Lover Unveiled (Black Dagger Brotherhood 19)

The connection got cut, and she muttered as she called up her work account. She was still talking to herself as she opened what the special agent had sent. Talk about short and sweet. The email had an attachment . . . a video file . . . and Delorean had typed out three words without punctuation: “taken last night.”

Triggering the footage, she—

Dim lighting. Crowd of noisy people in a circle. Someone in the center—

Ralph DeMellio. Shirtless.

The camera was bouncing all around, like the cell phone’s owner was being knocked into, but she knew what Ralph was doing: Underground fight club. Erika was well aware they went down in town, and for the last couple of months, she’d been expecting to get called into the aftermath of one when someone died from a bare-knuckle punch—

“Holy shit,” she breathed.

The camera panned around to Ralph’s opponent, and Erika recoiled as she got a look at the guy. The muscularity of the man’s chest was that of a professional athlete, and the tattoo that covered every inch of the skin was gang-member-worthy, the black field setting off the bony hand of a skeleton reaching forward.

“Jesus, Ralph, what were you thinking,” she muttered.

DeMellio had clearly been a hobbyist fighter, based on his build and what she’d learned after speaking with his parents. But this opponent? She didn’t need his rap sheet to know he was a killer: He was staring forward with the cold, dead eyes of a predator who had no conscience.

For a split second, Erika felt a chill go through her. Then her professional grit came back online and she watched what happened as the fight started, the pair circling each other, Ralph’s hands up while his opponent’s arms hung in a relaxed way.

When the action finally got underway—Ralph doing an approach with fists that looked like a child’s in comparison to what he was going to try to hit—she put herself in his shoes, heart in her throat, knowing what was coming next and not just with whatever happened in this bare knuckle contest. These were among the last couple of hours of the kid’s life, and she couldn’t help but think of what it had been like to sit across from his mother and father and break the terrible news of his death to two perfectly nice people.

The father had cried more than the mom had.

Erika, meanwhile, had lost it later, when she’d been home alone—

It happened so fast that a replay was necessary: The opponent dominated Ralph quickly, but something caused the man to look up into the crowd—and Ralph outed a knife and sliced that thick throat clean through.

The file ended abruptly with a wild jostling, like whoever was filming had taken off in a run along with the rest of the audience. Lot of concrete underfoot. Then a jammed-up stairwell.

It could be a lot of places downtown, she thought. But maybe a parking garage? Or the arena?

Erika played the footage again and turned up the volume on her speaker. On the second trip through, she noted that Ralph was wearing the same jeans he’d been killed in; she recognized the designer-made rips and frays. And as for the girl he’d been found beside? It was difficult to see much in the crowd, but it wasn’t going to be hard to freeze-frame images and double-check for her presence.

They needed to know more about the source for this footage.

As the moment came for the opponent to look up and go still, Erika stopped the play and closed in on that harsh, cold face. Then she did the same just as the knife finished its arc.

Hard to believe that the man lived through that, and under normal circumstances, she might think that Ralph’s death was caused by one of the guy’s crew, as payback. But not with the track record of so many others with their lovers and no hearts in their chest.

But what happened to the opponent? she wondered.

There had to be a body associated with that arterial bleed, and it was going to show up, sooner or later.

Just another part of the mystery.

The following evening, after the sun had sunk below the horizon, the outside lights came on around Nate’s neighborhood, but not all of the humans were staying home. Friday night. Time for dinner and a movie. Topgolf. Comedy clubs, the theater, a poetry slam.

Nate was leaving, too. The moment First Meal was over.

He had his excuse to go to Luchas House all thought out: He was going to call the farmhouse and tell them that he was looking for a jacket that he might have left in the garage, and could he come take a look.

As he replayed his casual, no-big-deal request in his head—for like, the hundredth time—he was vaguely aware that his parents weren’t talking. Murhder and Sarah were in their regular spots at the table, and the eggs and bacon, bagels and fruit, were standard issue for this meal, but neither of them were saying a thing.