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“She asked me the same thing.” Kit’s form flows into Colton, then Eduardo. “Others as well, and that’s just so far.”
Nina’s face clears, and she peers at me curiously. “You’re a dreamwalker, right? Just like Leal?”
“We have the same power, yes, though I’m not sure how I measure up to his abilities.”
She pours herself a glass of wine in the air and sips it thoughtfully.
Could she be the culprit, after all? She’s not answering my question, and overall looks like she’s hiding something.
“So,” I prompt cautiously, “when Gemma—”
“I was doing yoga,” she says abruptly.
Huh. I suppose that goes with the New Age vibe. “Anything specific you recall about that session?”
“This is so you can verify in my dreams if I’m telling the truth, right?”
“Exactly. The more details, the easier my job.”
“I was in this room.” She makes a gesture that causes all the furniture to float up several feet, clearing the floor—as she presumably would do for yoga practice. “I started with child’s pose, then flowed into downward-facing dog.” She throws more yoga poses at me, and I note each one in my phone. “At the end, I always do a relaxing corpse pose. I’d never reflected on how macabre that sounds until saying it just now—as a murder suspect,” she adds, fiddling with the hoop in her nostril.
“You won’t be a suspect for long,” I promise. “Now that I know what you were up to, I can easily clear you.”
“Right. In my dreams.” Her dark eyebrows pull together. “Talk to me once you have no doubt of my guilt.” She glances at Kit. “Privately.”
Okay, what is that about?
I throw out a wild guess. “If you know who the real killer is, I can ask Kit to leave so we can—”
“I don’t.” She lowers the furniture back to the floor. “But we should talk. Afterward. Now if that’s all, you’d better go talk to the rest of your suspects.”
Kit stands up and sets her glass on the nearby table. “Thanks for the drink.”
Our exit beneath the giant rock comes with a lot less fear.
“Kain’s next,” Kit says over her shoulder. “Hopefully he’s back.”
Before I can ask her where he’d gone, I spot a familiar figure coming down the corridor.
It’s Filth, and he’s giving me the evil eye.
“If it isn’t the blood whore,” he sneers when I’m within earshot. “Do let me know when you’re ready for an undiluted fix.”
I give him a placid stare. “Did you have any trouble getting the tampons, errand boy?”
Felix chuckles. “I forgot to tell you, I did make the checkout process harder for him—and there is a video.”
Filth’s fangs emerge. “I’ll rip your—”
“No, you won’t.” Kit has turned into Kain.
“Speaking of ripping…” I look over Filth’s sickly body. “Are you strong enough to rip someone in half?”
Kain Kit gives me a glare. “Don’t antagonize him further.”
“I’m asking as part of my investigation,” I say, stretching the truth only a little. “It’s a compliment, in a way. You said only the oldest vampires can accomplish such a feat.”
“I’ve never tried to rip something in half. I suspect I’d greatly enjoy it, though.” Filth gives me a deliberate once-over.
“That’s nice,” I say. “So what were you doing when Gemma was killed?”
“I was on a job with Kain.” His fangs go away. “Someone without a Mandate stepped out of line, so we put him down like a rabid dog—the way we should’ve done with you.”
“Thank you,” I say calmly. “Sounds like you and Kain are each other’s alibis. I hope you don’t take it personally when I verify your story with Kain and in the dream world.”
“You keep doing your pretend work. I’ll wait until you fail.” He brushes past us.
Kit turns back into her usual self and heads down the corridor to a black metal door. She knocks on it, and just as I catch up, Kain opens the door.
“She’s yours again,” Kit says. She turns to me. “I have some business to attend to, but I guess I’ll see you in my dreams?”
I smile. “Thanks for your help.”
“How goes the investigation?” Kain asks, gesturing for me to come inside.
He leads me into a sleek kitchen that reminds me of Colton’s, just with a normal-sized table and chairs, and sits me down on a stylish black bar stool as I bring him up to speed on everything except the alibi Filth provided a minute ago. It’s unlikely their stories won’t match, but if so, that would be a major breakthrough. And I can’t dismiss what Kit said about Kain’s potential culpability.
The vampire opens a bottle of distilled water and puts it in front of me like a bartender. “Tonight, you’ll establish a dream link with everyone on the Council. You’ll dreamwalk in everyone you’ve spoken with thus far, plus a few people I personally suspect.”
I greedily gulp the water. “Actually, I might have to do one or the other. There’s a limit to how much I can use my power in a day, and setting up links is draining. Why don’t I just set up links and dreamwalk in the people I’ve spoken with so far?”
