Already Dead (Laura Frost FBI)

CHAPTER ONE

Detective Scott Waters jumped out of the car while the engine was still running, leaving his partner cursing behind him. He didn’t want to wait. He was always being told he was too impatient, but what else was he supposed to do when someone’s life was on the line?

He darted down the street towards the opening of the alleyway, where he could already see a man standing slumped against the wall, his head down. He looked up at the sight of a police officer running towards him and straightened, pointing wordlessly, with a pale face and one single outstretched finger, down the alley.

Scott nodded at him without breaking stride, skidding around the corner and then coming to a complete halt. It was pretty clear that they were too late to make a difference.

Scott cursed mentally, wanting to hit the wall with his fist but very aware that he was being watched by a member of the public. When he’d heard the call over the radio, that someone had found Evelina Collins and she looked like she’d been attacked, he’d been hopeful that the person got it slightly wrong. That she was still alive and could be saved. They’d all been hoping that she would turn up alive from the moment she was reported missing.

But, this…

There was no mistaking it.

Evelina was dead, and maybe long dead. Scott stared at her neck, the way it gaped open like some kind of cartoonish second smile. It didn’t even look real. He hadn’t seen many bodies, working out here in Pacific Cove. Murders didn’t happen often here.

Still, he knew it was real.

He reached for his radio to call it in, wishing he hadn’t run out ahead of his partner. This was weird, and he had no idea what he was supposed to do.

“Waters?”

Scott turned slightly as his partner finally caught up, coming to a stop beside him. “What the hell are we supposed to do with that, Davis?”

Davis stared at the scene in front of them, looking just as confused as Scott felt. “Uh… I don’t know. Bag it up as evidence?”

“How are we supposed to bag a flame?” Scott asked. “You can’t put a burning candle in an evidence bag.”

“Right,” Davis agreed. They both stared down at it a moment longer. The candle was set right in the middle of Evelina’s chest, her dead, pale hands holding it in place like some kind of morbid recreation of a funeral pose. Not that funeral poses weren’t morbid in the first place. It was slowly going down, wax melting and dripping down the candle to pool on her chest. “Well, maybe we let it burn out and then put it in an evidence bag.”

“Isn’t it…” Scott gestured vaguely. “I don’t know. Contaminating the scene? What if there’s evidence on her hands or her clothes?”

“Then blow it out!” Davis said, with renewed urgency, motioning his younger partner forward.

Scott sprang a step ahead, then realized he was going to have to get down on his knees next to Evelina to reach it. He dropped quickly, trying not to touch anything, and blew quickly until the flame went out. Then he breathed for a second, and the smell hit him: the sickly-sweet tang of blood, the scent of death, something unique and undefinable. Nothing else smelled quite like it.

He turned quickly to take a breath of the air flowing in off the seafront and into the alley, so he wouldn’t throw up.

“What does it mean?” Davis asked, still standing safely far away to avoid inhaling anything himself. Scott looked up at him, glanced over the body one more time, and then stood up.

“I don’t know,” he said. “But I’ve never heard anything like it. We better call it in.”

“Right,” Davis said, reaching for his radio instead this time. “I’ll get the chief down here. I think we need someone with a bit more experience on this one.”

Scott said nothing as Davis stepped away to make the call, covering a hand over his own radio as it spit out the same words. He was looking down at Evelina, at the wax still cooling on her hands.

He had a very bad feeling about that candle – about it maybe not being the only one they were going to find.