Chapter 25

“Hmm. What did this, Max? Was it a big cat?”

“Perhaps. Or perhaps a big dog—or a wolf. The canines are large. I take it you’re checking the zoos?”

Alec blinked in assent.

“That’s not the interesting thing, though.”

Alec looked at him and echoed, mindlessly, “The interesting thing?”

“Yes. The interesting thing is that his brain was mush.”

“Pardon? Mush? What do you mean?” Grant spoke for both of them.

“You mean whatever ripped his throat out, chewed at his head?” Alec clarified.

“No. The skull was intact. But the brain inside—when I opened the cranium—it had dissolved. Exactly like that illness from Mile End last year. I wondered if he was killed elsewhere and the body dumped. But I can’t see how there would be that much blood around a body that was already dead. It was fresh blood. Grant told me there was a great deal pooled under the corpse as well as what came in with him on his clothes. So, from that, I would say to you that he bled out where you found him.”