Immortal Muse by Stephen Leigh Page B

would have had Nicolas been standing there, but the spell could feel the residue of his presence.
    Nicolas was responsible. She had no doubt of that now, none at all. She looked around, almost guiltily, as if she might see him watching her from nearby. She would find him; she
had
to find him, or guilt would consume her: these murders were at least partially her fault.
    Camille spent much of the rest of the afternoon walking around Mount Sinai, watching the doctors and nurses who were entering and leaving the hospital, searching for a familiar face, a familiar body shape.
    None of them were Nicolas. The Finding spell slowly evaporated from the pendant, and though she thought she could feel a faint tug of his presence around the building, it was far fainter than it had been around the site of the Black Fire murder. He’d been here, but not recently.
    Sunday evening, she went to the New York Aikikai, an aikido dojo she’d joined upon arriving in New York, and worked out. Over the last few decades, she’d become fascinated by the art and its concept of self-defense, and had studied it in several cities and under several instructors; she held the rank of Nidan, a second-degree black belt. The class left her breathless and gloriously sweating. She reveled in the throws and being thrown, letting the activity dissolve her tension and her uncertainty in the crystalline moment. A weapons class followed, and she stayed for that, letting the heft of the wooden bokken tire out her arms until there was only the thin
shfftt
of the blade through the humid air as she cut and cut and cut, imagining that it was
his
body that she was attacking.
    But after folding her hakama and putting her dogi in the gym bag and walking back out onto the streets, reality soon came back to her. She found herself watching the shadows in the street, ready if someone emerged from them. She kept her purse open, prepared to pull out the Ladysmith if someone attempted to accost her. But no one did.
    Monday morning, promptly at 9:00 AM , her cell phone rang. She looked at the screen, feeling a certain disappointment when she saw that it was, as promised, the detective Bob Walters calling. “Mr. Walters,” she said, accepting the call. “Any news?”
    She could hear his head shake before he spoke in that growling, too-early-in-the-morning voice. “I’m afraid not. Ms. Kenny, I can’t in good conscience continue working on this case when I think you’re most likely wasting your money. Without a name, without a current photograph . . .”
    â€œMoney actually isn’t an issue for me.”
    He nearly laughed. “In this economy? You’re a rare one, then. Are you certain? Your bill’s already into five figures.”
    â€œI’ll stop by your office later today and pay you for your work up to now, and give you an advance for another week. I really want to find this man, Mr. Walters. It’s important to me, and I’m certain he’s here somewhere in the city.”
    â€œAnd you know this how?”
    â€œI can
feel
him.” That pronouncement was greeted by nothing more than a breathy silence on the other end of the line. Camille hurried into the quiet. “Can you tell me that you never listened to your gut when you were on the force, Mr. Walters? Didn’t you sometimes just
know
the truth?”
    He sniffed, and she heard what might have been a sip of coffee. At this time of the morning, at least, she hoped it was coffee. “I listened, sure,” he said. “Saved my butt a few times, too—and got it chewed on a few times as well, since my gut turned out to be wrong. Your gut might turn out to be a very expensive one.”
    Camille shrugged, even knowing he couldn’t see the gesture. “Not finding this guy might turn out to be more expensive, as far as I’m concerned,” she told him. “Please, keep working on this.”
    She heard a long inhalation