appeared as bluish, blotchy discoloration of the skin where the blood had pooled. She listened closely as Brandt continued, indicating regions of Tiger’s body with a short metal pointer as he spoke.
“Lividity does not appear anywhere that the body has been in direct contact with the ground. He was found sitting up, slumped against a wall, but if you look at the pattern here, you’ll see there is no lividity in the relevant parts of his legs. He died lying down on his back. He was positioned sitting up at some later time.”
Brandt loved to expound, and she was grateful for it; she picked up all kinds of useful information from his mini-lectures.
“Now ask me what else is interesting about this,” he said.
Barrie tensed up. “What else is interesting about this?” she asked softly.
He held her eyes with his piercing ones. “I’m not entirely sure, but it looks to me like the unfortunate young man may have had some help.”
“Some help dying?” Barrie stammered. “So, he was murdered?”
“You’re getting ahead of yourself, fair Rosalind.” There weren’t many people Barrie allowed to call her by her real name, but Brandt was one. It was his Shakespearean quality; everything he said sounded vaguely Elizabethan. “But these bother me.” He aimed the pointer at some faint purple circles at the top of Tiger’s arm. They looked almost like—
“Fingerprints?” she asked, feeling a prickling at the back of her neck. “You think he was held? Forced?”
“Could be. On the other hand, it’s common for addicts to help each other shoot up. And an addict bruises easily, so it may mean nothing. I am merely pointing it out as an anomaly, and in fact...I never said it. But it’s something to keep in mind.”
“Now, moving a body is a crime, but it’s not necessarily murder. If he was shooting up in a gallery and someone didn’t want the cops around, they may just have dumped him. But I don’t think so. I think someone wanted this kid dead. He definitely didn’t stick that needle in his own arm.”
“Murder...” Barrie said, her thoughts far away. And she knew exactly where to go to find out what she needed to know. “I have to go,” she mumbled.
Brandt raised his impressive eyebrows. “I’m cutting him in a half hour. You don’t want to stay?”
Barrie shuddered. True, she regularly worked with the undead, but the actual dead were a different story. And she had no desire at all to see Brandt slice into Tiger.
“I need to get out to Hollywood to see someone. Can I check back with you about the tox screen and whatever else you find?”
“Of course. And I’ll make sure your soon-to-be-cousin knows.”
Barrie had to blink to understand that Brandt was referring to Brodie McKay.
“Thanks. And, Tony...” She had to swallow to get the words out. “I’ll claim the body if no one else does. I’ll make sure the Council gives him a proper burial.”
He smiled at her sadly. “You’re a good kid, kid.”
* * *
Barrie was both buzzed and depressed as she left the coroner’s building. She could feel the adrenaline rush of a mystery, the thrill of the hunt; at the same time she was grieving Tiger’s death and the possibility of evil intent behind it, which kicked her protective Keeper instincts into high gear.
If a shifter had been murdered on her turf, there was going to be hell to pay.
Chapter 3
There were two main east-west boulevards that ran through the district called Hollywood: Sunset Boulevard and iconic Hollywood Boulevard itself. Despite the tourist trappings of the day, at night the Boulevards had a shadowy, sleazy side. Between those thoroughfares every conceivable taste could be serviced: girls, boys, top, bottom, pain, pleasure...and some tastes inconceivable to most human beings.
This no-man’s-land was where Tiger’s body had been found, and where Barrie was headed next. She knew Tiger ran with another young prostitute who called himself Phoenix, and he would be her best bet for information. The street kids often banded together for protection and community; Tiger and Phoenix had cribbed together, sometimes in one of the appalling motels that lined the side streets of Hollywood, sometimes on the stoops of shops or warehouses late at night. Whether the boys’ intimacy translated to actual sex was an open question; Barrie suspected the two had been lovers as well, in some ambiguous way, but drugs often killed any real sex drive. Phoenix was a shifter, too, but nowhere near as skilled as Tiger was. She reflected that