“Shhh. I know. You have to eat the rush of it first. Sip the rest, a little at a time. Just like that.” I gasped against his shoulder. He tucked me into it and led the way back to the building and up into its guts. With each inhale and tucked step, I grew steadier.
Worley’s second floor door was locked, but Gabriel made quick work of it. A few of the other boarders wandered by, but no one said anything. Nice neighbors. If the blur worked, they wouldn’t remember our faces well—but they sure as spirits saw us breaking in.
The room was dark. Gabriel led me inside. I didn’t know what to think of his care in touching me again. He shut the door and opened the curtains. There were few adornments in the dingy, unremarkable space.
But an uneven stack of parchment, charcoal, and smudgers caught my eye. The most interesting things in the drab room. I moved the drawing tools aside. Beneath them was a partially completed sketch. The woman looked very similar to one of the victims in the coroner’s sketches.
“Gabriel. Look at this.” I moved the picture off the top, but the papers beneath were clean. Charcoal marked the wood of the desk and a few smudges smeared the wall.
He didn’t respond.
“Gabriel, I think Worley drew a picture of one of the victims.” I turned to see why he hadn’t responded.
He was standing, knuckles white around the cupboard handle, staring inside. “I think you are correct,” he finally said.
I hurried over, clutching my ribs, and looked around his shoulder. The window allowed just enough light to see sketches plastering the three walls. Women’s faces stared back. Handbills, notes, newspaper clippings.Vein Ripper captured!There were dates and times. Lists of names and places. Candle stubs clustered around the cupboard’s floor. A mad, makeshift shrine.
“Oh my.”
“Quite.”
There were handkerchiefs and scraps of lace pinned between other items.
“What are these?”
“Pieces from the victims? I don’t know.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. Too grotesque.
“Should we light the candles to get more light? Do you see any—ah.”
He waved his hand and an eerie blaze ignited on the floor, casting wicked shadows on the sketches. The sketches were lifelike, making them terrifying.
The women’s eyes looked down at us, and I shivered. It was as if I were in Octavia’s journal and these women were sitting in judgment. A yellowish tinge washed Gabriel’s face—an odd effect of the lighting. I took a quick look behind me; the last thing I wanted was for Worley to wander in while our backs were turned.
I focused on the sketches again. Most of the drawings were studies rather than complete portraits—showing only eyes, lips, hands, or nose profiles. Faces were obscured with fabric or animals. A veiled woman stretched out a gloved hand. “There are four or five different women sketched here. Maybe more. It’s hard to tell. But one looks considerably older than the rest. His mother, maybe?”
Gabriel shuddered.
“She looks familiar.” I touched a picture of a woman in profile. “Is there another picture of her from the front?”
“No.” He crouched down. “Do you see anything resembling a weapon? That’s what we have to find.”
I checked the desk drawers and searched under the bed, the pillow, and the sheets. I cast a cleaning charm on my gloves—one of the few spells still available in my dwindling supply.Everything I touched in the room made my skin crawl. “I don’t see anything.”
Gabriel was still staring in the cupboard.
“What is it?” I asked.
He turned to look at me. “Nothing.”
“What should we do?”
His eyes were focused on the open window. He didn’t respond.
“Gabriel, I know you don’t want to involve Dresden, but he will have to acknowledge at the veryleastthat there are other suspects besides Kennen and Ferris.”
He stayed silent, not looking at me.
