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I released a long, slow breath. And with it, Lavinia’s ghost. But I knew the relief would be short-lived. Demons like Lavinia Kane never stayed exorcised.
The door handle shook. I swiveled, automatically crouching into a fighting stance.
“Sabina?” Adam’s muffled voice drifted through the door.
I blew out a breath. “One sec!” I used my shirt hem to wipe away the rest of the water. Checked my reflection one last time in the mirror. I glared at the strange chick staring back at me. “Suck it up.”
With that, I turned and went to the door. My hands shook as I flipped the bolt. The door whipped open with more force than necessary. It slammed against the gray wall like a gunshot. Adam flinched and narrowed his eyes at me. “Everything okay?” The question was hesitant, the kind one would use with a woman on the edge.
“Yep. All good.”
“What happened back there?” He jerked his head toward the door down the hall.
This was definitely not the time nor the place to have a heart-to-heart with him about how seeing Marty strung up like a virgin sacrifice had resurrected feelings I’d believed buried for good. Feelings of revenge and loss, guilt and victory, disappointment and pride about Lavinia’s death. One of the shittiest parts about mourning is that just when you think you’ve moved on, someone else dies and all that grief rises up, resurrecting all the pain and anger and remorse. But, like I said, not the time or the place. Hell, if I had my way, no time or place would ever be right to talk about it again.
“The smell got to me.” I shrugged and forced a self-deprecating laugh to hide the lie. “Guess I’m losing my edge.”
“I don’t think anyone has an edge sharp enough not to be affected by that.”
True enough. Even Adam, who was normally unflappable, looked green around the gills. “Does Slade have any idea who did this?”
Adam shook his head. He turned to walk back down the hall. I froze, my feet glued to the grimy tiles. My gut twisted at the thought of going back into that room. But then I noticed someone had closed the door. Swallowing my resistance, I marched toward Slade, determined to ignore the fear and the memories and focus on the job of finding out who killed Marty.
When we reached Slade, Michael Romulus was by his side, going over what they knew so far. Adam and I exchanged quick handshakes with the werewolf Alpha before we all got down to business.
“None of the girls saw anything,” Slade said. “Cinnamon found Tansy knocked out in the supply closet. They found the body together.”
“How many entrances and exits are there to this area?” I asked, switching to just-the-facts-ma’am mode.
“Just the one door. None of the rooms have windows either. Best bet is the killer did the job and slipped back into the club while Pussy Willow was playing. Looks like probably a fifteen-to thirty-minute window between his escape and Cinnamon finding Tansy.”
In other words, he had f**k-all in the way of leads.
“From the looks of it,” I said, “the culprit is almost definitely a vampire.”
Michael frowned at me. “What makes you say that?”
I hesitated, not wanting to go down this path but knowing I had to. “The position of the body.” I couldn’t stand to say Marty’s name right then if I was going to maintain my distance. “There’s an old Dominae ritual where they string up virgins above an altar and bathe in the blood.”
Adam’s eyebrow raised to his hairline. Something in his eyes told me he was connecting the dots about my earlier reaction. Luckily, Michael jumped in before the mage could question me about it.
“Or someone wants us to think it was a vampire to throw us off their scent,” Michael said. “Any number of beings could have done it. Several classifications of demons would be capable of this.”
“Or a rogue werewolf,” Slade said.
Michael tensed like he wanted to get defensive about that theory but thought better of it. “A rogue wolf wouldn’t make it far without me picking up a scent, but it’d be foolish to rule any possibility out at this point.”
“He’s right,” Adam said. “A mage could flash in and out unnoticed, which blows Slade’s escape-through-the-club theory out of the water. Hell, even a faery with enough motivation could have pulled this off.”
“There’s something else,” I said to the mancy. The other two males knew this already but it was time to fill Adam in on the truth about what I’d seen earlier that night. “Remember how I said there was a murder in Central Park earlier?” He frowned and nodded. “When Slade asked me to come to his office it was to discuss that killing. When I saw the body, it had bite marks and there wasn’t enough blood at the scene to show for the extent of the male’s injuries. That means vampire.”
“She’s right,” Michael said. “My boys saw the body and believed the culprit was probably a vamp, too.”
“So you think the two murders are connected?” Adam asked.
“I think it’d be a mistake to think two sadistic murders happening on dark-race territory on one night is a coincidence,” I said. “The real question is, are we dealing with a garden-variety psycho or someone with more strategic reasons?”
“Do you think this is related to the peace negotiations?” Michael asked.
My stomach tightened at the possibility. “Like you said, we can’t rule anything out yet. But for the record, I sure as hell pray this is just a psychotic vampire with a hard-on for drama.” I didn’t even want to contemplate the alternative. I’d worked too hard, sacrificed too much to face yet another roadblock to peace.
Slade ran a hand over his face. “Christ, what a clusterfuck. When the Despina finds out about this, she’s going to rake me over the coals.”
“Forget the Despina,” Adam said. “When Orpheus finds out a mage was murdered—possibly by a vampire—he’s going to shit bricks. With the peace treaty signing looming, he’s going to lock this city down until the perpetrator is found.”
Slade looked like he was going to be sick. “Speaking of, I’d better go call the High Councilman now so he hears this from me. In the meantime, Mike, I want you and your boys to get statements from everyone in the bar. Maybe we’ll get lucky and someone will have seen something.”
“And if they didn’t?” I asked.
“Then I’m going to tear this city apart until I find the ass**le responsible.”
