The Death Dealer

“Do you mind?” she asked. “Say no—this is my apartment, and I can smoke here if I want to.”

“It’s your funeral,” Raif said with a shrug.

“I still like the smell of smoke,” Joe told her, smiling.

She flashed him a smile in return.

“How long have you been a psychic, Miss Star?” he asked politely.

She hesitated, a strange look on her face. “I’m really an actress,” she said.

Tom made a choking sound. She flashed him a cold glare. “I’ve been an extra in three movies now,” she said.

“Oh, yeah?” Tom asked. “Did you play a hooker?”

Joe shook his head, tempted to put a bag over the man’s head. Tom was too used to interrogating suspects with whom it was necessary to take a hard line.

In this case, though, a hard line wasn’t what was called for.

“Miss Star, please, we need your help,” he said. He had been ready to dismiss the woman’s claims himself, but something about the way she had looked when he’d asked her how long she had been a psychic had given him pause.

After all, who the hell was he to doubt anyone? He’d thought a corpse had spoken to him from a Gurney at the morgue.

She hesitated, looking at him. “Honestly?” she asked. And at that moment, there was something raw and young and vulnerable about her features that got to him.

She was scared.

“Yes, honestly.”

She looked around at the three of them. “This is off the record, right? You guys have to keep what I say between us.”

“If you know anything about an attempted murder…” Raif began.

She shook her head. “I don’t know anything about an attempted murder. Except for what I saw. In my mind.”

A shadow seemed to pass over Raif’s eyes. From now on, he wasn’t going to believe her. Tom seemed to have withdrawn, as well.

“What did you see, in your mind’s eye, and how did it all happen?” Joe said quickly, before either of the other men could say anything to shut her down.

“I was here. At home. Getting ready for the night.”

Tom made a choking sound again.

Joe flashed him a frown. “Were you here alone?” he asked.

She nodded. Then the words suddenly started spilling out. “I sat down here. Right here. On the sofa, like I am now. I lit a cigarette, and I was going to watch some TV before I went to change clothes. But then…it was so weird. All of a sudden it was as if I was in a car. As if I were really there. I could see the traffic in front of me. I was someone else. And I was gunning for a car. A green Cadillac. I knew the car. I knew where it was, because I’d been following it. It was as if I was me, but at the same time I wasn’t me. It was as if I was a passenger in someone else’s body. Oh, God, it was awful. As if I could feel all this hatred…I—the me that wasn’t me—knew not to hit the car myself, but I’m—he’s—a good driver and could make people swerve and stuff. So I…he…she…I don’t know which…did, and then…wham. Crash. There was metal and glass, and a word in my head….”

She stopped speaking. She was trembling, her face ashen. Either she really deserved her shot at Hollywood, or the fear she was feeling was real.

“Miss Star?”

She looked at him, as if she had forgotten that he was there.

“And the word? What was the word?” Joe persisted gently.

“Nevermore,” she said.

CHAPTER 5

“I’m going to the meeting tonight,” Genevieve told Sam. “No matter what’s going on. I can’t help it—I’m worried about my mother. About all of you.”

“Because of Thorne’s murder,” Sam agreed.

“I know he made plenty of enemies, and the Poe angle could just be the killer’s way to throw people off track, but…well, what did you think of his book?”

“I think it was a good book,” Sam said. “The man could write.” He looked past her for a moment, then turned back to her and asked, “I take it you saw that ‘psychic’ on TV?”

She nodded.

“You believe in psychics?”

“I don’t know what I believe.”

She heard a sound then and turned around.

Joe was there, leaning against the wall, arms crossed over his chest as he watched her. She swore silently.

“Joe, hi. Come on in,” Sam said.

She rose uneasily. “You two know each other?” she said.

“We met years ago,” Sam said. “Joe and Matt Connolly were cousins.” He stared at her. “But I guess you knew that.”

“I never knew Matt,” she said.

“Oh, right,” Sam said uncomfortably. “Anyway,” he said, “Joe and I actually go way back.”

“A long way,” Joe agreed pleasantly. “So how are you doing?”

“Hanging in,” Sam said. He must have noticed the way Joe looked at Genevieve—as if she had committed a sin—because he looked curiously from one to the other.

She hoped she wasn’t looking guilty. She shouldn’t feel guilty. She hadn’t actually lied to Joe.

As if trying to diffuse the tension, Sam asked her, “So Joe is working for you, right?”

“Yes,” she said, meeting Joe’s eyes.

“She’s an amazing woman. She hires me, but she still likes to do all the work herself,” Joe said dryly.