True Colors (Elder Races #3.5)(2)

All in all, the apartment was pretty typical for the city, and a perfectly charming place for a petite, 135-pound single female like the vic. Riehl stood six-foot-five and topped 263. He had only recently decided to domesticate himself from ninety-six roaming years spent as a captain in the Wyr lord Dragos Cuelebre’s army. He was used to a rugged lifestyle and spending a lot of time outdoors, often in inclement weather. To him the small overheated place felt claustrophobic.

There was no doubt in his mind the killing itself was the reason for the invasion. Her jewelry still lay scattered on the dresser and the corner of a wallet was visible in her open purse. It looked like nothing had been taken, unless the killer had snipped off a little something from one of the organs to keep as a souvenir, which would have to be determined by an autopsy.

He just couldn’t shake the sense of someone else being present. He was looking for some kind of fricking giveaway. Someone’s eye peering out from behind a closet door, or a webcam stuffed in a cute pink bunny. He even scoped the snow-covered scene outside the window to see if someone was watching from another building.

As he searched he took in deep, even, deliberate breaths. The heavy copper scent of blood pervaded everything. It all but buried the vic’s normal scent. There were other odors that he classified as normal and dismissed, like the faint lingering scent of fried fish and some floral stink that came from a bowl of potpourri. If Riehl had been in his Wyr form, his wolf would have had a sneezing fit at the potpourri and looked for the fish to roll in.

He noted two other very interesting things. He could taste faintly at the back of his throat a chemical tinge that hung in the air around the vic, along with the smell of rubber. He would bet his next week’s paycheck that the killer had worn rubber gloves, and that the chemical taint was KO Odorless Odor Eliminator, handy tool of deer hunters and Wyr criminals everywhere.

He would have expected the gloves, but using the KO meant the killer was either Wyr himself or at least he was familiar with Wyr investigative capabilities. The killer was organized, knew how to hide his scent, and planned ahead. That all fit with the deliberate care with which he had set out the victim’s organs, which was an exact match with the Jacksonville slaughter from seven years ago.

The second, very interesting thing Riehl noticed was another scent in the apartment. It was a light, delicate, feminine scent that tantalized his senses. Haunting and delectable, it hinted at an unforeseen, mysterious reality he wanted to dive into headfirst, except that the scent had turned jagged with stress pheromones that set his teeth on edge and had his hand inching closer to his weapon. The scent hadn’t had time to sink very deeply into the surroundings and was already fading.

The body was still warm, and a woman had been in the apartment before him. Well, how about that.

If the stubborn prickle at the back of Riehl’s neck was anything to go by, the woman might even still be around, although if she was, he didn’t have the first clue where she could be hiding.

He came to a sudden decision and strode out of the apartment.

Last week’s snowfall had turned to dark sludge in the streets and on the sidewalks, but the chill, wet December wind brought the promise of more. Fluffy flakes of white were just beginning to drift down. They looked innocuous and fairy-tale pretty, but they were the precursor of a major winter storm that would smother the city by the early morning hours. Snowplows had already begun working the streets. The wind tasted of exhaust fumes, fried food, salt and grit.

Riehl did a fast recon when he hit the street. No sign of a lingering perp, but then he didn’t expect anything else. Dude might be killer whack-job nuts but he was not stupid. Riehl was not going to get that lucky tonight.

The dead woman’s apartment was located in the melting pot of North Brooklyn, where a variety of Elder Races mingled with an ethnic hodgepodge of humanity. The gray smear of early evening was dotted with bright holiday decorations in storefront windows. The nearby street corner had a delicatessen/grocery store that was run by a Wyr family. They were some kind of grazing animal that liked to cluster in groups. The grocery store was across the street from a liquor store run by an older Armenian couple. The open-air newsstand had the strong earthy scent of a dwarf lingering around the edges of the door and hatch.

The newsstand had already closed for the day, and so had a dry cleaner’s half a block away. The dry cleaner’s shadowed doorway was far too shallow a nook to hide his broad-shouldered physique. Actually there weren’t any good hiding places where he could hope to watch the apartment building and remain undisturbed.

Riehl moved fast, dodging vehicles to reach the delicatessen. He thrust through the doors and stopped in front of the cashier station by the street window. The cashier was a lanky, middle-aged male who gave him a nervous smile that vanished as Riehl pulled out his badge and showed it to the guy.

“Ignore me,” Riehl said. The male nodded, his eyes wide.

Riehl went to the edge of the plate-glass window and flattened himself against the wall. At that angle he was hidden from the apartment building entrance. He tilted his head until he could see the front door. Then he waited. Riehl made people nervous at the best of times and if a woman had been hiding in the apartment, she was going to be skittish.

He considered. Could she have witnessed the murder? Even participated? The Jacksonville PD records made no mention of a possible partner. Had they missed something, or could it be a recent development? Would a killer that ritualistic make such a drastic change in his methodology?