Page 205 of White Wolf

She nodded at Nikita, and he nodded back. Yes, she understood. This had to be done, even if it left a bad taste in the mouth. Even if she wound up with nightmares.

She became aware that Lanny was talking to her.

“…say something?”

“What? Oh.” She turned to him. “I don’t.” Sighed. “What do you want me to say?”

Lanny stared at her, disappointed, then threw up his hands and turned away, making a disgusted sound.

She turned back to the others. “I’ll call this in. We can say he fell off the fire escape.”

But Sasha made a face. “Actually…”

“I’m not done,” Nikita said. “I need to make sure.”

“Make sure…” And then her stomach rolled. “Oh my God.”

He looked even more tired than before. “Say you lost him. Say…I don’t know. I’m sorry.” He ducked his head and slung Chad’s limp form across his shoulders, like a hunter hoisting up a deer. Chad’s hands flopped and Trina swallowed the urge to gag…even as her mind was already accepting it and making allowances. Her disgust was superficial and physical. Mentally, emotionally, she’d already forgiven her great-grandfather for the act.

“Okay,” she said.

Lanny turned around. “Okay? Are you serious?”

“What do you want me to say? It’s already done.”

He turned his back again, muttering curses under his breath.

“The one he turned,” Nikita started.

“I’ll go and check on him.”

“Like hell,” Lanny said over his shoulder.

“He wasn’t like this one,” Nikita said, tilting his head to indicate the body across his shoulders. “Was he?”

“Not before he died, no. Not if Chad and the roommate are to be believed.”

He nodded. “Alright. Be careful. Take Sasha with you.”

“I don’t think–”

“Take him with you.” And that was an order. If anyone besides her boss or her family had delivered it, she would have bowed up her back.

Instead, she sighed and said, “Yeah, alright.”

Nikita gave her one last serious look, flicked a glance to Sasha, then hiked his burden a little higher and started down the alley, into the shadows. Just before he disappeared from sight, she had the absurd thought that, from behind, carrying a body, his silhouette looked like a cross.

~*~

The fluorescent lights of the morgue had a way of making the living look like the dead. There was something eerily corpse-like about the bags under Dr. Harvey’s eyes when she flicked her gaze up from her paperwork and said, tone flat, “You what?” She looked like a woman at the end of her patience, and Trina knew the feeling.

“The lab came back about some fibers and I wanted to check the body,” she said, rolling her eyes and pretending it was an imposition, commiserating, while inside her heart pounded what was fast-becoming a normal panicked rhythm. “Total bullshit, I know.”

Harvey sighed and checked the time in the corner of her computer screen. “Oh. It’s morning.”

“Rise and shine,” Trina said with a hollow chuckle.

Harvey snorted as she got to her feet, swaying a little with exhaustion. “You look like I feel.”

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