“I didn’t kill Anthony Beale,” she said evenly. “I didn’t murder anyone. Ray was already dead. I just kept him from coming back to life.”

“So, who killed Beale?”

She looked down at her hands again, shaking her head. “It must have been Aaron. Beale either annoyed him, or got in his way.”

“And what about old Rutger Leon? Did you do him in— or was Aaron in the middle of a humanitarian streak?”

She frowned, looking at him. “Rutger? Rutger’s dead?”

She was honestly surprised, Sean determined. “Rutger Leon’s body was found yesterday. His torso and head, at least.”

Her frown remained. “Were they found—separately?”

“Yes.”

“I can’t imagine Aaron killing Rutger—he would have enjoyed him being alive too much, tormenting Callie.”

“Well, someone killed him.”

“I didn’t do it,” she said, sounding exasperated. “I’d tell you at this point if I had done so, don’t you think? Especially since you’re not believing a word I say to you anyway.” He reached over and opened the passenger door so that she could get out. “I’ve got to go to work. I’m going to have to go and see what’s left of Rutger’s body. Then I’m going to have a meeting with the task force. By the way—should I buy all my guys crosses?”

“Yours is very nice,” she murmured tartly.

“It doesn’t bother you?”

“I’ve always loved religious art. And I adore churches. Lucian is always making fun of me. I pray a lot.” She hesitated, then said, “Some vampires are weakened by crosses. They won’t stop them ... but a cross can buy some time. And holy water can cause burning ... especially during the daytime. Vampires are weakest by day.”

“What about garlic? Truth or myth?”

He saw the muscles in her jaw tighten. She didn’t know if he was mocking her or not, but she wanted to give him what she considered to be truthful answers. “Eat a lot of garlic. Garlic in the blood makes vampires sick as dogs.”

“And I can kill one with a stake through the heart?”

“If you get the chance to get a wooden stake through his heart.”

“Or decapitation?”

“Yes, decapitation kills vampires.”

“Great,” he muttered. “Just so I have something I can give the guys on the force when I tell them we’re after a vampire. Right before they haul me away.”

Maggie stared at him coolly. “I’ve bared everything to you,” she said. “I’ve risked my existence. And all you’re doing is mocking me.”

“I’m not mocking you.”

“You’re not listening to me.”

“Maggie, think about what you’re saying!”

“Sean—”

“Maggie, I’m not mocking you, I swear. One way or another, there’s a terrible killer out there. I just have to go to work.”

“But you still don’t believe me. And going to work isn’t going to do you any good if you don’t believe me.”

He hesitated, looking out the front window. “I don’t know, Maggie, think about how fantastic it all sounds.” He stared back at her. “I do know this.”

“What?”

He smiled crookedly. “I still love you. And whatever this guy is, I have to go catch him. For you, for me, for New Orleans Parish. Because I’m a cop, and I couldn’t live with losing this one. And again, because I love you. And we’re going to have some kind of a future.” Maggie shook her head very sadly. She touched his cheek. “I love you, Sean. But no, there is no future.

Not unless you can trust me enough to believe me.”

She got out of the car, and immediately started walking away from him.

“Maggie!”

But it was too late.

She didn’t look back.

CHAPTER 15

He walked into the office, barely aware of the ringing of phones, the hustle around him.

He plopped into the chair behind his desk, hands folded in his lap, staring blankly before him.

“The night continued bad, huh?”

He looked up. Jack Delaney was staring at him sympathetically.

“Have we had a good night lately?”

Jack shrugged. “Well, that’s a matter of separating our professional lives from our private lives—” Sean shook his head, leaning forward. “You’ve done your Ripper research, Jack, what do you know about vampires?”

Jack shrugged. “The old Nosferatu, really great movie. Then there were Bela Lugosi, Christopher Lee, Gary Oldman—and Lauren Hutton. That one was a kid’s kind of coming of age movie where she was after high school virgins. Fright Night, the first, I loved it. Getting into the whole concept, you can look at Omega Man as a vampire movie, then there’s Army of Darkness—”

“I’m not talking about movies, Jack.”

“Real vampires? The basis for the legends, Bram Stoker’s research? Naturally, there was a real Vlad Dracul, a Romanian prince, a bloodthirsty bloke if there ever was one. Records indicate that he killed tens of thousands of his enemies—and his own people—by impaling them and leaving them to die. He supposedly dined among the stench of the dying on the hills, which leads to the idea of drinking blood.

But in all seriousness—”

“Yes?” Sean arched a brow, shaking his head. “You are up on your vampire lore.” Jack grinned. “Can’t help it, I love a good movie, a good mystery, Jack the Ripper—and weird legends.

I’m an Arts and Entertainment channel junkie. When I was a kid in high school, I thought about going into film for a living, and I studied up on vampires because I wanted to make a really good horror film based on the bloodsuckers. Don’t really know why. Seems I’ve always had a fascination with vampires and Jack the Ripper. As if they actually affected me in a personal way, somehow.” Staring at him, Sean arched a brow. Maggie thought Jack was her doctor friend Peter, living another life.

Could it be ...

No. Too, too weird. He shook his head.

“Jack the Ripper was insane. Historians past and present know that to be true. And with modern technology—”

“Ah, but they didn’t have modern technology. Hey, and look what we’ve got—it hasn’t stopped crime, has it?”

Looking at his hands, clenched tightly on his desk now, Sean shook his head.

“I think the most interesting thing to me,” Jack went on, “is the way that the legend of some kind of blood-drinking creature has appeared throughout different cultures all through history.”

“Oh?”

Jack nodded. “Down to Adam, Old Testament. He supposedly had a wife before Eve. Lilith. She sinned, she was thrown out, she ate her own children, and for years, Jewish wives protected their offspring from her, because she was supposed to come back and eat other children. Because all men have descended from Adam and Eve, naturally, we are all prey to the cannibalistic Lilith. Lamia existed to haunt the people of ancient Greece—they were blood-sucking winged women, they seduced handsome young men and, well, you know the rest. All the Lamia were named after the Lamia, who was once beloved of Zeus, but found out by the vengeful Hera. Even in China, the people believed in a demon called the giang shi, another bloodsucker. In ancient Sanskrit there were baital, creatures who fed on blood; the Germans had a blutsauger, and so on. Pottery found in ancient Syria and Babylonia before the time of Christ depicts demons in various acts of bloodsucking or vampirism, and—”

“Hell, what did you do, take classes in this—Vampirism 101?” Sean asked.

Jack shrugged. “I told you, I was going to be a great movie maker. Why all these questions about vampirism? You think we’ve got a vampire in the city? Dead corpses, no blood.”

“I don’t believe in vampires,” Sean said.

“Well, there has been a mysterious lack of blood,” Jack said. “We don’t have any old castles, and it’s damned hard for us to dig up our baking dead, but—”

“But someone is killing in a copycat mode, someone who thinks he is a reincarnation of Jack the Ripper, or a vampire.”

“You know, Sean, a copycat can be just as dangerous, just like someone deranged, thinking he is a vampire, can be just as frightening as the real thing.”

“What if ...” Sean began.

“Yeah?” Jack said.

“All right, what if a vampire did exist?”

“We’d have to call in Van Helsing,” Jack joked. Then he saw Sean’s eyes. “I ... I ...”

“Don’t have me committed yet, I’m being hypothetical. Dealing with an imitator or the like. After all, this is New Orleans, Lestat’s playground, home of voodoo, vampire tours, and more. So, help me out here, huh?”

“In the old Hammer films,” Jack said thoughtfully, “vampires slept by the light of day, sunlight could fry them, Holy water was like acid, a stake through the heart was a sure killer, decapitation ...” His voice trailed away. He cleared his throat. “Decapitation,” he repeated. “But ... it’s the victims who are being decapitated. Ahh ... let’s see, a victim couldn’t become a vampire if he were decapitated, right?”

Sean didn’t answer him. “I’m heading back out to the morgue. I need you to do some research for me.

Old New Orleans history. I especially want to check into a man known to be in this region during the Civil War. Aaron Carter. See what you can find out for me.”

“Sure thing,” Jack said. “Maybe I should start wearing a cross, huh? Chewing on garlic?”

“Lots of garlic,” Sean agreed, smiling.

“Should I get hold of some holy water?”

“Not yet. I’ll let you know.”

Maggie had barely made it into her office when she heard the phone ringing. She picked it up.