The Death Dealer (3 page)

But she
was
scared. Bone-deep frightened. It was something that had just settled over her, and she wouldn’t be comfortable until the killer was caught.

“Please. The cops aren’t getting anywhere.”

“Give them time.”

“In time,” she told him, even though she herself had been thinking earlier that the press should cut the cops some slack, “somebody else could die.”

He lifted his hands, staring at her, shaking his head.

“Eileen hasn’t been threatened in any way, has she?”

“No.”

“Genevieve…” He lowered his head for a moment, then shook it again. “Gen, it’s only been a week, which is no time at all. You’ve been watching too much television. A murder like Thorne Bigelow’s isn’t solved in a one-hour episode.”

“I know that,” she said sharply.

“Then…”

“Joe, this is what you do for a living. I want to hire you.”

He sighed. “I’d be stepping in where people are hard at work already. I don’t know that I could find out anything new.”

“You don’t know that. Maybe you
could
do something. Before somebody else gets killed. That’s just it, Joe. Someone else could die.”

It was strange, but just then Kathryn, their waitress, came by, her eyes wide. “Man, what a night for the bizarre!”

“Why? What happened?” Genevieve asked.

Joe was studying Kathryn with apprehension.

The waitress shook her head. “There’s always one in every crowd, you know? Someone who just has to stick their nose in and make a tragedy worse.”

“What are you talking about?” Joe asked.

“The psychic,” Kathryn said.

“What psychic?” Joe demanded.

“Go look at the television,” Kathryn said disgustedly. “There’s a reporter talking to her right now, actually. Just turn around and you can see. It’s that Robert Kinley, and he’s with some so-called psychic named Lori Star, who claims that some guy named Sam Layman or Latham or something was supposed to die in the accident, and that it was the Poe Killer behind it.”

“How could she know that?” Joe asked, his expression darkening.

Kathryn shrugged. “She said she just
knows
it. And she says she knows more, too.”

“See?” Genevieve said.

“Oh,
please!
” Joe said.

“Joe, I’m telling you, it makes sense. That’s why I’m afraid,” Genevieve pressed.

“She is convincing,” Kathryn admitted. “She says that in a few days, someone else will die.”

“A Raven?” Genevieve breathed.

“She didn’t say. Just go watch. All she said was that the Poe Killer will murder someone else.”

Genevieve slipped out of the booth first, but she was quickly followed by Joe.

The woman, who was at the accident scene talking to the well-known anchor, was attractive enough. She just seemed to be slightly…rough around the edges. Her voice was clear, though, and her grammar was good. She didn’t have an identifiable accent.

She also seemed to know how to play to the camera. She was direct and dramatic, without overplaying her cards. “It’s true,” she whispered to the camera, wide-eyed.

“Most people would say that’s impossible,” the anchor told her. There was slight scoffing in his voice. Nothing direct. He was too professional for that.

“It was as if I were there,” the woman said. “As if I were driving.”

“And you said that you felt heat and anger?”

“Yes. It was as if I were someone else, and I could feel that person’s feelings.”

“Were you a man or a woman?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know. But as I said before, I do know this. It was the Poe Killer. And I know this, as well. He, or she, intends to kill again—soon.”

“Thank you, Miss Star.” The anchor turned his full attention to the cameras. “Truth or fiction? What’s in store for New York? Well, first things first. The police are busy cleaning up the FDR, and it’s going to be a long ride home for anyone on that highway tonight.”

Another anchor picked up from the studio, and Genevieve turned to look at Joe, but he was already turning away.

“Kathryn, I’ll take another beer, please,” he called.

Before he even opened his eyes, Joe winced.

His head was pounding.

What in the hell had made him drink so damned much beer? He hadn’t even gone for the hard stuff, which he should have. No, he had just started inhaling the beer because of…

The accident.

It was ridiculous. He’d seen lots of accidents. He should have felt good; a little girl had been saved because of him.

But he didn’t feel good.

He felt unnerved.

Because a dead man had spoken to him.

And things hadn’t gotten any better after that.

A psychic. A self-proclaimed psychic solving the whole damned thing while somehow not solving anything at all.

Lori Star? Like hell. She might as well have called herself Moonbeam.

He went ahead and groaned, thinking that voicing his pain might make him feel a little better. It didn’t.

Hell, no. Because he’d awakened
thinking.

And all he could think about was the fact that a dead man had spoken to him, and then, as if that hadn’t been bad enough, the news had dragged a damned psychic out of the woodwork. She knew, she just
knew,
that the driver of the car had been after Sam Latham.

No, they hadn’t dragged her out of anywhere. She’d come forward, claiming to be eager to help the police.

She couldn’t identify the car, of course. Because it was as if she had been the one driving it. She had been in his would-be head as he—or she—went after Sam Latham’s car. And then she’d finished up with the dramatic revelation someone else would be murdered within days.

Later newscasts had delved into the truth about the woman, but too late for him. Genevieve had looked at him with her huge blue imploring eyes. And he’d known right then that he was on the case.

Though he dreaded it.
Dreaded it.
And he didn’t know why, other than that it had something to do with that freakin’ psychic.

It had turned out that Lori Star was an aspiring actress, as well as a supposed psychic. No wonder she’d been so good in front of the camera. But there would be those out there convinced that it was no act, that she was right, that the accident had been no accident.

Even if she
was
right—and he sure as hell didn’t see how she could be—he was sure that all she had done was look at a few facts and take a lucky guess. She was definitely not a psychic. She just wanted her fifteen minutes of television fame.

And he was so angry because…

Because he had known Leslie. And he hadn’t believed in her at first, when she claimed to talk to the dead. But she had been legit.

And this girl sure as hell wasn’t.

He opened his eyes. He wasn’t at home, but he already knew that. He was at Genevieve’s. She hadn’t let him take a cab; she’d insisted he stay on her couch. Lacking both the will and the physical coordination to find a cab willing to go to Brooklyn at that hour, he had shrugged and agreed. And fallen asleep. Or passed out. One or the other.

He’d been doing all right last night, considering what he’d gone through with Leslie and her ability to commune with the dead, until that damned psychic had shown up on television. And then he’d started calling for the beers hard and fast.

Now, of course, he was ashamed of himself. Only cowards drank because they’d been spooked. And what a fool he’d been, besides. As far as talking to a dead man went, there was surely a logical explanation for what had happened. One, maybe the EMT had simply been wrong and Brookfield hadn’t died on impact. Or maybe, as Freud might have suggested, Joe had created the man’s voice as a tool to tell him to look for survivors in the car. There. That made sense—so long as he didn’t think about the fact that his inner voice had known the girl’s name.

And the fact that Lori Star was an annoying fraud seeking the spotlight. Well, hell, that made sense, too. She was just trying to get work.

So here he was, having had way too much to drink, sleeping on Gen’s sofa. It was a nice one, too. Antique, but restuffed and reupholstered. She loved things that were old and had a story. She and Leslie would have been great friends.

The thought made him wince and shut his eyes.

When he opened his eyes again, his face lined with tension, she was there.

Gen, not Leslie.

Thank God he was seeing the living, at least.

That caused a moment’s guilt to trickle down his spine.
Leslie…I would love to see you. Your face…

But that wasn’t really true. He didn’t want to see ghosts.

No problem. This was Gen in front of him, and she didn’t seem to be judging him for his night of imbibing, even if she probably didn’t understand it.

He didn’t intend to explain.

Let her think that it was because he had been a witness to such an awful accident, or because he could have died when the car blew up.

“Good morning,” she said gravely, handing him a glass and a couple of aspirin.

He looked at her, arching a brow.

“Trust me,” she said. “They work for a hangover.” She shrugged. “And no, I don’t spend my life fighting hangovers. A lot of people thought I’d wind up on drugs or alcohol after the kidnapping, and this was a tip my doctor gave me.”

“Thanks,” he said briefly, swallowing the pills with the glass of water she’d provided.

He didn’t really want to look at Gen. He felt too much like the dregs of humanity to want to face her.

There wasn’t anything not to like about her, of course. Genetics had made her beautiful—Eileen, at forty-plus could still turn heads. Gen had the same perfect features, perfect skin and more-than-perfect build. She had rich auburn hair that looked more lustrous than silk and more wicked than sin. And her eyes…

Just saying they were blue didn’t do them justice. They were the blue of the infinite sky, the blue of the deepest sea. Blue that could hint at darkness, blue that spoke of wisdom, even though she was only twenty-odd years old.

They were eyes that had seen a lot. The child of privilege, she had wanted to help those who hadn’t been born with silver spoons in their mouths. She hadn’t jetted around the globe, hobnobbing with the rich and useless. She had gone to school, gotten a degree and gone into social work.

She had survived for weeks in the underground lair of a psychotic killer.

She was strong. She was…

She was alive because Leslie had taken the bullet meant for her.

He pushed that thought from his mind. Genevieve sure as hell hadn’t wanted that to happen, and he knew it. And Leslie had been gone nearly a year now. He liked to think that she was back with Matt, at last, but he didn’t really believe it. He could have sworn that he had once seen them together on a little rise in the cemetery where they were both buried.

Again, Freud would have helped him out.

He had seen them there because he
wanted
to see them there.

“You should feel better soon,” Gen told him, breaking into his morose thoughts.

Better than he deserved, she might have said.

But of course, she didn’t.

He leaned back, studying her. She was already up and showered, smelling both fresh and subtly exotic, rich tendrils of her amazing hair curling over the casual black sweater she was wearing over jeans. He noticed her hands—delicate, refined, manicured, but not fussily so; she kept her nails filed and polished, but at a reasonable length. And she wasn’t encrusted with jewels; she wore a simple claddagh ring on her left middle finger, gold studs in her ears and a plain cross around her neck.

She could easily have covered herself in furs and diamonds. Instead, she didn’t even buy designer sunglasses; he knew because she had laughingly told him once that she seemed to lose a pair a week, so it made sense to buy them off the street vendors.

And in fact, she knew the streets.

Once upon a time she hadn’t been regularly recognized. Despite her family’s wealth, she’d kept far from the public eye and worked for a pittance helping to get prostitutes off the streets.

What the hell was not to like about her? he asked himself silently, wondering why the question left him feeling so irritable.

“I’m all right,” he said gruffly.

She grinned, looking away. “Right. Real men don’t get loaded on too much beer.”

He groaned aloud and started to rise.

“Hey, I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “Look, I know that what you saw must have been really terrible. I can’t even imagine,” she assured him.

Couldn’t she? he wondered.

Dead was dead.

Did it matter if death came with gallons of blood, mangled steel and mangled flesh? Or a neat little bullet hole that left a person looking as if she were at peace, merely sleeping.

She had seen enough, he thought.

And she had somehow risen above it all.

He felt even more like a lout, if that were possible.

“You have every right,” he agreed.

“That woman was a jerk,” she said. “Lori
Star?
I doubt it. I don’t know where she was getting her information, but I’m sure she’s not in touch with helpful spirits or anything like that.”

The way Genevieve looked at him, he knew that she was thinking about Leslie, too. She had known that her kidnapper had been determined to kill Leslie; she’d been at the top of his list.

Because Leslie had known things. She had seen things. He wasn’t certain that
psychic
was the word to describe her, but whatever she’d been, she’d been for real.

He waved a hand in the air. “Hey, I was a horse’s ass last night, and it was inexcusable,” he said.

“No, once you weren’t so angry, you were kind of cute.”

Kind of cute?
Great. Just what he’d always wanted to be. A kind-of-cute drunk.

“Well, thanks for your forgiveness. And your couch.”

“Think nothing of it.”

“I need to get going.”

“Joe, there’s a meeting tonight,” she informed him, her eyes somber.

“A meeting?” Heaven help him, did she think he needed AA?

“Of the—the Ravens.”

He looked at her quizzically. “On Saturday night? Date night?” His tone was mocking; he was stalling her, he knew. “Must be a wild bunch,” he said.

“Joe, we’re going.”

“No.”

“Joe, you promised last night that—”

He lifted a hand. Damn, she was persistent.

“I said I’d take the case,” he told her. “And I’ll go to the meeting. But
you
aren’t going.”

“Of course I am!” she said indignantly.

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Genevieve—”

“My mother is going to be there, Joe. There’s no way I’m not going to be there, too.”

He fell silent. What the hell was the matter with these people? If they all believed that Thorne Bigelow had been killed because he was a Raven, wouldn’t anyone sane think that perhaps they shouldn’t meet until the killer had been apprehended?

“It’s just stupid for them to be meeting,” he snapped.

“Stupid or not, it’s happening,” Genevieve said. “Besides,
you’re
the one who said that the whole Poe thing is a smoke screen.”

“I said it
could
be a smoke screen.”

“That…woman said that another Raven would be dead in a matter of days.”

“Gen…” He winced, lowering his head. He wasn’t sure if he was feeling the temple-pounding headache of a killer hangover, or a sense of mixed anger and dread. Gen was surely the most stubborn human being he’d ever met. She was like pit bull on behalf of the underdog or any cause she believed in. She rushed in where the sane wouldn’t go.

But he wasn’t angry with her, only upset that people liked to play so casually with the fears of others by claiming to know the future.

He lifted his chin, eyes on fire, and pointed a finger at her. “I said I’d take the case, and I will. But you’ll listen to me.”

“I always listen to you, Joe,” she said softly. That unnerved him.

Oh, yeah, she listened, in a perfect case of point noted—and rejected.

“Joe, honestly, I have to go tonight.”

“And you think the Ravens are just going to discuss some favorite masterpiece by Poe?”

She shrugged. “I’m sure they’ll talk about the murder.”

“We’re not members. Are you sure they’ll let us in?”

“Members are always free to bring guests. It’s simply a matter of paying for their meals. And can you imagine anyone trying to tell my mother that she’s not welcome to bring her daughter and a friend?”

Gen had a point. Eileen had the power to open a lot of doors.

He stood up. The world didn’t rock. A shower would fix him, he decided.

“All right, I’m going home, but I’ll be back in time to go to the meeting with you. And you’ll stay here until I come back for you.”

“Joe…” She said his name in a soft whisper, accompanied by a weary sigh. “I am not a hothouse flower. I’ve been taking care of myself in the city for some time now. I do not intend to stay cooped up in my apartment all day.”

He arched a brow. “It’s a really nice apartment.”

She flushed. It
was
a nice apartment. She lived here because of Eileen; the building was supposed to have the best security system in the city.

“Joe—”

“Give it a rest, Gen. I’ll be back in a couple of hours. Depending on traffic,” he added dryly, wondering how long it would take to reclaim his car at the impound lot.

“Oh?”

“Yeah. If we’re going to this meeting, let’s do a little Poe research first, huh?”

She stared back at him, a slow smile curving her lips, a light entering her eyes.

Damn, she was a beautiful woman.

“Oh, Joe, that’s great!”

She leapt up and threw her arms around him. Her scent was intoxicating, and the feel of her warm body as she crushed herself against him was like a taste of heaven.

He unwound her arms and stepped back. “You, uh, you stay here till I get back, promise?”

She looked at him with a frown.

“Just this morning, Gen, please? Until I get a handle on this.”

“I’m not a Raven. It’s my mom we’re worried about, remember?”

“Gen?”

“Yes, fine.”

He started out.