“Is that because you can’t or is it some moral code you live by?”
He’s wary, but inclines his head. “My own moral code. Incubi are some of the world’s most powerful demons. And the most dangerous. What is wrong, Zoe?”
I don’t trust him enough to explain. Yet. Or to tell him just how green I am. “Nothing.”
My curt response sets him off, and the low sound he makes could almost be described as a growl. “Fine. You know where the morgue is?”
“I’m assuming you’re not referring to the San Francisco Medical Examiner’s office.”
Sin flashes me a wry smile. “Hardly. Follow me, then. I’m in the A3.”
Like I hadn’t noticed. But I keep my reaction to myself lest he leave me to find the morgue on my own. After all, he is a demon. I don’t expect him to ever give me a straight answer.
How did I end up here? The only human working for an agency that calls itself BOO and following an incubus to a place no human knows about where I could disappear and never be heard from again.
Oh. That’s right. I got shot by a man I should have been able to trust more than anyone else in the world. And then, I had the gall to investigate it.
Four
Sin
The CSI team—this one comprised of a mage and two warlocks—teleports the body directly to the morgue, so by the time we arrive, Dr. Breslin, the Bureau’s coroner, is already partway through her examination.
My new partner looks a bit unsteady as she enters the room, but she swallows hard and schools her face into a mask.
“Initial findings?” I ask Breslin.
“Always hard to tell with shifters,” she says. “Their injuries heal so quickly.” Touching the dead woman’s wrist with a metal probe, she nods as the device beeps in her hand. “Yep. Ligature marks.”
“How can you tell?” Zoe asks, crouching so she can get a better look. “I don’t see anything.”
“This device reads the concentration of blood under the skin. Here,” Breslin points to one slender wrist, “it registers a seven percent increase in broken blood vessels. Too low for the naked eye. I’d guess her ankles show the same marks. She was restrained a few days before she was killed.”
“Cause of death?” I ask.
The doctor pulls back the shifter’s lips, then runs a handheld scanner over her torso. “Hmm. This looks like a puncture wound.” She points to a small red dot on the side of the shifter’s neck. “The tox screen will take at least four hours—and that’s only if I’m lucky and get the sample in ahead of the vampire-orgy-gone-wrong in the Castro.”
“Orgy?” Now that has the potential to be interesting. Unlike this case. Plus, the idea of seeing the very inexperienced Zoe Dawes wade through the aftermath of a vampire orgy makes my heart beat a little faster.
“That’s Harv’s case, Sin. And he’s not sharing,” Breslin says with a dry chuckle.
Shoving my hands into my pockets, I run through all the ways I could possibly convince the commander to transfer me as the doctor waves her assistant over.
The shifter is—was—beautiful. Long, dark brown hair, a lithe, toned body, and perfect skin. But a vampire orgy… The very idea leaves me salivating.
Breslin and her assistant slide the dead girl onto a sheet, then flip her. Zoe draws in a sharp breath, while I cannot seem to force my lungs to inflate at all. Her back is covered in fresh wounds. Long, thin welts with triangular-shaped markings at the ends. They healed enough to scab over, but only barely.
Breslin’s assistant takes several pictures, and then the doctor brushes the shifter’s dirty locks off her neck. “Well, this is interesting.”
A fresh tattoo mars her skin. Fuck.
“Mio maestro,” I whisper, and Zoe snaps her gaze to mine for a brief second until I shake my head.
No. I will not entertain the possibility. It cannot be him. But the small faery with luminescent wings and a chain wrapped around her neck is too much of a coincidence for it to be anyone else.
“What’s that?” Zoe asks as she takes out her phone and snaps a photo.
Bloodlust, anger, and yes, fear, simmer under my skin, and both the doctor and my new partner jump at my snarl. “That…is a brand.”
Fuck the vampire orgy. Harv can run with it. This case is mine—even if the Almighty herself offers me Heaven on a silver platter.
Zoe
Alone with the body after the medical examiner and her assistant head off to help with the victims of the vampire orgy—really? Vampires hold orgies?—my unease returns with a vengeance. The shifter is face up again, and her eyelids are peeled back, her empty sockets on display. Sin stares at her like he’s seen a ghost.
“I should have known,” he says under his breath. “I should have felt it. All these years. Centuries. Why now?”
“Um, hello? It’s your partner? I’m still here.” I take my small notebook and thwack it against his shoulder. Sin whirls on me, grabs it, and throws it across the room.
“Never do that again.” His eyes are a deep crimson around the edges now, and the anger in their depths…it’s terrifying. It also pisses me off. He doesn’t get to intimidate me like that.
“Then don’t shut me out, asshole. And tell me what you should have known.” My stomach twists and roils, and if I have to look at the body another minute, I’m going to throw up. Stalking across the room, I snatch my notebook off the floor and shove it back into my bag. Sin hasn’t moved.
“You’re really not going to tell me? Fine. I’ll see you outside.”
The Bureau’s morgue is just like all the others I’ve been in. Nothing but stainless steel, frigid air conditioning, and weird smells that stick with you for hours—if not days. The green tiles remind me of my high school gymnasium, but the girls’ locker room never had anything like the various tools lining the counters of this place.
It’s all too much. The air in the hall is slightly fresher, but it’s not enough to quell my nausea, and I replay the half an hour I spent at the crime scene. The poor couple who’d found the body had been sweet, and the techs had wiped their memories. Like something out of Doctor Who or Men in Black.
Who does that? Wipes memories?
Me, apparently. Or at least the organization I’m now a part of.
Bursting out into the brightness of late morning, I find a bench next to a planter of rose bushes. Something normal. Human. Even…pretty. I tip my head back and let the sunlight warm my cheeks, my eyes closed. Until a chilling image flashes behind my lids. A cage. In the dark. And I swear I can smell damp earth, moldy stone.
Get a hold of yourself, Zoe.
Forcing my eyes open, I scoot closer to the rose bushes and inhale deeply. I should not have read the BOO handbook while Interview with a Vampire played in the background. Big mistake.
A few moments later, Sin drops down onto the warm wood next to me. “That tattoo…the design is ancient. And I have seen it before.”
“Where?” I tilt my head to find him staring up at the hills surrounding the city.
“Nowhere I can speak of. Trust me, Zoe.”