Chapter 14

PROTECTOR OF THE INNOCENT

Selene’s cell phone vibrated angrily on her bedside table, wrenching her from a fitful sleep. She hesitated. If it was Paul, then he could be calling for only one reason: The rush of power she’d felt last night had indeed come from their mother’s death.

“Ms. DiSilva? It’s Theodore Schultz. From the park.” The professor sounded angry.

“Schultz. I didn’t think I’d hear from you.” She could breathe again.

“I didn’t think I’d be calling.” In the background, she heard the unmistakable hiss and beep of police radios. “But I told them this would happen and they didn’t listen to me.”

“What’s going on? Another murder? Already?” It made no sense. Killers who practiced ritual mutilation—especially the precise kind shown on Helen Emerson’s body—were usually organized murderers. Like Jack the Ripper, Jeffrey Dahmer, or the Hillside Strangler, they struck repeatedly over the course of weeks, months, or years. Not twice in three days.

“Yes, a teenage girl. A hospital patient, for fuck’s sake…”

“Where are you?” she asked tightly. Another innocent killed. Again, she couldn’t help thinking. I’ve failed again. I spent the night dreaming of the past, while the present keeps moving forward.

“I’m outside Mount Sinai Hospital right now. I went to the lead detective yesterday and warned him about the Asklepia, and—”

“Hold it—Asklepia?”

“That’s what I said,” Schultz snapped, as if she were the fiftieth person he’d explained this to. “It’s part of the Eleusinian Mysteries.”

Cold sweat beaded Selene’s forehead. If a mortal is messing with a revival of Demeter and Persephone’s rites, he must be either very foolish or very brave. The rites in Eleusis had always been the most secret, the most envied, and the most feared among the gods—although they never involved human sacrifice. Still, if someone was tying murders to the ritual, it might explain the pace of the killings. The Mystery Cult’s rites had taken place over the course of only a few days. Which meant more victims. And soon.

“That’s what we’re up against—Greek ritual, just like you said,” Schultz continued. “But the detective didn’t believe me. I couldn’t sleep all night, then I turn on the TV at five in the morning and see there’s been a murder in a basement storage room in the children’s wing. The perfect place to pay homage to Asclepius. So I’m here now, but I might as well be a prepubescent D&D player left out of the cool kids’ party. They won’t tell me anything and they won’t let me inside. I’m about to throw my dodecahedral dice at someone.”

By the time Selene hung up, Hippolyta was already pacing eager circles in front of her, tail swinging wildly. “Looks like Professor Schultz isn’t our culprit,” Selene said as she latched the dog’s leash. “But he might just be the lead we need after all. The hunt’s back on.”

Officer Nguyen had been patient with Theo for the last thirty minutes, but he could tell she was about to snap. “Thank God,” she said, looking across the curious crowd to where an unmarked black sedan had pulled up to the curb on Fifth Avenue. “Detective Brandman is here, sir, just like you asked.”

“It’s about time.” Theo drummed his fingers impatiently on the blue police barricade between him and the hospital.

“You need to step back, sir,” she reminded him for the fifth time. “This is an active crime scene.”

“Sorry.” She was only about five feet tall and wore her black hair pulled back in a demure bun, but she did have a gun strapped to her waist. Theo hadn’t completely lost his mind.

Brandman shoved his way through the gathered crowd. Even from across the street, Theo could see the stormy look on his face. “Professor Schultz. Of course.”

Officer Nguyen shook her head wearily. “Sorry, Detective, I know the last thing you want is to get involved here. We’ve already got half of the Twenty-third out, not to mention”—she lowered her voice and gestured discreetly to a wiry woman with close-cropped gray hair standing nearby—“Captain Hansen from Counterterrorism. But Mr. Schultz here insisted—”

“They used the room in the hospital for the Asklepia ritual,” Theo interrupted. “Just like I said they would.”

“Really? Just like you said?”

“I said a cave near a well sacred to the God of Medicine. A basement storage area near a pump room in a hospital amounts to basically the same thing once you transpose it into the twenty-first century. You’ve got to let me inside to take a look.”

“Absolutely not.” Brandman moved aside the heavy barrier with one hand so he could walk past, then firmly replaced it in front of Theo.

“You won’t know what you’re looking at. Do you have the first idea how to identify cultic elements?”

Brandman pulled at his mustache and replied with careful sarcasm, “I didn’t realize you were a forensic expert, too. They really do make ’em smart up there in the Ivy League. Interesting, though, that you left out the most crucial piece of information yesterday.”

“What do you mean?”

“I spoke to a few of your colleagues at the university. Turns out you dated Miss Emerson. Wildly in love with her, according to some, and then she threw you over. It was the talk of the department. Didn’t you think that was something you should’ve told me?”

“It was almost a year ago. Water under the bridge.”

“Huh. Well, let’s just say it casts your ‘cult’ argument into a whole new light. As does the rest of your record. Let’s see.” He raised his hand to tick off Theo’s misdemeanors, mocking the professor’s didactic manner at the police station the day before. “One: arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct at Harvard.”

“That was my lunatic roommate Dennis’s fault—”

“Two: a warning for trespassing in the New York Public Library after hours.”

“I fell asleep and—”

“Three: taken into custody while leading a sit-in against your own university’s eminent domain policy.”

This time Theo didn’t protest.

Brandman showed his teeth. He was enjoying this. “The department chair seems to consider you some kind of self-serving traitor, more concerned with your reputation among your bleeding-heart liberal students than with the good of the university. He really doesn’t like you.”

“Well, for once, you’ve got your facts straight.”

“Glad you agree.” Brandman turned to walk into the hospital. “I’ll be in touch, Professor, you can be sure of that. We’ve got plenty to talk about. And ancient Greeks are just the beginning.”

“Wait. What about the snake at the crime scene?”

“How did you know about the—” interjected Officer Nguyen before Brandman silenced her with a curt wave.

Theo pounced, glad his bluff had paid off. “It was the Zamenis longissimus specimen from the Natural History Museum. Right? Guess you needed an expert in dead languages and dead snakes after all.”

“What I need is the crime scene investigation team that’s waiting inside. They’re the ones finding the clues.”

“Are you sure?” Theo retorted, voice raised. “Because so far all you’ve found is rumor, lies, and conjecture.” From the corner of his eye, he saw the gray-haired female police captain from Counterterrorism turn to watch the altercation. Brandman glanced at the captain and then turned narrowed eyes back to Theo.

“Are you done, sir?” he asked tightly.

“You’re guilty of negligence, Detective, and if you won’t let me in there to examine the scene, I may have to call your superior.” As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he knew he’d gone too far. Gabriela was right. Since when was he Sherlock Holmes? But it was too late now to pull his punches. “Or maybe I should just talk to her.” He gestured up the street to the captain. Brandman stood silently for a moment, his barrel chest heaving, rocking onto the toes of his small feet as if he would try to match Theo’s height.

“That woman deals with Islamic extremists. She has as little to do with your crazy conspiracy as I do,” he finally said, his voice careful, as if every word were an effort. “I suggest that you climb back up your Ivory Tower. Make yourself useful doing some more library work and wait for my call.” He turned to walk into the hospital.

Theo reached across the barricade to grab the detective’s shoulder. “You have to listen—” Brandman spun around and threw off Theo’s hand.

“You need to not touch me, sir,” Brandman said, his voice soft and dangerous, sarcasm gone. “Not unless you want to add another charge to your record.”

Nguyen put her hand on her billy club and stepped forward. Other cops were watching now, too, ready to spring into action.

“If you won’t help me, I’ll go to people who will,” Theo warned. “I’ve hired a private investigator.”

“Are you threatening me, Professor?”

“I just—”

“’Cause if you’re threatening me, I’m going to need to take you into custody.”

“If you don’t listen to me now, I can guarantee that something even worse will happen next.”

“That sounds like a threat to me,” Nguyen piped up.

“Agreed. You’re coming with me, Professor.” Brandman moved forward to put a hand on Theo’s elbow.

Theo instinctively jerked backward.

“That’s it. Resisting arrest and assaulting an officer.”

“What! That’s not—” Before Theo could protest further, Brandman had jumped the barricade with surprising agility, pinned Theo’s arms behind his back, and secured plastic handcuffs around his wrists. “Makes your drunk and disorderly charge look like nothing.”

In the backseat of Brandman’s sedan, Theo kicked the back of the seat in front of him, accomplishing nothing but bruising his toe. He cursed loudly. No one could hear him anyway behind the bulletproof glass.

In a moment, his righteous anger dissolved into anxiety. Should he be calling a lawyer? He couldn’t reach his cell phone anyway. Shit shit shit. Do I never learn? He threw his head back, staring at the roof of the car as if it could tell him how he got into this mess. I blame Selene DiSilva, he decided. She’s the one who got me started.

As if she’d heard him, the woman’s perfect pale face suddenly appeared in the window. Theo nearly yelped as she pressed her nose against the glass, staring at him quizzically.

“How did you get here so fast?” he exclaimed, forgetting for a moment that the thick window was nearly soundproof. It didn’t seem to matter, though. She apparently heard him.

What are you doing in there? she mouthed.

“Contemplating the depths of my own stupidity!” he shouted back. She raised an eyebrow, but he plowed on. “I was just trying to get inside and they arrested me on trumped-up charges. You should try to get a look at the—” He wanted to say more, but Selene DiSilva’s eye had been caught by something he couldn’t see. Once again, she vanished like a ghost, leaving Theo alone, angry, and thoroughly miserable.