AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Ironclad. Just a couple blocks.”
I knew where it was—about four blocks from the parking lot across from Main Street Station, where the bus to Charlottesville stopped. Only a handful of blocks more from where Tatiana Zhirov said she’d been asked to meet her potential client and had, instead, been shoved into the back of a van. If this wasn’t tied to our case, I’d eat my fucking shirt.
“Where were you when they attacked you?” Raj asked.
Chisolm’s eyes snapped dark fire. “The seventeenth street market.”
It wasn’t a market anymore—just a fancy-ass parking lot in the middle of a bunch of restaurants. But everyone still called it that anyway.
“What happened?” he asked.
“There were a couple cars still parked. And a van. Didn’t think anything of it, but when I went past, someone came out from behind it and tried to put this fabric over my face.”
I had my phone out, taking notes.
“What did it smell like?” I asked her. So much for me not asking questions. I was pretty sure it wasn’t a rude question.
She turned those dark eyes on me, assessing. “Sharp. Chemical. Hurt my nose and made my eyes water.” Her gaze slid from me back to Raj. “I fought back.” On her arms, her fingers flexed. “Got the bastard pretty good, I think.”
“Did someone swab your fingernails, Ms. Chisolm?” Shay asked.
She started to nod, then stopped, flinching. “Yeah.”
“Did you try to shift?” I asked her.
“Fuck, no,” she answered immediately and emphatically. I must have looked surprised, because she continued. “You shift, somebody calls the cops and you get shot.” She blinked. “No offense.”
I sighed. “None taken,” I muttered. I wasn’t about to hold that particular sentiment against her—especially not today.
Beside me, Raj grimaced, and Shay shifted uncomfortably.
“Did you break free at that point?” I asked, trying to get us back on track.
“Yeah. Didn’t get too far before I smelled it.”
“Smelled what?”
“The vampire.”
“What do you mean, ‘smelled it’?” Shay wanted to know.
Chisolm pressed her lips together. “Vampires smell like… vampires. Blood and iron, but not fresh blood, you know?”
Raj was nodding, but Shay’s expression looked as confused as I felt. But shifters’ sense of smell is a lot stronger, so I was inclined to believe her. I had to ask, anyway. “Is it possible—and this is genuine question, Ms. Chisolm—that you could have been mistaken about the scent?”
“Hell, no.”
Raj also shook his head, slightly, so that I could see it. Apparently only vampires smelled like vampires.
“So you smelled it before it attacked you.”
“Yeah. I thought maybe… You know, being a Nid and all, they might be there to help me. But—” She stopped talking, her face taking on the kind of glazed-over expression that a lot of trauma victims got when they hit the most difficult part of their testimony. The part where they had to shut down or break down.
I’d seen it far too many times.
“He wasn’t… there.”
That clearly wasn’t what any of us were expecting her to say.
