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“I’ll go first.” He didn’t love the climb up, but the pipe looked solid, and he’d climbed many a drainpipe.
Now he grabbed it and used it as leverage as he climbed up, wedging his feet into the brackets that held it in place. Fraser waited at the bottom, not wanting to strain the pipe with his weight. Ned reached the fourth floor, then leaped for the balcony, just out of his reach. He grabbed the rail, then swung himself onto the small space, narrowly missing a planter of dead geraniums, then climbed up on the far edge and leaped over to the next balcony.
He landed hard but caught himself on the edge and righted just as Fraser landed on the balcony behind him. “One-handed,” Ned said. “Good job.”
“The cast helped, but I’d prefer the stairs next time.”
“Let’s say no on a next time.” He turned to the door.
It latched at the top, inside, and again Ned wished he weren’t naked. Okay, not completely naked, because he pulled his Leatherman PS out of a zippered pocket. It came TSA approved, without the blade, but the pliers were strong enough to wedge into the top of the frame. Then, with a kick, it separated the lock from its bolts.
The door shuttered open.
Twinkle-toes, aka Fraser, landed on the rail beside him, then dropped down.
“Me first.” He put a hand on Ned’s chest.
Maybe, okay. Because the sight of a dead Shae just might buckle Ned’s knees, and someone would need to be upright just in case Hansi heard them coming.
Was waiting in the room with a hunting rifle.
Ned stepped back.
Fraser pulled out his own Leatherman, the TSA version, and this time opened the nail file.
Better than nothing, maybe. He motioned inside and Ned nodded, put his hand on Fraser’s shoulder.
Fraser nudged into the apartment, armed with his silly nail file. But really, he could go barehanded and Ned would trust him with his life.
They’d entered a bedroom, the double bed unmade, clothing on the floor, a smell emanating from somewhere that had Ned’s hand over his face.
His gut dropping.
“Just stay calm,” Fraser said, his hand over his face as well.
Because yes, it smelled very much like—
“There’s a body in the family room,” Fraser whispered, having walked through the bedroom. “Stay here.”
Right.
But Ned waited a half beat as Fraser edged out into the darkened family room. Sparse, with just a table and a lone sofa, a massive flat-screen on the wall. Streetlight gleamed through the galley kitchen out onto the wooden floor.
And in the middle of the room, a body, sticky blood shiny against the light.
Ned nearly collapsed at the sight of amalebody.
“Is it Hansi?”
Fraser knelt next the man, pulled out a Bushnell light and scanned it over the mess.
“Blond guy, reddish beard?”
“That’s him.”
Fraser’s light flashed over the body. “Throat was cut.”
Yeah, Ned saw the gaping wound, Hansi’s wide eyes as if in shock.
