The Flame Game (Magical Romantic Comedies #12) - R.J. Blain Page 0,69
an hour or two, but a team is on the way. What did you find?”
“A murdered gorgon. She’s been petrified, and one of the women has been posed to coincide with her statue. I believe she was petrified after she’d been killed. All the clothes look to be in good condition, so probably a practitioner helped with that. The sword is probably the murder weapon, and one of the statues is holding it.”
“Damn it. How do you know she was murdered?”
“There’s a big hole where it looks like she was stabbed in the chest, and the stone is likewise damaged. It’s near the heart, so it was probably quick. Even as a statue, she looks pretty dead to me.”
“All right. Step one is to fully photograph the scene. This place has been abandoned long enough there’s no chance in hell we’d get any useful footprints, but try not to walk anywhere else you haven’t already been to limit the damage to the site. Take pictures of everything, and I’ll show you how to upload them as evidence into the system once we have a few moments. Get a good face shot of all victims, and we’ll try to do a black and white facial recognition scan. It looks like this got significantly more complicated than it already was.” My husband let out his breath in a gusty sigh. “It’s as good a time as any for you to start learning the ropes.”
“I never thought I’d say working with bombs seemed a lot easier than this.” I dug in the back for my holster, strapped it around my waist, and stowed my Glock before arming myself with my phone. “Whose bright idea was it to make me a cop again?”
“Personally, I’m grateful Clemmends had it out for you and wanted to dump you with the NYPD. You have far superior co-workers now.”
That I did. “What a dick. You should have let me light him on fire and shove our marriage license down his throat, though.”
My husband chuckled while he made his own preparations, which included arming himself and zippering up his new bulletproof jacket rather than show off his resilience against the cold. I pouted over his ability to tolerate snow and the brisk wind better than I could, regretting I hadn’t gotten a scarf, gloves, and the little things that helped make the outdoors during the winter almost bearable.
Within twenty minutes, I’d freeze my ass off, and I deserved to be mocked for my failure to plan accordingly. “Hey, Quinn?”
“What is it?”
“I need scarves and mittens and gloves and a cute little hat to keep my ears warm, assuming I survive this. Winter is bad for cindercorns. There’s no fire. No fire anywhere. I’m going to turn into a block of ice before the team gets here.”
“Check the back of the SUV in my black leather bag. I anticipated your special needs.”
Huh. I really did have the best husband. I checked the back, and sure enough, there were several pairs of black leather gloves that would fit me, several scarves, and a winter hat meant to keep my poor ears warm. I bundled up, muttering over how phones were evil and I’d have to wear the pair without fingertips in order to take the needed pictures. “We need an actual camera, one that doesn’t need me to touch a screen to operate.”
“Normally, we have one as part of our work kit, but we’ll get one of our own just in case. Until the team arrives, you’ll survive using your phone.”
“But will I?”
“You better.”
The gorgon was the only victim I believed to be dead, but I struggled to comprehend how seventy-three women had been left as statues for so long. Fortunately, none of the statues seemed weathered, which offered some hope they would survive being returned to flesh. While I took pictures, Quinn handled running the facial recognition software while keeping Blizzard and Avalanche company in the SUV.
When I finished documenting everything I could, I returned to the vehicle to watch him.
“Have I told you today you’re beautiful and smart?”
“Not sure,” I replied. “I could probably handle being told again. I haven’t had time to recruit the entirety of a mental health department to resolve my self-esteem problems.”
He snorted. “You’re smart and beautiful. I wouldn’t have thought to go this far back in Audrey’s records despite having them, and I probably wouldn’t have thought to come to some little bed and breakfast, as I would have assumed it was just yet