J. Robb - Possession in Death

“Now you'll get it back.”

She turned to Roarke, nodded. “Yeah. I will. I need to go home. You could drive while I talk to some cops.”

“Dallas,” Morris said, “I'd like to talk about this at some point.”

“Yeah. At some point.” She hesitated, handed him back the cloth, then closed her hand over his for just a moment. “Thanks.”

Cooler, steadier, she walked down the tunnel with Roarke.

“Is she there?”

Eve paused, looked down at the floor where she'd sat with Jenna. “No. I guess she's gone wherever she had to go. Jesus, Roarke.”

He took her hand firmly. “Let's get to the bottom of this, because right now I don't know if you need a doctor or a bloody priest.”

“A priest?”

“For an exorcism.”

“That's not funny,” she muttered.

“It's not, no.”

Roarke gave her the time she needed while he drove. He said nothing, listening to her talk with a handful of cops about someone named Alexi Barin. Since her color was back, and her skin no longer felt as though it might burn off her bones, he checked the impulse to take her straight to a health center.

He considered his wife, among other things, cynical, stable, and often annoyingly rooted in reality and logic.

When she told him, straight-faced and clear-eyed, she'd had a conversation with the dead, he leaned toward believing her. Particularly adding in her unhesitating response to his simple How are you? in Russian.

She clicked off her 'link again, said, “Hmmm.”

“How do you make Hungarian goulash?”

“What? I'm not making goulash.”

“I didn't ask you to make it, but how you would.”

“Oh, it's a test. Well, you'd cut up some onions and brown them in hot oil — just to golden brown, then you'd take this beef you'd cut in cubes and coated with flour, add that and some paprika to the oil and onions. Then — ”

“That's enough.”

“Why would you coat good meat with flour? I thought flour was for baking stuff.”

“Which proves you know less about cooking than I do, which is next to nothing, and yet you can toss off a recipe for goulash.”

“It's weird, and it's pretty fucking irritating. Which is why I'm going home instead of in to Central. I'm not going to find myself talking to some dead guy or whatever in front of other cops.”

“You're still you,” he murmured, foolishly relieved. “You're more embarrassed than frightened by the situation you appear to be in.”

“I don't even believe this is happening, but I know it is. I'm not sure I wouldn't rather have a brain tumor.”

She took a breath, then another. “I'm going back over it in my head. She was walking — staggering — bleeding all over the place. Science says she was dead, but Lopez saw her, too — and the medics when they got there. She talked to me. She looked at me.”

She moved back to the scene. “But she'd walked that way for blocks — I followed the blood trail back. And no one helped her, no one called for help. I can't buy that, so, using the twisted logic of this whole deal, I have to conclude no one saw her.”

“Continuing with that so-called twisted logic, she came to you. She had enough left in her to cross your path, to leave you a trail, to give you what you'd need to help her.”

“You could theorize. And the first thing she said was the girl's name: Beata. That she was trapped, needed help. She told me her name, and when I asked who'd done this to her, she said the devil. And . . . ”

“What?”

“She said I was the warrior. Her eyes were so dark, black eyes, so intense. She said I had to take her in, let her in. She asked me, begged me. Take me in, so I said sure. I just wanted to keep her calm and alive until the MTs got there.”

“You agreed.”

“I guess I did.” Huffing out a breath, she dragged a hand through her hair. “I guess I did, then she grabbed my hand, and bam — blinding light and like this electrical shock. These voices. I saw her face — the girl — Beata. Next thing I know, Lopez is calling my name, the medics are there, and Szabo's dead. Cold and dead.”

“Because, scientifically at least, she'd died hours earlier.”

“It's fucked up,” was Eve's opinion. “I felt shaky and off. I guess I haven't felt all the way steady since. I recognized things I shouldn't have and didn't recognize things I should. God, Roarke, I got lost driving to the morgue. I just couldn't remember the streets.”

He thought of how she'd looked, face dead white, shiny with sweat. “I think we should call Louise, have her come take a look at you.”

“I don't think a doctor's going to help, or a priest either. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I think it's like Janna. When we close the case, it'll be done.”

She shifted to him. “She cut me a little with her nails, see?” She held up her hand, palm out. “Said all this stuff about blood to blood and heart to heart. I had her blood all over me by then. And she said it wouldn't be finished until the promise was kept. And the thing is, I promised to find Beata while I was trying to keep the old woman alive.”

“You made a blood pact with a Romany.”

“A Romany speaker for the dead, apparently. Not on purpose,” she added with some heat.

“An accidental blood pact,” he qualified.

“You'd have done the same damn thing.” Peeved, she shifted away again. “And you're a civilian. I'm a cop. Protect and serve, goddamn it.”

“Which rarely includes blood pacts with dead travelers.”

“Are you trying to piss me off?”

“Got your color back,” he said easily.

“Well, whoopee. Eyes on the prize. I have to find out who killed Gizi Szabo, and I have to find Beata.”

“She's alive, Beata. You're certain.”

“In my current condition, tossing out the logic that says otherwise? I think Szabo would have known if the girl was dead. And I think I'd know it now. Instead, I have this certainty, against all that logic, that she's alive, trapped by the same devil who killed her great-grandmother. He wants to keep the girl, and the old woman made sure people knew she was getting close to finding her. Maybe she did that to lure him out, maybe she did it because it kept her going. But she was a threat.”

Her nerves throttled down a few more notches when Roarke drove through the gates, when she saw the house. Home. Hers.

“Beata's a liability now,” Eve added. “And that may weigh heavier on him than his need to keep her. Szabo stirred things up, and now I've done the same. He may decide to kill her rather than risk discovery.”

“This Alexi Barin?”

“He's heading the list. He knew her, wanted her, got shut down by her. He's got an ego the size of Utah. He knew where she lived, where she worked, very likely knew her basic routine. Added, they were rehearsing for this big dance — Diabolique, Angel and Devil, which is no fucking coincidence.”

“I'd agree. That would make it easier yet to lure her. Extra practice, after hours.”

“There you go. He's had violent run-ins, got a sheet, and the cops who busted him all say he's got a temper that lights him up — quick and fast. And that's why he's not in Interview right now.”

“Because while Szabo was killed violently and perhaps on impulse, if Beata's still alive, being held against her will, that took some planning. And continues to take planning.”

“Right now, it's a good thing you can think like a cop, because I don't know if my brain's firing on all circuits.” She got out of the car. “I need to be home. I need to be back in control. And if you're up for it, I could use some help running everybody on my list who knows Beata, studied with her, worked with her. Her neighbors, her friends, people who saw her routinely. You want what you see — or have to see it to want it.”