Who did this to Aurelia Edison? I stared up at the black new moon of another lunatic night, pondering the case. Police tape cordoned off the gruesome stain in front of the Century Luxe Hotel. The Crime Scene Unit was making a clean sweep. Yellow evidence markers followed a scattered trail of vehicle pieces.

My partner and I were interviewing witnesses, but half the spectators had found better things to do. The crime scene was already hours old. The place crawled with reporters. I dodged a videographer and made my way to Detective Tegan Stoney.

The smells of coffee and mouthwash clinging to her bespoke the predawn hour. It was too-early o'clock Saturday morning. I had a keener nose than most, so I picked up on the good time she'd been having before she'd come here. Not my business. We both had been called in for this.

"Don't all the cameras make you feel like we're filming Law & Order?" I asked.

"Complete with our own sexy leading man," she said.

"Love your sense of humor."

"I was talking about Mayfield." Tegan grinned as she pointed at the barrel-chested former marine crossing the hotel drive toward us. Captain Mayfield's salt-and-pepper buzz cut was as high and as tight as his personality.

"What have we got so far?" the middle-aged Black man called out.

"Hit-and-run," I said. "Nothing that warrants this level of hoopla, normally."

When he reached us, the captain confided quietly, "Yeah, NOPD wants this case closed fast. The victim is the daughter of Emily Leigh Edison of Metairie, better known as—"

"Nannette Baudelaire, Academy Award–winning director of two Best Pictures," said Tegan. She smiled at my surprised demeanor. "And her new movie, Gracious Fury, is projected to make that three. It opens next month."

"Well, somebody got cozy with Google when Alexa wasn't looking," I said.

"Actually, I'm a fan of Mrs. Edison's films."

Mayfield asked, "Did you know she summers in New Orleans?"

"Not until now," Tegan admitted. "According to her spokesperson, who I was on the phone with a moment ago, the daughters were raised here, but few people were aware of their link to the director. Mrs. Edison kept her children out of the spotlight."

"All great intel, but I doubt the famous mom was behind the wheel," I quipped.

Mayfield chuckled dryly. "You want to stake your career on jokes, Ravani?"

"C'mon, the perp is an out-of-towner sleeping off a rough night of Hand Grenades somewhere. He'll turn himself in when he sees the body damage to his rental. You could've put anybody on this."

"You're lucky to get anything after that crap you pulled a few months ago. Thanks to your wacky press conference with the psychic, the media thinks you're a nutjob. Take this easy A and solve this thing. Get your reputation back," he said.

I rolled my shoulder free from his condescending back rub. "Get help with one missing person's case, and suddenly you're a nutjob," I said as he left.

"He's fucking with you. You know that." Tegan didn't bother hiding her amusement.

"Yeah, well, I used to get more respect."

The thing with the psychic had pushed the envelope, but I needed an explanation for the leads I followed. Nobody—not even my longtime partner—knew of my network of Supernatural informants. Call it a perk of working for the Council of Overlay Affairs. Whenever unusual crimes spilled into the real world, it was my job to make justice look natural.

Unfortunately, cleaning up paranormal activity was beginning to affect my credibility. I wondered if, as Mayfield implied, I should be grateful for a simple hit-and-run. Nothing out of the ordinary about this one.

I tipped my head toward a surveillance camera at the corner of the hotel. "Whoever did this was kind enough to do it on camera. All I need is a license plate. Let's binge-watch some CCTV."

"Let's go," Tegan replied.

An hour later, we were in the manager's office with the run of the system. There was footage of the victim and her sister taking an elevator, flashing a doorman, and getting into a party on the top floor. But once inside, there was no record. I watched the uptight hotel manager. She smiled.

"Our VIP guests prefer not to be scrutinized, you understand."

"I want the name of whoever booked the floor," I said.

"You'll need a warrant." She smiled more tightly.

I gritted my teeth. Tegan drew my attention to the victim stumbling back into the elevator on screen. "She's drunk," said my partner.

"How much alcohol did they have?"

"Haley Edison blew a breathalyzer result of . . ." Tegan paused and consulted her notes, "less than 0.01, but she couldn't say how much the victim drank. They got separated at the party. CSU will get back to me with the tox report as soon as they have it."

My focus drifted over the girl onscreen. She swept back loose curls and pushed a phone to her ear, and the vision of her gorgeous face stalled me. God, I must need to get laid if I was drooling over a hit-and-run victim. I stared at her plush mouth.

"Who's Pat?" I asked. Tegan skewed her brows. The audio was full of noise, and she couldn't hear what the victim said. "I read her lips," I explained.

"There was a brief call around 11:45 about modeling agent Patricia Gramercy. The sister says the call was spotty, dropped right after she answered."

Nodding, I watched the victim exit the elevator on wobbly legs and trip through the hotel lobby. I zoomed in as a woman stopped her outside the building, but tropical landscaping obscured the view.

Tegan started to say something. I held up a finger and peered intently at the monitor, barely making out the victim saying she thought she had been drugged. Interesting. Toxicology would show what, if anything, was in her system. Now, who would drug her, and why? I squared my jaw, mulling it over.

"What is it?" my partner asked.

"That woman's going for help."

"How do you know? You can't even see her face."

"Call it a hunch. A young, drunk girl stumbling around a four-star hotel? Someone would go for help."

The young woman wandered around the sidewalk in a disoriented state for a few more moments before she stepped into the street. A second later, the SUV hit her with brutal force. Just like that. In a blink. I'd had a feeling it was coming, but it had still been tough to watch.

The stoic hotelier made the sign of the cross, and Tegan stepped away from the desk. I gave her a minute, but forced myself to watch, rewind, watch again. I heard it loud and clear with each replay: a truck idling out of camera range. A clue that the accident hadn't been an accident.

Tegan composed herself. "See a license plate number?"

I shook my head. So, what did we have? A VIP party. A drugged girl. An SUV with illegal tinted windows, no plates. Deliberate hit-and-run. It all added up to one thing: someone had wanted

Aurelia Edison dead.

Tegan blew out an exasperated breath. "Okay, we need to find out about famous Mama Edison's enemies."

"I want to know what happened in the penthouse." I was about to say more, but the surveillance video stopped me. A feeling like static crackled along my skin as the image onscreen wavered, and the thin veil separating this world from the next faded before my eyes.

I cocked my head in disbelief as an angel in full wing exited the hotel. Aurie got up. Is this real? she asked. The divine entity disappeared into the night, but my jaw dropped as our victim followed someone else out of frame. Suddenly, the crime scene was filled with vampires who were far too interested in the body. I recognized their mien. All well heeled with a swagger of entitlement.

"What in the holy hell?" I whispered, confused.

Tegan gave me a pointed stare, but I couldn't explain. She couldn't see what I saw. "Got another wild hunch?" she asked.

"Let's just say this won't be an ordinary case."

"It never is with you." She laughed.

No, I thought, it never is.