Текст книги "Lost Souls"
Автор книги: Delilah Devlin
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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 15 страниц)
3
Early the next morning, they stopped to pick up Jason on their way to the Criminal Justice Complex. “You both need to hear this,” Sam said, his tone all business. “Saves repeating it.” His steely stare said he didn’t want any secrets kept from him either.
Cait wrinkled her nose, knowing he was scolding her in a not-so-oblique way because she had a habit of holding on to clues until she’d had time to figure out what they meant or whether they were relevant. Something that annoyed him to no end.
Like the knowledge that Sylvia Reyes, a woman he didn’t know about yet, had somehow died the night before. Cait did feel a niggle of guilt for not sharing that fact with Jason last night, but he was used to her ways, having worked side by side since she’d been encouraged to resign from the Memphis PD. And she intended to talk to both Sam and Jason about it, but the drive to the station was too short. Or at least that was her excuse, and she was sticking to it.
Striding down the corridor toward the Homicide Bureau in front of the two most important men in her life, she admitted she’d made a conscious choice to not even consider talking to one other person, someone who might actually make sense of what she’d seen. Soon enough, she’d have to face that prospect. For now, she had enough worries on her mind. Like walking the gauntlet of desks lined up in the murder room. She glanced around the open area, amused by the wary, curious glances from the detectives she received.
The last time she’d been here, she’d been debriefed regarding the kidnapping and murder case that had kept the city riveted for weeks afterward. Stories of satanic rituals involving mummified women had shouted from the tabloids but had received a gloss of ordinary after Lieutenant Leland Hughes worked some PR magic of his own. A skin-walking demon who’d stolen women to devour as part of a spell to make him immortal was lost. Worthen’s demon became one unhinged perpetrator who’d left booby traps in a vacant house where he’d been “storing” his captives to serve his deviant desires.
Although she and Leland rarely saw eye to eye on anything, she was the first to admit Leland had shown genius worthy of a novel spinning that tale.
“Didn’t even get a chance to miss the place,” she murmured as they trailed inside Leland’s cramped office and closed the door.
The middle-aged curmudgeon sat behind his desk, same bulldog expression, his upper lip curled like he smelled something bad. Must have gotten hold of a slice of Jason’s pizza, she thought, suppressing a smile.
“Glad you all could make it,” he said, but his expression tightened.
Like he didn’t look at all happy to see her.
“Glad to see you’ve recovered,” she said, her voice just as falsely polite.
His eyes narrowed as he flashed her a tight smile.
At the sight, she nearly choked with laughter. His front teeth, shiny and impossibly white, looked like a row of Chiclets.
“Nice teeth,” she gasped.
“Temporary crowns,” he growled. “The final set are being made.”
Since she’d been the one who’d broken his teeth by shoving the end of a bellows in his mouth to extract a demon, she decided to refrain from making any other comments about his appearance. “Whatcha got?” she asked, looking at Leland and then Sam, who hadn’t taken a seat but hovered by the door.
“Why don’t you start by telling us what you were doing last night at the Deluxe?” Leland said. “We’ve had the place under surveillance. One of my men said you were parked outside for hours.”
Surprised by his comments, she sat straighter in her chair.
Jason cleared his throat, no doubt to avert any attempt on her part to drag out the explanation and possibly to prevent her from leaving out any salient details. She wrinkled her nose at him and then slumped back, giving Jason the lead. Her partner had tact, something she found occasionally helpful.
Jason leaned forward, setting his elbows on his knees. “We were hired by a man who wanted us to follow his wife. He found evidence she might be cheating and wanted us to verify.”
“The name of your client?” Leland barked.
Jason gave Leland a polite smile. “How about we keep his name out of this until we know if it’s relevant? We have a duty to protect our client’s privacy.”
Leland pursed his lips but then gave a curt nod. “The PD was called to investigate a murder. Workers hired to fix some leaky pipes found a body stuffed in the wall of one of the rooms. ME says it’s been there for decades. For shits and giggles, I had them run the DNA, hopin’ maybe we’d find a relative somewhere in the system.” His gaze sharpened, then went directly to Cait. “Wanna know what we found?”
Cait caught herself just before she rolled her eyes. Talk about building the drama.
“She was in the system all right.” He picked up a folder in the center of his desk and sent it sliding toward her. “Name’s Sylvia Reyes. She was in the database. Ten years ago, she claimed to be raped by a john when she was a workin’ girl. Case was dropped. But that’s why we had her DNA. Wanna tell us how some woman who wasn’t born ’til 1984 has been dead for forty or fifty years?”
Blood drained from Cait’s head, leaving her slightly dizzy.
Jason cleared his throat, catching her attention. He glared and tilted his head toward Leland. He gave his silent signal. It was time for her to spill.
She blew out a deep breath, dropping all attitude as she met Leland’s eagle gaze. “The target of our investigation was Sylvia Reyes. She was alive last night, until we almost caught up to her near that room you have taped off.”
Leland’s face froze. “You witnessed a murder and didn’t report it?”
The visions of what she’d seen flitted through her mind. She shook her head. “No, I saw a live woman walk around a corner, then a see-through version of her staring back at me seconds later.”
Behind her, Sam cussed under his breath.
Leland’s face screwed up into a scowl. “Knew soon as Sam mentioned you’d been there, you were somehow wrapped up in this. Uniforms found her car parked outside the hotel this morning, even before we could find her husband to have a chat about his missin’ wife.”
“She hasn’t been gone long enough for him to report,” Jason murmured as he ran a hand over his jaw. “He probably doesn’t know.”
Her glance slid away. “Unless he’s the one who set her up,” she said, suddenly uncomfortable when all three men’s gazes rested on her. She shrugged. “We’re assuming something completely unnatural happened, when this could be a hubby who made a deal with a devil. He didn’t have to hire us to get rock-solid evidence his wife was stepping out on him. He had her Facebook hookup documented. Just sayin’…”
Leland waved his hand, silencing her. “Guess we’re in need of your specialized services, Cait.” He leaned over his desk, his steel-gray eyes pinning her. “Try not to get anyone killed or anything blown up this time.”
When he spun his chair to stare out the window, a clear indication the conversation was over, Cait pushed up from her seat. She gave Sam a searching glance. “We working this together?”
“Why would you have any doubts? Didn’t you hear?” He jabbed a thumb at his chest. “I’m the new full-moon guy.”
His voice was gravel-coarse. Anger bristled in the stiff set of his shoulders, but she held her comments until they were back in the corridor, away from homicide’s gossipy cops.
“I was going to tell you,” she mumbled. “But I got a little distracted last night.”
He cussed again and turned on his heel, heading to the elevator.
Not until all three of them were striding outside toward Sam’s unmarked sedan did she open her mouth. “I wasn’t keeping secrets. I would have told you everything—once I was sure Sylvia was dead and that what I saw was her ghost, not just… I don’t know… her taking a walk outside her body. The other ghosts I’ve seen aren’t holographs. They look just like you and me.”
“That even possible?” Jason asked. “Someone walking outside their body?”
Cait shrugged. “My mom claimed she could do astral projection. I never have. How the fuck would I know?”
Sam turned and leaned his butt against his car. “Cait, we are not going down the same path we did last time. I’ll share everything I learn. I expect the same professional courtesy from you.”
“Of course.” Only maybe she’d answered too quickly because both Sam and Jason gave her a look that said they seriously doubted she would. “What? I want to figure this out as badly as you guys do.”
Sam folded his arms over his chest and glared harder.
Jason reached out to touch her shoulder. “Problem is, Cait, when things get hinky you hold on to stuff. Sometimes a bit too long. I know you have issues with that other world you walk in, but you’ve left us swinging in the wind before. We need a little reassurance you won’t this time around.”
Cait huffed. “Fine. I’ll tell you every time I take a potty break too.” She chopped a hand through the air. “You guys ever think that maybe some of this stuff might not be pertinent?”
“Why should you be the one to decide what is and what isn’t pertinent, Cait?” Sam asked, his jaw tightening.
Her glance slid away as she remembered too many times she’d failed to read them in fully because she’d been afraid of sharing her past—and what she really was. “I’m not sure where to start,” she admitted.
Dropping his arms, Sam shook his head, exasperation darkening his expression. “How about with the frigging crime scene?”
Cop 101. He was right. She’d been quick to leap ahead to the woo-woo when they needed to put feet on the ground first. Relieved, too, that doing so meant she could delay facing Morin, she nodded. “Let’s have a look around. Maybe we’ll find something the crime scene techs overlooked.”
Twenty minutes later, they trailed into the hotel, past a tow truck uploading Sylvia’s car to transport it to the impound lot where techs would comb it for clues. While Jason stopped at the front desk to get a list of all the guests who’d had third-floor rooms the night before, Sam and Cait headed straight to room 323.
Cait did her best not to let him see her unease as they entered the short hallway. But this morning, the light switch was behaving. No sparks or smells of anything burning. No see-through spirit haunting the hallway.
Sam used the edge of the hotel room key to slice through the tape sealing the door and then unlocked it, pushing it open and standing to the side for her to enter.
The first sight that greeted her stopped her in her tracks. Sylvia’s oversized purse sat atop the dresser.
“That wasn’t here before,” Sam said quietly.
“It wouldn’t have been. It’s Sylvia’s. She didn’t become a victim until last night.”
Sam set his curled hands on his hips and gave her an even stare. “Do you see her now? Hear any whispers?”
She cocked her head. “No. And all’s quiet.” Freakishly so, but she wasn’t going to mention her unease.
Instead, she inspected the room. The bed was made up. Never slept in. A large section of drywall was missing next to the bathroom door, leaving a gaping hole where the workers had opened it, and then the techs had removed more panels to gather evidence.
Cait walked toward it and stuck her head into the opening. An eight-inch space was framed with wood slats, bits of insulation sticking to the seams. The area appeared empty. An odor teased her nose. Something other than the faint telltale scent of decaying corpse, something she recognized from her apprentice days. Frankincense? Made sense. She popped out her head. “Anything odd about the body when it was found?”
Sam frowned. “Her internal organs appeared to be gouged out. Her body was a dried husk. The ME will have more for us about cause of death.”
“No one ever reported smelling anything odd?”
“You’ll have to ask the manager. He said he’d be standing by for us to interview him.”
She nodded, then stuck her head into the hollowed-out wall again. Something glinted from between the slats farther down. Might have been nothing, but she stepped into the space and stretched out her arm.
A wisp of a breeze blew over her, a second before a whiff of something that smelled like rotten eggs nearly made her gag. She reached blindly for the thing stuck between the tight seam, felt a crisp edge, and squeezed her thumb and forefinger around it. Her grip tightened, ready to jerk it out quickly and get away from the bad feeling causing a ripple of fear to shiver down her spine.
A rustling, crackling sound came from deeper in the walls. Then she heard the thing that had been missing since she’d reentered the hotel.
Voices. Whispers of the dead. Some rasping and dry, some agitated and high-pitched. Still, she took heart, because she didn’t hear a single screech from a malevolent wraith. She gave the thin object a tug.
A blinding flash exploded. She felt a jolt like a Taser’s blast and knew what was happening but was unable to move. The shock blasted through her body, making her muscles grow rigid and her mind clear of everything except the pain.
Although he didn’t have an ounce of psychic ability, Sam knew something was wrong the moment he smelled sulfur and a second before lightning exploded from the opening and Cait began to convulse.
Not understanding anything but the need to pull her free, Sam leapt forward, grabbed a wad of her shirt, and jerked her out of the hole. They both fell backward, bouncing against the mattress, then dropping to the floor. Above them, a thin bolt of white-hot electricity shot toward the ceiling, the tail flickering out to touch the overhead lamp, then bending to snap and pop against the wooden dresser.
Not daring to take his gaze from her, Sam low-crawled to Cait, whose face was screwed up in an agonized grimace, and wrapped a hand around her upper arm. He dragged her toward the door, reached for the handle, flung it open, then pulled her through. When they were both clear, he glanced inside the room to see another strange arc flicker from the opening in the wall, popping, cracking, and darting as it seemed to search the room. He slammed the door shut.
In the hallway, he scooted to the far wall and pulled her against his chest. “Cait.”
Her arms crossed her chest. One closed fist slowly uncurled. Inside was a tattered driver’s license.
Her eyes eased open, and she stared at what she held. “We’ll need cadaver dogs, sonar, something…” she rasped, then slumped in his arms.
Every few seconds, it seemed, Cait opened her eyes to take stock of where she was. Held against Sam’s chest in the dingy hallway. In his arms still, as he carried her into the elevator. On a low-slung couch with lumpy springs in the foyer, staring up at the grimy ceiling.
When she roused, feeling more herself, she found an EMT shoving fluids in her veins.
“Don’t try to get up,” he said, offering her a small smile. “You’ve suffered a shock.”
She almost blurted duh, but withheld the urge. He was cute and seemed genuinely concerned as he taped the needle to her arm.
Jason peered over the attendant’s shoulder. “Like the new ’do.”
Alarmed, she reached up with her free hand to touch her hair, only to discover it was standing on end and felt kinky as hell. “What happened?” she asked, surprised when her voice sounded like a dry, crackling whisper.
Jason waggled his eyebrows. “Bad wiring?”
She grunted, squinting upward because the effort to keep her eyes open made her head hurt. “The license?”
“Sam’s running it through the system now. Had to pry him from you with a crowbar, but he’s over there,” he said, lifting his chin to point to someplace over the back of the sofa where she reclined.
Cait pushed up even as the EMT tried to push her back down. One glance at Sam’s tight, gray features and she slumped back, satisfied they’d both made it out of the room relatively unharmed.
“He’s getting word to Leland we may have more vics,” Jason continued, his voice dropping. “He’s mustering dogs and sonar equipment to search the place. The manager’s not happy about the thought of us tearing up more walls.”
Right that moment, Cait was grateful her team was taking over. Every muscle in her body ached. She worked her jaw side to side and winced. Good Lord, whatever was in the walls packed a wallop.
A hand touched her cheek, and she blinked open her eyes, not realizing she’d drifted off again.
Sam was leaning a hip on the back of the couch, his gaze studying her face. “We got a hit on that license. A stewardess who disappeared in the late eighties.”
Cait swallowed to wet her dry mouth. “So, this may have been going on a while. More reason to get those dogs in here.”
“You’ve got great instincts, Cait.” He gave her a lopsided smile, but then his face grew tight again. Emotion burned in his bitter gaze. “Jason says you had similar trouble here last night. Might have helped to know beforehand.”
Back to square one. Cait closed her eyes. Better to play sick girl than face another round of condemnation.
“Things have been moving pretty fast,” Jason said softly, a hint of warning in his voice.
“Two words,” Sam snapped. “‘Lightning bolts.’ Doesn’t take more than a second to get across the point there might be danger entering that room.”
“Sorry,” she croaked.
“What’s that?” Sam asked, cupping his ear as an eyebrow arched. “Not sure I heard you right. The Cait I know doesn’t like apologizing.”
Anger burned away the teary feelings, and she glared upward into his face.
His lips twitched.
Irritation ran along her spine. So he was playing her.
“You look better. Got a little color back in those pasty cheeks, O’Connell.”
An older man with thin, graying hair and thick black-rimmed glasses approached, wringing his hands. “Detectives, how long are you going to be here? The guests are getting nervous.”
“They should be, Mr. Lewis,” Sam bit out. “Might want to refund their money and send them elsewhere.”
“Sam.” Cait reached out her hand. She tugged his arm to bring him closer to hear her whisper. “We need folks to stay right where they are. We need to canvass. One of them might know something.”
“Think I’m a rookie? I wasn’t gonna let anyone go until they’d been questioned.”
“But I think they need to stay at the hotel even after they’re questioned. Just not anywhere near 323.”
“Fine.” He gave a crisp nod and his gaze narrowed. “I’ll get uniforms going room to room. Anything other than the usual you want them to ask?”
“I need to know whether they’ve ever detected odd smells and where. Also, have any been living or working here long? That’s all I can think of.” She pushed up again. “I need to go…”
Sam and the EMT pushed her back down. “We’ll handle it,” Sam said, his voice firm. “You’re going to the hospital to be checked out.”
“No time,” she croaked with a shake of her head.
“Cait, now’s not the time to get stubborn.” His eyes flashed. “You need a mirror. You look like hell.”
She pushed out her lower lip. “I’ll get a brush.”
Sam stood and fisted both his hands on his hips. “Do I have to sit on you in the ambulance to make sure you behave?”
Her face felt tight, but she managed to wrinkle her nose. “You’re not the boss of me.”
A glint of heat sparked in his eyes. “Sometimes, I am.”
She laughed, and then moaned, because the sharp action hurt her diaphragm enough to reconsider. “All right, but don’t leave me there long. I’ll need a ride to wherever we’re headed next.”
His eyebrows formed a single disapproving line. “If they release you, you’re going straight home.”
Rather than argue the point, she clamped her lips tight. And he expected full disclosure? Soon as her feet hit the floor at the hospital, she had an errand to run. If he didn’t want to accompany her, it was just his tough luck. This investigation had been blown wide open. Even though she’d seen plenty of strange shit, this one was beyond her level of expertise.
Too bad he was playing the heavy. She would have liked having his support when she sought out the one man who might shed some light on what they were facing.
But then again, maybe going alone was just as well. The last time she’d seen Morin, they’d both been naked and locked in an embrace. Something Sam hadn’t liked one little bit.
“Any more arguments?” This came from the EMT. His green eyes danced with humor.
Did this handsome wannabe doctor think he was going to play boss like Sam?
She gave him a withering glance, but maybe her face wasn’t working right because he didn’t even flinch.
Just great. All out of mean, and aching head to toe, she lay back and let herself be lifted onto a gurney, Sam watching all the while, his laser-blue eyes glinting with satisfaction.
She’d let him have his moment. Hell, she was too tired to fight. Her body ached, and her eyelids felt like they weighed a couple of pounds each. On the ride to the emergency room, she’d take a nap. Then all bets were off.
