savage night, 10:30 p.m., frasers WHEN HE OPENED his sitting-room door, the last thing Fraser Savage expected to see was a corpse. Stuffed inside a stainless-steel bathtub on a plastic sheet in the middle of the floor, the body was naked and clearly male, even though it was facedown. "Who the fuck is that?" Effie said. Fraser shook his head slowly. The corpse had pale skin. Hairy buttocks. It was plump around the middle. Holy fucking Christ, it couldn't be . . . Fraser's toes and fingers started to prickle and his stomach cramped. The two pints he'd had earlier in the evening suddenly seemed like a lot more. And those three or was it four?lines of coke hadn't helped. Sweat rolled down his back. His nose was running, too. He dabbed at his nostrils with the back of his hand. "I think it might be Uncle Phil," he said. "Does he have any identifying features?" Effie asked. "Tattoos? Scars?" "I don't think so." He shivered. Not that he was cold. Felt like he'd puked his guts out and there was nothing left. Another shiver rippled through him. Was it his uncle? Same waxy pale skin that ginger people have, same overall body shape. But he'd never seen Uncle Phil naked. He might have identified him by his hair, that permanent ginger bed-head, but that wasn't an option. Maybe the corpse had ginger pubes. Although even that didn't mean it was Uncle Phil. There were plenty of other poor bastards with ginger pubes. Maybe the skin was excessively pale because of the blood loss and he wasn't ginger at all. Fraser could turn him over, find out. Yeah, right. He wasn't wrestling with that. There was a good reason for the tub. There was a good reason Fraser felt sick. There was a good reason Fraser didn't want to turn him over. Somebody had cut the poor bastards head off. And it was nowhere to be seen. "DRINK THIS." He took the glass of vodka from Effie, the liquid sloshing around as his hand shook. Steadied it with his other hand and knocked it back. It burned his throat nicely. He gave her back the glass and she poured him another. He took it, drank it. Felt warmer now, less shivery, hands not so shaky. Effie didn't appear fazed by the situation at all. Almost as if she were used to stumbling over corpses in her boyfriends homes. Not that he was her boyfriend, exactly. But they'd been getting along well and maybe something would have happened tonight. It certainly wouldn't now. A headless corpse was a major turnoff. Jesus, he had to grow up. Maturity, that's what it was. Fraser was twenty-five. Effied have to be around the thirty mark. He hadn't asked her, didn't want to risk screwing things up. Anyway, shed had more experience than him, which is why she was so much more composed. Although it was unlikely, however old she was, that shed seen a naked, headless corpse before. And yet, Fraser couldn't help but think of the way Effie had introduced herself when they first met. Wearing a two-tone orange blouse, o Excerpted from Savage Night by Allan Guthrie All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
