Page 67 of Criminology of a Character

Thescent of decay assaulted his senses as he steppedtothe cloth-covered body.For a moment,he stood over the table, his hands shaking erratically, but then a ripple ran through his muscles.His flesh became as stone as he strangled his emotions, and with unnerving stillness, he dragged the sheet back.

“Oh god.” He stumbled backward, his knee smashing the floor before he caught himself, and painunlikeanything he’d ever experienced ripped through his soul. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t see.He couldn’t stand,andhecrashed against the far wall before sinking to the ground.He stared at the face on the table, unwilling to believe his eyes, and then, with a guttural cry that shook the morgue to its foundation, he roared. Raw, unfiltered agony poured from his lips, the sound more animal than human, and Eamon Stone lost all control. Tears flooded his vision as his body shook. Reese had been telling the truth. There was no mistake. Isobel Emerson was on that table, and she was dead.

Eamon lost track of how long he sat there on the floorchokingon hisownsobs. Eventually, he found his legs, and he stumbled across the room to her corpse. She was dead. The love of his ancient and eternal life was dead, and he knew his fate. He couldn’t live without her. He would lay down beside her and end this miserable existence because there was no life without her.

“I’m so sorry I wasn’t there to protect you.” He grabbed the sheet and tugged it off her bare body, gagging at how mangled her flesh was. Again, Reese had been telling the truth. Heshouldn’t have looked at her like this. He’d never be able to erase this image of Isobel’s mutilated body out of his mind. The car accident had destroyed her lower half, somehow leaving her beautiful facemostlyuntouched, and Eamon collapsed over her, pulling her cold corpse into his arms.

“You can’t leave me,” he sobbed, his chest shaking with his tears. He didn’t know he could cry, but pain poured from his tongue, his very pores. “Isobel, don’t leave me. I love you. Do you hear me? I love you. Don’t make me live without you.” He pulled her limp form closer, burying his nose in her hair one last time. “Isobel, I’m sorry. I should’ve?—”

Eamon jerked to a stand and stared at the woman in his arms. The woman who looked identical to Bel, but…

He leaned down and shoved his nose into her hair again, breathing deeply, but he barely inhaled before he choked with a painful cough. He placed the corpse down on the table and studied it with a pinched brow, scrutinizing every inch of skin with a new perspective. The sight didn’t match the scent, and staring at her abdomen’s wounds, he realized there was only one way to becertain. He swiped his finger over her severed flesh and licked it, but the instant her blood hit his tongue, he gagged, his eyes watering at the putrid flavor.

He cursed, the sorrow eating at his chest instantly evaporating, and he raced out of the exam room to find a pale Sheriff Griffin and Lina comforting Reese.

“It’s not her!” Eamon jogged to them. “It’s not Isobel.”

“Mr. Stone,” Griffin said. “Trust me, I don’t want it to be Bel, but it is. You saw her.”

“Where’s her dog?” Eamon scanned the corridor with an unhinged edge in his black irises. “Where’s Cerberus?”

“Her friend Violet has him,” Reese answered.

“It’s not her,” Eamon repeated.

“Please stop,” Reese said. “Please. That’s my daughter in there. Why are you trying to hurt me?”

“Because that’s not your daughter,” Eamon insisted. “That isn’t Isobel.”

“Mr. Stone,” Lina started.

“It isn’t her,” he growled. “No one goes in there. No one touches the body until I get back.” He pinned Griffin with a dangerous expression. “No one.”

Without waiting for a response, he jogged to his car and broke every speed limit as he drove to Violet’s apartment. Bel’s friend was beside herself with grief, but she graciously relinquished the pitbull to his care, and he raced back to the morgue, guiding the dog to where the trio still sat in bewilderment.

“The dog will prove it,” he said as he walked past them toward the exam room.

“Mr. Stone, you can’t take an animal in there!” Lina shouted, but he didn’t slow.

“Don’t just sit there,” Eamon growled at them as he disappeared through the doors. “Let’s go. I’ll prove it isn’t her.”

The trio raced after him, eyeing him as if he’d gone mad, but Eamon didn’t care. That wasn’t Bel on the table. It wasn’t her scent. It wasn’t her blood. Even in death, her taste would be intoxicating, so someone else lay on that table, their blood foul and old. He didn’t understand what he was seeing, but he knew without a doubt that the dead woman wasn’t his Isobel, and Cerberus would prove it.

“Go see Mommy,” Eamon instructed as they entered the exam room, but Cerberus merely tried to play tug of war with his leash. They hadn’t seen each other in days, and the dog wasclearlyexcited his buddy was back in town.

“Eamon, stop,” Reese said. “He’s just a dog.”

“No, he’s not. He’sHERdog, and animals understand death,” Eamon said. “They feel emotions, and they love their humans. Cerberus is obsessed with Isobel, yet he won’t even look at that table because that isn’t her.” To emphasize his point, he scooped the pitbull into his arms and walked him over to the corpse.The doggave the body a good sniff, but he quickly forgot about her as he tried to lick the dried tears off of Eamon’s cheeks.

“He doesn’t care about this body,” Eamon said. “He doesn’t know this woman. It’s not his mom.”

“How certain are you?” Griffin asked, shifting to stare Eamon in the eyes. The men shared a wordless conversation as realization dawned on the sheriff’s face. He understood Eamon’s senses had uncovered the truth, and the pitbull was merely to prove it to Lina and Reese. Just like when Eamon inexplicably saved the Darling boys in their last case, he knew this wasn’t Bel despite the identical features, and Griffin believed him.

“I’m one hundred percent certain this isn’t my Isobel,” Eamon said, emphasizing each word so that Griffin understood the gravity of his statement.

“Okay.” The sheriff resumed control of Griffin’s grieving body, and he exhaled an unsteady breath as he regained his professional demeanor. “We need more than the dog’s reaction, though.”

“Don’t worry.” Eamon hugged Cerberus close. The pitbull still smelled like Bel, and he buried his nose in the animal’s fur with relief. “I’ll get you proof.”

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