Pure Blood_ A Nocturne City Novel - Caitlin Kittredge [18]
save me
My first order of business was to grab the bartender. “Do you have a key to the women’s bathroom?”
“Who the Hex knows. What of it?”
“I need a key!” I demanded, hitting the bar with the flat of my hand. He fished in the cash register and handed it to me, along with a sour look.
“Better bring it back … and no shooting up in there!” he warned. I ran back to the ladies’ room and locked it, preserving the crime scene as best I could, which amounted to practically nothing. Public bathrooms are the absolute worst place you can drop dead, for everyone concerned.
Then I went to the Fairlane, got my badge and gun, and called Mac.
“Get CSU on the wire,” he said after I’d given him the ten-second version of finding the body. I left out Trevor’s musical styling and the fact that I wasn’t, at the present moment, on duty like I should be.
“And call your partner,” McAllister added.
“Mac, no,” I moaned. “I can’t deal with her right now. Can’t you come instead?”
“You know what I had planned for this evening, Wilder? Drinks with a nice girl from the clerical staff at the Thirty-third. You know what I’m going to be doing now?”
“What?” I asked, knowing that I had him.
“Having drinks with the nice girl from the Thirty-third. Morgan gave you a partner, Wilder. You’re a grown-up; you don’t need me there to referee. Go fly free and all that.”
I squeezed the phone and it gave a pathetic chirp.
“I’m late,” said Mac. “Have you finished thinking evil thoughts about me so I can hang up?”
“Yeah, go. Have a good time,” I muttered, ending the call. I dialed dispatch and had them put me through to Dr. Kronen’s private number. Then, after Bart had the address of Belladonna, I pulled up Shelby’s contact number and called.
“O’Halloran,” she answered, sounding perky as a cheerleader for Dallas.
I pushed down the urge to break things and said, “Shelby, it’s Luna.”
“That’s what my caller ID says. I thought you were off duty.”
“Well, the dead guy in the bathroom of my boyfriend’s club changed my mind. How fast can you get over to the university?”
I could practically see her composing her speech for her promotion to lieutenant. Witch.
“I’ll be right over!”
“Take Devere and loop around behind the campus. Belladonna bar, you can’t miss it.”
She had already hung up.
I went back to the bathroom and stood by the door, tapping my foot as I waited for Bart and Shelby to arrive. Trevor was still onstage and people were milling and drinking without a care in the world.
Scenting the crowd yielded me nothing except the overwhelming urge to force deodorant on every person in the place. A sensitive nose is rarely a blessing, in practice. There are a lot of smelly things and people in this world. But tonight, none of them scented of blood, which left me at a dead body and a dead end.
I caught a flash of khaki and blond at the doorway and saw Shelby flash the bouncer her shield and then shove him out of the way. “This is a mess!” she shouted at me over the heavy synth of Trevor’s music. “We need uniforms in here to secure the scene!”
“Nobody’s leaving until the set is over!” I shouted back. “And I’m thinking causing a scene in a place like this is the last thing that will help the investigation!”
Shelby took out her phone and spoke quietly into it, turning back to me with a self-satisfied expression. “The head dispatcher is a friend of the family. She’ll have every available uniform here within ten minutes.”
“How fabulous,” I snarled, turning the key in the bathroom door. “Shelby, if I didn’t want anybody to listen to me I’d take a goddamn vow of silence.”
“I’m not following,” she said, pushing past me and pulling on gloves next to the body. I slammed the door after us and bolted it, drowning out the club noises except for the heavy heartbeat of bass.
“Partners respect each other,” I told her, pulling