All put together, it was the perfect place to kidnap a girl—or kill her.
I looked up at the security camera above the back door. It was pointed out at the parking lot, just like it should have been, but the plastic case was busted open on one side, revealing several frayed, disconnected, dangling wires. Well, that explained why there was no footage from back here. I wondered how long the camera had been out of commission and if it had been broken by some drunk asshole chucking beer bottles at it or by someone with far more sinister motives.
My phone beeped, and I pulled it out and read the message from Owen: No one remembers seeing Elissa last night. Trying to herd Finn toward the front door.
I smiled, knowing that he wouldn’t have any luck with that, and texted him back, saying that I would meet them at the front of the club in ten minutes. That would give me enough time to search the parking lot. Oh, I didn’t expect to find anything, but I had to make the effort for Jade’s sake and my own conscience. I wasn’t leaving here without doing every single thing possible to find her sister.
I had just put my phone away when I realized that the stones all around me were muttering—dark, dark mutterings that whispered of blood, violence, pain, and death.
Now, that was nothing new, since I’d actually killed more than a few people myself in this very parking lot. But these mutterings were high and sharp, meaning that they were fresh and that someone had been up to no good here very recently.
Maybe even last night, when Elissa had wandered back here.
I reached out with my magic, listening to the stones, and realized that it wasn’t the walls of the club muttering so much as it was the broken pavement under my feet. So I palmed a knife and walked forward, scanning the shadows and slowly following the violent mutterings to their source, as though they were musical notes dancing on the breeze in front of me. The mutterings led straight into the maze of Dumpsters and trash cans. Naturally. I wrinkled my nose, trying to ignore the stench of rotting garbage, and kept going. The farther I walked and the closer I got to the origin of the violence, the darker and harsher the sounds became.
Something very, very bad had happened here.
I skirted around a pile of empty cardboard boxes and found myself staring at a cluster of old, dented Dumpsters. Unlike the others, these Dumpsters had been emptied recently and pushed together like the three sides of a triangle, although wide gaps still remained at the corners. The formation created a hollow space in the center, one that was largely blocked from sight until you stepped up to the space where the corners didn’t quite meet. The mutterings intensified, growing harsher and louder, as though the musical notes I’d been following were building to a final, roaring crescendo.
My stomach twisted. I knew exactly what those sounds meant.
I eased forward. I took one step, then another, then another . . . until I could finally look through one of the gaps in between the Dumpsters.
The first thing that came into view was her long blond hair, shining like dull gold against the cracked, dirty asphalt.
My heart dropped, and my stomach twisted again, but I kept moving forward, even though I knew exactly what I would find.
Her arm was next, flung out behind her, the torn sleeve of her red dress fluttering like a feather in the winter wind. Then the curve of her back. Her long, lean, bare legs. And finally, scuffed red stilettos that barely clung to her feet.
I blinked and blinked, as if that would change the horrible image in front of me. But of course it didn’t. It never did.
A dead woman sprawled across the pavement, discarded right along with the rest of the trash.
9
I tiptoed forward and crouched down beside the woman.
Her blond hair was strewn all over her face, obscuring her features, but she seemed young and pretty, in her early twenties, just like Elissa. She was also wearing a red dress, just like Elissa had been last night.
The color perfectly matched the blood on her face.
Even through the strands of her hair, I could tell that someone had beaten the young woman to a pulp. Her face was a swollen, bloody mess, with a broken nose, two blackened eyes, and more cuts and bruises than I could count.
And those weren’t her only injuries.
Deep, ugly bruises circled her wrists, and matching ones marred her ankles, as though she’d been tied down to a chair. Still more bruises ringed her throat, each one a dark purple against her pale skin, almost looking like an expensive amethyst necklace instead of marks of death. I recognized the brutal pattern. As if beating her hadn’t been enough, someone had wrapped his hands around the young woman’s neck and squeezed, squeezed, squeezed.
Oddly enough, her hands were lying flat on the pavement, her fingers spread wide, as though she were trying to push herself away from her attacker.
I glanced around, but the surrounding pavement was empty. No purse, no phone, no coat, no sign of any personal possessions anywhere around her. She looked like a doll that a child had broken in a fit of rage and then tossed aside because it wasn’t fun to play with anymore.
Even though I didn’t want to, I forced myself to lean in even closer and study the woman’s face. I still couldn’t positively identify her, given the brutal beating, but the longer I stared at her, the more my heart sank. Blond hair, right age, red dress, last place she’d been seen. There was no denying those facts—and what they meant.
I’d wanted to find Elissa Daniels, but not like this. I might have assumed the absolute worst, the way I always did, but I’d still been hoping deep down inside that I was wrong and that things would turn out okay.
But Elissa was dead, and there was only one thing that I could do for her—and her sister—now.
I pulled my phone out of my pocket and hit a number in the speed dial.
She answered on the second ring. “Detective Bria Coolidge.”
“It’s Gin.”
“What’s wrong?” Bria’s voice sharpened, picking up on my sad tone. “Have you found Elissa?”
“Yeah. You and Xavier need to come over to Northern Aggression as soon as you can.” I sighed, more sadness creeping into my voice. “And bring the coroner with you.”
? ? ?
I hung up with Bria, stepped inside the club, found Roslyn, and told her what was going on. Then I grabbed Finn and Owen, and we all went back outside to wait for Bria, Xavier, and the rest of the police to arrive.