Page 57 of Deadly Lineage
Harrison choked on a laugh. “I suppose I’ve had worse offers.” Leaning forward, she reached across my desk and flipped open the anemic file she’d tossed down earlier. “I scrounged up a residence and Remington’s last place of employment, but that’s about all I’ve got. I figured we could head over and check out the apartment and maybe speak with some of his co-workers, see if they noticed anything out of the ordinary recently.” Harrison shrugged. “It’s a long shot, but it’s all I’ve got.”
“It’s more than I’ve had on the other two victims.” I checked my watch. I’d texted Boone earlier and we’d agreed on noon as a good time for me to pick him up and drive him to retrieve hiscar. I figured we might try and grab some lunch in there too. Any excuse to spend more time with the object of my obsessive thoughts was worth grabbing.
Now that I had a little help—reluctant as it was—on this case, I figured I might as well take advantage.
“How about we divide and conquer?” I suggested.
“I can go for that.”
Harrison and I were both used to working alone, so separating would be well within our individual wheelhouses.
“Do you have a preference?” I asked, hoping she’d go for Remington’s place of work.
“Not really?” She shrugged. “You?”
I tapped my pen on my desk, shifting a little. Harrison didn’t miss my uncomfortable tell and peered suspiciously at me.
“If you don’t mind,” I started, then coughed as I cleared my throat, “I’d like to take the apartment. I’m supposed to pick Boone up in about a half hour. I was going to swing him over to pick up his car and maybe get some lunch while we’re at it. From your notes, it looks like Remington’s apartment’s only a fifteen, maybe twenty-minute drive away from his dump site. I doubt Captain Cicely will mind if I drag Boone along with me to check it out.”
Harrison leaned into her chair, tapping her fingers along the armrest. “And the construction office is less than ten minutes away, so why the apartment?”
I felt my cheeks heat with anger and shame. “He’s a necromancer,” I needlessly stated. “His species doesn’t have a reputation for putting the living at ease. Boone’s caught enough flack recently. I don’t want to put him through more speciesist bullshit if I don’t have to. It’ll be better if you do the interviews.”
Harrison’s eyes softened with understanding before hardening with her own irritation. “Prejudice in any form is a fucking bitch.”
I didn’t disagree. “It’s the world we live in.” It was a shitty excuse, but it was all I had.
“That it is, O’Hare. That it is.”
“You take me to the nicest places.” Boone stared up at me, mischief lighting his beautifully enticing green eyes. With a sweeping gesture of his arm, Boone said, “After you, Detective.”
I huffed a short-lived laugh before starting for the stairs. Linus Remington’s last known residence was in a part of town that was only a couple of steps up from the neighborhood his body had been dumped in. The chipped concrete stairs led to a second floor with a balcony that ran the length of the complex. The balcony was made out of the same worn concrete and exposed to the elements. The place looked like a slightly glorified no-tell-motel.
“I’m not judging, mind you,” Boone said from close behind. “The guy had a job and was working for a wage doing something needed. I can respect that. What I can’t respect is the shoddy upkeep on this apartment building. Just because it’s low rent doesn’t mean the tenants should be afraid the floor will fall out from underneath them.” Boone pulled his hand back from the rusted railing and added, “Or get tetanus just from touching the railing. Gaia, this place is a death trap.”
I couldn’t argue and didn’t try. Instead, I walked halfway down the balcony until I came to unit twenty-six. I tried the door but it was locked. That was okay. The super had already given me the key.
“Flash a detective’s badge and they’ll give you a key to anything,” Boone teased. “I’d say that’s hot, but I’d be more impressed if it was a key to somewhere that had room service.”
My blood pounded, sounding unusually loud in my temples. That wasn’t the first flirting tease Boone had thrown my way since picking him up at his house earlier. The ideas he was planting in my head were making my pants distinctly uncomfortable.
Voice raspy, I said, “I’ll try and keep that in mind next time.”
Boone moved in closer, sandwiching me between his body and the door. He was smaller than me. Size, in this case, didn’t matter. I felt the heat of his body all down my back.
“This okay?” he whispered, his warm breath ghosting across the nape of my neck. “I can back up if you want. I don’t want to crowd you if you’re not ready.”
I felt Boone retreat and reached a hand back, blindly grasping his hip. “I don’t mind and fully expect to becrowdedwhenever you want. Just be careful not to crowd me into something inside the apartment. I don’t want to contaminate the scene.” That was assuming there was a scene to possibly contaminate. My gloved hands were a precaution just in case. Boone and I’d already discussed in the car that I didn’t want him to touch anything without asking, and I’d also given him a pair of disposable gloves to wear. I was pretty sure they were currently doing time in one of his many pockets. I idly wondered what charm they were cozied up against.
“Well, I suppose I can do that.” Boone backed away and I allowed the movement by relaxing my grip. “Although it will make this less fun.”
As a general rule, checking out a potential crime scene wasn’t usuallyfun.
“You ready?” I asked before turning the key.
“Ready as I’ll ever be. Just in case you’re wondering, there’s not a dead body on the other side. In fact, the whole area is pretty quiet. The nearest cemetery is about three miles south of here. It’s still accepting new clients, but it’s far enough away that it’s just a slight background hum.”
“That’s…” I hesitated.
