Second Skin Part 14

"Okay," he said, kindly averting his eyes so he didn't see the sheen in mine. "Hey, if you're ever down in LA give me a call. I'd love to take you out, try and lure you into the bureau."

He pa.s.sed me his card and I took it, and walked back to the Fairlane with the midmorning sun dazzling my eyes. I felt scarred, and shaken, but most of all, at my core, I felt nothing. Joshua's hold on me was broken. Yet somewhere in Nocturne there was another girl, someone who wasn't lucky enough to be able to confront her devil. My kidnappers had been well organized and well informed, and now it was a race between me, them, and the ticking clock to see who found the poor girl first.

At the Twenty-fourth I ducked Sh.e.l.ley by using the prisoner entrance and sat at Bryson's desk, spinning his chair until I got dizzy, and then getting coffee, and then finally throwing the stir-stick across the room. Where the Hex was the man?

His phone shrilled just as I'd decided to leave him a sticky note and drive out to find the Wendigo. I wasn't bleeding anymore, and thanks to Joshua I was also spoiling for a fight.

"Bryson's desk."

"Why, Luna Wilder. I thought I'd never hear your dulcet voice again," said Bart Kronen.

"Dr. Kronen, my favorite medical examiner," I said. "The same. What's up?"

"I'm trying to reach David," he said. "Something unusual with the victims in his four homicides that I needed to discuss."

"You know," I said in my brightest tone, reaching for a pen. "Bryson and I are working the case side by side . . . me being were and all. Sort of a consulting deal."

"Ah," said Bart.

"So I could come by and look at your findings." G.o.ds, this was so wrong. I would be so fired. Forget fired, I'd probably end up at Los Altos with my former homicide captain and a pa.s.sel of angry mercenaries who had worked for Seamus O'Halloran.

"I'm working my usual shift at the morgue," said Bart. "I'll look forward to your visit."

"Thanks, I . . ." Sweet orchid perfume blanketed my nose just before Matilda Morgan came to my shoulder, and I managed to slam the phone down in the nick of time. "Ma'am."

"Officer Wilder. To what do I owe the pleasure?

I plastered a smile on. "Just waiting on Detective Bryson, ma'am."

Her eyebrow arched delicately. "I see. Officer, I'm sure I don't need to tell you that the city's ability to prosecute your case and all cases attached to it goes down exponentially every time you-the victim-interfere with the investigation?"

"You don't, ma'am," I agreed. "But really, I just came here to share some information with David. So he might clear the other cases a little faster."

"Your altruism never ceases to astound me," said Morgan in a voice so dry you could set it on fire. "However, the next time I catch you in my precinct sticking your nose into an investigation you might directly compromise, I'll have your badge, Luna. You are not the only competent law officer in this city." She jerked her chin at Bryson, who had appeared from the hall carrying a bag from Big Darn Heroes, the sub shop one block over. "Give Bryson your information and get out."

"But ma'am . . . ," I started. She had to understand that Carla Runyon was most likely a were now, and that Bryson wouldn't be able to get to her alone.

"I think I've made my position clear, Luna," said Morgan. Her tone was still even but her expression was fierce. "Don't make me repeat myself."

"What's up, Wilder?" said Bryson, plopping his lunch down on top of a stack of paper. Meatb.a.l.l.s and sauce and delicately melted mozzarella cheese tickled my nostrils.

"A were named Carla Runyon, from the Serpent Eye pack," I said. "That's who they'll be after next."

"Hey, thanks," Bryson exclaimed. "I'll get a couple of uniforms on her p.r.o.nto."

"No," I started. "Her pack won't allow-"

"Bryson will investigate the lead in due time," said Morgan, glaring at Bryson. "Good day, Officer Wilder."

"No," I said. "No, it's probably going to happen tonight. David, you have to get to her now, and make her pack understand what's happening-"

"Leave, Officer," said Morgan, squeezing my elbow. "Do not make me call Captain Delahunt at the SWAT office," she hissed in my ear as she propelled me toward the front entrance. Officer," said Morgan, squeezing my elbow. "Do not make me call Captain Delahunt at the SWAT office," she hissed in my ear as she propelled me toward the front entrance.

"Find her, David!" I yelled over my shoulder. "Tomorrow will be too late!"

CHAPTER 11.

Nocturne City's morgue is straight out of a horror movie from the 1970s: down in a bas.e.m.e.nt, past a set of barred metal doors, dimly lit with flickering fluorescents. Tailor-made for zombies, slashers, and Dr. Kronen, the only ME who never seemed to leave.

"Hey, Doc," I said, rapping gently on the open door of his office.

"Officer Wilder." He tilted down his gla.s.ses and gave me a small smile. "Glad you could make it."

"Anything for you, Doc," I said. "What do you have for me?"

Dr. Kronen pushed his chair away from his desk and stood up, fixing his tie so that it hung crookedly on the left instead of the right. "You know, Luna, I heard about what happened to you. If the DA gets wind that I allowed you access to the investigation of a crime you were a victim of . . ."

d.a.m.n it. d.a.m.n it and double d.a.m.n it and d.a.m.n it again once more just for good measure.

"Kronen, these guys threw me naked into a forest to get killed, and even though the methodology is different, I think they did the same thing to four other people," I said. "I'm just helping Bryson out. Cut me a little slack here."

Kronen tapped his teeth. "Perhaps not so different as you think."

"What the h.e.l.l does that mean?"

Kronen gave me a small smile. "Let me show you something."

He led me down the hall and through a set of swinging doors. The cold room within was silent, linoleum floor and steel walls giving off a soft glow as the overhead vents kept the room at Corpsicle. The cadavers here were John Does, overdoses, natural causes who died in state-funded nursing homes. Anyone the morgue couldn't fit in the freezers down the hall went to the cold room.

At least in here, the smell was bearable.

"Full house tonight, huh, Bart?" I said when he hit the row of hanging lights dangling lopsidedly from the ceiling.

The rows of bodies zipped into their bags were identical except for the white tags tucked into the windows on the front panel. Kronen led me down the center row and stopped at a form midway, slipping on gloves and zipping down the bag.

The silent face of Bertrand Lautrec stared up at me and I flinched. "Jesus, Kronen. Don't you even close their eyes?"

He shrugged. "Doesn't bother me."

Bertrand's face was pristine except for the wide, dark bullet hole with the ring of powder burns in the center of his forehead.

"Upon examining him, I thought the same thing you're thinking now," said Kronen. "Gunshot wound, yes?"

"Close range," I agreed. "Poor b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

"Notice anything?" said Kronen. When I examined the wound again and shrugged, he reached out and stuck his finger into the hole the bullet had carved.

I jerked back. "That's just creepy, Bart."

"Keep calm, Officer Wilder," Kronen said. He pulled his finger out. "Now. Do you notice anything odd about this wound?"

The skin around the bullet's entry wound was still as pale and bloodless as ever. Pristine, almost, like someone had put out a cigarette on Lautrec's forehead.

"There's no blood," I said. "Not even clotted blood."

Kronen smiled at me and stripped off the gloves. "Which is logical, considering that Mr. Lautrec had lost nearly two-thirds of the blood in his body. The exsanguination is what killed him. The gunshot was an afterthought, or purely symbolic."

"Uh, we may have reason to believe that the killer, um, drinks blood," I admitted, remembering what Sunny had told me about the Wendigo. Was my pale, drained body next in line for a skull shot? "Seems like overkill," I agreed aloud. "Not even a were is getting up from that kind of blood loss."

"Or perhaps not pa.s.sion but precision," Bart said. "Someone who cared to keep the true cause of death concealed."

"That could be anyone at this point," I said, rubbing at my nose to expel the stench of old, dead flesh.

"At any rate, I examined the bodies more closely," said Bart, unzipping the bag next to Bertrand Lautrec. Jin Takehiko lay within. Fortunately, his eyes were closed. His chest was smooth and hard except for a st.i.tched Y-incision, muscle ridges stark where the blood had pooled. The rough st.i.tches bisected his tattoos of wolves racing through clouds, dragons wrapped around cherry trees. The meager-and magick-tattoo at the base of my spine was a shadow by comparison.

Kronen took out a penlight and shone it down on a spot in the middle of Jin's left pectoral. "All four of them are marked," said Kronen. "I haven't been able to discern the cause."

I leaned close and saw four oval bruises on Jin's skin, so light that you'd have to almost be not looking to pick out the imperfections on his blue-white inked clouds. Death had paled him and brought them into sharper relief, which was the only reason I spotted them at all.

"Kronen," I said, spreading out my hand. My reach was smaller than whatever had made the mark, but the pattern was the same. Five fingers, pressed down over the dead man's heart.

"How extraordinary," Kronen murmured. "Almost as if something compelled the life-force from the body . . ." He flicked off his light. "All four victims' hearts are missing. That's why I'm inclined to believe there is more to this than Captain Morgan is willing to admit."

"Yeah, I think you made a good call on that one, Bart," I murmured. Missing? Missing? Sunny admitted the Wendigo drank blood, but nowhere was there a story about stealing hearts. "Their chests don't seem . . . disturbed," I said, my hand still overlaying the eerie marks. Sunny admitted the Wendigo drank blood, but nowhere was there a story about stealing hearts. "Their chests don't seem . . . disturbed," I said, my hand still overlaying the eerie marks.

"Therein lies the mystery," said Kronen, reaching out to zip up Jin Takehiko's body bag.

The next bag over rustled. I yelped and even Kronen jerked his hand away faster than I'd ever seen him move.

"What in the . . . ," he started.

"Who's bag is that?" I demanded. Louder, "Is someone playing a Hexed joke?"

"That is Aleksandr Belodis," said Kronen softly. "I know it. He has not moved from that spot since I completed his post."

"Call me crazy," I said, "but aren't dead bodies-especially dead bodies sans sans heart-supposed to, you know, heart-supposed to, you know, stop moving stop moving?"

The bag jerked again, more violently this time, and a hiss issued from within.

"Dear G.o.ds," said Kronen. I didn't bother with G.o.ds, but I did jerk my sidearm out of my waistband and shove Kronen back with my free hand.

"Get behind me."

A moan issued forth from the bag, a hungry, haunted sound that rattled up and down the length of the metal-lined cold room. The body of Aleksandr Belodis sat straight up inside its confinement, and inside the stiff black plastic I saw the outline of a head rotate to stare at Kronen and I.

"New plan," I told Kronen. "Run your a.s.s off."

Bart, never one to ask a lot of questions when the dead were rising, turned around and made tracks for the swinging doors. I backed up slowly, keeping my gun trained on the writhing body on the steel table.

There was a dry crackle like leaves underfoot, and a set of long claws, way too long to belong to anything were, tore quadruple slits down the front of the body bag. Aleksandr poked his head out and hissed at me. Most of his hair was gone, the rest falling off in patchy clumps, and his eyes were pure silver, gleaming under the lights with an oily life that sent a sharp icicle straight to where my fear lived.

"c.r.a.p," I whispered. All right, I squeaked. Perhaps even whimpered a little.

Aleksandr slid off the table, the body bag falling around his feet. As I watched he took a step toward me, then another. His body began to change, smoothing and losing features, the st.i.tches from his autopsy popping out and falling away. His nose flattened out and his teeth grew, fangs where none had been before appearing along his gums. He walked jerkily, but with a purpose, and the small slits he had left for nostrils flared when I felt sweat start all over my body. Cold, just like the rest of me.

"Wolf . . . ," he hissed.

Aleksandr's skin began to ripple and slough away, like he was phasing before my eyes, and I realized that the moisture on my exposed skin wasn't sweat but a heavy, clinging sort of fog that felt as if I were standing next to a glacier.

"Wolf," Aleksandr hissed again, his foggy shape pulsing and re-forming every time he took another step. He paused and gathered himself in, his lips peeling away to reveal more silver teeth. Too many teeth. Way too many teeth.

Then, terrifying as Aleksandr was in that moment, I saw something even worse. On his gurney, Jin Takehiko gave a great shuddering gasp and then sat bolt-upright.

"Oh, f.u.c.k, f.u.c.k," I snarled.

Aleksandr returned my snarl, and I saw him crouch to spring. I turned and beat a retreat, slipping on the floor and going down hard. My gun spun away into a shadowed corner. The things behind me screamed, and I tried to pull myself up, but panic and the pain of falling made it a clumsy attempt at best.

"Luna!" Kronen shouted from outside the swinging doors. I looked back, saw Aleksandr about to latch his teeth into some vital part of me, and then a shrieking sound started, so loud in the echoing cold room I swear my skull split in half.

A moment later it began to rain from the ceiling sprinklers and an automated voice told me to proceed to the nearest emergency exit, this was not a drill. Kronen stared through the gla.s.s at me, his hand on the fire alarm.

I got up and got my a.s.s moving, skidding along the slick floor with Aleksandr snapping at my heels. He was fast, faster than me by a long shot, but the noise wasn't doing him any favors, either.

Falling again, I slid along on my side and hit the swinging doors, rolling out into the hallway. Kronen pushed the doors shut and twisted the latches behind me.

"You all right?" he shouted over the Klaxons.

I pulled myself to my feet. "I'll probably live!"

Behind me, Alexsandr hit the door, his claws leaving long flay marks on the security gla.s.s in the windows. "Holy G.o.ds!" Kronen yelped. "What is going on, Luna?"

"I wish I knew, Bart, believe me," I said. We were both pressed against the opposite wall, watching the four silvery shapes inside the cold room snarl and hurl themselves at the door.

"How long do you think those locks will hold?" Kronen asked me conversationally.

What used to be Jin Takehiko, and was now another walking-talking death masque with teeth, rammed into the door at full speed. A screw popped out of the hinges and rolled away into the stream from the sprinklers.

"Not long enough," I said. "We have to get out of here."