9
I tiptoed forward and crouched down beside the woman.
Her blond hair was strewn all over her face, obscuring her features, but she seemed young and pretty, in her early twenties, just like Elissa. She was also wearing a red dress, just like Elissa had been last night.
The color perfectly matched the blood on her face.
Even through the strands of her hair, I could tell that someone had beaten the young woman to a pulp. Her face was a swollen, bloody mess, with a broken nose, two blackened eyes, and more cuts and bruises than I could count.
And those weren’t her only injuries.
Deep, ugly bruises circled her wrists, and matching ones marred her ankles, as though she’d been tied down to a chair. Still more bruises ringed her throat, each one a dark purple against her pale skin, almost looking like an expensive amethyst necklace instead of marks of death. I recognized the brutal pattern. As if beating her hadn’t been enough, someone had wrapped his hands around the young woman’s neck and squeezed, squeezed, squeezed.
Oddly enough, her hands were lying flat on the pavement, her fingers spread wide, as though she were trying to push herself away from her attacker.
I glanced around, but the surrounding pavement was empty. No purse, no phone, no coat, no sign of any personal possessions anywhere around her. She looked like a doll that a child had broken in a fit of rage and then tossed aside because it wasn’t fun to play with anymore.
Even though I didn’t want to, I forced myself to lean in even closer and study the woman’s face. I still couldn’t positively identify her, given the brutal beating, but the longer I stared at her, the more my heart sank. Blond hair, right age, red dress, last place she’d been seen. There was no denying those facts—and what they meant.
I’d wanted to find Elissa Daniels, but not like this. I might have assumed the absolute worst, the way I always did, but I’d still been hoping deep down inside that I was wrong and that things would turn out okay.
But Elissa was dead, and there was only one thing that I could do for her—and her sister—now.
I pulled my phone out of my pocket and hit a number in the speed dial.
She answered on the second ring. “Detective Bria Coolidge.”
“It’s Gin.”
“What’s wrong?” Bria’s voice sharpened, picking up on my sad tone. “Have you found Elissa?”
“Yeah. You and Xavier need to come over to Northern Aggression as soon as you can.” I sighed, more sadness creeping into my voice. “And bring the coroner with you.”
• • •
I hung up with Bria, stepped inside the club, found Roslyn, and told her what was going on. Then I grabbed Finn and Owen, and we all went back outside to wait for Bria, Xavier, and the rest of the police to arrive.
The four of us stared down at the body, careful not to touch her or disturb any evidence. Still not touching anything, we also searched the area around the three Dumpsters, looking for her purse, phone, or anything else that she—or her killer—might have left behind, but the only things we found were crumpled fast-food bags, smushed cigarettes, and broken beer bottles.
I also reached out with my magic again, hoping that the stones might give me some clue to who had done this, but the cracked sections of pavement only muttered about the blood, violence, and death that they had witnessed. Nothing more, nothing less.
I also pointed out the busted security camera to Roslyn. It had been broken for more than two weeks, although she didn’t know by whom. She’d been trying to get the repair company to come fix it, but they’d been backed up with other jobs. Another dead end.
Thirty minutes later, a woman walked out of the back door of Northern Aggression. Given the cold, a toboggan covered most of her shaggy blond hair, although the dark blue fabric brought out the matching color of her eyes. Her cheeks were already pleasantly pink from the chill, and a silverstone primrose rune glinted against her dark blue jacket.
A few seconds later, the door opened again, revealing a giant who was around seven feet tall, with a strong, muscled body. Despite the frosty air, his shaved head was bare, and his ebony skin and dark eyes gleamed under the lights on the back of the building.
Detective Bria Coolidge, my baby sister, and Xavier, her partner on the force and Roslyn’s significant other.
“What do you have?” Bria called out.
“Nothing good,” I replied.
Finn, Owen, Roslyn, and I all stepped back out of the way so that Bria and Xavier could do their thing. The two cops crouched down and moved all around the body, studying the woman, their faces flat and expressionless. As cops, Bria and Xavier had seen a lot of bodies in their time, but you never quite got used to it, especially something like this, where a young woman had been so viciously assaulted.
Finally, after making pages of notes and taking tons of photos, Bria and Xavier straightened back up. Xavier went over to talk to Roslyn, Finn, and Owen, while Bria pulled me aside.
Bria’s mouth tightened into a grim slash. “You think this is Elissa Daniels?”
“Unfortunately. She fits Elissa’s description, right down to the dress and heels, and this was the last place she was seen.”
I told her about the security footage that showed Elissa heading in this direction. “You can watch it for yourself. I emailed it to you earlier.”
“I’ll do that. The coroner’s assistants are on their way. I’ve already got some men inside, talking to the bartender and other workers, but . . .” Bria shrugged. She didn’t have to tell me how unlikely it was that someone had seen or heard anything.
“Xavier and I will stay with the body.” She hesitated. “After we wrap up here, do you want to call Jade and ask her to meet us at the coroner’s office?”
My heart squeezed with dread. “Yeah. I can do that. Just tell me when you’re ready.”
Bria gave me a sympathetic look and laid her hand on my shoulder. Then she shifted into full-fledged detective mode, examining the body again, along with the surrounding area, and taking more pictures. At her request, Roslyn brought out several large trash bags, and Bria and Xavier pulled on black crime-scene gloves and started collecting the garbage closest to the empty Dumpsters, hoping that it might hold some clue.
Fifteen minutes later, the patrol cops had roped off the area with yellow crime-scene tape and had rigged up portable lights all around the three Dumpsters. Blue lights flashed on the police cars in the parking lots and on all the surrounding side streets, but the sight of the po-po didn’t stop people from entering the club. Instead, most folks simply ignored their presence. A dead body, even one that had been violently murdered, wasn’t an uncommon occurrence in Ashland, not even in this part of Northtown. It certainly wasn’t going to stop people from partying.
There was nothing else my friends could do, so Owen agreed to take Finn back to his car at my house, then check in with Eva, to see if his sister or Violet had learned anything about Elissa, her friends, or who might have done this to her. Finn said that he would coordinate with Silvio and start reviewing the nightclub’s security footage again. Roslyn went back into the club to tell her staff what was going on and question them again herself, on the off chance that someone had seen something after all. They were more likely to talk to their boss in confidence than to the cops.
Me? I stayed until the bitter, bitter end, watching Bria and Xavier slowly, methodically bag up trash and search the area yet again.
Finally, a large black van arrived, pulling as close to the back of the club as possible, given all the potholes, and a couple of guys wearing dark coveralls got out of the vehicle, pushing a stretcher along in front of them. The cops were finished with the scene, and now Elissa would be taken to the coroner’s office for an autopsy.
Bria pulled off her gloves and nodded at me, finally ready for me to make the call I’d been dreading ever since I found the body.
With a heavy heart, I pulled out my phone and dialed Sophia.
“News?” she rasped.
“Yeah. Let me talk to Jade, please.”
A second later, Jade’s voice flooded the line. “What’s going on, Gin? Have you found Elissa? Please, please tell me that you’ve found her.”
The raw, naked desperation in her voice made my stomach drop like a lead weight. It took me several seconds to force out the very last words that she wanted to hear. “I need you to meet me downtown at the police station.” I paused. “At the coroner’s office.”
Jade sucked in a breath. “What—why—”
Now she was the one who couldn’t speak, but I made myself keep talking.
“I tracked Elissa to Northern Aggression. A little while ago, I found a body in the parking lot behind the club,” I said, my own voice rough with regret. “It’s a young blond woman. Bria wants you to come down to the coroner’s office. Please.”
“No! No! It can’t be her! It can’t be her—” Jade’s voice went from a wail to a sob in a heartbeat.
I didn’t say anything else. Nothing I could say would change the cold, cruel facts or make this any better.
A loud clatter sounded, as though Jade had dropped the phone, although I could hear her still sobbing no-no-no in the background. Each one of her cries shattered another piece of my heart. The better part of a minute passed before someone picked up the phone again.
“Don’t worry,” Sophia rasped. “I’ll drive her.”
“Thanks. I’ll meet you there.”
We hung up, and I looked over at the crime scene. The workers from the coroner’s office had loaded Elissa onto the stretcher, and I watched while they slowly zipped the black body bag over her, hiding her bruised, bloody, battered face.
Out of sight but not out of mind.
Never, ever that.
And a hard, inescapable truth punched me in the gut, the way it always did whenever something like this happened.
This might be the end of Elissa Daniels, but it was just the beginning of her sister’s pain.