Page 44 of Deadly Lineage
Officer Johns gave a deep chuckle. “No guarantees but it held me. Just be careful where you step, and fair warning, inside’s not a hell of a lot better. Looks like the roof’s been leaking for ten tofifteen years. There’s a lot of rot and stink. Might want to breathe through your mouth.”
I frowned. It already stank outside, and yet Johns obviously believed it was better than inside. That did not bode well. Then again, finding a body in the middle of a Mississippi summer didn’t indicate sunshine and roses.
“Thanks for the warning,” I answered before carefully climbing the front porch steps. They creaked and groaned but somehow held on. Thankfully, so did the porch.
“Veer right,” Harrison’s voice came from deeper inside the house. “The floor’s more stable there.”
Considering I didn’t want to wind up in the basement or crawlspace, I followed her advice.
“The stairs seem solid but I’d still be careful.” Harrison offered more advice, and this time I could parse she was upstairs.
I followed her drifting tone, passing another officer on her way down the stairs. Her skin was pale and she had a hand held over her nose. I couldn’t really blame her when the scent of decomposition slammed into me, finally overriding the heavy odor of mold and decay.
“Fuck,” I murmured into my coat sleeve. My stomach roiled and only by the grace of many years in homicide did I manage to keep lunch down.
“You sort of get nose blind after a bit,” Harrison said, her voice much stronger now that I was standing inside the doorframe, looking into the room with our latest victim.
“You sure about that?” I asked, moving into the room carefully. I would have asked Harrison to open a window, but considering every window was already broken, I didn’t think that would help a whole hell of a lot.
Despite her words, I noticed Harrison was standing beside one of those broken windows. Considering there wasn’t much ofa breeze outside, I wasn’t sure how much it helped. but followed her lead.
“Sorry to haul you out here, O’Hare.” Harrison did sound oddly contrite. “I’ll apologize in advance for subjecting you to this if I’m wrong.”
Funny thing was that Harrison didn’t sound like she expected to offer up more apologies.
“Captain Cicely didn’t tell me much other than that you’ve got a shifter body. What makes you think it might relate to my case?”
Harrison shrugged, her eyes trained on the deceased victim I’d yet to carefully analyze. “Mostly my gut.” She pointed a finger in the victim’s direction. “You ever see one die like that?”
I took a closer look, and what I’d originally chalked up to decomposition took on a different shape. Taking two steps closer to the body only improved my mental image slightly while making the odor ten times worse.
“What am I looking—” Suddenly, the image made sense. Sort of. “Is that a partial shift?” That was the only way the angled limbs, pointed muzzle, and fur mixed with human skin made sense.
“I think so.” Harrison sounded as unsure as her words indicated. “That’s the only thing I can make out is that our victim is some type of mammalian shifter if the fur is anything to go by. The long canines and shape of the snout make me think canine or feline shifter.”
“Shit.”
“Shit indeed,” Harrison backed up my sentiment. “I’m not a shifter expert, but interspecies relations 101 taught me that”—she pointed at the body—“should be impossible.” When shifters die—”
“They revert back to their humanoid shape,” I finished.
“Exactly. So, what the hell caused that?”
I wasn’t certain and remained silent.
“I want to find out what kind of shifter he is before reaching out to anyone. I don’t know if this will cause a panic in the shifter community or not. Right now, I’m not willing to take that bet and thought keeping it on the down-low as long as possible would be best.”
I couldn’t fault Harrison’s logic, but still wasn’t certain if this death connected to my current case. Given the anemic autopsy reports on Mosely and Noland, I asked, “Any obvious cause of death?”
“Hell if I know,” Harrison answered. “But if you’re asking about blood, obvious wounds, and the like, then no, there isn’t. This appears to be a dump site, so no blood doesn’t really rule anything in or out. I’m still waiting on the coroner to get here.”
“Who’s on duty?” I’d never before hoped it wouldn’t be McCallister. I did now, though, and was even more disappointed when Harrison told me that’s who it would be.
“How long ago was he contacted?”
Harrison glanced at her watch and frowned. “Long enough that he should have been here by now.”
Dr. McCallister wasn’t the only one we were waiting on, and soon I heard Boone’s disgruntled voice wafting from downstairs. “Gaia, it smells nauseating in here. Franklin? Where are you? Don’t you dare make me walk through this Gaia-forsaken house to find you. Shit! Did you know there are rats in here?” Despite inquiring about our location, Boone’s voice strengthened as he climbed the stairs. “I don’t mind rats on principle, just when they scare the shit out of me by popping up where I don’t expect them. And here I was feeling sorry for those stray cats I saw outside. They’ve got a veritable feast in here if they’d just put in a little effort. Maybe they’re just lazy,” Boone finished with a grumble.
