Лорел Гамильтон - Incubus Dreams

I had to use my badge hand to help steady Ronnie as I went up the steps to the platform in front of the door, but we made it just fine.

Nathaniel went ahead and got the door that led into the cloakroom.

Micah went through the door and hurried in front of me to get the outside door. We went out into the cool autumn air. The door shut behind us, and the silence left my ears ringing.

“Put me the fuck down.” This time she struggled, not well, not like she could have, but I’d lost patience. She wanted down, I put her down. I dumped her on the gravel on her ass.

I think she might have yelled at me, but a funny look crossed her face, and she was suddenly scrambling to her feet and running, stumbling toward the grassy field that edged the parking area. She fell onto all fours and started to retch.

“Shit,” I said, softly and with feeling. I started walking toward her, and the men came at my back. I motioned them to stay by the last line of cars, as I waded out into the grass to Ronnie. The dry autumn grass made that whish-whish sound against my jeans.

Ronnie was still on all fours. The sour sweet smell of vomit reached me before I reached her. She had to be my friend, because I went to her, and I swept her hair back from her face and held it like you do a child. Only true friendship would have kept me there while she threw up everything she’d drunk that night.

I was trying to think of something else, anything else, while I stood there. I’m not good around people who are throwing up. Something about the sound of it and the smell of it leaves me fighting not to throw up, too. I looked out across the field, trying to find something else to think about. Nothing was interesting enough, until I looked almost straight out from where I was standing. At first I thought it was a deadfall, a tree, but my eyes made more sense out of it, and I realized it was a person. A pale line of arm, one hand pointing skyward, as if it was propped on something I couldn’t see. It didn’t have to be a dead body. Someone could have come out here and passed out.

I looked back at Micah and Nathaniel, I motioned them over. Ronnie was starting to slow down. She’d reached the dry heaves, at least.

“Stay with her.” I knew that by walking up to it, I might be destroying evidence, but I also knew that it could be a mannequin, or someone passed out. I had to be sure before I called in the cavalry.

What did it say about my life that I thoughtdead, murder, before anything else? That I’d worked on homicides too long.

I walked through the dry grass, and I was moving slower, watching where I put my feet. The grass didn’t make a sound against my jeans, because I was creeping along. If there was a weapon anywhere I didn’t want to step on it.

The more I saw of the body, the more I thought, dead. The skin had that paleness in the distant halogen lights and the cold light of the stars. It was a man, lying on his back, with that one arm propped up against a dead tree branch. If the hand hadn’t been propped up, I might not have seen it so quickly. Like the girl’s hair at the first scene, someone had taken a little extra effort to say, hey, look at me. Yeah, it was a man instead of a woman, but he was wearing a leopard skin thong that had been pulled aside so we wouldn’t miss the fact that he was shaved, very shaved. The chances of him not being a stripper that worked at Incubus Dreams were almost nil. Vegas wouldn’t take those odds.

The fang marks on his neck were black against his skin. More at the bend of his arm, his wrist. I didn’t touch him to move his head to see if he had matching marks on the other side of his neck. I didn’t move his legs and see if they’d marked him low. I just squatted down beside him, trying not to touch the ground any more than I had to, and touched his arm. Yeah, I’d like to say I was searching for a pulse, but that wasn’t really it. He was cold to the touch, but his arm moved when I pressed, oh so gently. Rigor had either not set in, or it had come and gone. Different things can affect that, but I was betting that he’d died earlier tonight. That they’d been killing him while we questioned Jonah Cooper at the Church of Eternal Life. Looking at the dead man, boy almost, he looked so young, I didn’t feel so bad about killing Cooper. Funny.

I stood up and fished in my jacket pocket for my cell phone. I dialed a number I knew by heart.

“Zerbrowski here.”

“I hope you’re not at home,” I said.

“Why?” and he sounded positively suspicious.

“Because I’m over the river and through the strip clubs, looking at another damn body.”

“No one notified us.”

“I’m notifying you.”

“Are you telling me that you found the body?” he asked.

“Yep.”

“Tell me what happened.”

I told him a short version. I didn’t leave out that the bartender had told Ronnie to get a ride home, just that she was shit-faced about breaking up with Louie. I left out the creepy couple, but that was it.

“Shit,” he said, “I’ve got to call this in. The Staties or the local sheriff are going to get there before we do. The sheriff didn’t like you much.”

“I remember,” I said.

I could almost feel him thinking on his end of the phone. “I’d almost say send your people home, but we’ll need them to corroborate your story.”

“You don’t believe me?”

“I do, but I won’t be first on the scene, Anita. Do you understand?”

“I think so, I’m going to need an alibi to explain how I just happened to find the next murder victim when they’ve got people patrolling all the clubs. They’re going to think that someone tipped me to it.”

“Yeah,” he said.

“You believe me, Zerbrowski.”

“Yeah, but I know you. If any woman could go out to a strip club trolling for guys and accidentally find a murder victim, it’s you.”

“I was not trolling for guys,” I said.

“Oh, yeah, I’ll be sure and tell all the guys here at RPIT that you were just doing a favor for a friend.”

“You bastard, don’t tease me about this.”

“Would I do that?”

“Fuck you, Zerbrowski.”

“I’d say yes, but what would Katie say?” His voice got serious all of a sudden. “I’ll put the call in, tell them that one of our people is on the scene, but if the sheriff gets there first, be nice.”

“I’m always nice,” I said.

He laughed. “Yeah, and hell is cool in the summertime. Just try to behave until we can get there to back you up.”

“I’ll behave, if he does,” I said.

“Great. I’ll be there as soon as I can, Anita.”

“I know you will.”

“Long damn night,” he said.

“Yeah,” I said.

He hung up. I hung up and started walking. I heard sirens before Ieven made it back to the parking area. I had time to give Nathaniel and Micah a thumbnail sketch of what had happened and what was about to happen. Ronnie was sitting on the ground, moaning and holding her head. I’m not sure she would have heard me even if I’d tried to talk to her. Then cars squealed into the gravel parking lot, and in the lead car was Sheriff Melvin Christopher. There wasn’t a state cop in sight. Perfect.

The EMTs, emergency medical techs, had given Ronnie a blanket.

They seemed to think she was suffering from shock. That wasn’t it. She was sobering up. Sobering up in the middle of a murder investigation, when she’d drunk more in one night than she’d consumed in the entire six years I’d known her. They had her sitting in the open back of their ambulance. I think partly it gave them something to do. It’s good to keep busy.

Physically Ronnie felt the worst, but none of us were having a good time. Sheriff Melvin Christopher’s opening shot to me had been, “Almost didn’t recognize you with more clothes on, Miss Blake.”