Demon's Vengeance The Complete - Jocelynn Drake Page 0,14

brows bunching over her nose. “Coroner estimates that he’s been dead three days.”

“Three days?” Trixie repeated in horror. “How could no one notice for three days?”

I shook my head, frowning down at the tattoo books. “Doesn’t he have anyone else working for him?”

“Two artists actually.” Serah paused and pulled out a little notebook from an interior coat pocket. “Nicole Quelsen and Ben Breen,” she read when she’d found the right page. “Both have been in San Diego since Tuesday at the Ink Pot Convention.” Serah started to continue to the main workspace, tucking her notebook in a pocket, but suddenly stopped. “Is it strange Kyle didn’t go with them?” she asked, looking at me.

“No. Kyle hated to travel. He attended only those cons that were within two hours’ drive of Low Town.” That and the Ink Pot Convention wasn’t a big tattoo artists convention. Most on the East Coast used it as an excuse to go out to the West Coast for a vacation under the guise of work.

As we stepped into the main tattooing space, my first thought was at least he still had his head. Unfortunately, Trixie immediately lost her stomach. By the sound of it, Trixie ran out of the room and grabbed a small wastebasket along the way. I was more disturbed by the fact that I didn’t get sick. But years of living in the Towers and fighting to survive had pretty much killed my gag reflex. I was growing more detached from it all, as if the violence couldn’t touch me.

Kyle’s body sat up against a tall mirror that had spider-webbed when he hit it. A large black pool of blood had dried beneath him while his guts were spilled into his lap from where his stomach had been cut open. Kyle’s face also was beaten and bruised badly from where the killer had taken a meat tenderizing mallet to it before dropping it at Kyle’s feet. What struck me as strange was that the mallet was in the tattooing room, when it normally would have been kept in the back for crushing certain potion ingredients. But then maybe it wasn’t so strange. The whole room was a chaotic, haphazard mess of items that had been tossed aside when they were no longer needed.

But the worst for me was seeing Kyle stabbed in the heart with his own tattooing gun. Was this the act of an angry customer? Had Kyle’s carelessness finally gotten him killed? If so, he wouldn’t be the first and probably not the last. Tattooing was dangerous business.

“Have Ben and Nicole been contacted?” I asked when Serah returned. She had chased after Trixie while I stayed locked to the spot.

“Yes. They’re flying back in the morning. Ben is part fey and doesn’t travel well at night.”

I nodded. Why rush? It’s not like they could help Kyle now.

At the sound of Trixie’s footsteps, I turned to see her slowly come back into the room looking paler and a little unsteady but determined to see this through. Her eyes flicked to the body for a second before finding my face. Reaching into my pocket, I pulled out a peppermint and handed it to her.

She managed a weak smile as she took it with trembling fingers. “You’re always prepared, aren’t you?”

“I try.” I didn’t tell her I used a tiny spell to summon a peppermint from the bag of peppermints sitting on the nightstand in my bedroom. It wasn’t important. The peppermint would help with the nausea and the smell.

With Trixie on firmer footing, I turned to Serah. “You had something for us?” The sooner we answered Serah’s questions, the sooner I could get Trixie out of this nightmare.

“The design is here.” She directed us to a counter with a couple pieces of paper on it. The first was Kyle’s original sketch, which was about half the size of a standard sheet of paper and was largely an abstract piece with bold and swirling lines. There were some images, like a knife, embedded in it but it didn’t make much sense to me.

“This isn’t good,” Trixie said in a low voice. Serah and I both looked over at her to find her chewing on her bottom lip in worry as she stared at the design.

“You recognize it?” Serah asked.

“It’s used in Alpha Conversion potions.”

Using the tip of my index finger, I carefully turned the paper slightly, taking another look at the drawing. My stomach sank as some of the lines finally tugged some memories