Ceremony In Death

"I'll close it, Feeney. I promise you."

He nodded, rubbed his hands over his face. "Okay. I'm sorry I jumped you."

"It's all right. It doesn't matter." She hesitated, then put her hand on his arm, squeezed lightly. "Go home, Feeney. You don't want to be here today."

"I guess I will." He put a hand on the door. "She was a sweetheart, Dallas," he said quietly. "My God, I don't want to go to another funeral."

When he left, Eve sank into her chair. Misery and guilt and anger twisted around her throat like barbs. She rose again, grabbed her bag. She was, she told herself, in the perfect mood to meet Selina Cross.

– =O=-***-=O=-

"How do you want to play it?" Peabody asked as they pulled up in front of an elegant old building downtown.

"Straight. I want her to know Alice talked to me, and that I suspect her of harassment, dealing, and conspiracy to murder. If she's got any brains, she'll know I don't have anything solid. But I'll give her something to think about."

Eve stepped out of the car, ran her gaze over the building with its carved glass windows and gri

"I'll give you one right now." Peabody clamped her recorder onto her uniform jacket, but kept her eyes on the topmost window of the building, a wide, round glass intricately carved. "That's another inverted pentagram. Satanic symbol. And those gargoyles don't look friendly." She smiled wanly. "You ask me, they look hungry."

"Impressions, Peabody. Try to keep the fantasies down to a minimum." Eve approached the security screen.

"Please state your name and your business."

"Lieutenant Eve Dallas and aide, NYPSD." She held up her badge to be sca

"Are you expected?"

"Oh, I don't think she'll be surprised."

"One moment."

While she waited, Eve studied the street. There was plenty of pedestrian and vehicular traffic, she noted. But most of those who walked used the other side of the street, and many of those eyed her and the building warily.

Oddly, there wasn't a single glida grill or street hawker in sight.

"You are cleared to enter, Lieutenant. Please proceed to elevator one. It is already programmed."

"Fine." Eve looked up, caught the shadow of movement behind the topmost glass. "Look official, Peabody," she murmured as they approached the heavily grilled front doors. "We're under observation."

The grills slid back, locks snicked open. The light on a recessed security panel blinked from red to green. "A lot of hardware for an apartment building," Peabody commented, and ignoring the fluttering in her stomach, stepped in behind Eve.

Like a viewing parlor, the lobby area was heavily into red. A two-headed serpent slithered over the bloodred carpet, the gold threads of its eyes glinted as it watched a black-robed figure slice a curved knife over the throat of a white goat.

"Lovely art." Eve lifted a brow as Peabody carefully picked her way around the snake. "Wool doesn't bite."

"You can't be too careful." She glanced back as they stepped to the elevator. "I really hate snakes. My brother used to catch them out in the woods and chase me with them. Always had a phobia."

The ride up was smooth and fast, but it gave Eve enough time to detect yet another security camera in the small, black-mirrored car.

The doors opened into a spacious foyer with floors of black marble. Twin red velvet settees flanked an archway and boasted carved arms of snarling wolves. A floral arrangement speared out of a pot shaped like a boar's head.

"Wolfbane," Peabody said quietly, "bellado

"But the usual is so tedious, isn't it?"

They got their first face-to-face look at Selina Cross exactly as she wanted to be seen. Flanked by the archway in a snug black dress that brushed the floor, her feet bare with the toenails painted a violent red, she posed. And smiled.

Her skin was vampire white, the slash of red over her full lips glossy as fresh blood. Her eyes glittered green and feline in a narrow, undoubtedly witchlike face that wasn't beautiful, but was eerily compelling. Her hair fell, black against black, from that rigid center part, to her waist.

The hand she gestured with held rings on every finger and her thumb. A silver chain was attached to each and twisted into an intricate mesh over the back of her hand.

"Lieutenant Dallas and Officer Peabody, isn't it? What interesting visitors on such a dull day. Will you come in… to my parlor?"

"Are you alone, Ms. Cross? It would simplify this if we could speak with Mr. Alban as well."

"Oh, what a shame." She turned, silks whispering, and slipped through the arch. "Alban's busy this morning. Sit down." She gestured again, encompassing a generous room crowded with furniture. Every seat boasted the heads or claws or beaks of some predator. "Can I offer you something?"

"We'll skip the refreshments." Considering it apt, Eve chose a chair with the arms of a hound.

"Not even coffee? That is your drink, isn't it?" Then she shrugged, slicked a fingertip over the pentagram above her eyebrow. "But suit yourself." With that same studied skill, she lowered to a curved settee that stood on cloven feet and draped her long arms over the back. "Now, what can I do for you?"

"Alice Lingstrom was killed early this morning."

"Yes, I know." She continued to smile pleasantly, as though discussing the nice run of weather. "I could tell you I witnessed the… accident through my scrying mirror, but I doubt you'd believe that. Of course, I'm not one to disdain technology and often watch the news and other forms of entertainment on-screen. The information's been public for hours."

"You knew her."

"Of course; she was a pupil of mine for a time. A dissatisfactory one as it turned out. Alice complained to you about my tutelage." It wasn't formed as a question, but she waited, as if for an answer.

"If you mean she reported to me that she was drugged, sexually abused, and was a witness to an atrocity, then yes, she complained."

"Drugs, sex, and atrocities." Selina let out a low, purring laugh. "What an imagination our little Alice had. A shame she couldn't use it to broaden her vision. How is your imagination, Lieutenant Dallas?" She flicked the hand gloved with mesh. In the small marble fireplace, flames burst to life.

Peabody jolted, didn't manage to muffle a yelp, but neither woman acknowledged her. They continued to stare, unblinking at each other.

"Or may I call you Eve?"

"No. You can call me Lieutenant Dallas. It's a little warm for a fire, don't you think? And a bit early in the day for parlor tricks."

"I like it warm. You have excellent nerves, Lieutenant."

"I also have low tolerance for grifters and dealers and child killers."

"Am I all of that?" Selina tapped her sharp red nails on the back of the settee, her only outward sign of a

"I will. Where were you last night between the hours of one and three a.m.?"

"I was here, in my ritual room, with Alban and a young initiate we call Lobar. We were engaged in a private sexual ceremony from midnight until nearly dawn. Lobar is young and… enthusiastic."

"I'll want to talk to them both."

"You can contact Lobar any evening between eight and eleven at our club. As for Alban, I don't keep his schedule, but he is generally here or at the club most nights. Unless you believe in magic, Lieutenant, you're wasting your time. I could hardly have been here, fucking two very entertaining men, and out luring poor Alice to her death."