Alex looked down at Tara’s body. She’d been frightened in those last moments, but she hadn’t been hurting. That had to count for something.
Lance would go to prison. There would be evidence. That amount of blood… Well, you couldn’t hide it. Alex knew.
The map still glowed above Tara. Little injuries. Big ones. What would Alex’s map show? She’d never broken a bone, had surgery. But the worst damage didn’t leave a mark. When Hellie died, it was as if someone had cut into Alex’s chest, cracked her open like balsa wood. What if it really had been like that and she’d had to walk down the street bleeding, trying to hold her ribs together, her heart and her lungs and every part of her open to the world? Instead, the thing that had broken her had left no mark, no scar for her to point to and say, This is where I ended.
No doubt that was true for Tara too. There was more pain locked inside her that no glowing map would reveal. But though her wounds were grotesque, there were no organs taken, no blood marks or indications of magical harm. Tara had died because she’d been as stupid as Alex and no one had come to rescue her in time. She hadn’t found Jesus or yoga, and no one had offered her a scholarship to Yale.
It was time to leave. She had her answers. This should be enough to appease Hellie’s memory and Darlington’s judgment too. But something was still tugging at her, that sense of familiarity she’d felt at the crime scene that had nothing to do with Tara’s blond hair or the sad, parallel tracks of their lives.
“Should we go?” she asked the coroner standing in the corner in his scrubs, looking vaguely at nothing.
“Whatever you like,” he said.
Alex closed the drawer.
“I think I’d like to sleep for eighteen hours,” Alex said on a sigh. “Walk me out and tell Moira everything went fine.”
She opened the door and strolled straight into Detective Abel Turner.
He seized her arm and drove her backward into the room, slamming the door behind him. “What the living fuck do you think you’re doing?”
“Hey!” Alex said cheerfully. “You made it.”
The coroner hovered behind him. “Are we going?” he asked. “Stay there a minute,” said Alex. “Turner, you’re gonna want to let go of me.”
“You don’t tell me what I want. And what the hell is wrong with him?”
“He’s having a good night,” said Alex, her heart pounding in her chest. Abel Turner did not lose his cool. He was always smiling, always calm. But something in Alex liked him better this way.
“Did you lay hands on that girl?” he said, fingers digging into her skin. “Her body is evidence and you are tampering with it. That’s a crime.”
Alex thought about kneeing Turner in the nuts, but that wasn’t what you did with a cop, so she went limp. Completely limp. It was a strategy she’d learned to use with Len.
“What the hell?” He tried to hold her up as she slumped against him, then released her. “What is wrong with you?” He wiped his hand on his arm as if her weakness were catching.
“Plenty,” Alex said. She managed to right herself before she actually fell, making sure to stay out of his reach. “What kind of stuff were Tara and Lance getting into?”
“I beg your pardon?”
She thought of Lance’s face floating above her. I’m sorry. What had they been using that final night together? “What were they dealing? Acid? Molly? I know it wasn’t just pot.”
Turner’s eyes narrowed, his old, smooth demeanor slipping back into place. “Like everything else related to this case, that is none of your business.”
“Were they dealing to students? To the societies?”
“They had a long roster.”
“Who?”
Turner shook his head. “Let’s go. Now.”
He reached for her arm but she sidestepped him. “You can stay here,” Alex told the coroner. “The handsome Detective Turner will see me out.”
“What did you do to him?” Turner muttered as they stepped into the hall.
“Freaky shit.”
“This isn’t a joke, Ms. Stern.”
As he hustled her down the hall, Alex said, “I’m not doing this for fun either, you get that? I don’t like being Dante. You don’t like being Centurion, but these are our jobs and you’re screwing it up for both of us.”
Turner looked slightly put out by that. Of course, it wasn’t really true. Sandow had told her to stand down. Rest easy.
They stepped into the waiting room. Dawes was nowhere to be seen. “I told your friend to wait in the car,” said Turner. “At least she has the sense to know when she fucks up.”
And not a single warning. Dawes was a crap lookout.
Moira Adams smiled from the desk. “You get your moment, hon?”
Alex nodded. “I did. Thank you.”
“I’ll have your family in my prayers. Good night, Detective Turner.”
“You do some freaky shit to her too?” Turner asked as they stepped into the cold.
Alex rubbed her arms miserably. She wanted her coat. “Didn’t have to.”
“I told Sandow I’d keep him up-to-date. If I thought any of the young psychopaths under your care were connected, I would be pursuing it.”
Alex believed that. “There could be things you’re not seeing.” “There’s nothing to see. Her boyfriend was arrested near the scene. Their neighbors heard some ugly arguments the last few weeks. There’s blood evidence linking him to the crime. He had powerful hallucinogens in his system—”
“What exactly?”
“We’re not sure yet.”
Alex had stayed away from any kind of hallucinogen after she realized they just made the Grays more terrifying, but she’d held plenty of hands during good and bad trips and she had yet to meet the mushroom that could make you feel like you weren’t being stabbed to death.
“Do you want him to get away with it?” Turner said.
“What?” The question startled her.
“You tampered with a corpse. Tara’s body is evidence. If you mess around with this case enough, it could mean Lance Gressang doesn’t go away for this. Do you want that?”
“No,” Alex said. “He doesn’t get away with it.”
Turner nodded. “Good.” They stood in the cold. Alex could see the old Mercedes idling in the lot, one of the only remaining cars. Dawes’s face was a dim smudge behind the windshield. She raised her hand in what Alex realized was a limp wave. Thanks, Pammie. It was long past time to let this go. Why couldn’t she?
She tried one last play. “Just give me a name. Lethe will find out eventually. If the societies are messing around with illegal substances, we should know.” And then we can move on to kidnapping, insider trading, and—did cutting someone open to read their innards fall under assault? They’d need a whole new section of the penal code to cover what the societies dabbled in. “We can investigate without stepping on your murder case.”
Turner sighed, his breath pluming white in the cold. “There was only one society name in her contacts. Tripp Helmuth. We’re in the process of clearing him—”
“I saw him last night. He’s a Bonesman. He was working the door at a prognostication.”
“That’s what he said. Was he there the whole night?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted. Tripp had been banished to the hallway to stand guard. It was true that once a ritual started, people rarely went in or out, only when someone got faint or sick or if something had to be fetched for the Haruspex. Alex thought she remembered the door opening and closing a few times, but she couldn’t be certain. She’d been worrying about the chalk circle and trying not to vomit. But it was hard to believe Tripp could have skipped out on the ritual, gotten all the way to Payne Whitney, murdered Tara, and gotten back on duty without anyone knowing. Besides, what homicidal beef could he have with Tara? Tripp was rich enough to buy himself out of any kind of trouble Tara or her boyfriend might have tried to make for him, and it wasn’t Tripp’s face Alex had seen hovering above Tara with a knife. It was Lance’s.