Iris Johansen - Blood Game

“Why, Joe.” Her luminous smile lit her face and reached out to touch him, embrace him, enfold him in love. “I’m Bonnie.”

____________________

MADNESS.

That sense of peace vanished, and he had turned and run down the porch steps in a panic.

It wasn’t real. It was a hallucination. It was all craziness, and there was no reason for him to feel this-His heart was beating hard. Why was he afraid? Not of that little girl in the swing. She wasn’t real.

Insanity. The breakdown of the mind was the enemy, that was why he was in this panic. He had always been so sure of what was real and what was fantasy. It was the bedrock of his character and now that bedrock was shifting, crumbling.

He’d forced himself to look back at the swing on the porch. No little girl with a luminous smile. He’d felt a little of the tension leaving him. He was still shaken and alarmed, but the first panic was gone. He’d known it was only a momentary aberration and would never be repeated.

Just as he was sure of that now, hours later, as he drove toward Lake Allatoona. There had been no ghostly visit from Eve’s daughter. Stress, the strain of the last days, and imagination had combined to make him lose it for a couple minutes. But now he was back to doing what he did best, and even the thought of Bonnie was fading.

A few minutes later, he pulled over behind the medical examiner’s van. Back to his reality. Not pleasant. Often grim.

Today he welcomed it.

He got out of the car, ducked under the yellow tape, and made his way toward the bank where Detective Gary Schindler was standing.

“Nasty.” Schindler turned to face Joe as he approached. He nodded at the body of the girl a few yards away surrounded by the forensic team. “She was just a kid.”

“Naked. Do we know if she was raped?”

“Not yet. She was wearing jeans and a red University of Georgia sweatshirt. Her clothes are piled over beneath that tree. Very neatly. Her body and hair are arranged neatly too.” He was silent a moment. “Ritual killing?”

“Could be.” Joe took a careful step forward to get a closer look. Poor kid. Her eyes were closed, but her expression was twisted with horror. “Her throat was cut.”

“Again, very neatly,” Schindler said. “One neat swipe of the jugular, or so the M.E. said. Her wrists have rope burns. She must have been tied down before or during the killing.”

“Not enough blood for that kind of wound.”

Schindler nodded. “Oh, there was blood. The bastard cleaned her up so that she’d be all pretty. Except for the goblet. He left traces in the goblet.”

Joe’s gaze flew to his face. “Goblet?”

“Her right hand.” Schindler pointed. “It’s half under her body, but there’s some kind of gold or brass goblet in her hand. I think it has carvings on it. We can’t move it until forensics gets finished, but you can see the blood on the inside of the cup. That’s why I was leaning toward a ritual killing.”

Joe stiffened.

Gold cup, intricately carved, Eve had said.

Joe squatted to get a better look at the goblet in Nancy Jo Norris’s hand.

The gold glittered in the early-morning sunlight. He couldn’t make out what they were but there were definitely carvings on the goblet.

Shit.

EVE WATCHED THE POLICE CARwith the young officer who had picked up the goblet go down the drive, passing the other police car parked on the road.

“There, it’s gone.” She turned to Jane. “Now will you go to bed and get some sleep?”

“Yep.” Jane gave her a hug and turned toward her bedroom. “It made me uneasy. No, it scared the hell out of me. The thing just reminded me of an Aztec or Mayan sacrificial cup. Not the most soothing thought to lull one to sleep. Now it’s in the hands of the police, and we’re doing something about it. Joe will get to the bottom of it.”

“Yes, we can count on that.” Eve watched Jane go into the bedroom and shut the door. She knew what Jane meant about the uneasiness. She’d had the same reaction when she’d seen the goblet.

Forget it. She couldn’t do anything about it now. There was a guard on duty. The alarm-company inspector would be out in a few hours to make sure the alarm could not be tampered with again. Keep busy. Check the mail. Check her e-mail to see if there were any requests for her to work on any of the children found on the island in the swamp. She reached for the pile of letters on the coffee table.

Her phone rang. Megan, again.

“I’m fine, Megan,” she said as she picked up. “I know you’re concerned, but I’m not experiencing any-”

“What about Joe Quinn?”

Eve froze. “What about him?”

“How much physical contact did he have with me while I was unconscious?”

“You were in shock and ice-cold. On the way back to the dock, he held you in his arms to warm you.”

“Damn.”

“Megan, you were unconscious. According to what you told me, this particular gift doesn’t usually work unless you’re fully aware and in a high emotional state.”

“Usually. I don’t have that much experience with it. I just don’t know. But I told you, I could hear those murdered children even while I was in a coma. That means every part of my mind was still keyed up and functioning. Maybe that facilitation effect was functioning too.”

“If it was working, then maybe Joe and I are immune.”

“God, I hope so. Your Joe isn’t behaving differently?”

“No. He’s working on a case now. I talked to him on the phone a few hours ago.” Eve tried to smother the sudden flash of anxiety that made her hand tighten on the phone. “Okay, he was a little… stiff with Jane when she first came. Maybe a little emotional with me. But he’s been through a hell of a lot in the past few days. I’m not willing to ascribe a slight difference in behavior to your voodoo.”

“Would he talk to you if he had a problem that was off the normalcy scope?”

“He talks to me.” But Joe was the ultimate realist. Would he even admit to himself that he was experiencing something neither real nor acceptable to him? And he hadn’t been able to talk to her this morning about what was troubling him.

“But you’re not sure,” Megan said shrewdly. “Not in this case. I don’t blame you. I don’t blame him. None of the usual rules apply. You question your sanity. That’s the first reaction. After that, I imagine it’s up to the individual.”

“Megan.” Eve had to say it. “I believe that you heard those dead children. It was very difficult for me to come to that conclusion. As you said, it breaks all the rules. But I can’t believe in this facilitation business. I know you do, and I respect you, but I think you must be mistaken.”

“You said that very diplomatically,” Megan said. “It’s only what I expected.” She was silent a moment. “We’ve become friends, Eve. I hoped you might trust me in this. It’s lonely carrying this by myself.”

“We are friends. Friends don’t always agree.”

“That’s true.” She added, “But friends also protect each other, and I have to keep trying to do that. I have to protect you, and I have to protect Joe Quinn.” Her voice vibrated with intensity. “Even if I had no personal feelings for you, I have a responsibility. I won’t let either of you be destroyed by something I did, something I am. Promise me that you’ll keep an eye out for anything out of the normal?”

“Of course.”

“And promise you’ll call me. Don’t keep it to yourself.”

“I’ll call you.”

“Good. I know that was hard for you. You prefer to keep things to yourself.”

“And you don’t?”