“How do you have all this stuff?”
“Best not to ask,” I murmured to Winter. She shuffled closer to me, and I forced myself to ignore the urge to touch her, focusing on Zayde’s actions instead.
“Z. Can we get a fingerprint?” I indicated the severed digit.
He shook his head. “No prints. The boys said all his fingers were the same.”
“That’s fucking shady.” I pulled on a pair of the latex gloves and picked up the finger, examining it more closely.
“Use the magnifying glass,” Zayde suggested without looking up, still intent on cleaning up the ring.
“Can I see?”
I glanced up at Winter staring at the finger, curiosity in her blue eyes.
“C’mere, then.” I tugged her onto my lap. She made a small noise of protest, but I held my arm around her waist like a steel band—she wasn’t going anywhere. “Pick up the magnifying glass, and I’ll hold the finger.”
Obediently she took the magnifying glass from the tray, her hand shaking slightly. My girl was fighting her reaction to me—her little game of teasing me earlier had backfired, and she was back to being in denial about the way I affected her. I bit back a smug grin before she noticed; that would go down as well as a fucking lead balloon. “Good. Hold it over the top of the finger,” I instructed.
I moved my face next to hers so we could both look through the glass. “See how the tip of the finger is all smooth?” I angled my head slightly, letting my stubble graze the soft skin of her cheek.
She shuddered, swallowing hard. “Yeah. How? How did it happen?”
“My guess,” I said, moving my head again, my lips almost touching her skin, “is that they were burned off. It’s a quick and easy way to do it. See how the skin’s a different colour here?”
My stubble scraped against her cheek again as she nodded, but neither of us moved our faces away.
“Enough with the flirting, please,” my brother groaned. “Sort your shit out. It’s clear you both wanna be together. Fix whatever it is”—he glared at me—“Caiden, and we can all play happy families again.”
“I’m kind of turned on watching the two of you,” Cass interjected, waggling his eyebrows at us. Fucker.
Winter groaned, clearly uncomfortable, her cheeks flaming at the attention. “Please, Cass.”
Best to ignore them.
I removed my arm from around Winter’s waist. “Sit back down, Snowflake.” She moved off my lap, leaning forwards and propping her chin on her elbows, which rested on her thighs. Before she had a chance to protest, I dropped a light kiss on her hair, then placed the severed finger down and quickly changed the subject. “Anyone else want to look at the finger?” No takers. “Z? You done with that ring yet?”
“Yeah.” He indicated towards the magnifying glass, which Winter passed to him, and he studied the ring in silence for a moment, then wordlessly handed both the ring and the magnifying glass to me.
“Fuck,” I breathed. “I think this is the same ring Petr was wearing that day at the hotel.” It was a tarnished gold, sovereign-style ring. In the centre of the sovereign was a cloaked man with arms outstretched, one holding what looked like a lightning rod, and the other resting on top of what was either a number eight or an infinity symbol.
I passed both items to Winter, who studied them intently. “You’re right. I’m sure of it. Do we have any photos of his hand wearing the ring?”
“Yeah, we do.” I pulled my phone from my pocket and scrolled through my picture gallery as Winter passed the ring over to Cass. “Here.” I zoomed in on the photo. It was clear that it was the same ring.
“This is great. I’m gonna send photos to Mercury and see what he can pull up.” West stood, stretching. “Speaking of Mercury, he found something. It’s not much, but it might be everything. He found record of Petr working at the docks last year. And, get this, he’s also employed as a server at AMC. Right now. He’s only had the position for a few months—looks like he works both there and at the Crown and Anchor. Dunno which days he works at AMC, but we need to check this out.”
“This is great news.” Winter smiled at Weston. “I finally feel like we’re getting somewhere. Now we know there’s most likely a connection between Petr and the dead guy. I mean, it’s kind of clear to me at this point that the dead guy is the one who attacked me, since he was the one keeping me captive, and now he’s dead, and whoever got me out of the docks took me to a hospital.”
“I agree.” Cass nodded. “Makes sense, and that was my feeling when we found the body. We have a probable connection between dead fingerless guy, Littlefinger, and the docks, so I’d say the odds are high.”
“I’ll send this stuff to Mercury now. Unless we need to discuss anything else?” West glanced at me, and I shook my head.
“I’m heading back to campus now.” Kinslee stood.
“Do you have to go?” Winter pulled a sad face.
“Don’t go guilt-tripping me, bitch. I’ve got shit to do.” Kinslee gave Winter a stern look, and they both dissolved into laughter. Zayde raised a brow at me, and I shrugged, mouthing “women” to him.