”
“He’s probably right,” I said.
Christian stepped in front of me. “Are you suggesting that Vampires are a bunch of murderers?”
“I’ve heard blood is pretty tasty.”
He leaned in close. “You should know. You’ve probably had more of it in the past year than I have.”
“We have a flawed system that doesn’t lock up all the feeders. I’ve lived on the streets for a few years. Blood addiction is a problem, and you can’t deny it.”
“Perhaps we should have a twelve-step program. While you’re at it, you might want to acknowledge that juicers are an even bigger problem.”
There was truth to that. I’d run into far more Mage juicers looking for an energy high than Vampires sipping on the red stuff. I shifted away from the wind. “So you don’t think there’s more than one murderer?”
Christian looked away when Shepherd’s bandana flew off, revealing the woman’s angelic face. “It only takes one fanghole to ruin our reputation.”
My gaze swung toward the trees where Claude was circling. His eyes darted to the woman every so often, but he kept walking, his nostrils flared.
Christian noticed the direction of my gaze. “I didn’t even think he’d be able to get this close.”
“Maybe he’d be able to smell the killer if he got a little closer to the body.”
Christian led me away. “That’s as close as a Chitah needs to get to a dead woman. It won’t matter anyhow, seeing as the killer’s a Vampire. This kind of thing has been going on for centuries.” He glanced back at Claude. “A tracker’s worst nightmare is hunting a Vampire. Some crimes can’t be solved. We don’t leave behind energy or emotional imprints, let alone a personal scent a Chitah could pick up. We’re hard to catch.”
“Maybe the higher authority should invest a little money in learning about DNA. You’d be able to catch a serial killer a lot faster if you could swab that neck for saliva.”
“Serial killer?” He huffed out a laugh. “All I see back there is someone who drank a little more than their fill. There’s nothing wrong with a cocktail so long as you know when to say when.”
I spun on my heel. “Really? That whole scene is staged. If someone accidentally drank too much, he’d hide the body so he wouldn’t get caught. Whoever did this put her on display. You admitted to having killed more people than I have. We might suck at relic hunting at the pawnshop, but you know as well as I do that this isn’t a case of some youngling with bloodlust.”
His jaw tensed as he looked at the body. The wind ruffled his dark hair, and his stance was relaxed as he seemed impervious to the cold. “Maybe I don’t like rumors of a Vampire serial killer circulating. People don’t trust us as it is, and this could be a setback.”
I bit my lip as Viktor and Detective Glass neared. “Let’s remain indecisive and see what Glass has to say.”
“Is everyone finished up here?” Glass said, staring at his watch. “I need to call the cleaners and write up a report for the higher authority. I don’t think there’s anything you can add I haven’t already worked out.”
I could tell he was annoyed by our involvement.
Viktor tucked his hands in his coat pockets. “We’ll be in touch. Until my contacts tell me otherwise, I need to be the first person you call when you discover a body linked to this case with the same… How you say?”
“Modus operandi,” I suggested.
Viktor snapped his fingers. “Correct. I don’t want anyone else on the scene beforehand.”
Christian unwrapped a piece of candy from his pocket. “What’s your position on the case?” he asked the detective.
“Got another one of those? I haven’t eaten in hours.”
Christian tossed him a piece.
Glass caught it and turned it between his fingers. “I’m not convinced these are linked to just one man. It’s more likely a gang or coven run amok. Vamps are becoming a real problem.”
I thought I heard Christian growl, but maybe it was just Glass’s stomach.
“How did you find her?” I asked.
When Detective Glass steered his eyes my way, I looked down. It was hard to hold a Chitah’s intense gaze. He tucked the candy in his pocket and studied me for a long moment before answering. “An anonymous caller.”
“You don’t find that suspicious?”
“Most people don’t like to get involved. A lot of crimes are reported through anonymous tips.”
Viktor waved at Claude and Shepherd to head back to the van. It was almost completely dark now, and a few cars were pulling in
to the far end of the parking lot and filling the spaces.
“Have you been able to identify any of the victims?” I continued.
The detective inclined his head. “I’m sorry, but I didn’t get your name.”
Viktor stepped between us. “This is Raven Black, the newest Mage on my team.”
He smiled, revealing a crease in his cheek. Glass clasped his hands in front of him and widened his stance. “That explains your interrogation. You must be new in our world. When you’re speaking to me, you’re speaking directly to the higher authority. Tread carefully on how you choose to address Regulators and detectives. I’ll cooperate and provide my insight to your boss, but you should follow the chain of command within your group and leave the questions to him.”
I lifted my chin. “Only my boss can reprimand me. I haven’t said anything out of line, or he would have spoken up.”
Viktor didn’t silence me, and I felt his support even if I didn’t sense his approval. “We’ll leave you to finish up here,” he said. “I appreciate your cooperation.”
Glass bowed, his eyes still on me. “Delighted, Miss Black.”
Christian gripped my upper arm and led me away so quickly that I almost tripped over a metal rod.
I wrenched away. “You don’t have to be so forceful.”
“Maybe I don’t like the way he was looking at you. It’s unnatural.”
“If I didn’t know better, Mr. Poe, I’d think you actually cared.”
“Don’t be daft. I’m just trying to save your life.”
I barked out a laugh. “From a detective?”
He paused and turned to face me. “A Chitah’s your mortal enemy. Maybe that’s reason enough not to trust him.”
Claude stepped close and cleared his throat. “I missed that last part.”
But he hadn’t. He put his arm around me to make a point.
Christian held his ground and didn’t blink. “You might be chummy with the lass, but you know as well as I do that there are plenty of your kind who would like nothing better than to do away with every last Mage in the city.”
“I’m not going to argue that point,” Claude said. “But let’s not generalize.”
Christian’s fangs descended, and my heart skipped a beat when he stepped forward. “Don’t teach her to be so trusting. That’s how people get themselves killed. Trust a person, but never trust a Breed or a badge.”
