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  A warm laugh sounded in her ear. “Yeah, sometimes I think she loves her Caddy more than she does me.”

  Brianna smiled, then sobered. “I’ve told you before, you’re very lucky to have someone like her in your life. Now that I’ve met her, I’d say you’re very, very lucky and don’t you forget it.”

  What she would’ve given to have had someone like Nana in her corner when she’d been young. Even when she’d been adopted, she felt like she was more of a pretty little trophy for her parents to show off to their socialite friends at their country club functions. In fact, the only person she ever remembered being there for her, pushing her to be a better person had been her best friend Abby Whitson, now Edgars since she’d married last year. Abby had looked beyond the surface and seen what she’d really been, a scared, smart girl who used her looks to manipulate people into liking her.

  “Oh, believe me, I am,” Kirk F said, bringing her back to the present. “Do you and Jeffers need me to do anything else?”

  She glanced into the small room where at least five people besides Aaron and Jaylon milled about like worker ants. “No, I think we’ll be here a while.”

  “Why? The coroner should just take him to the morgue, right?” Again, Kirk F paused. Brianna almost heard the wheels turning in his head on the other end of the phone. “Unless he was murdered. Was he?”

  Again, Brianna took a deep breath before answering. “Aaron believes he was, yes.”

  “Fuck,” he said, for once not schooling his language with her. “That’s messed up.”

  Brianna couldn’t agree more. “I know. It’s so sad, really.”

  “Why would someone want to murder a homeless man? It’s not like he has anything they’d want. Well, except for Stanley.”

  “You’re right. It doesn’t make any sense.” She looked into the other room again, staring at the sitting figure of Art. “We won’t know more tonight. You might as well head home. I’ll see you at the hospital in the morning.”

  Once Kirk F hung up, she called the hospital and asked for Paula’s room.

  “Hello?” Paula sounded a little groggy.

  “Hey, Paula, it’s Brianna. I’m afraid I have some bad news.”

  “He’s dead, isn’t he?” Paula said in a whisper.

  Brianna’s heart clenched in pain for her friend. “I’m so sorry, Paula, he is.”

  “H—how?”

  “We’re not sure yet.” No way was she telling her over the phone that Art had been murdered.

  Soft whimpering sounded over the phone. Then she could hear Nana comforting her. “There, there, missy. I know it hurts to lose a friend.”

  “Miss Brianna, she’s gonna need to rest before you tell her more,” Nana said into the phone a moment later. The older woman’s firm voice implied there would be no further discussion tonight. Brianna was thankful again that Paula wasn’t alone and had such a fierce gatekeeper at her side.

  “I couldn’t agree more. We’ll be here late. Are you still good to spend the night? Sleeping in a recliner?” She didn’t want to stress Kirk F’s grandmother out too much.

  “Child, I’m just fine. The nurses have been real quiet coming in and out and they’ve got me fixed up with extra pillows, blankets and a big pitcher of water. And I sleep in my recliner at home half the night anyways. You be careful out there and we’ll see you in the morning.”

  The phone went dead, and Brianna had to smile. Nana had spoken.

  Stanley lifted his head from her lap and his tail wagged. Brianna looked up to see Aaron, Jaylon and Anita moving her way as other technicians lifted Art’s body onto a black draped stretcher. The trio peeled off their masks and gloves as they approached her.

  “What did you decide?” she asked as they stopped in front of her.

  Ramos glanced at Aaron, who nodded. “Like I said, Brianna is the one who brought us this case, she deserves to know what we’ve found.”

  “Well, like I told you guys,” Ramos said glanced at Aaron and Jaylon, “this isn’t our murder scene.”

  “You know this because there’s no blood around him and he’d been cleaned?” Brianna looked at Aaron. “You and I already determined that.”

  “True. But there’s more.” He arched his brows and tilted his head to the tech to continue.

  “We’ll have to wait for the coroner to do the final examination, but not only was the victim and his clothes cleaned and then posed in this spot, there is no blood.”

  “We knew that. Everything was clean.”

  “You’re not listening,” Aaron said. “There is no blood. None around Art. None in him.”

  A shiver ran over Brianna and she settled a hand into Stanley’s warm fur. “You mean whoever killed him drained out all his blood? What? They embalmed him after they killed him?”

  “He wasn’t embalmed. There’s just very little lividity,” Ramos said. “Technically almost all the blood was taken. There’s always a little left in the liver, the bone marrow or microscopic capillaries.”

  “What is lividity?” Brianna hated feeling like they were taking a test and she was the only one in the class without the answers.

  “When the body dies,” Ramos went on to explain, “the cells immediately start to deteriorate, gravity pulls blood cells down to pool in whatever part of the body is the lowest. With our victim in the sitting position, we’d expect to see a great deal of this on the lower buttocks, thighs and legs. If he’d been lying on his back for any time after death, we’d see the lividity on his whole back.”

  “So, you’re not seeing any of that?” Briana asked.

  “Not as much as I’d expect to see,” Ramos said rubbing the back of her neck. “I think his blood was drained before he died.”

  “Can you do that? Drain all the blood out of a body while they’re alive?” Brianna asked, shifting her gaze to Aaron then to Jaylon and finally back to Ramos.

  “If you lose more than forty percent of your blood, more than two-thousand milliliters, you will die,” Ramos paused. “It happens rapidly with gunshot wounds, stabbings, severe auto accidents. But we’d still see a good amount of lividity. There is such a small amount of it this time. I think your man was slowly drained of blood until his organs gave out.”

  “Shit,” both Jaylon and Aaron said.

  “Oh, my God,” Brianna said, covering her mouth and tears filling her eyes. Stanley let out a low whimper and she hugged him a little tighter to her middle, comforting herself as much as him. “Was he in pain while this happened?”

  “That I can’t answer. Depends on how fast or slow this guy bled him out.” Ramos stopped as the other technicians walked the stretcher containing Art’s body in the black zipped up body bag past them. “The autopsy will tell us more, but there were only three small wounds on his body. Two on the back of his neck.” She pointed to the spot on her own body. “Looks like burn marks from a taser or stun gun of some sort.”

  “And the other one?” Aaron asked.

  “That one was in his left brachial area,” she said, pointing to her own inner left elbow. “Like where you’d put a big bore IV needle to give or get blood.”

  “You think someone was harvesting his blood?” Aaron asked, shock and anger lacing his voice.

  “If his blood was harvested, his death wasn’t an easy one. His heart rate would pick up and a sense of panic would ensue. Then his extremities would grow cold as the body shunted the circulating blood to his vital organs, brain, heart and lungs. Eventually, he’d become woozy, he’d have trouble breathing. And eventually his heart would stop beating.”

  “Oh man,” Jaylon said. “That’s sick.”

  “You’ll have to wait for the coroner’s official report, but my guess is, whoever did this? He or she knew exactly what they were doing,” Ramos said with a nod as she left the group to go back into the small office and gather her equipment.

  “So, Ramos thinks whoever did this is in the medical field?” Brianna asked, finding it hard to believe that someone whose job it wa
s to save lives would take Art’s in such a cruel fashion.

  “Or else they’re a modern day vampire,” Jaylon said without any humor.

  Aaron shook his head. “I don’t think so, and let’s not go saying that to anyone. We don’t want that idea getting into the media.”

  “Because it would bring out all the sci-fi and paranormal freaks?” the younger detective said. “I get it. But you have to admit it feels just as weird to think a doctor might have done this.”

  “If not,” Aaron looked around the space, the muscles on his face tight with concern, “then given how little evidence we found and how little this place was disturbed, I’d say we have a bigger problem than an off-his-rocker doc.”

  “What’s that?” Brianna asked, not liking where he was headed.

  “Someone who’s perfected this style of killing.”

  8

  Aaron didn’t like how this situation was shaping up. He looked at his wristwatch. Nearly three.

  Halloway gave him grief daily about still wearing an old school watch. “Man, you don’t need one anymore. Your phone can tell time, as well as the weather, check your email, take pictures. Why do you insist on wearing a watch?”

  He never answered. It was a personal thing for him. The weight of the heavy metal band on his arm felt reassuring. His grandfather had always worn a wristwatch, a military one that had a compass and stopwatch in it. As a kid he’d thought it was so grown up and when he’d graduated from high school, Granddad gifted him with one—same compass and stopwatch features. A few years back he invested in a more expensive watch, heavier chain-link band and self-illuminating hands and numbers—good for seeing in the dark, on late night cases, like tonight.

  Tilting his head to one side until the tension cracked, he then repeated it the other direction.

  “That’s not really good for your neck,” Brianna said. “Causes more damage in the long run.”

  Jaylon snorted next to him and Aaron considered making him stay the rest of the night with the patrolmen. He shot him a don’t-give-me-any-grief look before focusing on Brianna.

  “Did you get ahold of Kirk F?” he asked, ignoring her comment about his neck.

  “Yes, he’s headed home. Said the staff stone-walled him on information anyways.” A little smile teased the corners of her lips. “But he did manage to get a few phone numbers.”

  “Good thing that kid wants to be a cop. He’d make one hell of a con artist.” He laughed with her, a little of the sadness from Art’s death easing off his shoulders. Then he grew serious once more. “And your friend?”

  “All I told Paula was that we found Art and he was dead. I thought it best not to tell her your suspicions until we know more and I’m actually there with her.”

  One of the patrolmen signaled Jaylon to come over.

  “How did she take it?” Aaron asked, moving a little closer, wanting to take her in his arms to comfort her, but knew she wouldn’t appreciate it here in such a public place, if she’d allow it at all. Their relationship was one of friends and he had a sinking feeling she meant to keep it like that.

  Tears filled Brianna’s eyes a second before she dashed them away with one hand. “It hit her hard, but I think she expected to hear of his death from the moment she started looking for him.” Her hand went down to pet the wire-haired pup snuggled in her lap. “But I think she expected us to find him dead in some alley of natural causes, not…bled to death by some crazy freak.”

  “We don’t know that he’s crazy.”

  Brianna shot him a sardonic look. “Someone drains blood out of a person, cleans them from head to toe, dresses them in new clothes, then poses them to look like they’re sleeping sitting up for someone to find them. I’d call that crazy.”

  “They could just be evil,” he said, appreciating she hadn’t repeated the real label for their murderer.

  “Oh, that’s reassuring,” she said with a shake of her head. “Either way, I’m going to have to tell Paula how he died, but I’ll do it tomorrow in person. Nana says she’s staying the night.”

  “Good. She’ll have someone with her, and you can get some rest.” He held out his hand to help her off the ledge only to have her deposit Stanley in them. Moving back, he gave her room to slide off the ledge and grab her bag.

  “Jeffers, we have a problem,” Jaylon said, joining them as the patrolman headed back out of the room. “Reporters got wind of this and a small group are outside along with some of the area’s residents.”

  Residents meaning other homeless people or motorists passing by, stopping to gawk.

  “Great,” Aaron muttered. Could this night get any worse? He’d agreed to help Brianna look for her friend as a way to spend some time alone with her, thinking it would be a quick solution and they’d find her at home—which they had—only to end up searching for a homeless man, who now was possibly victim one of a serial killer. Even though he wasn’t ready to confirm it—not with only one body—his gut told him that’s what they’d stumbled onto.

  “How do you want to handle it?” Jaylon asked at the same time Stanley wiggled in Aaron’s arms.

  An idea hit him.

  “We’ll tell the truth. That this little guy led us to a dead body. We don’t know his identity,” he held up a hand to stop Brianna as she opened her mouth to protest. “Which is true. All we know right now is his name is Art, and we won’t know more unless someone comes forward or his fingerprints are in the system somewhere. But we won’t divulge that information. In the meantime, we’ll use a little news conference in our favor.”

  He set Stanley on the ground and gave his leash to Brianna. “Do you think you could use your phone to video the crowd while I talk to reporters, maybe a little distance away, maybe while Stanley takes a whiz or something?”

  “I want do that because…” She let her words fade into the unspoken question.

  “Sometimes, a killer returns to a crime scene, especially if it’s getting news coverage,” Jaylon said, nodding Aaron’s direction. “Good idea. You want me to get one, too?”

  “No, if Brianna can do it inconspicuously, we might catch someone unawares.” They all headed to the stair exit at the far end of the hall. “If nothing else, we might get some images of other homeless people in the area to talk to tomorrow. Did you have the patrols check out the rest of the building?”

  Jaylon nodded as they headed down the steps. “Yeah, no other vampire victims posed inside.”

  Aaron shot out a hand and grabbed his colleague by the shirt, stopping him mid-step and fixing him with his I’m-pissed-so-don’t-argue-with-me glare. “Do. Not. Use. That. Word. Again.”

  Jaylon threw his arms up in surrender. “Whoa. Okay. No Vlad the Impaler jokes.”

  “I’m serious, Jay. The last thing we want to do is give this guy a nickname to gain cult followers and imitators. Not to mention sending a panic into the homeless community. So, this is just a routine dead body for now, got it?”

  “Got it,” Jaylon answered, finally all serious cop again.

  Aaron liked the guy. One of the best partners he’d ever had. Quick to assess situations, not one to rabbit hole a case until all the facts were in. Willing to think outside the box, but not too far that they couldn’t stay focused. Pushed the rules without breaking them. But he liked to make jokes that were sometimes out of place and of course there was the constant hitting on any female with a pulse within fifty feet of him. Someday the kid would run into the wrong female who would either put him in his place permanently or sue his ass. Until Jaylon got his crap together and grew up, it was his place to keep the guy in check.

  “Okay, let’s go face this hoard of leeches,” Aaron said, walking through the loading dock area, now lit with police lamps to the exit, he and Jaylon flanking Brianna and Stanley. From this moment forward, officially she was a bystander who found the pup and he led her here. End of story. The last thing he wanted was putting her in the crosshairs of the killer.

  * * *

  Brian
na stood a few yards to the left and slightly behind where Aaron and his partner were talking to the reporters. Stanley had taken advantage of the tree just outside the loading dock entrance to relieve himself, so she’d taken the time to turn on her camera’s video recording device, and then pretend she was talking on it, all the while aiming it at the crowd.

  She was glad she’d been given the assignment of minding Stanley and was out of the center of attention. It was an eclectic group surrounding the two detectives. Trucks from three local news stations lined the sidewalk halfway down the block and beyond the perimeter the police had marked off. Reporters and cameramen ringed the front row where Aaron stood to answer questions. Passersby milled around behind the media. Most looked to be part of the homeless community. The lineup of vehicles on both sides of the street suggested some of the gawkers were drivers who’d seen the police and stopped to find out what was going on.

  Could Aaron and Jaylon be right? Could one of these people be the one who tortured—and given the description of how Ramos thought Art had died, she couldn’t think of it as anything less than torture—and killed Art be standing here quietly gloating in what they’d done?

  A shiver ran over her.

  Get yourself together, Bri. Aaron gave you a job to do. Don’t wimp out on him now. You want to help Art? Get good videos of the crowd.

  Why did her conscience always sound like Abby? Because Abby had always been the one person who didn’t buy her sweet little dumb blonde routine. She saw through the bullshit and called her on it.

  Taking her Abby-conscience’s advice, she shoved the idea that she might be a few yards from a sadistic killer into a dark box in her brain and buried it. “Come on Stanley,” she said, pulling lightly on his leash until he lost interest in whatever he was sniffing on the edge of the sidewalk and they moved closer to the crowd. Standing a few feet behind Aaron and Jaylon, she gathered the pup into her free arm, holding him far enough away that he couldn’t lick her.