Bear This Heat (A BBW Shifter Romance) (Last of the Shapeshifters) (3 page)

The summer had so far been unusually hot. The hottest day of the year had already been recorded a couple of weeks earlier, peaking at just under fifty-three Celsius, and she was fairly sure the scorching summer was not yet done. No, that oppressive bitch had a lot left in store for the residents of Salty Springs. She asked herself a question, as she had done many times before: Why the hell would anybody choose to live out here?

Blue lights flashed on two police hatchbacks in the middle of Lester Street, a narrow road lined with houses, one indistinguishable from the next, save for a child’s pushbike here, a swing there, or a basketball hoop in the driveway.

Sasha pulled up next to the two police cars that were parked at odd angles, bonnets facing one another. She sat in her car for a minute, calming her nerves. She closed her eyes, rocked back and forth a little, the cotton-clad cushion beneath her lumpy against her bum. She was preparing herself to deal with officers she knew, but now as their superior, as well as the sight of the deceased Charlie Kinnear.

It wasn’t so much that she was afraid of seeing a dead body – though the visage was always grim, and definitely more than a little creepy in the hair-raising, goose-bump-inducing way. This certainly wouldn’t be her first. The town wasn’t known for its low crime rate – it wasn’t a place you let your kids play out in the driveway unsupervised. Well, some parts were, but most of it wasn’t.

What concerned her was that this would be her first time working a scene, and being in charge. It was daunting, and feeling tired, groggy, and very definitely hung-over, she knew she wasn’t in the best state of mind to even be doing the job, let alone a good job.

She reflected: In cases where people have been killed, no job after the fact was ever good enough.

Hearing a tap at her driver’s side window, she turned to see a familiar face. The police officer, a young and angel-faced man, moved back to a respectful distance while Sasha climbed out of her car carefully. She knew if she stood up too quickly, her headache would come heaving back in full force.

“Detective Inspector Sasha Monroe,” he said, grinning and nodding, the tone in his voice congratulatory, but with a hint of humor.

“Hey, Jack,” she said, returning the smile. The boy was in his early twenties, brimming with enthusiasm, and prone to foot-in-mouth moments. He was a nice kid, even if his edge was a little dull. “Mr. Kinnear inside?” She nodded with her head at the dark and narrow house.

The young police officer nodded gravely, the smile fading from his face as he remembered there was a dead member of the community not twenty meters away.

“Yes, he is.”

“Bad?” Sasha asked, making a face, and placing her front teeth on her bottom lip. She felt then how dry her lips were, and dug out her lip balm. She carried it everywhere. It was essential out here.

He blinked, and nodded again. “Yes.”

“They haven’t told me much of anything, yet.” She took a deep breath, her mind doing its best to run through the standard crime scene protocol. “You’ve got everything taped up?” she asked, but she could already see the police tape cordoning off the house.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Coroner on his way?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Don’t call me that,” Sasha said quietly. She turned her back on the sun, already formidable. Sweat beaded on her upper lip. “It makes me feel old.”

“Should I call you sir, then?”

“Why not?” Sasha said. She smiled briefly. “It is the twenty-first century, after all. They do it in the military now.” She took a breath, and put a hand on her hip. She didn’t want to ask it, but she had to. “Touch anything?”

The young officer recoiled visibly. “Of course not.”

“Come on, Jack. I’ve got to ask.”

“Didn’t you always hate it when the D.I.’s asked you?”

“Yes,” Sasha admitted. “I did. Touch the body?”

Jack laughed, shook his head. “Just the wrist to check for a pulse.”

“Not the neck?”

He stalled for a moment, scuffed his feet against the ground, kicking up sand that drifted away like a puff of orange smoke.

“Maybe you’d better go inside.”

Sasha looked at the young man. She hated that he was being cryptic. That was always a bad sign. “Right. Who called it in?” She looked at the two flanking houses, and saw a face in the windows of both.

“Um, hold on.”

“Okay,” Sasha murmured, watching him flip through his pad. “Take your time.”

“A Mrs. Sally Clark over here,” he said, pointing at the house to the left. “Called in saying she saw a large animal outside of her house. That was at two in the morning.”

“I wonder what Mrs. Clark was doing up at two,” Sasha murmured. Her instincts told her that wasn’t a particularly useful avenue of speculation, but she almost felt put on the spot now, as though she was supposed to be doing
more
, considering
everything
.

“So we responded, my partner and I, but we didn’t find anything.”

Sasha blanched momentarily. “Wait,
you
were here last night?”

“Just hours ago.”

“But you didn’t see or notice anything.”

“No, sir.”

Sasha paused. Being called ‘sir’ was a bit weird. “Okay, so who called Charlie Kinnear in?”

“Over there on the right, Mr. Sands – I’m sure you know him.”

“I do.” He ran the free local paper in town.

“Called it in,” the young officer finished.

“Right, I’d like to talk with him. Could you go over there and ask him to get dressed?”

“I’m sorry?”

“I can see he’s still in his robe. I’m not in the mood to see a hairy paunch this morning, so ask him to get dressed and come outside. I want to have a chat with him.”

“But it’s half past five in the morning.”

Sasha put her other hand on her other hip, shifted her weight as though considering how she should respond to him, but was unable to stop a look of irritation from rippling across her face. “So what?”

She watched as Jack nodded quickly and then began walking to Mr. Sands’ house, nearly tripping over an empty bottle of beer on the pavement.

Sasha shook her head. Etiquette was the first thing to go whenever there was a crime scene to work. Jack should know that.

After taking a few moments to prepare herself, she then ducked beneath the plastic, reflective crime scene tape and entered the house. She nodded at a uniform, a man she recognized but didn’t know by name. They had never worked a shift together.

“In the bedroom, Detective Monroe.”

“I’m sorry,” Sasha said. “I can’t remember-”

“We’ve never formally met, but every cop in town knows you by now.”

Sasha swallowed. “Thanks.”

It was not exactly what she wanted to hear, given now that she was in charge of what was certain to be a fairly high-profile death, considering it happened right next door to the local paper merchant.

On top of that, there were usually only three likely outcomes when a body was in the bedroom, and two of them were bad. The third one was worse. The first and best case was that the death was due to natural causes. Old age or a heart attack. Then came accidental deaths. Choking, accidentally-induced heart-attack, auto-asphyxiation.

The third most likely possibility, and the worst, was murder.

At least, that was what Sasha’s experience was telling her. She ambled down an unlit corridor, the old wooden floor creaking in complaint beneath her feet. She wanted to somehow stall even longer. Maybe she should go outside and talk to Mr. Sands first?

No, she’d have to work the scene eventually. She sucked it up, took three decisive steps, had one look at the bedroom through the wide open doorway, and then turned around, hand over her mouth. Sasha wasn’t the squeamish type – she wasn’t going to vomit – but a storm of dizziness now overcame her.

“Oh my God,” she said into her hand. She fell into a squat, making sure her back didn’t press up against the wall. Old man Kinnear was missing most of his neck.

“You alright?”

“Yeah,” she said, not looking up at whichever of the uniforms had asked. “I’m fine.”

“Pretty horrible, eh?”

“Yes,” Sasha agreed. “Horrible.”

“We’ve been talking,” he said then. “It looks like an animal did it, right? Because it’s really messy. But then you look around, and nothing’s been disturbed, right? Surely an animal would go for the rubbish bin. I took a look, and there’s left over food in there!”

Sasha looked up at the police officer. He had his hands on his hips, thumbs tucked into his belt. “Did you touch anything?”

“No,” he said, putting his hands up and shaking his head. It was quite obvious to Sasha that he was doing his best to mask a swell of indignation. She didn’t particularly blame him. “No, of course I didn’t touch anything. It’s just weird, don’t you think?”

“How did you get in?”

“The front door.”

“It was unlocked?”

“I told you, we didn’t touch anything. It’s not my first day, detective.”

“Right,” Sasha said. “Sorry.”

“No need to say sorry.”

“So the door was unlocked?”

“Yes.”

“But you opened it?”

“I used a glove. And just two fingers.”

“Good,” Sasha said, nodding. They’d be able to print the knob. “Then why do you think it was an animal?” Sasha got to her feet, cocked her head to the side. “I mean, like you said, nothing was touched.”

“Did you see old man Kinnear?”

She nodded.

“That’s how I know. I mean, how would a man even do that? Like, I can’t really think of a tool that could do that, and the way the blood is splattered doesn’t suggest multiple wound inflictions.”

Sasha tilted her head at the officer.

“I read a lot of forensics books,” he said.

Sasha agreed with him on the splatter pattern. It wasn’t messy enough for multiple blows. “Why did you say man? Could have been a woman.”

“Just saying,” the officer said. “I didn’t mean anything by it. But rumor has it that Mr. Kinnear, uh, swung the other way.”

“What rumors?”

“Oh, you know, you hear things.”

“Really?” Sasha asked. “I haven’t heard that.” The policeman didn’t say anything, and offered only a shrug. “Right. Well, anyway, thank you. You can go now.”

“Want me to call anyone else? Coroner’s on his way already.”

“No,” Sasha said. “I’ve got it from here. I’ll make the calls. Thanks for the help.”

“No problem, detective. Oh, and good job at that meth lab.”

Sasha looked at the police officer. She had tried not to think about it. “Thanks.”

“I mean it. Really. Those fellas were bad, and meant business. You did good.”

“I shot at people,” Sasha said. Her voice was quiet. “Injured two of them, and nearly killed one of them. Even if they were criminals, I don’t feel particularly glad about the whole thing.”

The officer shrugged. “You don’t shoot, then you wouldn’t be here right now.”

“Yeah,” Sasha said. She eyed the officer. She knew where she recognized him from now. “Hey,” she said. “You were first backup to arrive, weren’t you?”

“Yeah,” he said.

“Sorry. I didn’t remember. I’ve tried to sort of put that day out of my memory. Why did you say we’d never formally met?”

“Because we haven’t. I was assigned to traffic control soon afterward. Didn’t see you for the rest of the day. Anyway, don’t worry about it.”

“Thanks, I guess. I mean, for getting there so quickly.”

“Don’t worry about it. We watch each other’s backs, right? See you later.”

“Yeah. See you later.”

Watching the police officer go, Sasha steadied her breathing, and then turned back toward the bedroom. Ignoring the lifeless body of Charlie Kinnear as well as she could, she saw that the officer was right. Nothing looked like it had been disturbed. There wasn’t all that much in the bedroom, and Sasha noticed a film of dust lying atop the bedside table. Not much in the room ever got touched, moved or cleaned. There were few obvious clues.

At least he was killed in his sleep, Sasha thought. No, she hoped.

She left the house then. She would have to wait for the coroner, anyway, and she was having a forensics guy bring down the necessary gear. She didn’t want to stand around and stare at the victim’s open neck.

Walking toward the house on the left, where Sally Clark lived, she noticed the woman looking out of her window at her. Sasha waved, smiled, and gestured at Mrs. Clark’s front door. The older woman nodded, and a minute later, was standing in the open doorway.

“Would you like a cup of coffee?”

Sasha closed the gap between them quickly, and nodded. “No thank you, Mrs. Clark. Truthfully, I would love a cup, but we’re not to accept anything from anybody.”

“Ah,” the old woman sniffed. “Corruption. Caffeine kickbacks. Luxury beans.”

Sasha smiled. “You get the picture. Anyway, just want to ask you to go over what you told the officers.”

“Like I said, saw a big animal. Dog, maybe? Called you people. By the time they arrived, animal was gone.”

“You called the police because of a dog?”

The woman bristled. “This wasn’t just
any
dog. It was huge. Had a big bushy tail, and a snout as long as a bottle. Never seen anything like it round here.”

“A number of people own big dogs.”

“Yeah, well this wasn’t one of those.”

“Okay,” Sasha said. She looked to her side, saw the road already shimmering with heat. “Anything else?”

“Nope.”

“Nothing? So you saw or heard nothing within the last two hours or so?”

“Don’t think so.”

“Are you sure about that, Mrs. Clark?”

“There was a man. I think he was jogging.”

Sasha widened her eyes. “When?”

“Oh, I don’t know. You know, I lose track of the time.”

“But this was after you saw the large dog?”

“Yes.” The woman nodded slowly. “I think so.”

Sasha’s temper strained against its leash. “Okay. Why didn’t you tell the officers this?”

“I didn’t think it was important.”

“Mrs. Clark,” Sasha said. She took a breath. “Never mind. Anyway, so you saw a man jogging after you saw the dog. I presume this was also after the police came and left?”