Hotter Than Helltown: An Urban Fantasy Mystery (Preternatural Affairs Book 3) Read Online Free PDF Page A

contractor had refused the director’s marriage proposal yet continued to work for him anyway.
    Like I said, totally normal.
    Also a pretty compelling reason not to take Fritz to San Francisco with me. Talk about a cockblock.
    But it seemed like I wasn’t the one taking Fritz anywhere. He was taking me. He slipped through Los Angeles traffic with all the caution of a guy whose team of lawyers can make speeding tickets vanish as easily as fanning away a fart.
    Did I mention that Fritz is rich? He is “holy fuck” levels of rich. He hadn’t bought his spaceship of a sports sedan on a government paycheck. More like a legacy of mining money and smart investments. He earns more breathing in his sleep than I will in my lifetime.
    He also wasn’t driving northward.
    “This isn’t the right way,” I said.
    “I’m taking you to the morgue to meet Suzy.”
    “We’ve got a morgue on the OPA campus.”
    “I didn’t want to catch Isobel on the security cameras,” Fritz said. “We’ve borrowed a funeral home and sent the body on a detour. After I drop you off, I’ll pick up Belle and bring her back with me.”
    “But she’s missing—possibly somewhere in the Bay Area. I was going to get to San Francisco and then cast a tracking spell.”
    “I know where she is. I’ve already warned her I’m coming,” Fritz said.
    Right. He was a former client. Of course he could contact her.
    Annoyance pricked at me. Why did he get her direct line while I had to deal with Craigslist and breathy interns?
    At least I wasn’t going to have to listen to jock jams all the way to San Francisco.

CHAPTER FOUR

    JAY BRANDON’S BODY LOOKED so much worse in the sterile lighting of the morgue.
    We had borrowed the Golden Fields Funeral Home for this conversation because it was conveniently close to the OPA campus—just about two blocks west. They had great lighting in their embalming room. I could see every little detail of Jay Brandon’s severed nose and lips, not to mention all the other damage.
    The cutting hadn’t been limited to his face and nose; the murderer had also cut his heart out of his chest by going under the ribs, too.
    Demons are creative bastards.
    The room itself was decorated with white and red tile on the walls and stainless steel everything. The vibrant, high-contrast colors kind of made me think of the way a fifties diner might be decorated, which made me think of burgers and fries, which made me feel pretty sick.
    Greasy food was not a pleasant thought while staring at a mutilated body.
    I forced myself to look away from him. The alternatives weren’t much better. Jars of embalming fluid were lined up along the tiled walls right next to the pump that filled the veins of cadavers with plastic junk to make them look slightly less dead.
    The fluids were just as bright as the walls themselves. Some were purple, others were pink-tinted, one was clear, and the most disturbing of them was a sort of bodily fluid-reminiscent orange. All the colors together made me think of a soda fountain.
    I really needed to stop thinking about food around the victim.
    “Poor bastard,” Suzy muttered, pulling on a pair of fresh gloves. “What a way to go.”
    “How did he…uh…go?” I asked. I was pretty certain that I didn’t want to know the answer to that question, but it seemed like the thing to ask. “Was it the heart or the…” I pointed at my own throat to indicate the slit under his chin.
    “Cause of death was definitely the throat injury. But they verified that all of the mutilation was inflicted before he died—including the removal of the heart. It must have gone fast.” She grimaced. “I swept the scene for spell residue and found nothing. Whatever happened on Cherry Tree Lane was violent, but not magicked.”
    “Damn,” I said.
    “I know. Poor guy.”
    Being killed without magic was far worse than the alternative. Ritual sacrifice was often so intoxicating to the victim that they didn’t feel anything. At