Vampire Shift (Kiera Hudson Series #1) Read Free Page B

from behind me and he sounded pissed off. “Look, you can see the ground around the body is covered with footprints,” I said. “Yeah, so?” Luke said, leaning over my shoulder. “Well, there are no footprints leading to or from the body,” I told him. “And your point is?” Luke asked. “So how did the killers get here if they didn’t walk?” I said, sounding exasperated. “Did they fly?” Then before Luke or even I could answer my own question, there was the sound of people approaching us from the distance. “Who’s there?” Luke called out, sounding spooked. “It’s just me and Constable Potter.”   Aiming Luke’s torch in the direction of the voice, I could just make out two figures approaching us. As they drew nearer, I could see that one of them was Sergeant Murphy by the way he stooped to the right and the other I guessed was Constable Potter. He was tall and lean, with black hair that was slicked back off his forehead. He looked slightly older than Luke and I guessed he was about twenty-four-years-old. Both Murphy and Potter had torches and the light bounced off the trees.
    Reaching us, Sergeant Murphy leaned over the body of the boy and showered him with torch light. “Jesus wept,” he gasped and kissed the tiny crucifix pinned to his tie.
    “It looks like we’ve got ourselves another one,” Potter groaned, popping a cigarette between his lips and lighting it. “I don’t think you should be smoking here,” I said before I could stop myself. Raising an eyebrow with a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, Constable Potter looked at me and said, “And you are?” Before I could answer, Murphy had cut in and said, “This is Kiera Hudson, our new recruit.” Drawing on the end of his cigarette, Potter smiled at me and asked, “Do you have a problem with me smoking?”   Meeting his stare, I said, “No, but I just don’t think you should be smoking here – after all it is a crime scene. At training school…”
    “…they fill your head with shit,” Potter cut in. “This is the real world, sweetheart.”
    I was just about to tell him that I wasn’t his sweetheart, when Luke said, “Kiera says that there was three of them and that the boy has been here at least three days.”
    I don’t think Luke said this to embarrass me, I think he really was impressed with what I had told him. Blowing smoke out of his nostrils, Potter laughed and said, “Looks like we got a right little Miss Marple this time around.” Eyeing Potter, Sergeant Murphy said, “Okay Sean, that’s enough. Let’s hear what the girl’s got to say.”   At first I didn’t say anything, fearing that Potter would start ragging on me again. I know that I’d only just met him, but I already disliked the guy.
    “Go on Kiera, tell them what you told me,” Luke said, and he sounded supportive, like a good friend would.
    “Go on Hudson,” Sergeant Murphy urged. “You’re with friends here.”
    So pointing the torch back at the body of Henry Blake, I crouched down and started to point out the footprints, blisters, and fluid which had come from the boy’s mouth, nose, and ears. Before I’d finished, Potter had started to spray laughter into the darkness.
    “What a bunch of horseshit!” he cried. “I don’t know what they’ve been teaching you at training school but whatever it is, you ain’t in no episode of ‘CSI’.”
    Standing, I looked at Luke and feeling embarrassed, I wished that I hadn’t said anything.
    When Potter had stopped laughing, he flicked his cigarette away into a nearby bush and Sergeant Murphy stepped towards me.
    “I admire your enthusiasm Kiera, but Sean is right, this ain’t no T.V. program, this is real life. Being a police officer in the real world ain’t like what you’ve been watching on T.V.”
    Although Murphy was trying to comfort me, I couldn’t help but feel that he was patronising me.
    “I haven’t been watching -” I started.
    “Kiera, this is a