Fire Within - By Ally Shields Page 0,3

officer said it was a shooting?” She flipped her hair back to avoid dunking it in the coffee cup and sipped the hot liquid. When she realized Ryan hadn’t answered yet, she looked up. “Is there a problem with the cause of death?”

He cleared his throat. “There could be.”

“Why?” Ari frowned, puzzled. “What did the medical examiner say?”

“Not enough.” Ryan sighed and met her gaze. “It was a night of mistakes. The patrol officers didn’t know anything about vampire biology.”

Ari groaned. She knew what was coming. She’d had enough contact with the Riverdale Police Department over the last thirteen months to realize that regular patrol cops had limited experience with vampire deaths or Otherworld forensics. Most recruits and even experienced PD officers had never seen a vampire corpse. The vampires maintained a secretive community, and the rare deaths—usually at the hands of another vampire—weren’t reported to outside authorities, not even to her bosses at the Magic Council. The officers wouldn’t have known the basics.

Ryan was trying to explain what happened. “A crowd had gathered, and our officers were collecting witness names before anyone got away. That delayed the call to Doc Onway until they noticed something wrong with the body. They didn’t know decomp would start that fast.” He shook his head. “Why don’t they listen to me? I keep telling them we need to train anyone working in or near Olde Town. Anyway, patrol reported they saw round, bullet-like punctures to the head and the chest area. But, thanks to the rapid decay, there wasn’t much left by the time Doc or I arrived.

“So, it could have been any instrument that made a round hole. Like a stake or a pole?”

Ryan shook his head again. “Don’t think so. Bar patrons reported hearing shots. But we didn’t find any sort of weapon on the scene. The delay cost us good evidence.”

“Are they sure it wasn’t fireworks?”

“Claimed it wasn’t. And whatever it was came from the parking lot.”

“Drive-by?”

“Not likely. But look at the scene yourself.”

While the delay was discouraging, Ari wasn’t sure the arrival of the PD experts would have made much difference in the evidence. Not calling her or the magic lab was the problem. A vamp corpse began to decay within minutes and turned to bones within an hour, ashes shortly after, depending on the chronological age of the vampire. Ordinary forensic procedures weren’t much use, but Otherworlders had additional senses, magical ones, to use. The lab even had handheld sensory instruments now. That was the reason the Magic Council had recently expanded the Otherworld research lab: so these problems wouldn’t occur.

“Wounds to both the head and heart, huh? Double tapped?” Ari looked thoughtful. “Someone was thorough. Almost sounds like an execution.”

“What do you mean, someone?” Ryan puckered his mouth, his voice tinged with suspicion. “You mean Eddie. You might not want to hear it, but we got him cold on this, Ari. And, yeah, I’d say your boy wanted to be sure the vamp was dead.”

“It does look that way.” She kept her voice neutral. “What about the lack of weapon?”

“Just because we haven’t found the gun, doesn’t mean there wasn’t one. We’re still looking for any possibility—stakes, weapons made from silver—but the bar crowd and neighbors heard gunshots.”

“Any other physical evidence? Gun powder residue, brass, silver bullets?”

“Nothing. If I didn’t know better, I’d think someone had policed the area. An accomplice may have fled with the gun, but according to witnesses there wasn’t time for anything else. Residue tests on Eddie’s hands were negative, but you know we get a lot of false readings.” Ryan scowled in frustration. Ari knew he’d been lobbying for an upgrade to a better testing system, but his department was balking at the cost.

If Eddie’s test had been accurate, it reinforced a critical question. No weapon, no bullets, no gun residue. How could Eddie, a slightly built human, kill a vampire without a weapon?

Ryan’s thoughts must have centered on a similar concern. “In spite of the current lack of a weapon or forensic evidence, we have the killer in custody. Eddie confessed. And no one else was in the parking lot.”

“As far as we know,” she hastened to remind him. “You suggested the possibility of an accomplice. If you believe someone had time to get away, couldn’t there have been a different killer? And Eddie just happened to be there?” Ari was beginning to see possibilities in the case. So many missing pieces. “If there really was no one else, and there’s