скачать книгу бесплатно
She pitied Sylvia’s killer when he, too, found that out.
Chapter 4
Just a few weeks ago, the swell of Sylvia’s pregnancy had been a sign of hope for good things to come. Today, as Sylvia lay on the shiny metal of the medical examiner’s table, it was a grotesque reminder of promises that would never be fulfilled.
Diana stood by patiently as the M.E. went over the details of the evidence. Bullet entry and exit wounds. Proximity of the muzzle—a close-contact kill with a large-caliber weapon, straight to the heart. Sylvia could never have survived the trauma. The delay in getting help had sealed the fate of the baby.
Gunpowder burns and stippling marked Sylvia’s pajamas and skin. The bullet had gone straight through her and into the mattress below. CSU had recovered the bullet, but no casing. Ballistics was already attempting to link the bullet to the gun found and to any other crimes recently committed.
“Do you know if your friends owned a gun?” Peter asked as he picked up the .45 caliber revolver in an evidence bag.
“In law school Sylvia lobbied on behalf of the Assault Gun Ban. What do you think?”
With a quick nod, he held the bag out for the M.E. “Any prints?”
“Palm print as well as four fingers. We’re running them now against the suspect.” The M.E. reached into a tray holding more evidence and extracted a bag containing clothing. “Mr. Rodriguez’s pajamas tested positive for blood in various locations, as well as high-velocity blood splatter along the right sleeve.”
A possible inconsistency suddenly occurred to her. “Palm and fingerprints. Right or left hand?”
The M.E. flipped the bag containing the gun back and forth and examined the fingerprint powder residue. “Right.”
“Raul’s a lefty. Sylvia was always getting him those silly gadgets for lefties.”
“That doesn’t rule out that he used his right hand,” the M.E. said.
Diana went over the M.E.’s earlier report on the entry and exit wounds. “He was lying on his side, facing her, when he did it.”
The M.E. bobbed his head up and down. “That would explain the lack of defensive wounds. He could get the weapon in place and fire without her noticing.”
“Or someone could put the gun in his hand, hold it in place and pull the trigger. Especially if Sylvia and Raul had been drugged. What about gunshot residue?”
“We haven’t tested him for GSR yet. Before you arrived, he clammed up and asked for a lawyer,” Peter said.
Years of experience had taught her that the innocent rarely felt the need for a lawyer, but then again, being married to an attorney might make Raul hesitant to provide assistance without legal advice. He had probably heard his share of horror stories from Sylvia about how things got twisted into something other than what they really were.
“The GSR test would confirm whether or not he was close to the gun when it was fired,” Peter said.
“But not whether he was the one who actually pulled the trigger,” Diana reminded him. “The blood splatter pattern, however, might tell us.”
With an annoyed sigh, likely at the prospect of doing additional work, the M.E. said, “Special Agent Reyes, you can’t actually believe the husband didn’t do it? The case is almost airtight.”
“Airtight? If someone placed the gun in Raul’s hand and pulled the trigger—”
“There would be an area on the sleeve that lacked splatter,” Peter finished for her. “Have CSU check the entire right sleeve and make sure those toxicology reports are carefully reviewed for any unusual residues.”
“Of course, Detective Daly,” the M.E. answered. The glance he shot Diana was anything but friendly. As if to retaliate for the extra assignment the M.E. picked up the scalpel and let it linger above Sylvia’s body. The light caught the sharp edge and a chill transferred itself to Diana’s skin.
She had seen hundreds of autopsies before, but this one…
“I need to get back to the office.” She bolted from the room, Peter hot on her heels.
“You okay?” he asked as she leaned against the wall outside the autopsy room.
Swallowing to keep down the bile, she could only nod. “Will you call me later? Let me know what’s up and if toxicology finds something?”
“Will do.”
As she started to walk away, he said, “Diana?”
“What?”
“Will you be all right?”
With a shake of her head, she said, “I wish I knew.”
She couldn’t face going home. Couldn’t deal with sitting there alone, thinking about all that had happened. How what had started out as a normal day had spun into…darkness. As black and numb as that which had claimed her nearly a decade earlier.
Rushing out of her office, she started walking, headed nowhere in particular. Each step took her farther away from where she began, but no closer to where she needed to be. She wanted to be with other people, somewhere she could let go of the pain that had staked a claim on her this morning.
She could have gone to her brother, only she didn’t want to drag him down with her misery. As for her partner, David had tried to help her upon her return to the office, but had failed miserably. Her wound had been too fresh for her to accept sympathy.
Her reaction to today’s events was familiar, she realized. After her father’s death, she had driven away those closest to her. Her mami, her then boyfriend and lover Alejandro, even Sebastian, at first.
A stitch in her side made her stop. She suddenly realized she had been running, attempting to escape her emotions.
Only there was no escape.
As she paused until her breath became regular, hands on her hips, she glanced down the street and realized she was only a block or two from Ryder’s nightclub.
Had she been running to him or to the darkness she would find there?
With a deep inhalation, she told herself there was only one way to find out.
The Lair was the same as always. Charcoal-gray walls, structured to look like rock, absorbed most of the light, leaving the club with the feel of a subterranean chamber. Overhead, by the length of the stainless steel bar, hundreds of fake bats hung from the catwalks and ceiling. The only difference tonight was that the club was less crowded. It was early. So early that not even the band was on stage yet. Instead, music was piped in from a sound system.
Fine by her. Although she didn’t want to be alone, Diana wasn’t in the mood for masses of people milling around.
She couldn’t feel Ryder, but then again, she couldn’t feel anything but pain and anger. Loss. And worse than any of them combined, guilt—for not protecting her friend, for being absent from Sylvia’s life so often lately.
She had been too busy with work—and with Ryder. Years earlier, she had experienced something similar. She had been too busy with college and with her boyfriend, too involved with the needs of her own life to have time for her father…
Until he was gone.
Grief squeezed her chest, making it difficult to breathe. She forced herself to move forward, but not toward the steps leading to Ryder’s office. Not yet, anyway. Instead, she plunked herself down on a bar stool. Raising her hand, she motioned to the bartender she recognized from previous nights at The Lair.
The attractive blond laid out a coaster with the club’s stylized bat-and-blood logo.
“A shot of Cuervo.” Diana waved her hand toward the back of the club. “Is Ryder here?”
The girl shot a look up at Ryder’s office window. “I don’t think so.”
So he was gone, Diana thought. She had suspected as much with the connection she hadn’t felt from the moment she had stepped into the club. Maybe it was for the best. Maybe if he had been here tonight, she would have made a mistake she would so totally regret in the morning.
She rubbed at the tattoo on her shoulder, letting it remind her about not only protecting her heart, but avoiding rash actions. Seeing Ryder tonight likely being bad on both counts.
Diana slugged back the shot and then asked for another, which the bartender immediately supplied, although concern clouded her All-American features.
“Worried that I can’t handle it?” Diana asked, both interested and amused by the young vampire’s obvious anxiety.
The girl motioned to the tequila with a manicured nail done in pink. Nothing Goth about this vamp, Diana thought. “Last time I had one too many of those, I ended up undead.”
Diana choked on her drink. “I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, me, too. But I guess you go on, don’t you?” She gave a careless shrug that couldn’t quite hide the sorrow in her inquisitive blue eyes.
Diana only nodded her agreement. Was that why Ryder wasn’t here? Was he going on, moving on? She peered around again, trying to open herself up to sense him.
“I don’t think he’ll be back for a while.”
Diana experienced a rush of heat to her cheeks. “Am I that obvious?”
The vampire leaned her elbows on the bar and grasped the bar towel between both hands. “People tell me I’m intuitive. I guess that’s why I get such good tips.”
As Diana caught a glimpse of the cleavage the young vampire’s current position exposed and shot her gaze up to the coed’s too earnest and classically pretty features, she suspected there were other reasons, as well, but couldn’t be cruel.
“You are that,” she offered.
“So what about you and the boss man?” the vampire asked.
What about her and Ryder? “I’m not…like you.” She looked down at her glass, a bit uncomfortable about reminding the unfortunate coed of her undeadness.
“Yeah. You’re older,” the bartender said, so matter-of-factly that Diana jerked her gaze up in surprise, only to find the girl smiling. A broad, fooled-you smile that was friendly and blasted away her earlier discomfort.
“You’re right. I’m older and my clock—big tick tock. Settling-down time, sabes?”
“You don’t seem like the home-and-hearth type.”
Diana hesitated, thinking about the kind of life most people considered routine, about the kind of life she had finally acknowledged she might want. Except that lately an ordinary life seemed impossible.
Look at what had happened to her friend Sylvia. To her normal life. Look at what had happened in Diana’s past.
The girl placed her hand on Diana’s arm. “I never thought of myself as a soccer mom, either. I guess I should be glad I can avoid babies and wrinkles—”
“And sunburn,” Diana tacked on, slightly renewed by the young vamp’s honesty.
A wistful look came to the vampire’s features. “I always did burn, but damn did I look good in a bikini.”
Diana patted her cold hand. “It’ll work out. I’m sure you’ve got friends here. Ones who will help you.”
Some of the sadness faded from the girl’s face as she nodded toward Ryder’s office. “So do you.”
A reluctant sense of rightness came to Diana as she realized the young vampire was right. For so long her mantra had been one of sticking to herself and limiting the circle of people around her. But now, she had an ever-expanding cadre of the living—and the undead—whom she could count as friends.
The sadness of her recent loss was slightly tempered as she met the bartender’s gaze. “Maybe I do.”
Chapter 5
Immobile as a gargoyle, Ryder balanced high on the edge of the building across from the church, watching over Diana in the crowd below. He had been lucky. The funeral was in the early morning and the day overcast enough to allow him the freedom of attending.
Diana hadn’t called to tell him about her friend. She hadn’t left a message at the bar, either, although the bartender had made a point of relaying that Diana had been by and appeared to miss him. Funny how Diana could spill her guts to a stranger, but be unable to convey anything to him about her emotions.
Not that she needed to tell him what she felt this morning, he thought. Grief etched lines on her face as she gripped the top of the gray casket and helped the other pallbearers wheel their burden to the uppermost step of the church.
Diana’s steps were slow and measured, keeping pace with those in front of her. Each of the pallbearers peeled away until only Diana and a man stood at the back of the hearse. The husband, he suspected. They both stroked their hands over the surface of the casket one last time, and then the man embraced Diana and cried. His heartbroken sobs carried all the way to where Ryder perched. Diana tried to comfort the man, but her actions were stilted. Awkward. The lines of her body tense.
Luckily, someone from the family came to her aid and gently led Sylvia’s husband to a limo. Others quickly followed, but Diana hung back, her eyes on the hearse.
Death sucked.
And being undead didn’t make it any easier.
He had imagined too often lately how it would be after Diana died. He’d pictured the interminable days until they were reunited in the afterlife. The pain that came with such thoughts made him yearn to turn her, to keep her with him always. It was a desire he struggled with every day. And the struggle had kept him away from her.
Diana stood on the steps alone, clad in black, scoping out the church grounds.
Across the street someone with a camera busily snapped pictures. A few yards away at either end of the church, uniformed officers took down license plate numbers. Ryder had watched enough detective shows to realize they thought whoever had murdered Diana’s friend might be in the crowd.
Ryder recognized one detective as Diana’s friend, Peter Daly. He was clearly the leader of the investigation. Surprising. Especially since the murdered woman had been one of Diana’s best friends. Ryder hadn’t thought Diana would settle for anything less than being in command.
He didn’t mind that she liked to take charge. He understood where the need came from. Her sense of control kept her balanced. That she could give up that control on such an important case was a new facet to his ex-lover.
He shifted his position on the ledge, inching closer in the hope of hearing their discussion. Of connecting with her telepathically as he’d done before, only…
Something blocked him. Whether it was intentional or not, he didn’t know. He suspected the latter since he and Diana were both new to talking in each other’s heads. The only way of finding out, however, demanded either a visit to one of his vampire friends or a trip to the Blood Bank. Foley would surely tell him all about this particular skill while gloating over the fact that Diana had ditched him.
Ryder was even more sure that Foley would leap at the chance to advance his own relationship with Diana. She called to men like one of the sirens of old with her enigmatic blend of vulnerability and strength. Not that Ryder blamed him. Diana’s enticing darkness surrounded a pure heart. The way she still called to him.
He hated that. Hated how he ached for her. How he cared about her, despite his vow to stay away.
Her head tilted upward, rebellious in its posture. Her eyes, those amazing gold-green eyes, glittered with a hard light. And when the detective hugged her, she held on to him, her head buried against his chest.
Ryder was tempted to leap down there and…
What? he asked himself. The demon within—the one he had kept at bay for so long—answered all too quickly.
He would rip the other man’s throat out with glee, not even bothering to slake his thirst afterward.
Fists clenched, Ryder battled the urge to do just that. He battled the feeling of power that surged through him when the demon emerged. That sense of might always threatened to corrupt his humanity. But he had allowed himself to explore his demon half because the vampire’s strength let him help others. Let him be her hero.
