Ritual in Death

by J. D. Robb

  Gone, Eve thought, bled out. Throat slashed, multiple body wounds. She shook her head at Roarke, gestured to the left.

  She moved right, in a suite the mirror image of Maxia’s. Sweeping her weapon, she cleared a dining room, a short hallway, a kitchen, a powder room, making the circle that brought her back to Roarke.

  “Bed and bath clear, this level,” he told her. “Both were used. There’s considerable blood—smears not spatters. Hers, I expect.”

  He wasn’t a cop, she mused, but he could think like one. “We’re going up.” She did a chin point toward the elevator and tried to ignore the stench—not just death, but a kind of burning on the air. “Can you block that? Shut it down?”

  Saying nothing, he walked to it, took out his tool again. While he worked, Eve circled the pentagram to clear the terrace.

  “Done.”

  “What’s the layout on the second floor?”

  “Bed and bath, small sitting room to the left. Master suite—living area, powder room, dressing area, bed and bath to the right.”

  “I’ll take the right.”

  The place felt empty, she thought. It felt dead. The metallic reek of the blood, the sickly sweet overlay of death mixed with candle wax smeared the air. And something more, that burning and a kind of . . . pulsing, she thought. Spent energy, the shadows of it still beating.

  Together they cleared the second level, then the third.

  She found evidence of sexual frenzy, of food, of drink, of murder. “The sweepers are going to be hours in here, if not days.”

  Roarke studied the glasses, plates, half-eaten food. “What kind of people do murder, and leave so much of themselves behind?”

  “The kind who think they’re beyond or above the law. The worst kind. I need to seal this place off, all three levels, until crime scene gets here. Who was registered in this suite?”

  “The Asant Group.” On the steps, he stared down at the body posed on the pentagram. “Jumble the letters, and you’ve got—”

  “Satan. God, I hate this kind of shit. People want to worship the devil, be my guest. Hell, they can have horns surgically implanted on their forehead. But then they’ve just got to slice somebody up for their human sacrifice and drag me into it.”

  “Damned cheeky of them.”

  “I’ll say.”

  “Naked Jack didn’t do this on his own.”

  “Nope. Let’s go see if his memory’s a little clearer.”

  The uniforms had taken over. Eve directed them to take names and contact info from the guests, then clear them out.

  She sat on the floor with Jackson. “I need a sample of the blood you’re wearing, Jack.”

  “There’s so much of it.” His body jerked every few seconds, as if in surprise. “It’s not mine.”

  “No.” She took several samples—face, arms, chest, back, feet. “What were you doing in 606?”

  “What?”

  “Suite 606. You were in there.”

  “I don’t know. Was I?”

  “Who’s the woman?”

  “There were a lot of women, weren’t there?” Again he shuddered in pain. “Were you there? Do you know what happened?”

  “Look at me, goddamn it.” Her voice was like a slap, shocked him back to her. “There’s a woman in 606. Her throat’s slashed.”

  “Did I do it? Did I hurt somebody?” He pressed his forehead to his knees. “My head. My head. Somebody’s screaming in my head.”

  “Do you belong to the Asant Group?”

  “I don’t know. What is it? I don’t know. Who are you? What’s happening?”

  With a shake of her head, Eve rose as the med-techs she’d ordered stepped in. “I want him examined. I want a blood sample. I need to know what he’s on. When you’re done, he’ll be transported to Cop Central.”

  “Whose blood is it?”

  “You’re too late for her.” She walked back into the living area to leave them to it just as her partner came in the main door.

  Peabody’s hair was pulled back in a stubby little tail that left her square face unframed and seemed to enlarge her brown eyes. She wore baggy dark pants and a white tee with a red jacket tossed over it. She carried a field kit.

  “Who died?”

  “An as yet unidentified female. Prime suspect is in there.” Eve jerked her head. “Naked and covered with what is most likely her blood.”

  “Wow. Must’ve been a hell of a party.”

  “It happened on the other side. Let’s go work the scene.”

  Outside the doors of 606 they coated hands and feet with Seal-It while Eve gave Peabody the rundown.

  “He just walked into the cocktail party? And doesn’t remember anything?”

  “Yes, and so it seems. He doesn’t come off as faking it. Both pupils are big as the moon. He’s disoriented, motor skills are off, and he appears to have one major headache.”

  “Stoned?”

  “Be my first guess, but we’ll see what the MTs have to say about it.” Eve unsealed the door, and now used the key Roarke had acquired for her.

  When she stepped in, the sturdy Peabody blanched. “Man. Oh crap.” She bent over at the waist, pressed her hands to her thighs and took long, slow breaths.

  “Don’t you boot on my crime scene.”

  “Just need a minute. Okay.” She kept breathing. “Okay. Black magic. Bad juju.”

  “Don’t start that shit. We’ve got a bunch of assholes who had an orgy, topped it off with ritual murder using Satan as an excuse. Used the private elevator,” Eve added, gesturing toward it, “most likely, coming and going. We’ll want the security discs for that. Cleaned up after they did her. Evidence of that in the bathrooms, of which there are six in this place. Beds show signs of being used, and food and drink were consumed. Since I doubt the pentagram is part of the room’s original decor, somebody drew it on the floor. A question might be ‘Why?’ Why use a fancy, high-dollar hotel suite for your annual satanic meeting?

  “Let’s get her prints, get an ID and a time of death.” Since Peabody still looked pale, Eve opted to take the body herself. “Do a run on Pike, Jackson. His prints came up with age thirty-three, and an addy on West Eighty-eighth. He’s a doctor. See if he’s got a sheet.”

  Eve stepped over to the body, doing what she could to avoid the blood. Not to preserve her shoes, but the scene. The air chilled, teased gooseflesh on her arms, and once more she felt, sensed, a pulsing.

  She lifted the victim’s hand to the Identi-pad, scanned the prints.

  “Marsterson, Ava, age twenty-six, single. Mixed-race female with an address on Amsterdam. Employed as office manager at the West Side Health Clinic.”

  Eve tipped her head at the tattoo—a red and gold serpent swallowing its own tail—that circled the left hip. “She’s got a tat on her hip, and it’s not listed on her ID. Maybe a temp, or maybe fresh.”

  She took out her gauge. “TOD, twenty-two-ten. That’s nearly an hour before Pike crashed the party down the hall.” She replaced the gauge and studied the body. “The victim’s throat is deeply slashed, in what appears to be a single blow with a sharp blade, right to left, slightly downward angle. A right-handed attacker, facing. He wanted to see your face when he sliced you open. Multiple wounds, slices, stab wounds, over shoulders, torso, abdomen, legs. Varying sizes and depths. Various blades held in various hands? Victim is posed, arms and legs spread, in the center of a black pentagram drawn directly onto the floor. Bruising on the thighs. Possible rape or consensual sex, ME to determine. No defensive wounds. None. Didn’t put up a fight, Ava? Did they just take you down by slashing your throat, then have a party on you? Tox screen to determine presence of alcohol and/or drugs.”

  At the knock on the door, Eve called out for Peabody.

  “I got it.” Peabody hustled over, used the security peep. “It’s Crime Scene.”

  In minutes the room filled with noise, movement, equipment, and the somehow cleaner smell of chemicals. When the crew from the morgue rolled in,
Eve stepped away from the body.

  “Marsterson, Ava. Bag and tag. Peabody, with me. Run this Asant Group,” she ordered. “We’re going in to shake what we can out of Pike.”

  “There had to be at least a dozen people in there, Dallas. Twelve, fifteen people by the number of trays and the glasses. Why come here to do this? You can’t cover it up this way, and hey, party down the hall going on at the same time with a cop right there. By the way, you look totally mag. The shoes are up to wicked.”

  Eve frowned down at the shoes she’d forgotten she was wearing. “Shit, shit. I’ve got to go into Central in this getup.” She’d also, she realized, forgotten Roarke.

  He leaned against the wall outside Maxia’s suite doing something that entertained or interested him on his PPC. And looked up as she approached.

  “Sorry. I should’ve told you to go home.”

  “I assumed you’d want the code for the car since it’s not one of yours. I had the garage bring it out front. Hello, Peabody.”

  “Hey. You guys look superior. It’s really too bad the evening got screwed for you.”

  “It got screwed bigger for Ava Marsterson,” Eve commented. “Maxia?”

  “Took a soother and went to bed. I’ll get myself home.” He caught Eve’s chin in his hand, skimmed his thumb down the dent, then kissed her. He handed her a mini memo cube. “Code’s on it. Take care, Lieutenant. Good night, Peabody.”

  Peabody watched him walk away. “Boy, sometimes you just want to slurp him up without a straw.” She wheeled her eyes to Eve. “Did I say that out loud?”

  Three

  Grateful she kept some workout gear in her locker, Eve stripped off the party dress, pried her aching feet out of the hated shoes, then pulled on loose cotton pants and a faded gray tee. Since she couldn’t walk around Central or successfully intimidate a suspect dripping in diamonds, she had no choice but to secure them in her locker.

  Safe enough, she thought. If they’d been a candy bar, odds were lower that her property would be there when she opened the locker. But a small—probably not so small—fortune in diamonds, no problem.

  After stepping into an ancient pair of skids, she met Peabody in the corridor.

  “No criminal. Nothing, Dallas. He had a detained and released for disturbing the peace when he was twenty. Some college fraternity party. It wouldn’t be on his record except the campus cops slapped the whole fraternity over it. He’s from Pennsylvania, just moved here a couple of weeks ago. He’s a doctor, pretty much brand-spanking-new, and just took a position on staff at—”

  “The West Side Health Clinic.”

  “It’s annoying to do the run if I don’t get the payoff. Interview A. They got him cleaned up.”

  “The victim?” Eve asked as they walked.

  “Clean to the squeaky level. Moved to New York about two years ago from Indiana. Both parents and younger brother still back there. We’ll have to notify them.”

  “We’ll take Pike first. They can wait a few hours to have their lives shattered.” She pushed open the door to the interview room, nodded to the uniform.

  The uniform stepped out, and Eve walked to the table where Jack sat in the orange pants and shirt of a con. “Record on. Dallas, Lieutenant Eve, and Peabody, Detective Delia, in interview with Pike, Jackson, regarding the investigation into the death of Marsterson, Ava.”

  “Ava?” Jack looked up, his face squeezed tight as if he struggled on the name. “Ava?”

  “That’s right, Ava. You’ve been read your rights, Mr. Pike, is that correct?”

  “Ah, I don’t know.”

  “Then we’ll refresh you.” Eve recited the Revised Miranda. “Do you understand your rights and obligations?”

  “I think. Yes. Why? Why am I here?”

  “You don’t remember?”

  “My head.” He pressed both hands to his temples. “Was I in an accident? My head hurts.”

  “What do you remember about today?”

  “I . . . I went to work. Didn’t I? What day is it? Is it Tuesday?”

  “It’s Wednesday.”

  “But . . .” Jack stared up at her. “What happened to Tuesday?”

  “What drugs did you take, Jack?”

  “I don’t, I don’t take drugs. I don’t do illegals. I’m a doctor. I’m on staff at . . .” He held his head again, and rocked. “Where? Where?”

  “The West Side Health Clinic.”

  He looked at Eve, his eyes, his face slack with relief. “Yes. Yes. That’s it. I just started. I went to work. I went to work, and then . . .” He moaned, shuddered. “Please, can I have a blocker? My head’s pounding.”

  “You’ve got something in you, Jack. I can’t give you a blocker until I know what it is. Did you go to the Palace Hotel with Ava? To Suite 606?”

  “Ava . . . I can’t . . . Ava works at the clinic.” Sweat shone on his face from the effort. “Ava, manages . . . Ava. We . . .” Then horror covered it. “No. No. No.”

  “What happened to Ava, Jack?”

  “No. No.”

  “What happened in 606?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t—”

  “Stop!” She reached over, grabbed a fistful of his shirt. “You tell me what happened.”

  “It’s not real. It didn’t happen.”

  “What isn’t real?”

  “The people, the people.” He surged to his feet, and Eve signaled Peabody to stay back. “The lights. The voices. Smoke and fire. And hell came.” He lurched around the interview room, holding his head. Tears leaked out of his eyes. “Laughing. Screaming. I couldn’t stop. Did I want to stop? We had sex. No. Yes. I don’t know. Bodies and hands and mouths. They hurt her. Did I hurt her? But she was smiling, smiling at me. Then her blood.”

  His hands ran over his face as if wiping at it. “Her blood. All over me.”

  His eyes rolled up in his head. Peabody managed to break the worst of his fall by going down with him. “Jesus, Dallas, no way this guy’s faking it.”

  “No. Let’s get him into a cage. I want him on suicide watch. I want eyes on him.” She stepped to the door at the knock.

  “Screening on your suspect, Lieutenant. They said you wanted it ASAP.”

  “Thanks.” She took the report from a tech, scanned it. “Jesus, what doesn’t this guy have in him? Erotica, Rabbit, Zoner, Jive, Lucy.”

  “Sleepy, Dopey, and Doc,” Peabody finished. Then shrugged at Eve’s frown. “Bad joke. No wonder his head’s screaming. Coming down off a cocktail like that’s gotta rip it up.”

  “Get him into a cage, have a medic treat him. He’s had enough for one night.”

  “He doesn’t come across like somebody who could do what was done to that woman tonight.”

  “That much junk inside him, you don’t know what he could do. But he’s not a regular user. No way he could be a regular with that kind of habit and not have a single pop.”

  Eve started back to her office. A couple of uniforms led a weeping woman away in the opposite direction. Outside the bullpen a guy wearing a torn and bloody shirt sat laughing quietly to himself while he rattled the restraints that chained him to the seat.

  She swung into the bullpen while he went back to giggling. In her office she hit the AutoChef for coffee first, then sat at her desk. She gulped caffeine while she booted up the security discs from the hotel.

  She ran the VIP check-in first, the elaborate parlor reserved for guests in the tonier suites and the triplexes. She ordered the computer to coordinate with the time stamped on the Asant Group’s check-in. And watched the parlor fuzz into white static. She ran it back, noted the glitch began thirty minutes before the log-in, and continued to twenty-three hundred.

  The pattern repeated when she ran the security discs for the private elevator, and again when she ran the main lobby discs.

  “Son of a bitch.” She turned to her interoffice ’link. “Peabody, wake up your cohab. I need McNab in here to dig into the security discs. They’re wiped.”

 
If the boy genius from the Electronic Detectives Division couldn’t dig out data, she had someone who could. She contacted Roarke.

  “Why are you awake?” she demanded when her ’link screen showed him at his desk.

  “Why are you?”

  “Oh, just a little something about a ritual murder. I thought you’d want to know that all the security discs from your hotel are compromised. Nothing but static on all starting thirty minutes before the log-in for the Asant Group.”

  “Are you bringing them to me or am I coming to you?”

  “I’ve got McNab coming in, but—”

  “I’m on my way.”

  “Wait. Listen, grab me some work clothes, will you? And my weapon harness, and—”

  “I know what you need.”

  Her screen went black. Pissed off, she thought, and couldn’t blame him. She imagined a few heads would roll at Roarke’s Palace, and in short order. But meanwhile, she had useless discs on her hands, a suspect with drug-induced memory blanks, and a mutilated body at the morgue.

  And it was still shy of dawn.

  She opened her murder book, set up her board. According to the hotel records, the Asant Group had booked the triplex two months prior, and secured it with a credit card under the name of Josef Bellor, who carried an address in Budapest.

  She fed the data into her computer, ordered a standard run. Only to learn Josef Bellor of Budapest had died there five years before at the ripe age of one hundred and twenty-one.

  “Gonna be hard-pressed to get him to pay the bill,” she muttered.

  One night’s booking, she thought, going over the notes. All room service delivered through the suite’s AutoChefs or pre-ordered and delivered prior to check-in. Five cases of wine, several pounds of various European cheeses, fancy breads, caviar, pâtés, cream cakes.

  No point in ritual murder on an empty stomach.

  So they ate, drank, orgied, she thought, pushing up to pace the small space of her office. Popped whatever illegals suited their fancy. Three floors of revelry, soundproofed high-collar digs with the privacy shades activated.

  Would’ve saved the best for last, she decided. The sacrifice would’ve been the evening’s crescendo.

  Just how did a nice girl from Indiana end up the star of the show? How did a transplanted young doctor from Pennsylvania get invited and left behind?