“Thank you.” Bel tried to stand, but Eamon caught her waist and yanked her back into his lap.
“Nope.” He cemented her against his chest despite her resistance, the playful struggle more flirt than fight. She’d spent so much time resisting his pull at the beginning of their relationship that it felt unnatural to surrender without at least the pretense of defiance, but it was a ballet they both thoroughly enjoyed.
“Hey, I have a question for you?” Eamon said when his contact answered his call, and Bel fell limp against his chest to listen. It was a quick conversation, and by the time he hung up, she already knew it hadn’t been helpful.
“He isn’t familiar with Neptune’s Ink.” Eamon kissed her hair. “Why did you want me to ask?”
“I want to know what I’m walking into,” she said. “How much danger will I be in when I walk through its doors? Because I went into a doctor’s office and ended up dead according to the news. So, I was hoping your friend could give me an idea of what to expect.”
“Do you want me to come with you?” He sobered, all signs of flirting vanishing from his gravel-rough voice.
“Olivia will be with me.”
He glared down at her.
“We’ll be armed.” Bel smoothed his eyebrows until they relaxed. “But I promise to hit the panic button if we need backup.”
Eamon ran a finger over her book charm necklace, the simple metal blessed by both a witch and stolen government tracking technology.
“Hey. I promise.” She cupped his jaw. “But I’m probably being overcautious. I mean, what good are their tattoo guns?—”
“Machines,” he corrected.
“What good are their tattoo machines against my real gun and my very real aim?” She pointed imaginary finger guns at him, and in the spirit of the moment, Eamon threw his hands up in surrender.
“You’re right,” he teased, grabbing her fingers and yanking her against his chest. “What good is anything against these?”
“I have the cause of death,”Lina Thum said as Agent Barry finally joined her and the detectives in her office. “And thank you for sending me the extra help. We were able to make it through more than one autopsy because of it.”
“You’re very welcome.” Barry set the coffee tray on the desk, and the women gathered their orders before they settled in for the news.
“Well, this isn’t a surprise, but cause of death was drowning,” Lina said. “There were microscopic findings of foam in both women’s airways and signs of pulmonary edema, a condition caused by too much water in the lungs… and we also found water in their lungs.”
“Did he drown them in the lake before sealing them inside the mermaids?” Barry asked.
“No,” Lina said. “The water in their lungs tested positive for trace amounts of chlorine.”
“So we’re looking for someone with a pool?” Olivia asked.
“Maybe?” Lina said. “The chlorine wasn’t strong, so maybe a poorly kept pool or a small body of water that the killer was trying to keep somewhat bacteria-free.”
“We didn’t see signs of bruising during the autopsy,” Barry said. “How did he drown them if he didn’t hold them underwater?”
“Filled a tank they couldn’t climb out of.” Bel shrugged, trying yet failing to stop the memories of six floating Anne Blaubarts from pushing to the front of her mind.
“These poor girls.” Olivia’s face paled. “What a terrifying way to leave this world… were they…?” She met Lina’s gaze with the unspoken question they all feared the answer to.
“No,” Lina confirmed, and the entire room collectively exhaled. “They were not sexually or physically assaulted, and the tox screenings came back negative. They weren’t drugged, or at least they weren’t drugged immediately before death. However, he coerced them into sitting for these tattoos, so the healing process would’ve made sure all traces of sedatives burned from their bloodstreams.”
“So he could’ve drugged them to force their compliance while he worked, and then he let them heal before drowning them in something like a pool with a lid?” Olivia recapped.
“Unless he found other ways to keep them still,” Barry said. “Fear is a powerful agent. Find their fear’s pressure point, and every human alive will eventually cave.”
“Drugs or fear, it doesn’t matter; both are paralyzing,” Lina said.
“You know what else is paralyzing?” Bel said, suddenly back in Abel’s basement, her bruised ankle changed to the bed. “Hope. If someone hopes they’ll survive, if they hope they’ll be set free, they’ll fall into compliance. Or if they hope they can con their captor into a false sense of security, they might be convinced to do anything. It’s what I did.” She lowered her gaze to avoid meeting the three pairs of pity-filled eyes boring into her. “When Abel took me, I woke up wearing different clothes with a chain locked around my ankle. He drugged me. He violated my privacy. I was a chained animal for him to play with, and despite my training, he had the upper hand. I couldn’t bulldoze my way out of that basement, so I tried another tactic. I played along. I didn’t fight. I let him keep me like a pet. I smiled. I ate his food. I looked him in the eye. I held his hand, and then I choked him until he fell unconscious enough for me to grab the keys. Hope that I would find my opening to escape, that Eamon was looking for me kept me going, but it kept me compliant. These girls could’ve been praying they’d survive captivity.”
She fell silent, forcing herself to meet her colleague’s gaze, and while she expected sympathy, Olivia’s expression made her pause. The women remained locked together, as if Olivia were seeing Bel for the first time.
