Dancing with the Devil (Wild Beasts Series)
Page 3
Alexia burst out laughing and remembered to elbow his arm this time. She saw him wince again and had the added pleasure of realizing she might not be able to outwit him right this moment, what with feeling like she was about to keel over any second, but she could still kick his ass. Not that she ever would. Danny had become a good friend.
As she and Danny walked into the house, Alexia saw him look over her shoulder and give a ridiculously over exaggerated salute. She felt the shift in the air, and rather than making her feel worse, she felt comfort. Not comfort like her Man Bear gave her. No. Comfort like that of her pack.
Nicky.
“Hey, Newb,” Danny said over her shoulder, but she didn’t bother to turn. She just walked into the small home. The entryway had a red, painted wood bench and several pairs of shoes scattered along the floor. Adult shoes for both a male and a female, but also smaller shoes. Shoes Alexia knew belonged to the two little boys in the home. She shook her head and lifted her chin, giving her spirit the necessary reinforcements it needed to make it through the next few hours.
Her booties slid along the polished wood floor, and she had to steady herself as she listened to the hushed tones of Danny’s voice explaining the case and Nicky’s grunted replies.
“... the boys were found in the bedroom upstairs, a bloodied bat next to the bed, splintered and left-” Danny’s voice broke, but he quickly continued. There was no reply but slight breath from Nicky. “The wife was found in the kitchen, in a pool of her own blood, having been stabbed 26 times, my ma said. The wounds appear to have been made by the same knife the vic was using to make a chicken dinner.”
“Shit,” Alexia heard Nicky whisper. He tried to hide it. Tried to stay stoic, but she felt it. She hated that the wolves she had met had that effect on her. She could feel what they felt, and her overwhelming desire to help them was like a ringing in her ear that wouldn’t go away. However, she’d felt the same thing a week earlier when she’d met Gemini Harrington, so maybe it wasn’t just wolves. Gem was definitely human. She had smelled like copper and rain and the breeze the rushes through the window during a road trip. Like freedom. Nothing supernatural. Just normalcy. Well, and the copper because she’d been sick and her nose had been bleeding.
Alexia welcomed the calming and normal thought of the human as she walked forward into the kitchen, taking a fortifying breath. She needed to let go of Nicky’s emotions, get control of her own, move past the sick feelings she’d been experiencing since she’d started having recurring dreams again, and work on this case. Nothing too big. She smiled internally at the flippant thought. Just the everyday in the life of Alexia Maria Garda-Martinez.
The plastic white kitchen counter had a mallet left carelessly on the dark wood cutting board where six pieces of chicken had been flattened. One of which sat next to a Tupperware bowl filled to the brim with breadcrumbs. Breadcrumbs and egg wash had spilled over onto the counter, and Alexia let her eyes follow their flow. The eggs had coated the cabinetry on their way down, but the breadcrumbs were stuck in little crevices, almost as if they too were afraid to be close to the carnage.
And carnage it was. Alexia could not have held back her gasp for all the world.
Emily Barrons, the mother, lay face up in the large pool of blood. The smell of copper and chicken and any other scents were completely overpowered by the most recent addition: the stench of death. Alexia held her breath and looked to Caty.
“H-h-how?” Alexia took a breath again. Tears gathered at the edges of her eyes and she blinked them away, except they wouldn’t go away. They wouldn’t stop. What the hell was wrong with her? She’d seen death. She could do this.
Except, Emily Barrons had short, black hair, and the pool of blood was like a flashback to another time, to a time only six months earlier when Alexia had lost her person, her soul sister, her Mindy.
Caty walked toward her, but Alexia brushed the tears from her cheeks with the sleeve of her suit. She wasn’t going to have any more fuck ups tonight. Jesus. She breathed out and held up her hand to stall Caty’s movements.
“I’m fine, S’Bones,” Alexia said as she felt Danny and Nicky move in behind her. “She just reminded me of someone.” She took another fortifying breath and looked to Caty. “How long has she been here?”
Caty gave her a curious look, but walked back to the body. She’d known Alexia for years because Caty was best friends with her adoptive mom, Lara Martinez. Caty also knew that Alexia needed time to process, but that once processed, she was good to go. Alexia always made it through. She was that goddamned determined, that goddamned stubborn. Her mama always said she was resilient, but Alexia wasn’t ready to own that word. She’d take stubborn.
“The body has been here for less than two hours,” Caty said, crouching just outside the pool of blood. “Lividity suggests about one to two hours, but aye dios mio, it’s too soon to truly tell, so definitely less than two hours. The boys upstairs”—she pointed to the ceiling and indicated the children’s room—“have been there less than that.” She stood to her full height. “The mother here was stabbed 26 times. There appear to be downward, angled stab wounds to the sternum suggesting that she was standing when the first three stab wounds occurred. Three more are in her left arm, but they’re jagged and one ends on a scratch, as though the suspect kept stabbing even as she was falling to her knees. The kneecaps appear broken from the bruising around the area. We’ll have to take x-rays at tomorrow’s autopsy, Lex.”
Alexia moved closer, more confident now that the case was more facts than emotion. She could deal with facts. They grounded her.
“So, three to the sternum? Jesus,” Alexia breathed out. “The suspect must have been fired up. That takes a lot of strength. Maybe on some drug?” Alexia said absentmindedly, trying to work her way through the crime verbally just like Caty had been teaching her. She crouched next to the body and took in the other stab wounds. The first three had been to the sternum, and the next three had been to the arm, but there were also several stab wounds to the upper and lower abdomen, including the area of the womb. Alexia mentally counted the wounds she could see.
18.
18 stab wounds to the upper and lower abdomen. There were small amounts of blood still oozing from some of the slashes, but Emily hadn’t bled out from those wounds. The stab wounds to the area of the liver and the heart would have caused her to lose blood rapidly. She said as much to Caty and her mentor gave a nod. That was the thing about Caty. As a teacher, she wanted her students and interns to come to their own conclusions. If the answer was wrong, that was okay. Those were her other teaching moments.
Alexia added the wounds: 18 + 3 + 3. That was only 24. Where were the other two wounds? Alexia put her hand against the body to turn it over gently, and she felt the lukewarm blood through the glove, but she moved beyond the mental, physical, and spiritual shudder that tried to take over. She gently lifted the body with Caty’s help.
Two more wounds.
One in the upper back. One in the middle back.
Both deep.
Thorough. He’d been thorough.
Emily had quite literally been stabbed in the back, most likely by her husband, Neil Barrons.
“Shit,” Alexia heard Danny say from his crouched position about a foot away from the woman’s head. Alexia quickly looked away from the sight of the short, black hair and shook her head to ward off the bad thoughts.
“Cut and dry,” Nicky said from his place just inside the doorway. He hadn’t moved any closer. They’d tried to get to know each other again, but Nicky was just so different than what Alexia remembered. He was cold and hard and detached.
He’d been a week on the force with Danny, though, and he seemed to be handling things better than Alexia, who’d been Caty’s intern for over a month now. Perhaps cold and detached was the way to be.
“How’s that?” Caty asked, standing once again, and both Alexia and Danny stood in tandem, their eyes turning toward the entryway to the kitchen.
“Cut and dry.” Caty echoed his earlier statement, but she had a tone Alexia knew. Danny knew it too because the charming asshole just danced back on his heels and smiled. Nicky missed the smile, or he chose to ignore it.
“Yep,” Nicky said. “Cut and dry.”
“Have you gotten a drug test for the husband back from me yet, Nicholas Arviso?” Caty asked, and Nicky shot her a wary look. She held his gaze and Alexia found herself smiling as well. “Have you gotten the preliminary report?” She took a step toward the Navajo giant and Alexia looked over at Danny and snickered. “Have you tested fingerprints? Have you received x-rays or any data from Lex and I other than what we were just looking at? Have you tested blood samples for anyone else in the house? Have you even seen the boys upstairs? Have you talked to witnesses about anyone else in the neighborhood? Have you done anything but ask a few questions of the neighbors, who are already afraid because of the recent murders, and check in with Danny to get the details of this crime? And you have the cajones to come in here, without even getting close to the vic’s body, all the while making snap judgments and guesses”—she spat the word ‘guesses’ in a dangerously hushed tone that had Danny smiling even bigger—“about my case?”
Nicky watched her steadily for a moment, and his gaze went from arrogant to wary and measuring, finally landing on what looked like respect as he nodded at Caty.
“You bring up good points,” Nicky said, his voice measured and cold, the voice Alexia had gotten used to since she’d seen him for the first time in almost ten years.
Nicky and Caty looked at each other for a moment, then Alexia’s eyes met Danny’s. They both knew the effect his ma had on people. Alexia hadn’t known Danny growing up, except in passing, because he’d been about four years older, but she had known Caty. That woman would have no problem taming a Vuković wolf who thought he could throw out guesses without facts in Caty Rios’ presence.
Danny’s stomach growled, breaking the moment, and Alexia laughed.
“Danny boy,” Caty said, shaking her head as she turned to look at her son. “I’ll bring leftovers later tonight after we get enough evidence from the scene before moving the bodies.”
“Awww… thanks, ma,” Danny said, as he rocked back once again on his heels. Charmer. Alexia laughed again and she looked over to find Nicky with a slight smirk twisting his lips. She didn’t linger on the look. She wanted him to feel comfortable smiling again. Maybe some time around the others in the mountains where they lived and some time with Danny would help.
They made their way through the rest of the house. The boys’ room was even more difficult for Alexia, but she again wiped her wet cheeks on her sleeve and made the observations she needed to, making sure to answer Caty’s questions thoroughly, and asking her own when something didn’t make sense. Nicky still stood back, observing the scene, but Danny joined them in a crouch at each of the other two scenes in the house.
Afterwards, Danny dropped her off at her trailer in the woods. She found Devon seated on the large back porch hammock, his feet resting on an ottoman he’d restored from a local thrift store. Relaxed as could be under the clear midnight sky. His eyes followed her as she opened the back door, a hard cider and a big bowl of heated up chili in hand.
She sat down next to her mate, and they were quiet, but his body language said everything. His dark hand had touched her pale one as soon as she sat. Comforting and soothing, he gently rubbed the spaces between her fingers while she ate her chili in silence.
“Matt and Ben are in their trailers, bloodied again.” His soothing voice broke through the silence.
“He’s been here less than a fucking week, Devon.”
Less than a fucking week, and he’d already gotten into six fights. Shit. A fight a day. The man couldn’t get through a day without his face meeting someone’s fist.
“On the bright side,” Devon said, letting the thought sit there.
“There’s a bright side?” Because Alexia couldn’t see it. She wanted to pummel them both.
“Ben,” Devon continued, and Alexia grudgingly nodded. He was right of course.
“Yes,” Alexia said, looking into the grey-green eyes of her fated mate. “It is nice to see Ben with something other than a stoic expression on his face.” She blew out a deep, cleansing breath. “It’s nice to see him do something more than try to save his sister from her own goddamned self-imposed misery.”
They were quiet again after that.
When she had finished her chili and her hard cider, she put them down on the small side table next to the hammock and moved in closer to Devon’s body. His whole body relaxed, and she could feel the breath he released as she molded herself to his form. Finally, she let go of the tears she’d brushed away earlier in the Barrons’ house where death had made itself known. She put aside thoughts of Ben and the new Luna who her father, James, had sent. Matt was helping them start work on the new Lodge that would take a good year to build because of the permits and other construction materials they would need to have brought in for the large project. But Matthew Garrett was trouble. She could feel it. She pushed the feeling to the back of her mind, though, and focused on Devon.
She didn’t need words with her Man Bear. She’d share some eventually, but right now, their minds were connected, and she needed his love to make her feel better. She was still feeling clammy and slightly sick from the dreams she’d been having. The laughs with Danny, the chili and the drink, and just being with Devon were helping, but she needed what only her Man Bear could give her.
“Make it all better, Man Bear,” she whispered against his ear, nipping at the lobe and settling her legs on either side of his hips. She felt his erection tick and she smiled brilliantly at her mate.
He was her home.
That’s what they were for each other. After all they had been through, they had found each other and started making a beautiful life together even through the heartache this year had brought them.
They were each other’s home.
Each other’s safety.
The safety of what a true home offered, not the mess she’d witnessed tonight.
“Always, Red,” her Man Bear grunted out, in a deep voice that showed his bear was close to the surface. She loved how animalistic her guy was. His animal matched her wolf so well. He lifted her and the movement put his erection right at her sex and she moaned and bit her lip at the feeling through her leggings. The jostling movements as he walked into the trailer only had her nerves firing erratically in ecstasy, her mind becoming numb to everything but his breath, his touch, his voice in her mind and against her ear. Her eyes had closed as they walked into the sprawling trailer, but she heard the water to the shower turn on.<
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She whined aloud.
“Man Bear, it only fits one.”
“Then you better clean up quickly, Red,” Devon said, his voice muffled and she saw his eyes darken to the black of his bear and she shuddered.
“Oh-okay,” she squeaked out, and the serious look on his dark chocolate, beautiful face morphed into a slight smirk.
She quickly washed from head to toe in the warm spray as her Man Bear watched from outside the stall. He didn’t shut the door. He just watched. And hell, but that just turned her the fuck on. She was a curvy half vampire/half werewolf or half Skröm/half Vuković in their world, but he loved her curves; in fact, he spent extra time loving on and caressing her curves any chance he got.
She turned off the shower knob and grabbed the towel off the rack next to the stall and dried her red hair gently. She didn’t need a rat’s nest tomorrow morning at the morgue.
As she went to dry the rest of her body, though, she felt her Man Bear move into her and take the towel from her hands, tearing the fragile piece of cloth.
Her big, bumbling bear.
“My job tonight, Red.” Devon’s voice was low as he bent to drag his tongue along a drop of water that had been sliding slowly down her shoulder. He licked up the length of her arm and then nipped at the junction of her collarbone. She shuddered at the touch. Her body was so on fire, she felt every spark of his touch, but his nips were everything. So in tune to his body and his soul was she that every movement was a comfort and a shock all at once.
His tongue licked along her shoulders, her neck, her jaw… where he nipped and then moved north to her mouth as his large hand grabbed at her ass. He gripped her with one hand on her behind while his other hand tangled in her hair and his mouth moved slowly against hers in a kiss that stole her breath and lit her up. And while he kissed the wind out of her, the hand on her butt moved further down until his hand found her sex. His finger entered her, moving in and out, and she felt a thousand shocks of every shape and size fling her into forever as she came in her Man Bear’s arms.