Titan Song Dan Stout (top 20 books to read txt) 📖

“Vandie took the reins and ran with it,” he said. “Hired a full crew of rig workers, every one of us out of work since the damned feds put a freeze on drilling. We’re all better off now, too. We get medical expenses, more time off, and we rub elbows with celebrities. She’s a practical saint of the Path, that Vandie.” I respected his need to defend his boss, but I wasn’t about to change my opinion about the young Cedrow.

After a short time we came to a wider hallway with a number of doors. They had been a cluster of steel-framed outbuildings before being consumed by the festival’s labyrinth of tents. A red-uniformed patrolman lounged against the door frame. The patrol was a stocky human male with a baby face, and he was deep in conversation with a human woman who looked to be a dancer. His thumbs were hooked in his duty belt as he told some story that sent the dancer into laughter, one hand covering her mouth.

His own smile dropped away when he saw us, any small talk forgotten. Behind him, the dancer’s eyes widened, and I could track her gaze as she stared at Jax’s fearsome jaws. I suppressed a chuckle. Southerners.

“Anyone inside?” Jax asked, the small hole in his throat working carefully. I suspected he was aware of the dancer’s scrutiny, as he added less musical tonality than he normally did to the human words.

“No sir,” said the patrol, whose tag indicated his name was Worthington.

“What about the tech team?”

“Come and gone,” he said. “Cleared the site for access, when you’re ready. Body’s still on site.”

I glanced around the area. There were no other patrol cops in sight. “Where’s your partner?” I asked.

“She got sick.”

Jax pointed at the door, mandibles spread with surprise. “Is it that bad?”

“Nah, not that. Normal sick. Said she was light-headed, queasy. Ringing in her ears. That kind of thing. I’ll probably catch it in a day or two. You know how it goes. She caught a ride back to town with the tech team.”

I nodded. “It happens.”

“Oh,” he added, stooping to pick up a sealed folder propped against the bottom of the door. “They left this for you.”

I accepted the folder. CaDell rubbed his hands and said, “Well, now. Looks like you’ve got this in hand. You need me, flag down someone wearing an orange vest. They’re with our site management staff.”

The aging roughneck departed, and we entered the crime scene.

The room beyond was spacious, and more luxuriously decked out than the other backstage areas we’d seen. There were a few rolling stands of costumes, four mirrored desks, a pair of couches, a nice television set, and a dead body shoved into the far corner.

I broke open the documents left by the techs, carbon copies with faded writing that only revealed itself when I squinted. I tossed it on the dressing table and turned to the divination officers. Now that we were alone, we could speak more freely. “You got here before us. Hear anything worth repeating?”

Harris pointed at the body. “Bobby Kearn. McIntire’s drummer. Seems he was mostly respected, according to the people who kept volunteering their opinion.”

“What kind of people?” I asked. “Came with the festival crew, or hired-on locals?”

Harris shrugged. “Mostly people who want in here to do their makeup or get costumes. Haven’t heard much beyond that; we got here not too long before you.” His fingers danced, a cartilage-popping warm-up for the gruesome brand of sorcery known as divination. “I’m ready to get started if you are?”

“No,” I said. “We need to walk the scene first. Even with the techs’ write-up, it’s not the same as being hands-on.”

Harris sighed assent, and Guyer watched without comment as Jax and I established the scene. It was time to get to know Bobby Kearn so that we could find him justice.

The victim was neither human nor Mollenkampi, but another of the eight Families. Bobby Kearn was a Gillmyn. A Family not uncommon in Titanshade, Gillmyn were built bigger than an average human or Mollenkampi. While some Gillmyn had fins along their cranium, others had smooth, domed heads. Our victim fell into the latter category. Kearn had a vivid green skin tone. Buccal sacs traced his throat, and webbed hands curled half closed on the carpet. All trademarks of the Gillmyn’s amphibious ancestry. He wore denim jeans and a thin silk shirt in a muted blue. Judging from the flashy outfits I’d seen so far backstage, Kearn was not dressed for his performance. One foot had slid underneath the couch, but the other was exposed and barefoot. I crouched down and peered under the couch, confirming my suspicion—the other foot still wore a sock and shoe.

Jax hummed, mostly to himself. “Stab marks evident across his back.”

I counted a dozen or more blows from a wide-bladed implement, but the pathologists back at the Medical Examiner’s Office would let us know for sure.

“Direction of the strikes and his lack of one shoe indicate he was changing clothes—or at least shoes—when attacked. From the layout of the body . . .” I stood and took two steps away from Kearn, then turned back. “The attacker entered through the door and crept up behind the victim.”

It also told me that the killer probably knew Kearn would be in the room, likely alone and unsuspecting.

Ajax scratched a note on his pad. “Start a search spiral?”

I glanced around. “Nah, too much clutter in here. Let’s break it into sectors.”

A quick consultation with the carbon-paper sheet the techs had left listing everything they’d cataloged showed that they’d also used a sector-based search pattern. Jax and I used their nomenclature for our own walk-through to make the later write-up easier.

The search was fairly uneventful, turning up only the things you might expect in a rock band’s dressing room. Some booze, some unlabeled pills, and a ridiculous amount of gaudy clothing that probably cost far more than it should have. There were also