“Race analysts believe the IC will be dominated by Ace and Bedlam again this year. Any comments?”
“My team and I are up for the challenge.” I see the cogs working in her head. She’s trying to rile me up. Her next question proves it.
“So you believe you have the guts it takes to make this a three-way race to the finish?”
“Guts is only part of the equation,” I say, unimpressed. I face the camera again, the declaration forming on my tongue. “I’m ready to win the Impulse Cup. Many might think I don’t have what it takes to play with the big boys, but they have another thing coming.” My gaze narrows. “I’m prepared to do whatever it takes to win.” The truth of my words hits me square in the chest. I’ve been overthinking things when the answer is so simple. Death is part of being a racer. Regardless of how I feel for Bedlam, if it takes killing him during a race to get to Ace, then so be it.
I’m just about to face the reporter again to continue the interview when something in my periphery drops out of the sky. It lands a yard from where we stand. I actually feel the sickening thud on the pavement beneath my feet. Something warm splatters on my side and face. The reporter beside me screams—her face a mask of utter horror. Frozen to the spot, I raise a shaking hand to my cheek and swipe at the wetness there. I bring my fingers to eyelevel, and the tips are stained red. A crowd gathers around us. Many spill out from the diner behind me. Magda is beside me, saying something I can’t understand. As if a bomb exploded, there’s ringing in my ears. It drowns out the mounting commotion. I try to make sense of what’s going on, but my brain isn’t working properly, like it popped a fuse.
Without turning my head, I give the lump on the ground a sidelong glance. My gaze lands on a word carved into what I think is skin.
Vanity.
Chapter Eight
OUTSIDE THE autopsy room, I sit on a metal bench. Leaning forward, I rest my forearms on my uncontrollably bobbing knees. My hands clap together as if I’m in prayer, when in fact I’m trying my damnedest to stay relatively calm. I rub my forehead back and forth, back and forth over the tips of my thumbs. When that doesn’t work, I begin nibbling on my thumbnails. Still my knees bounce like shock absorbers over potholes. Shit. I seriously need to calm the fuck down.
The LED lights lining the hallway hurt my eyes. I blink rapidly. It doesn’t help erase the image of the mangled body that fell from the sky outside the Crazy Cat. I guess now we know what happened to Whiplash. The fall shattered every bone in his body. The coroner is busy determining if he was still alive when he plummeted. Brody’s with him. I don’t have the stomach to watch. Not this time.
It took sliding a thin sheet of plastic underneath what had become of the body for the cleanup crew to transport the remains to HQ. The cracked skull left brain matter on the pavement. My stomach twists and I dry heave into my palm. I will never look at a pancake the same way again. Like a water balloon, the impact caused blood to splatter in all directions. Brody took my clothes as evidence, giving me overalls in a tacky shade of orange to wear. He even took my boots and left me with these paper flats that crunch when I walk.
Brody steps out of the room just as I draw blood on my thumb. I push to my feet, and our eyes meet. The lines of his face seem deeper since last I saw him. Not even twenty-four hours ago and already he looks like he’s aged ten years.
“So?” I ask expectantly. My hands tremble at my sides, so I make fists. Then my fists start to shake. Not good. I take in as much of the sterile air as my lungs can hold. The disinfectant burns going into my nostrils.
My mentor lifts his hand to squeeze behind his neck. This is becoming a habit. He shakes his head and sighs. I open my mouth to complete my question, but he stops me by raising his other hand, palm facing me.
Only after dropping both his hands to his sides and sighing again does he speak. “The coroner says Whiplash was already dead before he landed on the pavement.”
I breathe out, not realizing I’ve been holding my breath until the meaning of Brody’s words sink in. “And the word?”
“Perimortem.”
“Just like with Hubcap.” I rub my hand down my face. On reflex, I check my palm for blood. Nothing. My relief is instantaneous. I washed everything off when Brody took my clothes. Scrubbed my body raw.
“Take me through what happened,” he says, stuffing his hands in his pockets. A deep furrow forms between his bushy eyebrows.
I drop back onto the bench, forcing my brain to rewind. “I just exited the diner when a reporter ambushed me for an interview. I was in the middle of answering a question when….” I swallow, unable to finish. That splat. It cannot be unheard.
“Do you have any idea from where Whiplash’s body was dropped?”
I shake my head. “All my attention was with the reporter. I only really saw him fall from my periphery.” Then I remember. “There’s a relatively tall building beside the diner. Maybe ten stories high?”
It’s Brody’s turn to shake his head. “We already considered that, but the coroner says Whiplash needed to have been dropped from a higher altitude to sustain the kind of liquefaction that his internal organs suffered.”
Bile rises up my throat. The sourness coats my tongue before I can shove everything back down. “Oh racing gods.” I push to my feet and face my
