Smoke in Mirrors

it and paused in the middle of an aisle of books, trying to think. There was a small office in here somewhere. And inside the office there was a book. She had been looking at it just this afternoon. It was a very important book because it contained a picture of her killer. She had to mark the picture for Deke and Thomas.
    The shelves of books around her curved and warped themselves into a maze. Gathering her waning strength, she staggered through the twisting corridors to the office.
    The little book was lying on the desk, just as she remembered. She got it open and stared helplessly at the first page. The picture was here somewhere. She had to find it quickly. The killer was halfway down the hall.
    She turned pages, taking refuge once more in the comfort of numbers.
    Seventy-nine.
    Eighty.
    Eighty-one. There it was. A picture of the killer.
    There was a pen next to the book. After three attempts she finally managed to pick it up. She was beyond being able to write a name but she had enough eye-hand coordination left to draw a shaky circle around the picture on page eighty-one.
    She paused when she finished, concentrating hard.
    There was something else she wanted to do just to make sure Deke and Thomas understood.
    The envelope, please.

    She smiled with satisfaction as the memory blazed clearly in the fog of her thoughts.
    The envelope was in the purse draped over her shoulder. She got it out. Managed to slip it inside the book.
    Now what?
    Hide the book and the envelope. She could not risk having the killer discover them.
    “I know where you are, Bethany. Did you think you could hide in the library?”
    She looked around, searching for a place in which to conceal the book and the envelope.
    The large, old-fashioned wooden card catalog stood against one wall, the rows of little drawers neatly organized in lovely straight lines.
    Perfect.
    “Mirror, mirror on the wall,” the killer chanted from the door of the library. “Who is the smartest one of all? Not you, Bethany. Not Sebastian Eubanks, either. I’m the smartest one of all, Bethany.”
    She ignored the taunting and wedged the book with the envelope inside into the hiding place. Deke and Thomas would find it sooner or later.
    It was done. A sense of peace flowed through her. She had completed the task. She could sleep now. She turned around, clutching the desk for support.
    The killer came to stand silhouetted in the office doorway.
    “I’m the smartest one of all, Bethany.”
    Bethany Walker did not respond. She closed her eyes and slipped into a peaceful world on the other side of the looking glass, where the laws of mathematics reigned supreme and everything made sense.

Chapter One
    T HE PRESENT . . .

    A shifting of the light reflected in the mirror above the dresser was the only warning she had that she was not alone in the dead woman’s apartment. Her hands went cold. The fine hair on the nape of her neck stirred as if she had been zapped with an electrical charge.
    Leonora straightened swiftly from the drawer she had been searching and spun around, a soft, pale pink cashmere sweater in her hands.
    Two junkyard dogs stood in the doorway of the bedroom.
    One of them was human.
    His broad shoulders filled a lot of the available space and cut off the view of the hall behind him. There was about him the deceptively relaxed, totally centered grace of the natural-born predator. Not an impulsive young hunter overeager to take down the first of the prey that bolts from cover, rather a jaded pro who prefers to pick and choose his targets. He had the face of a man who haddone a lot of things in life the hard way and he also had the cold gray eyes to match.
    The ghost-gray beast at his heels had a lot in common with his companion. Not real big, but very solid. One of his ears was permanently bent, the result of a fight, no doubt. It was difficult to imagine this creature springing playfully in pursuit of a Frisbee. Probably tear the thing to shreds and eat the plastic raw.
    Both of the intruders looked dangerous but her intuition told her to keep her eyes on the man. She could not see his hands. They were thrust casually into the deep pockets of a charcoal-colored windbreaker. He wore the lightweight jacket open over a button-down denim shirt and a pair of khaki trousers. His feet were shod in leather work boots. The boots looked large.
    Both man and beast were damp from the rain that misted this stretch of the southern California coast today. Each gave the