“So why didn’t you call the Queen?” I leaned back against a clear patch on the wall, watching her. “If Riordan had somebody killed, even by accident, she broke Oberon’s first law. You could have brought charges against her.”

“No proof.” Jan raked her hair back, frustration briefly beating back anger. “We don’t even know for sure that it was her. Who’s ever heard of the night- haunts leaving a body behind? What the hell was I supposed to do? Go to the Queen’s Court and be all ‘excuse me, Your Majesty, but Duchess Riordan maybe had one of my people kidnapped, or somehow had her killed in a way that doesn’t make sense, and anyway, I don’t know any of this for sure, but can you make her stop?’ It wasn’t going to work.”

“You could have told someone.”

“I tried.” Jan sighed. “Whether you believe me or not, I’ve been leaving messages for Uncle Sylvester since this started. I wanted his advice. But he never called me back.”

Sylvester thought she’d stopped calling; she thought he’d stopped answering. I didn’t know what it meant, but it couldn’t be anything good. “The night-haunts didn’t come for the first victim?”

“They haven’t come for any of the victims,” said Elliot. “All three of them just . . . stayed, exactly like they were before they died.”

“And we’re sure they died.” Jan kept pacing. “There would be demands by now . . . or something. Or someone would have managed to get loose, if they’d been kidnapped and replaced with some sort of mannequins.”

“Kidnap victims don’t always escape on their own,” I said.

“The first victim—Barbara—was a Cait Sidhe Queen of Malvic’s line. The cats have been in mourning ever since.” She fixed me with a steady look. “Don’t you think they’d know if she were still alive?”

I winced. Malvic is one of the Cait Sidhe Firstborn. Most of the Kings and Queens of Cats are his descendants, and he wouldn’t be happy when he heard about this. Neither would Tybalt.

“All right, so we know she’s dead,” I said. “Where did you find her body?”

“In the cafeteria.”

“The cafeteria. The cafeteria where you left us alone?” She nodded. “Right.” They ditched us in a place where somebody died. How sweet. “I assume that means you didn’t close the scene after the body was found?”

“We tried, but . . .” Elliot waved his hands.

“It was upsetting people, and there wasn’t anything to find,” said Jan.

I bit back a groan. Being largely in denial about the existence of death means most purebloods never learn thing one about proper police procedure; when they find evidence of a crime, they’re likely to clean it up just so they won’t have to look at it. They probably destroyed any evidence before the body was even cold, oblivious to the fact that this could be a bad idea.

“Was there anything that stood out about the first victim?” I asked.