The Alchemical Detective (Riga Hayworth) (15 page)

Riga jerked awake.  In the dark room, she felt a moment’s disorientation. Then she heard Donovan, already up and moving about the bathroom; it was around five A.M., then.  She slipped out of bed and dug her black notebook from her leather bag, recording the dream.  Riga had never dreamed an entire tarot spread before, and wanted to remember it.

She tied her hair into a pony tail and slipped into soft, gray sweat pants and a thin plum-colored microfiber jacket.  Riga ran through her Tai Chi form on the balcony, enjoying the sight of the sun cresting the mountains, setting the lake alight.  But dark clouds massed on the horizon.  When she finished and went inside, her skin felt like ice, but her blood was pumping.

She went to the study, seated herself cross-legged upon the floor, and with a whisper of energy, called for Sarah Glass.  The ghost didn’t come.  Riga frowned, called again.  Nothing.  A year ago, if a ghost didn’t respond to her call she would have assumed it had crossed-over.  Her ability to interact with spirits had seemed unchanged, but now she was riddled by doubt.  She needed to fix herself.  Soon.

Riga went to the bedroom and hefted the alchemical texts from her bag, taking them to the kitchen  and laying them out on the table by the window.  Soon she was entranced by the material, taking notes on a yellow pad that lay beside her elbow.

He, therefore, that would attain this Essence, must by Art turn his gold into dust, and make it resolve into a mineral water, which circulate with a good fire until the moisture being dried up it becomes fixed; this must then be often imbibed and re-congealed, thereby, as it were, sealing up the infant in its mother's womb, which feed so long until it obtains strength sufficient to overcome all its sturdy opposites: then being fermented, it must so long abide the doom of iterated blackness until the Natures rot and die, which then be sure to revivify, sublimate, and exalt, and again make it return to the earth, where you should let it stand in heat so long until its blackness is turned into the purest white; the King being then placed upon his Royal Seal, will shine like the sparkling flame, and the hidden stone which we call our sulphur. This you should multiply so long until it is made into the spiritual elixir; which then like the judge at the Day of Doom, condemned to fire all earthliness adhering to the pure substance in imperfect metals.

“Interesting reading?”  Donovan waggled a toasted bagel slathered with cream cheese beneath her nose. 

She took the bagel from him and bit into it.  It was encrusted with big chunks of salt on the outside and tangy with sun-dried tomato schmear.  Yum.  “Philalethes, the Marrow of Alchemy,” she mumbled between bites.  “It’s some of the clearest alchemical instruction I’ve come across so far, which isn’t saying much.  And thanks,” she said, looking up.  The sun was well over the horizon now.  In spite of their head-spinning metaphors, the alchemical texts had drawn her in, time had slipped away.  “Shouldn’t you be leaving for the airport?”

“It’s my plane.  It will wait.” Donovan sat down across from her.  A table setting complete with bagel and orange juice was before him.  Someone had set it up without Riga noticing.  He pushed a glass of juice toward her, then brushed an invisible crumb from the sleeve of his charcoal-colored suit.   

He looked damned good in it, Riga thought, admiring. 

Unaware of her regard, Donovan opened a copy of the
Wall Street Journal
and unfurled it before him.  “So how’s it going?”

 Riga raked her fingers through her hair.  “I’m starting to think part of the process of breaking oneself down and building oneself up is just struggling through these texts.  Every time I think I understand something, I read something else and have to turn the whole construct over.”

He looked over the paper at her.  “When does the lab work begin?”

 “It doesn’t.  I’m keeping this strictly philosophical.  Jung thought that alchemy was an entirely psychological process – no lab required, though the alchemists were clearly conducting physical experiments, possibly projecting their subconscious onto the work.  And there was a line of alchemists who never messed with labs, viewing it purely as a mystical work.”

“Hm…”  He put the paper upon the table.  “Speaking of which, what do you think of upside-down Christmas trees?”

“Upside – what?  How did you get from alchemy to Christmas trees?”

“That should be obvious.  The decorator suggested an upside-down Christmas tree for the casino entrance.”

“It’s not even Thanksgiving.” Riga closed the book at her elbow and stacked it atop the others.

“But snow is on the way and people expect holiday decorations this time of year.  Apparently, the upside-down trees are cutting edge.  What do you think?”

“I think they’re satanic.”

Donovan’s brows drew together.  “Huh.  Really?”

Riga laughed.  “No.  I’m just old-fashioned. I like pumpkin pie and turkey at Thanksgiving and I like my Christmas trees right side up.”

He looked at her thoughtfully.  “You’re right.  You are old-fashioned.”  He shook his head, as if he’d made a decision.  “I’ll leave the upside-down trees for Vegas.  If I’m going to give this place an American Craftsman theme, I might as well keep the more traditional look.  And now that we’re talking about Thanksgiving, your family or mine?”

Riga blinked.  “What?”

“Are we going to have Thanksgiving with your family or mine?” Donovan asked patiently.  “Sorry to throw it at you, but the family wants to know, so I thought I should get that settled before I leave for Philadelphia.”

“Uh…” The thought of introducing Donovan to her sister, Rebecca, or worse, the aunts, terrified her.  She swallowed.  “I’d like to get to know your family better.”

“Good.  They’re curious about you.  I’ll let them know we’ll be there.”

“I’ll bring the sweet potatoes.  I have this recipe with orange liqueur…”

Donovan gave her an odd look. 

Of course, she realized, not a potluck.  They had a chef.  “Or not.  Whatever you think is best.” 

“You put alcohol in everything, don’t you?”

“It cooks off,” she said defensively.

“I do love you.”  He grinned, reaching across the table to ruffle her hair.

It sounded like a throw-off line and she felt her heart clench.  “You shouldn’t say that unless you mean it,” she said lightly.

His brow furrowed.  “Of course I mean it.  Didn’t you know?”

“You’d never said it before.”

He reached for her, and stroked her hair.  “I love you.  You’re beautiful and exciting and brave.  You have an old-fashioned honor code, which I appreciate.  I think you’d kill for your family.  I know you’d die for them.  And you see the world in a way I thought I’d forgotten.  You’re a force of nature, Riga Hayworth, and we’re a match.  Don’t tell me you don’t feel that.”

“I feel it.  I wouldn’t have come here otherwise.” 

Their eyes locked and her heart swelled with a feeling that she’d thought had been barred to her.  Riga dropped her gaze, feeling suddenly awkward. “Your lawyer’s going to be here in thirty minutes.  I’d better change out of these sweats.”  She pushed her chair away from the table.

His expression flickered.  He unfurled his paper before him, obscuring his face.  “She’s your lawyer.”

Riga hurried through the penthouse, but was arrested by a sound from the gym, a quiet shuffling, as if someone was creeping about.  Her eyes narrowed.  She padded to the door, then flattened herself against the wall, palm flat upon the door.  Riga pushed it open a fraction of an inch, then slowly wider.  Through the cracked door she saw Pen squatting on the carpeted floor, her knees on her elbows, balancing with her hands upon the ground.  Riga shoved the door open.

“What’s going on?”

Pen breathed out smoothly.  “Even you must be acquainted with yoga.”  She placed her feet upon the ground and then straightened to a forward bend.  Today’s t-shirt had a target on it with a tight grouping of bullet holes and said:
Group Therapy
. 

“Do you shoot?” Riga asked.

“Yeah.  I started taking lessons last month.  Is there a range around here?”

 “We’re in Nevada; of course there’s a range.  I’ll take you, if you like.  It’s been a while since I’ve had any practice.  So when did you start getting up this early in the morning?”

“When I got a job on a film crew.”  Pen kicked her legs gracefully into the air and swung into a handstand. 

Even on her best day, Riga couldn’t do a handstand.  Even with magic, Riga couldn’t do a handstand.  Youth really was wasted on the young. 

“How long have you been doing yoga?” Riga asked.

“The counselor suggested it.  She thought it would calm me, increase my mental control,” Pen said, still upside down.

 “Is it working?”

Pen lowered her legs and stood upright.  “Hatha yoga is about uniting the sun and the moon, or the left and right energy flows of the body, or our perceptions of others and ourselves.  If you can join those things, then your kundalini, or consciousness, awakens and can move upward to the super-consciousness.  You see things differently, gain enlightenment.  So no, it isn’t working.  But I don’t freak out anymore when…” Pen trailed off.

“When you see ghosts,” Riga finished for her.

Pen swept a white towel off a weight machine that looked like it belonged in a dungeon.  She wiped her brow, turning away from Riga. 

“I’m glad the yoga helps,” Riga said and abruptly left the room.  Pen was stubborn.  When she wanted to talk to Riga about the ghosts, she would, but pushing Pen would only drive her further away.

Riga’s hair was still damp from the shower when Donovan’s attorney arrived exactly at eight o’clock.  Riga had armored up, putting on dark gray woolen slacks and a white blouse with a cheerful Hermès scarf around her throat.  It was the only gift of any value she’d ever accepted from Donovan, and then only as reparations – he’d ruined her only other Hermès. 

Sharon looked cool and collected in a cream-colored designer pantsuit that made her skin look like dark chocolate.  Riga told her how she’d identified Lynn Chen, but left off the encounter with the demon.  The lawyer just shook her head, her brown eyes impassive. 

“Under normal circumstances,” Sharon said, “I don’t think the Sheriff would go for the medium angle.  But you’ve worked with other police departments before and since you never actually met Lynn Chen, I don’t see how else we can explain how you were able to identify her.  I’ll take care of it.”  And she did.  Within fifteen minutes, Sharon had called the police and settled things.  Riga would have to go in to sign a statement, but she was free.  For now.

“You realize,” Sharon said, “by acknowledging you know the victim, you’ve just handed the police strong circumstantial evidence against you.  You shouldn’t have discussed this with Lynn’s friend.”

Riga winced.  If she hadn’t been so damned impatient, if she hadn’t needed to understand...  She’d made a junior league mistake.  “I know.  I screwed up.  But I didn’t kill Lynn or Sarah.”

Sharon gave her a long, steady look. “You’ve been in the Tahoe Basin roughly a month.  You were here when Lynn Chen was killed, and when Sarah Glass died.  You’ve admitted to the police that you know how to make the sigil found at the site of Sarah’s death.  They’re going to be watching you,” Sharon warned. 

That was fine by Riga.  With a killer on the loose, the more eyeballs on her, the better.

Chapter 16: Separation

Donovan swept Riga into a knee-weakening kiss before he left.  Once she’d recovered, she decided to get her errand at the police station out of the way before anything else happened that day, and she drove there to sign her statement.  Sharon had made it sound like a pro forma activity, but it took longer than she’d expected, and Riga found herself pushing it to get to Lily’s on time.  She’d set back-to-back appointments with Lily and Audrey that morning.  If Riga couldn’t have a day with Donovan and Pen, who’d abandoned her for the intrigue of the TV crew, she’d work.

Lily’s tea and palmistry studio was in a converted photo shack, located at the outer edge of a grocery store parking lot.  She’d added gingerbread trim, window boxes with miniature Christmas trees, and a giant palm painted on one side of the minute wooden building.  Icicles dripped from the eaves, and to Riga, the building looked like something out of a fairy tale. 

She gazed wistfully at it for a moment, allowing herself to indulge in the fantasy: prince, princess, and happily ever after.  But fairy tales were only sweet in kid’s films.  The old stories were brutal.  The Grimm Brothers had been just that – grim.  Hans Christian Anderson was a ghoul, with his match girls who froze to death and a mermaid who underwent torture to be with the man of her dreams, only to be betrayed in the end.  Still, Riga thought, they reflected the harshness of life in that age.  And not all the old stories were bad.  There was always Santa Claus.

Riga got out of the Lincoln and checked her watch: ten o’clock sharp and the morning light had turned sullen, the sky now a mass of gray clouds.

A blue SUV pulled into the lot and parked a few spaces away.  The passenger side window glided silently downward.  Cesar leaned across the empty seat and waved.  He glanced at the tiny building.  “Doesn’t look like there’s room for three in there.”

“No,” Riga said dryly.  She walked to the SUV, rested her gloved hands on the bottom frame of the open window.  “I’m glad you’re here, but I can’t have you close and do my job, and I need to do my job.”

“I’m not acting as a real bodyguard.  Mr. Mosse told me to give you your space, to watch, and to jump in if necessary.”

“Right now, it’s not necessary.”

“Got it, Miss Hayworth.”

She strode to the shack and rapped on the blue-painted door, her brown leather gloves cushioning her knuckles.  A curtain shifted in the window and Lily looked out.  Then the curtains fell back into place and Riga heard locks turning.  The door swung outward. 

“Quick!” Lily gasped.  “Before I lose all the warm air.”  Her long blond hair flowed from beneath a pale violet knit hat with earflaps, tied with ribbons.  She wore a crocheted blackberry-colored vest over a white blouse and tight, faded jeans.