“Fresh.”Andy said, looking pale.
“—haven’t been dead that long,” she agreed.
“Memories?Like who did this?”Jace said, looking intrigued.
“Shit!”Chayton said again, as if it was the only word he could remember.
“You’re a Were,” Sophie snapped at him.“Act like it!And you’re the ones who started this!”
“You’re, uh, you’re not gonna tell anyone, right?”Andy asked.
“Why?Worried that your Alpha wouldn’t be happy?Then maybe don’t go searching out dead bodies!”
“We weren’t searching—”
“I was,” Chayton said, swallowing.“Only I didn’t know I’d find this…”
“What did you expect to find?”Jen asked, her eyes closed.“And what was his name?”
“Does that help?”Jace asked.
“Sometimes,” she murmured.
“Ludovic,” Chayton said thickly.“Ludy.He was a reseller.Made some potions, sold others, including Punch when he could get it, and occasionally dealt in body mods.I thought he might know something about whoever killed that guy in the grocery.Lia’s out of it right now, but…”
“You wanted to find him for her,” Jen said softly.
“How?”Sophie asked.“You’re not an investigator.”
Chayton shrugged uncomfortably.“No, but being on the streets, you hear things.”
“Like what?”
“Like everybody’s scared.And not just because of the war.There’ve been other bodies found recently, three or four over the last month, and those are just the ones I know about.”
“Three or four?Like the guy at the grocery?”
“No, like this one.”He looked down, then quickly away.“Hearts ripped out.And other people who just… went missing.Not that they don’t down here all the time, but every time it happens now, people don’t think, hey, maybe he moved on.They think, hey, maybe he got his heart ripped out, and we just haven’t found the body yet.”
“I don’t know,” Jace said thoughtfully.“The other body was Reaped, right?But this one… he’s mostly still here.And he’s just a mage.He doesn’t have anything interesting anyway.”
“But maybe he did in his stash,” Chayton said.
“So the Reaper is removing the competition?”
“Bro, like I know!”
“It sounds like you knew a lot, but didn’t tell Lia,” Sophie accused.
Chayton shook his head.“I was going to, but everything happened so fast, and she got hurt before I had the chance.And she… she looked bad, okay?And Cyrus—I’ve never seen him like that.I thought, if I could take something off their plates, maybe… it would help.”
Sophie’s face softened, and she reached out to touch his arm.“You still shouldn’t have gone alone.What if somebody ripped your heart out?Then we’d have to tear this place apart looking for him.”
Lee snorted.
She rounded on him.“What does that mean?”
“Nothing.”
