Devil Hath Come (an FBI/Romance Thriller ~book 7) (30 page)

“What’s her name?”

The woman pointed. “That’s Dyana Carlos.”

“As soon as this is over, I’ll make the home visit
to give them the bad news,” Elizabeth stated.

The woman shook her head. “I’ll do it. I think it
will be less cold from someone that will sympathize with them.”

Callen didn't like how the chief assumed Elizabeth wouldn’t care. That was so far from the truth. He was about to say something, but she
had already moved on with the conversation.

“
Have at it. If you enjoy doing a notify, then you can take it.”

“Thank you
, Director. I think that in this situation, it’s for the best.”

Elizabeth
gave her that and refocused on the scene. “The ground shows some wear over here,” she said, pointing to the crushed grass not far from her boot. It was one of the few spaces where there wasn’t any blood.

Callen crouched down
and stared at the ground. Being Native, his grandfather had taught him to track anything that wandered the woods, and a killer wasn’t much different. “I think he stood here,” Callen offered. There weren’t any shoe marks, but the grass had the distinct impressions of weight bearing down on it for a good deal of time.

Elizabeth
stared over at Callen and tried to picture the killer during the crime. If the nutjob had been standing where Callen had said, he was now behind her head. Could the murderer be changing up his technique? She moved closer to his side to get a different perspective.

“See the markings,
angel?” he asked, pointing with his finger. “This looks like a footprint.”

It was hard to ignore the nickname
that Callen had just thrown out, but Elizabeth wasn’t going to comment, since Ethan had just kissed her. “I think you’re right,” she answered. “Those crazy mad tracking skills are coming in handy,” Elizabeth teased.

Callen winked. “I aim to please.
I’m glad my Native-ness isn’t just aesthetic.”

Before she could comment,
there was the crunch of tires and Elizabeth heard her name.

“Hey, Doc,
I’m glad you could make it,” she stated, checking out her ME and the agent not far behind him. They looked exhausted and yet pink from the rush of blood. Yeah, it wasn’t hard to figure out what had been going on in their room. It looked like Cupid found another pair of Feds to shoot with his arrows.

“Sorry, I was in the shower, and I knew you’d want to check the scene out first anyway. I generally have a little time bef
ore you get all bitchy,” Chris stated, already pulling out his protective gear from his kit.

She laughed. “Agent Austin, help the team. Since this is a shrubby area, we need to look
through it all. Christina will give you a general idea where to start.”

Cyra nodded and was more than happy to escape
her boss’s speculative stare.

“I’d like our ME to assist if
that’s possible,” the police chief stated as she crossed her arms across her chest.

Elizabeth shrugged. “I have to defer this one to our doctor. He’s in charge of the lab and knows how I like it done. You need to
make that request to him.”

Chris was in a damn good mood. “I can use someone to help with the autopsy. It’s not easy to do it alone. He can be my Magnus.”

The woman looked confused.

“He misses our anthropologist,” she
clarified. “The two of them are inseparable. You can inform Doctor Parrish that he’s more than welcome to jump in and assist our ME. Doctor Leonard will be transporting soon, since he generally doesn’t like to dig around at the scene too much.”

The woman hustled off
to go do the notify, but before she even made it halfway to her car, she turned. “I’d also like copies of all the reports too,” she tossed in, figuring why the hell not. The woman was being pretty accommodating today.

Elizabeth shrugged. “You’ll get them,” then her voice dropped
low enough for only her team to hear her. “When little baby pigs fly around me singing bacon related lullabies.”

Callen snorted and Chris offered her a fist bump.
There was only so much leeway the cops would have when it came to Elizabeth, and Chief Lowry was apparently at her max.

“So, Christopher, tell me all about it,” Elizabeth stated.

The man looked over at her with his mouth hanging open and a horrified look on his face. Surely, their friendship had a limit, and he wasn’t expected to discuss his relationship with her too.

Whitefox found
it all amusing. “Doc, for clarification, she meant the body on the altar, not the naked one that was in your bed this morning.”

There was nervous laughter. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Elizabeth shook her head. “Chris, here is just a little piece of advice. Don’t cover up the blatantly obvious. It only gives away the answer. When you immediately went with sex as the meaning, it proved it was bouncing around your brain.”

“Oh.” Well
, crap!

“Besides, Cyra’s partner already
told us that you came to the door butt nekid,” Callen added.

He looked appalled. “I was wearing a towel
!”

Elizabeth offered Callen a fist bump. “And we just got more
details out of you by switching up some of the information. You know better than this. This isn’t your first day at the ‘
Elizabeth Blackhawk’
rodeo. It’s more proof what’s going on in your noggin. You, my friend, are off your game.”

What could he say to that?

“How about we discuss work?” she offered.

Chris shifted his focus towards the dead woman
, and he began doing his job. His brain began working it, and he allowed everything else to fall away but the victim before him. “It looks the same as the other one. Her hands were restrained, and I don’t see defensive wounds,” he paused, offering nothing more.

“
You’re going to make me wait on everything else, aren’t you?” she inquired.

“Yep.”

“All because I was busting your ass?”

He grinned at her. “Yep.”

Elizabeth and Callen began laughing.

“Fair enough,” she said. “Can you at least let me have the love note from the killer?” she inquired, pointing at the woman’s throat.

“That I can do,” he answered. Cautiously, he opened it and bagged it to pass to his boss.

As she read it, Elizabeth was pretty sure both men in her life were going to go nuclear.

Now you have two
of my women. I’m watching you and before long it will be you on my altar, Elizabeth.

“Well, the good news is the media hasn’t gotten wind of this
yet. If they do, it’s going to be a circus.” Elizabeth sucked it up and handed Callen the note. As he read it, his face went red with anger.

Yeah, he was going over the deep end.

“Over my dead body will you be found like that,” he hissed. “When I find this asshole, I’m going to make him bleed for even thinking this shit.” Besides the anger, the only other thought in his head was that he would offer up his own life before the killer even got close enough to Elizabeth. They had children, and he didn't want them growing up motherless.

Callen Whitefox had
been there and done that, and it sucked. He was still fighting back from the damage it caused in his life.

She patted his arm reassuringly. “I’m not going down like this, Cal. Breathe and stay focused for me.”

That was going to be easier said than done and he knew it. This killer was a dead man if he even tried for Elizabeth.

Sensing the tension, Doctor Leonard tried to get the man to refocus. Sliding
his fingers around in the throat wound, he inspected the cut. “Yeah, it’s relatively the same depth. I’d say likely the same weapon too, but I’ll know more as I get her back to the morgue.”

Suddenly, he stopped. “We go way back, right Lyzee?” he asked
as he kept his voice low.

She paused
from entering information in her phone to look up at the man. “Yeah we do, Chris. We’ve been together a long time. What’s up?”

“I need a favor.”

Well, this was a first in over a decade. “Is this going to be a boss related one or a friendship kind of deal? Because if it’s personal, you know you only need to ask. If this is work related, I can’t promise, but I’ll try to the best of my ability.”

He told her all about the altercation at the door
of the hotel. “Cyra said you were aware, but I’m getting that sick feeling in the pit of my stomach that Agent Rickard is a problem just waiting to happen.”

Elizabeth motioned to her husband, who was watching her from across the scene. Immediately, he
crossed towards them and stood protectively at her side.

“Yeah, b
aby?”

She pointed at Chris. “Tell him what you just told us.”

Chris once more voiced his concern. “I know it’s not proper protocol. I’m a big stickler for rules, and I’ve ridden you three repeatedly, but I really need to keep Cyra away from him. Is there any way you can help me out?”

Elizabeth would do it in a heartbeat, but she tossed it to Ethan, since he was the one
who generally had issues with needlessly breaking the rules.

“We can take her out in the field with us. We’re doing an interview today
, and she can tag along. We have to head to ‘
Mystic Memorabilia’
to discuss Scarlet Red working there.”

“What about Rickard?” Chris inquired.

Ethan contemplated it. “I’ll have a little talk with him and go from there. I need to mull it over in my head and find the proper way to handle it. I just can’t send him back without a reason. I’ll work on it.”

“Thank you for this.” At least Cyra would be safe
for now. It would help him focus. “I owe you one,” he stated.

Callen began laughing at that one. “You just handed your soul over to the
devil.”

They all looked over at him.

“Come on! That was very apropos considering…”

Blackhawk
shook his head. “It looks like Callen needs sensitivity training,” he stated. “He’s been hanging out with a very bad influence lately.”

They all looked at Elizabeth.

“Seriously? You’re going to blame me for Callen. I want you both to think back to your childhoods. Who here has stolen a car?”

Ethan and Callen raised their hands.

Chris tried not to laugh.

“Who here has been arrested for breaking and entering?” she continued.

Again, both men raised their hands.

“Who here has…”

Ethan stopped her. “I think you’ve proved your point.”

“I rest my case,” Elizabeth said. “I didn't corrupt the man. This is all a Blackhawk gene thing. I’m just the one
who potentially passed it on to our children.”

Now
, Chris started laughing. He really loved when the three of them came together. There was always something funny revealed about them.

“Now, back to the
job,” she stated as she pointed to the now bodiless altar. “It all looks the same to me,” Elizabeth added in frustration.

Chris
looked up from his clipboard. He was logging details as his team carried the woman to the van. “It’s definitely a Wiccan altar.” He pointed at the different objects. “Over here you have the elements being represented. North is Earth,” he stated, touching the cauldron of dirt and blood. “South is fire.” He pointed at the candle covered in splatters. “East and west were moved, probably for the body to be placed in the center, but here’s air,” Chris motioned to the incense stick that symbolized east. Then he gently picked up a shell filled with now bloody water. “This is supposed to be indicative of west.”

They all watched him and were
thinking the same exact thing. Their ME was smart, but this was a little too weird of a topic to be an expert in all of the sudden.

“A Satanist doesn’t use the elements and call quarters,” he added. Then he po
inted down at the ground. “The killer used salt and in Wiccan rituals, it’s meant to protect the circle and keep anything unwelcome out.”

Elizabeth was getting more and more suspicious as the conversation continued.
Her bullshit detector was going off big time.

Chris
went back to logging information on his clip board. “I’d hazard a guess, that the killer at one time was a practicing Wiccan or was at least trained in it before he decided to go the other way. Too many things here scream white magick.”

“So he’s incorporating them both. Will that work when you’re worshiping the
devil or is it strictly a witch thing?” Elizabeth asked, setting him up.