Swallowing down her revulsion and fear, Trinket forced herself to take in every detail she could. The blood was hard to miss; it was everywhere. Trickling from his ears and down his temples, bubbling from his lips, congealing around his nostrils. Moving past that obvious bit, she noticed that a pool of blood was seeping out from beneath him. A wound, perhaps? But it didn't seem to be coming from his back. No, it was lower, as if leaking through the bottom of his trousers. Was he bleeding from his posterior? The thought was repulsive, but as she continued her hurried examination, her gaze was drawn to a bloodstain just below his belt. Yes, it seemed he was bleeding from every possible opening in his body.

Quickly averting her eyes, she returned her focus to the old man's face, which was covered in blood and twisted in pain. Despite this, she recognized him as the man who had come to Booker claiming to have been attacked by a vampire. The two puncture wounds on his neck were unmistakable. In fact, remnants of the bandage Booker had applied to the bite were still sticking to his skin. It looked as though someone had clawed it off. Stealing a glance at the man's hands, she saw bits of the white material stuck under his nails.

Why had he torn it off?

Looking back at the bite marks, she realized blood was pouring out of them as well. Was that why he had ripped the bandages off? But wouldn't it have made more sense to find Booker rather than to tear at his already wounded flesh?

There was a young woman sitting on the ground by the front door of the apartment building. She was huddled into a tight ball, her hands clasped over her mouth as tears streamed down her cheeks, doing all she could to put distance between herself and the dead body. There was blood smeared around one of her wrists in the shape of fingers.

A whistle pierced the air, and the crowd parted to allow the police to approach. The officers shooed the gawkers away, but those who had gathered didn't need much encouragement. They all hurried back to their business, unusually quiet and somber despite the excitement that had just occurred.

Trinket took one last look at the old man before turning to follow the others. As she went off to find Daphne, Jewkes approached the scene. His gaze instantly caught on her, and he stopped short, eyebrows raised.

"Miss Trinket," he said in his gravelly voice.

"Constable," she said with a polite nod.

His eyes flickered to the body, and his mouth twisted into a grimace. "Lord, you're getting to be as bad as Larkin."

"Pardon?"

"Can't be a dead body without you showing up."

Her lips twitched, threatening to break into a crooked smile. "To be fair, I ended up here completely by coincidence."

He flashed a teasing grin. "He would say the same thing."

Shrugging, she peered back at the body, now surrounded by blue-uniformed men. "Surgeons are often in the company of corpses, Constable."

"So are murderers."

She turned her gaze to him. "You still think he's a killer?"

Sighing, he ran his hands through his salt and pepper hair. "I'm not even sure anymore. I know he's mad. Not completely certain about the murderer part, though." He met her eyes. "Tell me, is this another ungodly creation of man and animal?"

She shook her head. "No, this seems a little different."

"But just as unnatural?"

"You're a police officer. Why don't you go look for yourself?"

"Well, believe it or not, Miss Trinket, despite my occupation, I don't exactly have the stomach for the gruesome crimes that have been taking place as of late."

"Is that so? Even with all the time you spend in mortuaries?"

He gave a rough laugh. "Trust me, I only end up in that icebox when certain upstanding doctors blackmail me. Or when their lovely assistants use their sweetness to charm me."

With a sad smile, Trinket shook her head. "I'm surprised you're a police officer, Constable."

He cocked an eyebrow. "Is that so? And why is that?"

She was about to tell him that it was because he was clueless enough to still think she was sweet and nice and was therefore too daft to solve murders and crimes. However, she feared that would lead to a string of questions she was not ready to answer.

So instead, she offered a gentle smile and said, "You just seem more of a family man to me."

With a grunt, he shook his head and turned back to the group of officers surrounding the body. "Try to stay out of trouble, Miss Trinket. And please, do your best to keep Larkin out of this one."

"I can't make any promises, Constable."

He waved her off and slowly made his way over to his fellow officers. Trinket let out a long breath and tore her eyes away from the bits of the bloody corpse she could still see. There wasn't much else she could learn from the body. Perhaps if Booker dissected the dead man, he could find out more. But she highly doubted that would be possible. She only hoped that her few observations would be enough to help him form at least a hypothesis of what had happened, leading him one step closer to finding Benedict.

And one step closer to making yourself obsolete.

Someone grabbed hold of her arm. Instinctively gripping the faux perfume in her coat pocket, she spun around to meet Daphne's warm, brown eyes. Deflating slightly, Trinket released her weapon.

"Oh, good, it's just you," she said, placing a hand over her chest as her heart beat wildly. "I'm sorry to have run off like that."

Shaking her head, Daphne nodded at the group of officers who were now taking notes and making sketches while still shielding the body from view.

"A dead body. He appears to be the man who came to Mr. Larkin a few nights ago."

Daphne's mouth formed a surprised o, and she glanced back at the crowd with renewed interest. She turned her eyes to Trinket, raising an eyebrow inquisitively.

"I'm not sure what happened to him, but I'm hoping Mr. Larkin can make sense of it with what information I've gathered."

With a nod, Daphne handed her a parcel wrapped in brown paper. It took her a moment to realize what it was.

"Oh, the shawl. Thank you. I completely forgot about it when I—"

She stopped and hesitated, eliciting a confused look from Daphne. Trinket had nearly forgotten about the blonde girl she'd gone running after. Had she truly been there? Or had it been another hallucination, one pulled from the depths of her memories of Elysium? It was impossible to know. And until she was certain, she couldn't tell anyone about it. Even if she did discover that the girl had, in fact, been flesh and blood, she wasn't sure that she was ready to share that piece of her past with those in her present.

Tell them and they'll never look at you the same again.

It'll ruin everything.

"I got distracted," she said, giving Daphne a weak smile. "Come along, we'd best report this incident to Mr. Larkin."

Though seeming unconvinced, Daphne nodded and fell into step with her as they made their way home.

~

"Blood?" Booker repeated, looking back at Trinket from where he stood by the fireplace.

She nodded as she fidgeted with the teacup in her hand. "Yes. And lots of it. From every orifice as far as I could tell."

Setting his own cup on the mantle, he paced over to her and sat on the settee beside her. He was closer than she deemed necessary, and while normally she would have ignored this, her nerves were still rattled from earlier. Her heart beat violently as she became very aware of how warm Booker's body was.

"Now, when you say every orifice—"

"I mean every orifice," she said, hesitating to make eye contact with him.

"Even—"

"There was blood on the front of his trousers and pooling from beneath him. So yes, even from there."

Booker's eyes widened slightly as he sat back and stared into the distance. "Lord, the bite hadn't seemed that bad. What on earth could have caused him to bleed out so quickly?"

"You're the doctor. I assumed you might know."

"This is beyond anything I've ever treated. I mostly deal with missing limbs and broken bones. Perhaps the occasional fever or poisoning. But sudden bleeding from every orifice?"

Sipping her tea, she thought back to the scene in the city center. "There was a girl there, too."

Booker sat up and leaned in closer. "A girl?"

She nodded. "Yes. She was curled up and sobbing in front of the apartment building. And there was blood around her wrist."

"Her wrist? Was she hurt?"

"No. It almost looked like someone had grabbed hold of her and smeared it onto her skin."

"Like perhaps a terrified old man in the throes of death?"

Meeting his eyes, Trinket couldn't keep the corners of her mouth from lifting into a slight smile. "Precisely."

A smile was playing on his lips as well. "Could you pick this girl out of a crowd?"

"There wasn't anything all that memorable about her aside from the blood, but I believe if I saw her I'd recognize her."

"Excellent. Perhaps we need to take a trip back into the center to be sure our neighbors are not worse for wear after this horrific incident."

"You're so very caring, Mr. Larkin."

"Well, my dearest, we city folk must look out for one another. There are some sick, twisted people out there."

"Who better to protect them from such madness than a mad scientist?"

Booker's grin grew, and he gave a soft chuckle. "I must say, I'm beginning to enjoy it when you call me that. I take it as something of an affectionate term."

She sipped her tea to hide her smile. "Take it as you will, Mr. Larkin."

Clapping his hands together, he rose to his feet. "Very well. Tonight we'll dine at the Clocktower and search for this blood-covered girl."

Tilting her head, Trinket furrowed her brow. "Tonight? You don't want to go straight to the center now?"

"The police are likely questioning her at the moment. I'm guessing after such an exhausting ordeal, she'll need to head to the alehouse for a little intoxication to steady her nerves."

"I don't know. She looked a bit too young to drink."

He laughed and raised his eyebrows. "One is never too young to drink here in Tinkerfall."

"So what's your excuse for not partaking?"

"Intellectual superiority."

Someone cleared their throat from the hallway, making Booker jump. He and Trinket both turned to find Daphne standing in the doorway, her hands on her hips and a less-than-amused expression on her face.

Booker paled. "Of course, I meant no offense to you, dear Daphne. There is no doubt that your intelligence is indeed magnificent and is in no way impeded by your decision to enjoy alcoholic beverages."

Daphne raised an eyebrow as she pursed her lips together, and her gaze seemed to bore a hole into his skull.

Falling back a step, he fumbled for words. "Truly. I do mean that. I intended no insult. You are certainly a worthy opponent when it comes to intellectual prowess. Not to mention your incomparable skill with a kitchen knife. And you wear those portiums so beautifully. Not everyone could pull them off, you know."

Still, she seemed unimpressed.

Looking to Trinket, he held his hands out helplessly. "A little assistance, assistant?"

She shrugged. "You're the one who called her stupid for drinking."

His mouth fell open. "I did no such thing." He turned to Daphne. "I did no such thing, I swear. I didn't call you stupid. I don't think you're stupid. You're most certainly not stupid. I—Lord, Trinket, you're not helping."

Unable to hold back her laughter at Booker's flustered state, Trinket finally set her teacup on the table and got to her feet. "Oh, Daphne, we mustn't harass him too much. Despite being a brilliant doctor, he is, in fact, rather clueless when it comes to dealing with teasing women."

Daphne's disapproving frown quickly changed into a lopsided grin as she looked between them. Giving Trinket a wink, she whacked Booker playfully on his stitched-up arm. A hiss of pain escaped from his lips as he rubbed it and watched Daphne retreat into the hallway. He then turned his eyes back to Trinket, his face softening.

"She may know how to tend to a wound, but her bedside manner is sorely lacking," he said.

"To be fair, you're not in bed. And you've had worse injuries than that."

He removed his hand from his arm. "Very true. Besides, you offer all the bedside comfort a patient would need."

"Are you planning on being bedridden anytime soon?"

"I certainly hope not. There's far too much to do with old men dropping dead and bleeding to death in broad daylight."

The image of the corpse bleeding from every open part of his body sent a shiver through her bones. Rubbing her shoulders, she asked, "So we wait until tonight?"

Booker brushed off his jacket and gave a sly smile. "Indeed. After all, isn't it under the cover of night that the undead roam the streets?"

"I don't know about the undead, but I have seen corpses make their way into basement laboratories during the late midnight hours."

Clearly pleased with her dark humor, he leaned in towards her, his face only inches from her own. Holding her breath, she forced herself to meet his intoxicating eyes, trying not to lose herself in the passion and excitement that danced behind them.

"Perhaps with a bit of luck and a lot of cleverness, the dead might tell secrets tonight," he nearly whispered.