She nodded. Then the words suddenly started spilling out. “I sat down here. Right here. On the sofa, like I am now. I lit a cigarette, and I was going to watch some TV before I went to change clothes. But then…it was so weird. All of a sudden it was as if I was in a car. As if I were really there. I could see the traffic in front of me. I was someone else. And I was gunning for a car. A green Cadillac. I knew the car. I knew where it was, because I’d been following it. It was as if I was me, but at the same time I wasn’t me. It was as if I was a passenger in someone else’s body. Oh, God, it was awful. As if I could feel all this hatred…I—the me that wasn’t me—knew not to hit the car myself, but I’m—he’s—a good driver and could make people swerve and stuff. So I…he…she…I don’t know which…did, and then…wham. Crash. There was metal and glass, and a word in my head….”
She stopped speaking. She was trembling, her face ashen. Either she really deserved her shot at Hollywood, or the fear she was feeling was real.
“Miss Star?”
She looked at him, as if she had forgotten that he was there.
“And the word? What was the word?” Joe persisted gently.
“Nevermore,” she said.
CHAPTER 5
“I’m going to the meeting tonight,” Genevieve told Sam. “No matter what’s going on. I can’t help it—I’m worried about my mother. About all of you.”
“Because of Thorne’s murder,” Sam agreed.
“I know he made plenty of enemies, and the Poe angle could just be the killer’s way to throw people off track, but…well, what did you think of his book?”
“I think it was a good book,” Sam said. “The man could write.” He looked past her for a moment, then turned back to her and asked, “I take it you saw that ‘psychic’ on TV?”
She nodded.
“You believe in psychics?”
“I don’t know what I believe.”
She heard a sound then and turned around.
Joe was there, leaning against the wall, arms crossed over his chest as he watched her. She swore silently.
“Joe, hi. Come on in,” Sam said.
She rose uneasily. “You two know each other?” she said.
“We met years ago,” Sam said. “Joe and Matt Connolly were cousins.” He stared at her. “But I guess you knew that.”
“I never knew Matt,” she said.
“Oh, right,” Sam said uncomfortably. “Anyway,” he said, “Joe and I actually go way back.”
“A long way,” Joe agreed pleasantly. “So how are you doing?”
“Hanging in,” Sam said. He must have noticed the way Joe looked at Genevieve—as if she had committed a sin—because he looked curiously from one to the other.
She hoped she wasn’t looking guilty. She shouldn’t feel guilty. She hadn’t actually lied to Joe.
As if trying to diffuse the tension, Sam asked her, “So Joe is working for you, right?”
“Yes,” she said, meeting Joe’s eyes.
“She’s an amazing woman. She hires me, but she still likes to do all the work herself,” Joe said dryly.
She forced a tight smile. “I thought I’d drop by to see a friend,” she told him. “You did say you’d been held up.”
“So I did.”
“Hey, Joe, do you know if they’ve questioned all the drivers, trying to figure out who hit me?” Sam asked.
Joe nodded. “Not that it did much good. Apparently, if you’re a crook in this city, you find a dark sedan with mud on the license plate so no one can read the number. A lot of people noticed a dark sedan driving dangerously. Some say it was blue, others say it was forest-green, and one man is positive it was black. What do you say?”
“No idea. I’m sorry I can’t be more helpful,” Sam said. “Really sorry.”
Joe moved farther into the room to stand by the bed. “Sam, do you think the driver might have been gunning for you?”
Sam had nice brown eyes. They were intense as he stared at Joe, then Gen. “I’m praying not. I’m praying that someone else didn’t die because of me, and that a dozen people aren’t laid up in a hospital like I am—because of me.”
“Do you think the Poe Killer is after more members of the society?” Joe asked.
“Hell if I know,” Sam said bitterly, shaking his head. “That psychic says so, huh?”
Genevieve expected Joe to say something derisive, but he didn’t. He just waited for Sam to go on.
“My wife is afraid it’s true, though,” Sam said. “Really. Afraid…Oh, God. I’m sorry, Genevieve, I shouldn’t be talking to you about fear.”
There they were. Back to her ordeal once again, she thought. Why wouldn’t people let it rest?
“Sam, please,” she said awkwardly, avoiding Joe’s eyes. She knew he was angry with her for leaving the apartment.
Too bad. He would just have to get over it.
“There are many kinds of fear,” she said to Sam. “And I’m afraid, too. Afraid for my mother.”
“The police haven’t said anything about needing to protect you, right?” Joe said to Sam.
“No. But Dorothy has decided that she wants to hire off-duty officers to guard my room,” Sam said, shrugging. “I honestly don’t know what I think, but God knows, I have time here to try to figure it all out. But if it’s going to make Dorothy happy, I guess it’s fine to bring in some security.”
“That’s never a bad idea,” Joe said, to Genevieve’s surprise. Had he changed his mind on his conviction that Bigelow’s murder had nothing to do with Edgar Allan Poe and the Ravens?
Dorothy and Sam’s mother returned just then. They both greeted Joe and spoke with him about hiring private security. He put through a call to a friend, and before he and Gen left the hospital, an off-duty officer was sitting in the hallway.