Eileen Wilks - Mortal Sins

Good thing she’d fallen in love with him.

Lily wedged the phone between her chin and her shoulder while Rule gave her more details as she dug out jeans, socks, a tee. Clothes to tramp the woods in. She’d want a jacket to hide the shoulder holster.

When he finished, she said, “Sounds like you’ve found the vics of that murder Mrs. Asteglio told us about. The local cops ought to be grateful, but I wouldn’t count on it. Ah . . . it’s okay for them to know you found them, isn’t it?”

“I didn’t call you instead of the local authorities to avoid involvement. I’d have kept you out of this if I could. No, don’t argue,” he said before she had a chance. “I know you’ve seen bodies. That’s not the point. These bodies . . . there’s a small pack of feral dogs in the area.”

Oh, ugh. “The dogs dug them up.”

“So it looks. Smells that way, too.”

“You’re sure it was dogs? I’ll be asked,” she added hastily. He knew she wouldn’t accuse him of anything so vile, but others might. “And there are other carnivores around, aren’t there? Bears?”

“Bears are unlikely at this elevation, and the scent is quite clear. Five distinct canine scents near the grave, though only three are actually on the uppermost body.”

“Dogs, then.” Lily frowned. Why had Rule called her? He could have phoned in a tip anonymously. “What haven’t you told me? There’s something important you aren’t saying. What is it?”

“A smell. In addition to dogs and decay, there’s a smell that . . . but I could be wrong. It’s faint, and so smothered by normal putrefaction I can’t be sure. You’ll be able to tell.”

Tell what? Not the nature of the scent, because she’d never notice it. Compared to lupi, humans were all but scent-blind.

All at once she keyed into the phrase he’d used: “normal putrefaction.” “Shit. Oh, shit. Tell me the rest of it.”

“Death magic. I’m not sure, but . . . I think the bodies smell of death magic.”

JAYDeacon was thin, trim, under forty, and under six feet. With his gold-rimmed glasses and skin the color of wet tea leaves, he looked more like a Northern academic than a stereotypical Southern sheriff.

He sure acted like a small-town sheriff, though. “You’re not listenin’ to me, ma’am. Coroner’s van’ll be here any minute now. We don’t need the FBI to work the scene, so once you take us to the bodies, you can go on back to bed.”

Until a few months ago, Lily had been on the other side of the local-federal divide, working homicides in San Diego. She would have sympathized with the sheriff’s desire to hang on to his case if he weren’t virtually patting her on the head and telling her to toddle on home.

“Sheriff, I called you as a courtesy, not because there’s any question of jurisdiction. My ERT will be here within the hour. Your people can hang around or go back to bed themselves—your choice. I am not conducting you to the bodies.”

His people consisted of a pair of deputies, both male. No surprise there. They were also white, however, and didn’t seem to have a problem working for a black boss, which might give her hope for the future of the nation . . . later. When she could think about something other than bodies tainted by death magic.

After showing Lily what he’d found, Rule had walked her to the highway to wait for the FBI’s Emergency Response Team, then gone back to the scene to make sure no more little forest creatures chowed down on the remains. Lily had left her headlights on to guide the ERT, but their illumination was partly blocked now by the three county cars pulled up on the shoulder behind her car.

Both deputies held flashlights. Sheriff Deacon wasn’t carrying anything but an attitude.

“Your team can help, I suppose.” He grudged the words, as if he were offering a major concession. “If they get here in time. But like I said, we’ve got the perp locked up, which makes this my scene.”

“Murder by magical means is a federal crime.”

He shook his head and sighed. “Roy Don Meacham didn’t use magic to kill his family. Crazy sumbitch used his son Andrew’s baseball bat. We’ve got the bat. Roy Don handed it to me himself. We’ve got a pattern of domestic violence—”

“How many calls?”

“Just one, but plenty of witnesses say Roy Don didn’t mind using the back of his hand on the kids or Becky. We’ve got physical evidence—the murder weapon, and blood and other traces on his clothes and skin. Hell, we’ve got a witness. Bill Watkins has the postal route out that way. He heard screamin’ when he pulled his truck up to the mailbox, so he went to help. Ended up with a plate in his skull where Roy Don whacked him, but he tried.”

“He remembers what he saw at the house?” Severe head trauma usually meant some degree of amnesia covering the time of the injury.

“Oh, yeah. He went inside, saw Roy Don walloping on Becky with the bat. He doesn’t remember anything after that, but he remembers that much, poor bastard. We’ve got all the evidence we need.”

“Except a confession. Or the bodies.”

“Which you’ve found. You got a tip,” he added, his voice landing heavy on the last word. “One you haven’t elected to tell me about.”

“No, I haven’t.” Lily had to tilt her head back to meet his eyes. This wasn’t uncommon; at almost five foot three, she looked up a lot. But Deacon was standing too close, making a point of the difference in their heights. That annoyed her. “However, I’d heard of the case, which is why—”

“Didn’t know it had made any of the big city papers.”

“I’m visiting a relative in the area.” Sort of a relative. Rule’s son didn’t fit neatly into any of the labels people used for relationships. For that matter, neither did Rule. People looked at you funny if you spoke of your mate.

“Yeah? This relative have anything to do with that tip you won’t tell me about?”

“You know, Sheriff, I’d be more likely to share information if you weren’t such a pain in the ass. Step back.”

Deacon scowled. “What the hell do you—”

“I want you to quit crowding me physically. It doesn’t intimidate me. It just pisses me off.”

Impossible to tell if he flushed. But the quick duck of his head suggested embarrassment, and he did move back a pace, yanking off his cap and running his forearm over his forehead as if he’d worked up a sweat.

Maybe he had. It wasn’t as stinking hot at this hour as it had been yesterday when they arrived, but the moist air held on to heat. “You don’t want me messing in your case. I get it. Problem is, you have no choice. Magic was involved in the deaths of three people. That makes this mine.”

He reseated his cap and spoke with strained courtesy. “An’ you know about this magic how?”

“I’m a touch sensitive.” She waited to see if he knew what that meant. Most people did, or thought they did. As with many things magical, their assumptions were packed with old wives’ tales, prejudice, and tabloid headlines. Kind of like the way people “knew” all about lupi.

His eyebrows climbed, then descended in a scowl. “Shit.” He gave the word two syllables: shee-it. “You wouldn’t happen to be that weer-lover, would you?”

Lily sighed. Pronounced like weird without the D , weer was Southern for werewolf, and she’d made the news a few times. Then there were the gossip mags, which were fascinated by her relationship with “the Nokolai prince,” as they insisted on referring to Rule. “Maybe you haven’t heard. We call them lupi these days.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve heard about you. You and that Turner weer, the one who’s some kind of prince.”