Total pages in book: 53
Estimated words: 50820 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 254(@200wpm)___ 203(@250wpm)___ 169(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 50820 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 254(@200wpm)___ 203(@250wpm)___ 169(@300wpm)
I follow, eager to see what he has to show me and get the hell out of here, and already Andrew steps to my side, silently telling Adams to fuck off. I’m liking this new Andrew. Fuck you, Adams. I’m here for it. At this point, Adams is leading us down a hallway, fancy marble beneath our feet. He stops at another archway and rotates to face us. “Forensics is on the way. So is the coroner.” He motions to the exposed room I can’t quite view. “You’ll want boots to go all the way in.” Apparently not that worried about Andrew, he moves out of the way to allow us to step forward.
We’ll want boots, I think. Not booties.
In other words, a messy murder to go with my breakfast. Maybe Andrew needs to go back to the foyer. He can’t handle the killer in me that doesn’t mind dead bodies, but then again, I don’t like blood in excess. Boots say excess. Andrew steps toward the archway and I capture his arm. “You’re not a member of law enforcement any longer, Andrew. You made that decision. Go back to the foyer.”
He yanks his arm back and walks right into the fire, otherwise known today, as the archway. I sigh and follow him, halting by his side.
Before us is a dead man hanging by the neck from the ceiling, his hands chopped off, blood staining the cream-colored carpet beneath him, crimson red.
Chapter Twenty-One
We’re silent several beats, just having a good old fashion family moment, and in true Love fashion we’re doing what Love brothers and sisters were destined to do, hanging out together, staring at a dead body. Which is fine by me, necessary to catch a killer, but Andrew doesn’t understand how to let a dead body talk to him. He doesn’t want that kind of imagery or conversation. And I can’t focus and let it happen for me when I know he’s living a nightmare in his mind.
Andrew doesn’t have the stomach for death, I realize now with one hundred percent certainty.
Meanwhile, I am death.
As sisters do, I try to blow off my brother’s discomfort, returning my attention to the body, and trying to find an empty place in my mind I start filling up with the victim’s data; he’s thirtysomething. Wearing pants and a black T-shirt. His pant legs are soaked with dried blood. His body is rigid. He’s not a fresh kill, which stirs all kinds of new questions in my mind, but Andrew’s discomfort is a beating drum next to me, tugging my gaze his direction.
He’s so damn stiff, he could be the corpse. My brother is fucked in the head, beyond his normal fucked in the head. This part of the job is a necessary evil to most badges and you find a place to put it and just deal with it. Why can’t he just see that we’re the last defense this person has and if we shy away from the blood and gore, if we don’t let them talk to us in death, the killer goes free in life. It becomes cat and mouse between me and the monster who took a life, and I am one hundred percent the cat.
Fear is a grave someone else will be buried in, and right now I’m afraid that means my brother.
Andrew’s gaze finally meets mine and in the depths of his stare I find ten shades of fucked up, the kind of fucked up that comes from watching your own sister stab a man to death and then burying a body, all while wearing a badge. He didn’t give up his badge to take down the Society. He gave it away because he thinks he doesn’t deserve it and I’m literally going to beat his ass. Just not now with witnesses. “I got this, Andrew. Step back.”
Shockingly for my non-compliant brother, he steps back, and repeats that action three times until he almost hits the wall.
My attention slides to Adams. “Why isn’t this place locked down?”
“It is. I have everyone who was here when I got here confined to the offices upstairs, told not to leave until their interviews, printed and asked for DNA samples.”
That’s reasonable, but still feels off. All of this feels off.
“Why isn’t the forensics team here?” Andrew asks, clear headed enough now that he’s not looking at the body to read my mind. “And what about the medical examiner?”
“We’ve claimed jurisdiction. Our team will be here soon.”
He means the FBI which doesn’t surprise me considering the circumstances and location of the body. “You were here before me. Where are they? Why aren’t they here?”
“At your father’s request, I waited to call them until you were present and you’d spoken to him.”
Andrew holds up his hands. “That’s wrong in so many ways, and I don’t even want to know what words come out of your mouth next.” He’s talking to Adams. I think. I’ve been known to have words come out of my mouth, too, often in offensive ways. “I’ll go talk to Dad,” he adds. “I really don’t know why he thinks Lilah is a good choice. Ever.” He rotates and starts walking.