Spin the Shadows (Dark and Wicked Fae #1) - Cate Corvin Page 0,54

reaching to the Unseelie land below… and then the screams of surprise, shivering through the night.

The heat of a burning body on its trunk. The salty-copper taste of blood soaking into its soil, tainting the ground.

It had felt moonlight on its leaves and death in its roots.

I pulled my hand away from the tree, feeling sick to my stomach. Thank you, friend.

A hand steadied me as I straightened up. “What did it say?” Robin asked, his brow furrowed.

I shook my head. “Not much we can’t tell from this, unfortunately. The older the tree, the less interest they have in the living world. All I could tell is that it was at night, and there was a lot of bloodshed before the victim was burned. The tree tasted it.”

But Robin didn’t look disappointed. He squeezed my hand and released me. “Thank you, Miss Appletree.”

One of the Garda was at his shoulder, writing down everything I said. “It corroborates one thing: the Ghosthand has been slicing or beating his victims before burning them, lately.” The female Garda’s pale lavender face was both drawn and familiar: she’d been there the night I found the other corpse. “Not only is he moving outside his usual window, but he’s become far more violent about the manner of death.”

I started to retreat to Gwyn, carefully stepping around the body, but paused. Something silver was shining on the victim’s scorched left hand, slightly warped, but the pattern was still visible.

I knelt down closer, drawing in a sharp breath.

I regretted that breath, filling my lungs with the scent of blood and burned meat, but my stomach was flipping for another reason. “Boss.”

Robin was at my side in an instant, and a rustle of cloth and the scent of juniper cologne told me Jack had followed as well.

They surrounded me as I pointed to the ring. “Turn it, please?”

Jack was already wearing powder-blue gloves. He reached for the hand, gently turning the ring, and I felt even sicker at the black smudges already on his fingertips.

But the wavy pattern on the ring was unmistakable; I’d seen it only last week, on a hand that had given me a drugged drink.

“I know this man,” I whispered. “This is Fionn.”

Robin tensed when he recognized the name, but my eyes were already drifting up to the singed hair. If it was less frazzled, uncoated in dried blood… yes, the shade would be a deep emerald green. His face was unrecognizable.

My boss was speaking in low, rapid tones to the lavender Garda when I stood up, feeling dizzy. I heard the name ‘Fionn Daire’ and tried to listen, but my mind was fuzzy.

Only two weeks ago, Fionn had tried to date rape me. Now he was destroyed beyond measure.

There was a tiny pinch of bitter satisfaction in my heart.

Someone led me away from the body, back to the privacy of the oak tree. I blinked up into eyes of pale ice that didn’t seem so cold anymore.

“How did you know this man, Briallen?” Jack asked, his tone gentler than I’d ever heard it.

Gwyn stood on my other side, blocking off a reporter who was trying to hold a mic over the silver gate. He flicked his hand, and the mic went tearing off into the street, where a bus ran it over and crushed it into sparkling bits of plastic.

The reporter swore and vanished.

Both Jack and Gwyn exchanged a brief look of amusement that vanished as soon as I started talking.

“A week or so ago, I went out to the clubs.” It was impossible to keep the burning rage out of my voice, remembering Fionn and how proprietary he had been, so convinced that vapid Cress Willowtree was a nymph he could use up and throw away with no repercussion. “He drugged my drink. Robin got me out before… before anything else could happen.”

A flash of pure rage crossed Jack’s face, there and gone so quickly it was like it had never existed. “Was this on the job?”

I nodded, then gave him a narrow-eyed look. “Don’t pry for more than that.”

Jack shook his head. Salt-white hair brushed his high, sharp cheekbones.

My eyes couldn’t help but drift back to Fionn’s corpse. “I’m glad he’s dead.” I didn’t realize I’d spoken it out loud until something touched my cheek and was gone.

“Perhaps the Ghosthand has done us a favor for once,” Jack said with a tight smile. He opened his mouth to say something else, still looking at me with that odd light in his