Page 62 of Death and Do-Overs

What should have been a somber moment was broken when Levi barked a laugh.

“It’s not him.” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “It’s not Otis.”

He’d seemed so sure as soon as he’d spotted the dead guy’s legs. Confused, I said, “That’s great.”

“Those are his shoes, which isn’t a great sign, but this isn’t him. That means Otis could still be alive.”

The shoes were fairly typical white sneakers. I looked harder and spotted small doodles along the rubber, like I used to do during classes in school. How old exactly was Otis? How old was Levi for that matter? I’d assumed mid-forties, like me, but I didn’t actually know. I knew almost nothing about him at all, yet I was allowing him to worm his way past my defenses.

“I hope Otis is alive,” I said.

He gave me a smile, this one less sad.

I looked at the dead guy.

There was a knife jutting out of his neck, likely his cause of death. But it was his face that kept me staring.

I knew that face—the crinkles next to his eyes, the thin lips, the regret so deeply etched into his being that it seemed to emanate from every pore.

A voice whispered through my head, the dead man’s voice.

“No other choice,” he’d said.

A color flickered—yellow.

I tried to make sense of the yellow. The only thing that came to mind was crime scene tape, but that didn’t feel right.

The rest of it did.

“This is the guy who broke into our hotel rooms,” I said. “He’s the one who took Nie.”

“I concur,” Levi said. “I noticed that mole on his forehead during the break in.”

Again, he’d sensed something beyond my own perception. I couldn’t say so now, or I’d have to explain the specifics of how I knew this was the Nie-napper.

If this man was Nie’s killer, and someone had killed him, did that mean there were two murderers in Nevermore? Or did thatmean this guy was attempting to kill a second time, and his latest victim wasn’t as easy to kill as he expected?

Levi dug through the dead guy’s pockets.

I downloaded a blacklight app on my phone that Rose had used before and shined it on the body. The familiar glowing pattern appeared on his skin, vines wrapping up his neck and all over his face. They also wound down his arms, which was interesting. I’d bet the vines snaked all over his body.

Levi shot me a questioning look.

“It’s an Anchorbriar Chains,” I said. “It’s a curse that binds people to a location. It was on Nie, too.”

“What else did you learn from Nie?”

Lots. Not enough.

“Check his mouth,” I said.

Levi pulled down on the dead guy’s chin, reached in there, and pulled out a scarab, just like the one that had been in Nie’s throat. Since he was able to reach it with his bare hands, it wasn’t as deep in there as Nie’s.

“Serial killer’s calling card,” I said. That also implied whoever killed Nie the first time wasn’t this guy. The original killer was definitely the person who killed him.

Levi wiped a finger across the jade scarab. “There’s hair on it.”

I leaned in for a closer look. It looked like animal hair, and too light for the black shadow-like fur this guy had when he turned into…an underworld gorilla or whatever it was that he turned into.

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