GODDESS OF THE MOON (A Diana Racine Psychic Suspense) (23 page)

Selene’s account of
yesterday
left Diana breathless, and she strug
gled to maintain her composure.

Liar
.

She wanted to defend herself but chose not to give anything away.
Yet.
“Well then, that must have been what happened. After my near catastrophe
a while back
, I
drank a little too much, then
quit until I was sure I
had a handle on it
. I guess I started back too soon.”

“You blacked out,” Phillip Crane said. “I remember a few of those from my yo
unger days, don’t you, Cybele?”

“I’m loath to confirm that,” Cybele said. “I finally made him cut down.” A chorus went up among the men admitting to those
wild days when they were young
.

“Now
,
at my age,” Crane said, “I have two drinks, and that’s quite enough.”

Diana debated pursuing the line the conversation had taken and decided to forge ahead. “I did have a rather unusual dream, however, and when I awoke, I became rather ill. Result of the scotch, I imagine.”

“
Tell us about the dream,”
Sophia Reyes
said
.

Diana caught a warning eye from Lucier but acted
once more
like she didn’t see him. “It was very strange. Either the room was going around or I
lay
on a revolving platform, naked. The room was bathed in red light and people congregated around me, staring, touching me. I couldn’t see their faces because they wore masks.” She watched the couples fidget as she spoke. Martin Easley looked especially uncomfortable, focusing his attention on Lucier. Sweat beaded on his upper lip, and he wiped it away with a handkerchief. Edward Slater
’s
slow shake of his head
sent a warning
, but she ignored him too.

Everyone in the room reacted.
How many
sets of
eyes leered down on me?
Ten?
Twelve?

“What an odd dream,
”
Rhea
Haynesworth said. “But then I suppose a lot of your insights appear in dreams, don’t they? Like that television show where the psychic always wakes up with some premonition or vision or whatever they’re called.”

“Actually, no.
If you’ve ever seen one of my shows, you’d know that my
insights
materialize
through contact with an article from the person I’m reading
or the person himself
.
Sometimes
an unsolicited impression develops, something so invasive it’s impossible to ignore, but that’s rare.”

“That’s how you did my reading,” Compton said. “We sat at that table over there, and you took my hands in yours. You made me take off my
wedding
ring and
close
it in my hand.”

The thudding beat of
Diana’s heart
increased until it was so loud in her ears she
feared
everyone heard
. That’s how she read a private client. How did he kn
ow that if she hadn’t read him?
Of course.
She’d mentioned her method in dozens of articles over the years. He probably read it.

Silas Compton probably knew everything about her.

Fernando Reyes interrupted her thoughts. “Do you think your dream was one of those? I mean, you didn’t have something in your hand wh
en you were sleeping, did you?”

She could hardly get out the words. “I―I did wonder what the dream meant,” Diana sputtered. “It sounds
otherworldly
, doesn’t it? More like a scenario from
The Exorcist
or
Rosemary’s Baby.
”
A few of them exchanged glances.
Diana almost questioned whether she’d translated an ordinary nightmare into an imagined interpretation. Then she remembered the sickness and the black bile.

“Are you implying your dream contained satanic overtones?” Selene asked.

Right out in the open
. She looked at Selene.
Calm, self-assured, smiling.
She was goading Diana, and it pissed her off.
But then she was goading the group.
She didn’t meet his gaze
but felt
Lucier’s stare bore into her.
“I don’t know what the dream meant. I guess my overindulgence
yester
day affected me more than I thought.”

“Or maybe
―
” Selene stopped.

“What?”

“Well, our driver mentioned you were so unsteady he walked you to your door.”

“Well, that does it then.” Diana tapped her knee. “I was sloshed.
Serves me right for drinking so much.
No wonder I had a nightmare.”

She caught Lucier scanning the room. Maybe he wouldn’t chew her out for bringing this up after all. She worked the group the same way she worked an audience.
Throwing tidbits at them, reading their responses, measuring their body language.
Did he see something she missed
, b
ecause she received nothing from anyone in the room except Slater
?
He
sat cross-legged trying to appear relaxed, but he was as tense and coiled as she now felt, and he fixed on her the steely stare of his blue-gray eyes.

Silas and Selene were lying through their teeth. She would never request a scotch before a reading and would never get drunk after one.
Never.
Diana passed out before
returning home
, and they knew it.
Worse, one of them had taken her home
, told her to lock the door
,
and go
to bed.
She wanted to tell them
that,
scream it, but for once, she curbed her candor. She’d gone too far already.

The butler brought Diana and Lucier their drinks. “Maybe I shouldn’t have this after all,” she said. “What do you say, darling? Should I?”

“I’ll make sure you don’t overdo it.” He held up his glass.
“A toast.
To good company and interesting conversation.”

They all raised their glasses. She noticed Selene nodd
ing
toward Lucier.
T
he smile she beamed at him was more than from a hostess to a guest. It said, here I am, come get me. Even before this
blatant
come-on, something about the woman made Diana want to smack
her
well-chiseled face.
W
as
it
because Lucier smiled back
?

She reminded herself this was all part of their strategy to befriend the enemy. Then
she
thought―whose strategy
?
Befriending the enemy
worked
both ways
.

At the dining table, Selene conveniently seated
Lucier
next to her, and they engaged in animated
discussion
. Diana
held
the seat of honor to Compton’s right,
with
one of his daughters on her right
, and
Compton’s mother-in-law, Cybele Crane, a woman his own age, to his left.
Polite conversation ensued
throughout dinner.

And what a dinner.
Compton had
lured
a renowned New Orleans chef from a famous restaurant
into his employ
, so the cuisine reflected
what one would expect from the kitchen of a man in wealth’s stratosphere: crawfish bisque followed by pan-seared scallops and grouper with champagne sauce
,
with
an appropriate wine accompanying each course.

Dinner
guests
paired off. Compton, his fascination with the famous well documented, monopolized Diana
while
Selene appli
ed
her abundant charms
to
Lucier. One would have to be blind and deaf not to see and hear
her
compliment
his
heroic exploits in the capture of
a killer
, and a
man would have to have one foot in the grave not to
react
to her
fawning over
his every witticism
.
Lucier responded like the
very
living, breathing, virile man he was.

Damn him
.

Diana finished her wine, and the attending waiter refilled her glass.
Her
face flush
ed with annoyance
. Why
,
Lucier barely looked at her all evening, but then Silas Compton never relinquished her for a second.
The
Comptons
were carrying out
a planned
divide-and-conquer
strategy. Slater spoke in hushed tones to Sophia Reyes, his eyes shifting toward Selene and Lucier, then in Diana’s direction. Their gazes met, and she interpreted his apparent amusement at Diana’s forced restraint. She
c
over
ed her wineglass when the server
offered a
refill
.

After dessert, the party retired to the main living room.
A
t the other end of the room
,
Lucier
fell into
deep conversation with the queen witch, as Diana silently began referring to Selene.
Diana latched on to
Compton
’s
arm
, and
a slight wave of dizziness
hit her
. T
hen
poof! It was gone. What was it about his touch that
rendered
her
lightheaded?

“Come,” he said. “I want to show you my art collection. Oh, don’t worry about your man. Selene will take good care of him.”

That’s what I’m afraid of.
She shook off
her uneasiness
and joined Compton
, arms l
inked.

“I couldn’t help overhearing, Silas,” Slater said. “You’ve promised to show me your art collection, and so far I haven’t seen it. Mind if I tag along?”

A flash of irritation sparked Compton’s eyes, but being the good h
ost, said, “Of course not, Edward.”

Slater offered an almost imperceptible nod in Diana’s direction. She
breathed a sigh of relief
, glad he’d forced his way into their company.

Compton led the way through his house, pointing out the museum-worthy collection of two Picassos and one each
Mir
ó
, Kandinsky, Cezanne and Van Gogh. A few paintings
by artists
with names Diana didn’t recognize
covered
the walls throughout. A small Degas pastel of a horse race caught her eye.

“Degas is one of my favorites,” she said.

Compton moved closer
to Diana
. “I bet you’ll like the next one
then
.”

He led her to a
framed
pastel sketch of ballerinas hanging
above
a small settee in a sitting room off the main hall. From the
feminine
décor, Diana assumed the room was Selene’s private domain.

“Yes, it’s beautiful.” Diana examined the loose sketchy quality of Degas’ later works, as his eyes failed. She’d viewed collections in museums around the world where she performed, but seeing this private collection provided an extra thrill.

“Degas is one of my favorites too,” Slater said.
“Though I prefer his horse scenes.”

“A difficult choice,” Compton said. He
concentrated
his tour
on the first floor, by-passing the stairways to the upper and lower levels and making no excuses for doing so.

“Are there more treasures in the rest of the house?” she asked.

“
A few less valuable pieces
.
The
crown jewels
are on the main floor. Only people who interest me are invited to my home, Diana, and I’m
quite
selective when extending invitations. Maybe I’ll include a codicil in my will to show the collection as an exhibit, but I’m not quite ready to die, so I choose not to
project
such negative vibes.”

“It’s a beautiful collection,” Diana said.