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chapter one

The dead were her business She lived with them, worked with them, studied them She dreah, in some deep, secret chamber of her heart, she mourned for them

A decade as a cop had toughened her, given her a cold, clinical, and often cynical eye toward death and its many causes It ht on a dark street nasty with litter, almost too usual But still, she felt

Murder no longer shocked, but it continued to repel

The woolden hair spread out like rays on the dirty sidewalk Her eyes, wide and still with that distressed expression death often left in theainst cheeks bloodlessly white and ith rain

She’d worn an expensive suit, the same rich color as her eyes The jacket was neatly buttoned in contrast to the jerked-up skirt that exposed her triainst the sleek lapel of the jacket A leather bag with a gold clasp lay near her outstretched fingers

Her throat had been viciously slashed

Lieutenant Eve Dallas crouched down beside death and studied it carefully The sights and scents were fa new Both victim and killer left their own imprint, their own style, and made murder personal

The scene had already been recorded Police sensors and the more intimate touch of the privacy screen were in place to keep the curious barricaded and to preserve the murder site Street traffic, such as it was in this area, had been diverted Air traffic was light at this hour of the night and caused little distraction The backbeat from the music of the sex club across the street thrummed busily in the air, punctuated by the occasional howl fron pulsed against the screen, splashing garish colors over the victim’s body

Eve could have ordered it shut down for the night, but it seeun ban, even though genetic testing often weeded out the more violent hereditary traits before they could blooularity that the fun seekers across the street would befor such a minor inconvenience as death

A unifor video and audio Beside the screen a couple of forensics sweepers huddled against the driving rain and talked shop and sports They hadn’t bothered to look at the body yet, hadn’t recognized her

Was it worse, Eve wondered, and her eyes hardened as she watched the rain wash through blood, when you knew the victim?

She’d had only a professional relationship with Prosecuting Attorney Cicely Towers, but enough of one to have for wohter, one who had pursued justice doggedly

Had she been pursuing it here, in this hborhood?

With a sigh, Eve reached over and opened the elegant and expensive bag to corroborate her visual ID “Cicely Towers,” she said for the recorder “Fee forty-five, divorced Resides twenty-one thirty-two East Eighty-third, nu jewelry Approxih the wallet “Twenty in hard bills, fifty credit tokens, six credit cards left at scene No overt signs of struggle or sexual assault”

She looked back at the wo out here, Towers? she wondered Here, away from the power center, away from your classy home address?

And dressed for business, she thought Eve knew Cicely Towers’s authoritative wardrobe well, had ad colors—always camera ready—coordinated accessories, alith a feminine touch

Eve rose, rubbed absently at the wet knees of her jeans

“Ho her”

It was no surprise to Eve that theit down before she’d reached the glossy building where Cicely Towers had lived Several reer reporters were camped on the pristine sidewalk The fact that it was three AM and raining buckets didn’t deter theleas the trophy

She could ignore the ca in her direction, the questions shot out like stinging darts She was almost used to the loss of her anony the past winter had catapulted her into the public eye The case, she thought now as she ailance at a reporter who had the nerve to block her path, and her relationship with Roarke

The case had been , soon passed out of the public interest

But Roarke was always news