The scene was a loading bay behind a defunct fish cannery on the South Lander Street overpass. The air was a cocktail of brine, rust, and something else—a sweet, chemical undertone that made her think of burnt circuit boards.
She turned to Thorne. "Bag the mouse separately. And don't let anyone from Cephalon within a hundred yards of this body. If anyone asks, DOA 061 is a John Doe with a heart condition." doa 061
The rain over Seattle wasn't falling so much as it was reassembling , molecule by reluctant molecule, into a thick, grey gauze that wrapped the city in a permanent, weeping twilight. For Detective Lena Cross, who had seen three decades of this sky, the weather was just another form of paperwork—endless, soul-dampening, and inevitable. She pulled the collar of her coat tighter, the cheap coffee in her thermos already lukewarm, and nodded to the uniformed officer guarding the yellow tape. The scene was a loading bay behind a