Deadly Lover (16 page)

Her golden eyebrows rose. “Yes, he does. She’s my sister, actually.”

She walked toward him, stopping with only inches between them. He had to crane his neck down to look into her upturned face.

“Bradley is a jerk,” she said. “He stopped by last night drunk and passed out. I have no interest in sleeping with him, if that’s what’s rattling around in that big, thick skull of yours.” When she paused, he could see a quick mind turning behind those remarkable eyes. “I’d sooner sleep with you,” she said at last.

When he didn’t respond, she took a small step forward, the soft swell of her breasts pressing against his chest. “And don’t give me that
Ormney don’t do sex with humans
line,” she told him, her voice low and fierce. “I’m not buying that crap anymore.”

He held himself very still. She was angry and didn’t realize how her taunts sent fire roiling through his body. How her aggressive stance only made him want her more. She had learned some piece of the truth behind the horrible deaths he’d asked her to investigate and she was testing him.

“I wasn’t going to say that.” He reached out to wrap his hands around her arms, carefully pressing against her soft skin while keeping his claws as retracted as possible. Her breathing quickened and her fist clenched compulsively. The smooth tracery of her scars beneath the pads of his fingers mad him want to shake her and make her promise never again to take such risks with her life. Gently, he forced her back, putting space between them. “I was going to tell you I’ve arranged for you to meet with the men who found Fresna’s body before they begin their shift at the dock. It might be best if we leave now.”

Lily studied him in silence for several heartbeats, her breathing still fast, then bobbed her chin in agreement and started to pull away.

He tightened his hands on her arms and her gaze snapped back to his. She was nothing like the sweet, simple mate he’d once valued so highly, but everything about her called to him. Her words and actions had shaken his control of the mating instinct. He needed to warn her away.

“You should know... my mate didn’t survive The Crossing. I haven’t shared the pleasure of mating with a female since that time.”

He released her arms in favor of wrapping a hand carefully around her throat. She trembled at his touch and her pulse beat a rapid tattoo beneath his hand, but she didn’t struggle. He bent down to put his face very near hers, letting her breath brush his lips and her scent fill his lungs.

“Do not offer sex again, unless you mean it.”

He stood at a flower cart near the North entrance of The Zone—the place where his mother had sinned. He selected an elegant bunch of purest white calla lilies, while keeping one eye on the steady stream of Ormney animals pouring through The Zone gate. He humphed under his breath. Some predators the bastards were. They couldn’t even smell his hate for them. His absolute loathing. The flower stems squished in the crushing grip of his gloved fist. Fuck.

A quick glance told him the vendor was busy with a dorky suit type buying roses for his wife. Plenty of time to slide the ruined flowers back into the cart’s holder and select another bunch for Lily. Content to study the faces of the filthy beasts walking past, he waited. When the vendor finally got to him, he paid using a
borrowed
com link. He had to work at keeping a smirk from slipping across his face. The owner didn’t need it anymore.

The vendor put the flowers carefully into a silver box then passed him the e-card. With an easy smile, he thanked the man and stepped over to a bench and sat, watching the steady flow of foot traffic as he considered what message to enter. His gaze caught on the animal he’d been waiting for. Slipping the e-card in his pocket for now, he rose and headed down the street, stepping into the wake of the big ugly male. If he had any luck he’d find where the animal had stashed the little slut he was fucking.

And somewhere along the way he’d find a private locate-and-deliver drop for his lilies. Remembering how tired his own special Lily had looked this morning, he pulled out the e-card and tapped in the perfect message.

Don’t lose sleep over the lost girls. They made their beds and they deserve to die in them.

Kuna and Shev, the two men who’d found the earliest known victims, were waiting at the diner where Jolaj had arranged to meet them. One tall but slim, the other stocky with noticeably large ears, both wore identical grimaces. After quick and painfully polite introductions they went inside. The diner was low tech but clean and smelled of real bacon. Her stomach rumbled, drawing the notice of all three Ormney.

Lily slid into the booth seat opposite the dock workers, taking slow, careful breaths. Despite her earlier show of bravado, their big clawed hands, resting on the table, still had the power to flash her back to panic mode. Jolaj slid in beside her and the press of him against her shoulder and thigh ignited a completely different sort of panic, distracting her when she should have been concentrating on the men she was there to interview.

Twenty years. Jolaj’s mate had died twenty years ago.

Lily had tossed out the line about sleeping with him out of anger. Anger that he’d thought she’d sleep with Bradley. That he hadn’t told her Jennifer and Lanyak had been lovers. That she found herself attracted to a man who had seemed completely unreachable.

The server, a middle-aged man with a round face and a ready smile, poured steaming coffee into their mugs then went back to restocking supplies at the other side of the near-empty diner.

Lily focused her attention on the men seated across from her. “What can you tell me about...”

“Fresna,” Jolaj supplied.

The one called Kuna, the stockier of the two, cleared his throat then met Lily’s gaze. “Fresna worked with us at the docks.”

The other man, Shev, tapped his claw tips against the scarred table top, sending a shiver across Lily’s skin. She wouldn’t let the panic out today, she promised herself. Shev repeated the little staccato tap. “We ought to be getting to work ourselves. Shift starts soon.”

 Lily kept her focus on Kuna, who seemed more willing to talk and had, god bless him, moved his hands beneath the table. “How long had you known Fresna?”

“I knew him from when we all got jobs at the port about fifteen years back.”

Lily took a sip of coffee then slid her hands around the warm mug. “Did he have a beef with anybody? Anybody who’d want to hurt him or cause him trouble?”

“No.” Kuna’s voice didn’t falter and he didn’t fidget or give any sign he might be lying.

Lily did see him glance at his coffee, but his hands remained out of sight. “What happened the day you found Fresna dead?”

Kuna looked down as he began his answer. “It was a normal work day to start out. We, ah…” He peeked up at her. “We didn’t notice he was missing till end of shift.”

There was some regret there, Lily thought, but still no deception.

“We usually walk together,” he continued. “Back to The Zone, but he never came in from the yard. Never came to scan off shift. So we asked around as everybody was leaving. Couple of guys said they’d seen him headed to the long-term container storage lot earlier in the day.”

“We went out looking for him,” Shev added. “Thought he could have fallen or gotten hurt.”

Kuna nodded. “When we got to the lot I scented him and followed that to the container. Knew he was dead inside. It was locked from the outside. When we opened it we saw him and Doc both dead.”

“Doc?”

“The woman,” said Kuna.

The woman they’d had a nickname for... and still thrown her dead body in the river. “Could you tell how they’d died?”

“Doc, she was broken,” said Kuna.

“Her neck, for sure,” Shev said.

The uncomfortable twist of dread tightened in Lily’s stomach. Jolaj chose that moment to shift in his seat, pressing his thigh more firmly against hers. “Any other visible damage?”

Kuna hesitated, eyes unfocused as if remembering. “Some gashes across her face and arms.”

Lily took another sip of her coffee. “That’s all? Just her face and arms?”

“That’s all,” he said.

“The others were all eviscerated,” she explained.

“The broken neck may be the reason,” said Jolaj. “If he was drugged and acting blindly, instinctively, he might well have broken off the attack when she stopped fighting.”

Or she might have been dead before he arrived. A dead body would have drawn him into the container.

“Fresna had done a job on himself,” said Kuna. “He was covered in gashes and torn up real bad.”

Shev shivered. “The inside of the container, there was blood everywhere.”

Jolaj made a noncommittal noise. “If she died quickly and most of the blood was his, it’s possible that he threw himself against the container trying to escape.”

But of course, they would never know, because the two men in front of them had covered it all up. Lily fought to suppress her anger. “Did you scent anyone else?”

“No one in the container,” said Kuna. “Some of the other crew, the supervisor for that area, all in the yard around it. Those were all pretty old scent trails.”

“I scented the woman outside too. And another human.” Shev had cupped his mug with his hands and that seemed to have stopped the claw tapping. He took a sip of coffee before continuing. “Male I think. But I didn’t recognize him.”

A human male—Lily filed that bit of info away for later consideration. “The woman? You called her Doc. You recognized her?”

Both men nodded.

“Who was she?”

When the both kept silent, Jolaj leaned forward. Putting her hand on his thigh, Lily stopped whatever intimidation he intended. Beneath her palm his thigh turned to stone. A muscle in his cheek twitched.

Kuna and Shev watched them like gawkers at a hov-board exhibition, waiting for a spill.

Lily withdrew her hand and focused her attention on Kuna. She smiled. “How do you take your coffee?”

His big eyes, blinked once, twice, a third time. “Two sweeteners.” His confusion made it sound like a question.

The sweeteners came in little packets in a holder at her end of the table. She plucked two from the stack and tore them open. She turned them over, letting the thin slivers of sweetener tip into his mug. The melted instantly to disperse through the warm liquid.

Lily leaned back against the seat. All three men stared at her openly. She dipped her chin at Kuna. “It’s okay. Go ahead. I’m fine.”

He pulled his hands from beneath the table in smooth, slow movements. His eyes never left her as he sipped.

As he set the mug back on the table Lily gave him another half smile. “Now, you were going to tell me about the woman.”

Kuna nodded. “We only knew her as Doc. Doc Smith. I saw her a few times at the after-shift dives near the docks.”

The woman pulled from the river had been DNA-identified as Ginger Simon. Doc Smith was obviously an alias, but why? “Any idea why she hung out there?”

Kuna darted a glance at Jolaj then shrugged. “Said she was doing some kind of medical research. Used to ask lots of questions.”

So Doc was a nickname because Ginger had been playing doctor. According to her record, Ginger had been into petty crime. She might have been running a con. “What kind of questions?”

“She asked some of us for tissue samples, blood, stuff like that.” Kuna frowned. “We all told her no, but she kept coming around. Said she just wanted to get to know us better.”

Shev fidgeted with his mug, twisting on the table. “Some of the guys would talk to her.”

Kuna’s frown deepened. The faded brown stripes of his face followed the brackets around his mouth, failing to camouflage the expression. “Many from our generation lost their families in The Crossing. Sometimes they get lonely.”

Mention of The Crossing made it impossible not to think of Jolaj. How lonely had he been? He should have found a new mate in twenty years. He would have to have loved his dead wife very much for his grief to keep him celibate so long.

Lily didn’t think Shev and Kuna were holding anything back, but they were clearly nervous. “Anyone you can think of that might know more about her?”

Shev shook his head.

“No,” said Kuna. “But she gave me a com code where I could contact her.” He rattled off the code, then repeated it back when Lily used her com-lens to do a data search.

Lily slanted him a look. “You just happen to remember the code?”

“We don’t carry com-units much. I learned to memorize.”

The data search returned a dead end. She ran it again with the same results. The com address had been wiped from the data. Very curious.

Shev scooted free of the booth and stood at the end. “We must get to work now.”

Lily curved her lips into a semblance of a smile. “Okay.” She blew out a frustrated breath. “I appreciate your help.”

Jolaj walked them to the door then came back and slid into the booth across from her, lifting an eyebrow.

“The record was removed from the public data.”

Jolaj took advantage of the extra space, sitting in the middle and stretching his arms out, hands slide along the seat. “What does this mean?”

“I have no idea.” The com code was the only lead they had. “A Metro search might turn something up, but I’d have to tell Sean where the information came from.”

Lily only had to study his face to confirm that option was off the table for now. “There might be another way.” She tagged her brother’s com. She didn’t like bringing him into it, but she could count on him to keep it just between them.

“Hi, sis, you should have called.” Hurt his under Brian’s scolding and she hated that she’d worried him. She should have known one of the O’Learys would have told him.

“I’m fine, Bri. Truly. But I need your help. No questions, okay?”

There was a pause and she could almost hear him thinking across the link. “Sure, as long as you swear we’ll make time to talk soon.”

“Swear,” she said and made a mental note to call him when things settled down. He was her little brother. He shouldn’t have to worry about her over every little thing, but he’d been the one to locate her in the med center after the accident with Kiq. She had given Deepwater instructions not to call her family unless she was dead and they’d complied. Brian had found her anyway and been furious.