Stormrage (2 page)

"I think we found Bob's clothes," she said, laying them aside.

Aspen frowned and looked at the pile and the other items drooling out of the bag.
"How did you find that? We already combed the alley."

Raven smiled humorlessly.
"This is why I get all the weird ones, kid. I find the clues everyone misses."

She pulled the clothes closer and let her senses do their work;
the man had been terrified, but there was more than that. Cigarette smoke, sweet pine mixed with juniper berries and ginger. There was also the very strong scent of urine and blood, type A positive.

"Why would this guy smell of pine and juniper berries?"
Raven asked the world in general.

"Dry mar
tini with an olive," Aspen replied without hesitation.

Raven looked over her shoulder at Aspen, her eyes glowing in the darkness.

"What?" she asked, trying to keep the surprise out of her voice.

Aspen looked uncomfortable under Raven's gaze.

"That's how a good martini smells," she replied. "I'm legal, you know. The girls and I hang down at the Isle of Night every Thursday."

Raven blinked and looked at Aspen again.
She'd always assumed the young intern was somewhere around seventeen. Under the pale makeup, the girl possessed an elven quality that made her seem very young.

She added a couple years to the kid's age and turned her attention back to the evidence.
"Right…so we have a guy hung in Death Alley who wears designer clothes. He had been drinking fine martinis and was frightened enough that he peed himself."

"Well, he could have done that last when he was hung," Aspen said.
"The force of the hanging and the decapitation could cause him to void himself."

"Yeah
, but then we would be dealing with dirty diapers," Raven replied. "He would void everything, not just urine."

Aspen nodded, "yeah, good point, Ray.
So what does all this tell you?"

"Not
much," Raven replied in annoyance. "Someone hung a guy on meat hooks and then cut his head off after stitching my name in his chest. The perp is a psycho, but I get that all the time."

She began going through the man's pockets;
she pulled out a wallet, keys, Swiss Army knife and an oddly-shaped ink-pen and laid them on a cloth that Aspen hurriedly placed on the ground next to her. She examined each item, sniffing them gently. The keys smelled of iron and on closer inspection she found that one of the keys was very old, probably dating back to old Chicago, and she could make out a fingerprint on the knife.

"Aspen, I need everything, especially this key and the knife, dusted for prints," Raven said.
"I also need to know if this key matches anything we've come across before or what lock it might go to."

"Got it, Detective,
" Aspen replied, gathering the items and bagging each one for processing.

Raven stood and pulled off h
er gloves, which she dropped into a spare evidence bag.

"These have some of his
blood and urine on them," she said, laying the bag with the others. "Process his clothes and the gloves and see if there is anything interesting in his fluids. I doubt he was poisoned, considering the high-velocity spatter on the wall, but you never know. You can start by typing his blood as A positive."

Ra
ven then turned and walked back toward Levac, who had finished tape-lifting the vic.

"What did you find, partner?"
she asked.

Levac shook his head unhappily.
"Not much, and what I found was weirder than our usual level of weird," he said. "Fibers that are probably from his clothing, some odd powder in the hair and leather on his chest…and signs of extreme sexual torture."

Levac lifted Bob Doe's genitals and showed Raven the bruising and the series of nails put through the man's scrotum.

"Oh my Lord!" Raven said in surprise.

"Yeah.
Somebody didn't like our friend very much," Levac said.

Raven switched to a fresh pair of gloves from Levac's pocket and then reached down to tug one of the nails free.
Levac winced at the sucking noise the nail made as it came free and looked away. Raven ignored him and raised the bloody nail so she could see it more clearly. The nail was made of brass and was just over three inches long. The tip was cut with spiral grooves, somewhat like a screw, but not as deep, and the point was razor sharp. The length was covered in sticky, coagulated blood. Raven raised the nail to her nose and sniffed gently. She detected the coppery sent of blood, the smell of brass, obviously from the nail, and a hint of iron and semen.

"Anything?"
Levac asked, knowing his partner's sense of smell was legendary.

Raven dropped the nail in an evidence bag and placed it on top of t
he pile. "Nothing helpful, yet. But this poor bastard was alive when they did this to him. Someone really didn't like him much.

"Which leaves us with…?"
Levac trailed off, leaving the question hanging in the air.

Raven shrugged and pulled off her gloves with a loud snap.
"An unexplained headless guy with lots of clues that lead nowhere."

She
straightened and walked over to where Aspen was running the print she'd found through the Automated Fingerprint Identification System or AFIS for short. She bent down to peer over the young woman's shoulder and asked, "Get any hits?"

A
spen shook her head. "Not yet. It was just a partial so I am having a hard time getting enough points to match. But don't you worry, if this guy is in the system I'll find him. The boys and I will finish up the scene. We've got this, you and Ripper go and do whatever it is you do, you know, to bring the weird ones to justice."

Raven blinked at the purple haired woman.
"Ripper?"

Aspen rolled her eyes
and frowned up at Raven. "Buffy? You know, the slayer? Giles' nickname was Ripper because his name was Rupert. Rupert is totally uncool."

Raven looked over her shoulder at Levac, who was picking up the candy and food wrappers he had dropped while processing the corpse.
She loved him dearly, but a Ripper he was not. She turned back and shook her head at Aspen.

"Don't call him that," she said.
"So far he's stayed alive with me because he listens and keeps his head down when the shit hits the fan. Start calling him Ripper and I just know he will get himself hurt. Okay?"

"Okey dokey, Ray,"
Aspen replied with a mock salute.

Raven made a face at the kid that said, 'I mean it!' and she watched Aspen's face pale.
When she was sure Aspen had gotten the message and Levac had finished cleaning up his litter, Raven turned away and walked back toward him.

"Co
me on, partner," she said. "There isn't much more we can do here. Take me home, it's been a long day."

Levac nodded and led the way back to his tiny car.
A few moments later they were cruising through the deserted streets of Chicago. Raven had leaned the old seat as far back as it would go, which wasn't much, and was slouching, lost in thought as the city's ever-glowing lights flickered past and reflected off the window. She barely noticed when the car came to a halt, part of her assuming they'd reached a stop light.

"Um…
Ray?" Levac said, his voice dead calm.

"Yeah, Rupe?"
Raven asked, part of her mind on the new case, the rest on a certain blond vampire who'd given her to an evil so dark it still gave her nightmares.

"We've got company,"
Levac replied, pulling the new Beretta 93R he'd been issued for working with Raven from his shoulder holster.

That got the tall redhead's attention and she turned to look forward.
Standing in the street were a dozen men dressed in black body armor and what looked like armored trench coats. They stood in formation behind a tall, slender man dressed in a similar uniform. He stood with his arms at his side, gold-plated Desert Eagles clutched in his gloved hands. No…not man. No man had that shock of white hair. Vampire.

"Shit," Raven muttered.
"Rupert, stay in the car."

Levac looked at his partner in surprise.
"Stay in the car? Have you seen the kind of heat they're carrying?"

Raven n
odded and opened the door. "Yeah. So stay in the car and if this goes bad get the hell out of here. This isn't a police matter."

Levac continued to stare at his partner in a mixture of anger and confusion.
"Ray…you know I always have your back," he said, opening the driver's door. "Whatever this is, it is a police matter, most of that hardware is illegal, even in Chicago."

Raven
knew she didn't have time to argue. The vampire's men were about ready to open fire on the Met, she could feel it. "All right, fine! Stay behind the door and cover me. This antique steel should protect you. I don't see anything with more power than the Desert Eagles he is holding and I just know those will be aimed at me."

Levac nodded and knelt on the pavement behind the driver's door, his new pistol aimed at the vampires blocking the road.
Raven walked out in front of the Nash so the lights were to her back, silhouetting her and drawing attention from Levac.

"Hello, Xavier," she said in a quiet voice.
"Long time no see. I'd say mom sends her love, but she pretty much hates your guts and wants to put your traitorous head on a spike outside the house. Nice group of renegade assholes you've found."

Xavier lau
ghed, a musical sound that humans and even some vampires found hypnotic. It was one of his powers and he loved to use it. The noise just annoyed Raven, like a small dog yapping in the distance.

"How is dear old mother?"
Xavier asked, walking forward, his guns held at the ready.

Raven stood
her ground and watched Xavier approach. He always had been a cocky bastard, but he was swaggering even more than usual.

"Better than your father, Whitey,"
Raven replied. "Did you ever find a dustpan big enough to hold all of him? He left quite a mess downtown."

Xavier's face darkened and Raven saw his fingers twitch on the triggers of his Desert Eagles.
"Killing Father violated the Totentanz, little sister," Xavier hissed. "You will be punished for what you did to Lord Strohm."

"What
Strohm did violated plain old-fashioned morality, not to mention about eighteen Federal laws," Raven replied. "And if you want to talk vamps, he threatened the Mistress of the City, which carries a death sentence under the Totentanz. As Fürstin it was my duty to put him down. As your sister, it was my sheer pleasure. Your father was a psycho just like you."

Xavier ignored the verbal attack on Strohm and stepped forward.
"You cannot always protect mother, dear sister."

Raven could see in his glowing blue eyes the vampire was only a few heartbeats away from trying something stupid; something that might get Levac killed.
Her next decision was simple. With the speed of a Master vampire she drew her Automag, stepped inside Xavier's guard and pressed the barrel against his chin.

"You've never been fast enough to take me, Whitey," she said, her voice laced with menace.
"No one would be stupid enough to send you to kill me, everyone knows I'll send you home in a plastic baggie. So stop posing and tell me what you want or mom will be sending one less lump of coal this Christmas."

Xavier smiled, showing fang.
"Do you really think you can take me and all of my friends, dear little Ravenel?"

Raven smirked and thumbed back the Automag's hammer.
"I'm always willing to try. I think the real question is, do you want them to be scraping you off the pavement with a toothbrush? Tell me what you want and I why shouldn't send one of Thad's special hollow points out the back of your skull."

Xavier paled then, a neat trick for a
n albino walking corpse. "My master ordered me and my men to deliver a message. Lady Valentina has one week to vacate the palace or the master is coming for her. Starting tomorrow he will begin killing one member of the Blood every other day until she surrenders you and herself for punishment before the new Court."

"Master?
What Master?" Raven asked. "I left Strohm in a pile of ash and if you are talking about Du Guerre, he hasn't got a snowball's chance in hell of taking mother in a war and he knows it. What Master wannabe is pulling your puppet strings, Whitey?"

Xavier only smiled
, showing fang. "I have delivered my message. Do what you will. I will answer no further questions."

Raven looked into her brother's eyes and choked back the bitter anger growing in her belly.
There was no point in threatening or killing Xavier. The look in his soulless eyes made it clear he was ready to die for whoever was giving the orders. She pushed him away and took a step back, the Automag still leveled at his head. "Tell your master this, dear brother. If he touches any of the royal family, especially mother, I will find him. And when I am through, there won't be enough of him to fill a matchbox."