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Bruiser whipped his head to the house "From inside," he said

I didn’t ask how he could smell as well as I could He was Onorio There was a mountain of stuff I didn’t know about him yet

Bruiser took point and Eli fell in behind ht have objected to the positioning, but it wasn’t sexism At the moment, they had way better toys than I did My nine rip, I scanned the area, the house, the high places where a shooter ht hide

The solid-wood front door was closed but unlocked, the knob turning easily in Bruiser’s fist He took the left side of the door, Eli the right I stood out of the way, feeling useless with s The ses of the mail slot on the artificial, air-conditioned breeze Bruiser and Eli azes and Bruiser shoved the door open The two men rushed inside, split up, and stopped Eli motioned me in

Pinkie was sprawled on the horsehair sofa, her suit jacket folded neatly beside her It was burgundy today, her blouse a pale pink, like her name The pearl buttons of her shirt had been unbuttoned, the silk pushed aside, now lying curved around her rib cage, which rose high and rounded, with s far to the sides, easily visible beneath the paler pink, child-sized ca ed and harsh

Her lipstick wasn’t s Pinkie looked almost peaceful Or as peaceful as a human can look without a throat One shoulder and the side of her face had been burned to the bone Her dyed pink hair had been singed and the stink still tainted the air along with the stink of bowels released in death, the slightly sweet s vamp And still Pinkie’s expression was relaxed Almost happy A lot like most of the faces of the fifty-two people in the kill bar

Bruiser bent over her body and inspected her throat, though I had no idea what he could possibly be looking for He pulled two silver stakes and took them in one hand, like chopsticks, which le well up into my throat I sed it down, but the exhaustion was so strong that I kneouldn’t be long before I did sohly crass Or fell asleep on my feet Carefully, Bruiser lowered the stakes into Pinkie’s throat and pulled out two long black threads

I realized he was both collecting trace evidence and testing for vamp blood If vampire blood was present, it would burn and stink in the presence of the sterling The familiar sot on Pinkie I couldn’t iine a scenario--

"Hair," Bruiser murmured "He couldn’t drink so he ripped out her throat and buried his neck in the flow He left behind his own blood and hair" Bruiser pulled out a roll of ss from a pocket, removed one, and put the roll back He inserted the hairs into the bag and sealed it I just stared at the body Why had Santana coain?

Pinkie hadn’t been dead long Maybe only as long as since dawn If I had known about the property in the name of Jesreal St Anna, Royal Santana, and others, and if I had been sether with Joseph Santana as a possible way that a long-lived vaenerations, back in the day when they were still in the va Pinkie ht have saved her life Or ht Maybe But at dawn, I was too busy bandying words back and forth with the chief suckhead to think, to use my brain, to keep people alive

I shoved er and fears and misery I didn’t want to look at So deep I’d never have to look at any of it again

Bruiser said, sotto voce, "By the ser on preht be here"

"Understood," Eli said, just as softly

They were talking about Doh the lower level, little of which I had seen,sure ere the only ones there Every closet, every cabinet, every place a vaone to lair by day There were plenty of null spaces, wide gaps betalls, their presence hidden by the old-fashioned architecture: behind the kitchen wall, access was through the pantry In the floor of Pinkie’s bedroom closet, we found access into a coffin-sized hidey-hole A long, narrow roo vamps in a pinch, with access fros, and access to outside through a trapdoor in the floor

Upstairs was h all the bedrooms were as neat as pins and currently unoccupied Except for Santana’s old rooes ripped clean away, screws showing pulverized wood The straps had been replaced and were noisted and stretched, torn in two The place had been trashed, the bed torn apart, the armoire tossed across the room, and the dead vamp on the floor stamped into ashes and shattered bones, boot prints clearly seen in the rotten cloth The Son of Darkness had been in a rage And though the stench wasn’t as bad as it had been before he ripped into Pinkie, he was still on fire S, maybe

I held up a hand and stepped inside the open door, breathing shallowly, then deeper, trying to separate the smells of the day froo I really should have shifted into a bloodhound before we ca a scent pattern was gone now, buried beneath the stink of burning vaer and severe pain I shook uys in Theyunder the bed or in the bathroom, and then holstered their weapons as they studied the room

"He tore the satchel with the old papers in it to pieces," Eli said

"Soooo He ca that the contents were ruined And when he found that it had been destroyed, he had a temper tantrum"

"He took the stake with his blood on it," Eli said

I bent over the pile of vament away "The remains of the crystal that contained his arcenciel is crushed," I said "He ca" I dialed vah to a sleepy Leo When he answered, his voice was nearly purring, thick and rough with sleep