Slashback (Cal Leandros, #8)(10)

I hadn’t seen anything. It had come down out of thin f*cking air as far as I could tell. It hadn’t been from one of Grimm’s gates. Those I could feel in my gut, twisting and adrenaline-packed, and invisible they were not. No, this wasn’t him. I’d already looked up to see nothing. Now I looked back down and saw why the impact had sounded as if the body had fallen into mud instead of on once-immaculate marble tile.

It had been skinned.

I hadn’t seen that before. I’d seen people gutted, their throats cut; I’d seen mutilated corpses and even dismembered remains. Parts of a meat puzzle. You could put those kinds of puzzles back together, but they weren’t ever the same. And neither were you. With every new horror, you thought that was the end. You’d seen enough. Nothing, no matter how new under the sun it was to you, would be able to rattle you again. You always thought it. And you were always wrong. I probably should’ve been grateful for that. That was the nature of being human. I was still human, some of me anyway, no matter what the depths of me said.

I moved back toward it and studied the god-awful mess at our feet, trying to feel gratitude for my spoonful of humanity. I tried and failed. Right then I would’ve preferred a monster’s indifference.

There was leaking red flesh, patches of rippling fat like small clumps of yellow grapes, the smooth shine of muscle in the stairwell light, dead veins and arteries the color of ash, and the pale flash of bone from surgically clean slashes over the chest between small scarlet mounds. The eyes weren’t gone, but they were burned to the black of charcoal. The lips, the only skin still intact, were the smooth pink of a woman’s lips. They were peeled back from the teeth in agony, showing she’d been alive when the skinning started.

No, no f*cking gratitude in me at all.

Goddamn it. I kept the Eagle ready and used my other hand to run over my face, quick and hard. Coming to terms. All right. As much as we had on our plate already with Grimm planning to remake the world in His image—could I get a Hallelujah—I was forced to admit Ishiah was right. There was no way around it now. Something had to be done, especially as we were obviously subjects of special interest. Nothing says “Hi! Nice to meet ya!” like a dead, tortured woman crashing on top of you. A basket of muffins and a balloon bouquet couldn’t match that for the goddamn personal touch.

I exhaled and ignored the pungent smell of death with long practice. “Oh yeah. I forgot to mention: Ishiah says there’s a serial killer in town.” I checked the stairs rising up and up above us again. “And it’s not human.”

*

Niko wasn’t pleased I’d planned on holding that information back. He was less pleased about that than about being targeted by a supernatural serial killer for reasons unknown. To be fair to him, that wasn’t new. We’d been targeted by another supernatural serial killer a few years before—Sawney Beane. But we’d attracted his attention by chasing him first—a case for which we had been paid. Whatever this son of a bitch was, why he had a hard-on for us, I had no idea.

We’d checked with Promise to make sure she was all right. The body was too tall to be her, but on the inside I couldn’t tell vamp from human, except for the teeth and they retracted at death. I didn’t blame Niko for calling her. It was quicker than running back up twenty flights to make sure you weren’t off on the height by a few inches. She would also arrange for the police to be called as they already knew about the bodies and a killer, just not a supernatural one, but she’d give us a few minutes until we were done. With his katana still in one hand, he used his other to take pictures with his cell phone to better research what type of monster was into skinning people alive. He’d remarked on the three cuts in the chest. All three crossed each other, but whether it was supposed to be a mathematical shape or a letter, I had no idea. The murderous * must not have made it past kindergarten in monster school.

I left my phone in my pocket. I didn’t want pictures, I sucked at research, and if I had pulled it out, Niko would’ve most likely inserted it in a place I was saving for my colonoscopy when I turned fifty. My caution didn’t help. Once we were out of a cab and home, my plans for the whole Niko having a life having taken a nosedive, he used words instead. The second we made it through the door, it was all over for me.

“You somehow thought in your minuscule mind that it was a good idea to keep the fact to yourself that another Sawney Beane is turning the city into his hunting ground?” he demanded.

Although it had been only a lie of omission and an extremely short omission at that, I gave him the truth now. “It was for your own good.”

“My own good?” he echoed, not impressed with my logic. “That is what an adult tells a child, an impatient adult, and it’s certainly not what I told you when you were young.”

He was right. He’d always explained exactly why things were the way they were or why things had to be done. He hadn’t once brushed me off with an “it’s for your own good.” Even as a kid he’d been a better man than I was now. It didn’t bother me a bit. Watching out for Nik was more important than being a better man.

“You were a good big brother. Still are, which is why I wasn’t going to tell you. It really was for your own good.” I dumped my jacket on the battered couch. “If the dickhead hadn’t dumped a body on us”—less metaphorically than I’d have liked—“it would still be for your own good.”