The door slammed behind us, and Raphael threw the deadbolt while glaring at me. I was too used to being glared at to be terribly bothered by it.

“Please, just get out of there,” Raphael said. “The police may be paying a visit soon, and if they find you there, they might start asking questions. Unless Adam has made more progress than I think in creating an identity for you, you can’t hold up to much scrutiny.”

He listened intently for a moment; then the tension in his body language dwindled, and I knew Saul had agreed to get out of my apartment. I was beginning to think through the ramifications of Keller’s death, and I wasn’t liking them one bit.

First off, it meant that we had no idea whose body my demon enemy was in now. Second, it meant there was another mysterious death that I could be a suspect in. And last, but certainly not least, it hinted that the demon had no more use for Keller, which meant that if he’d been planning to plant incriminating evidence, he’d likely done so already.

Raphael hung up the phone, finally turning his attention back to me. “Saul is on his way here. Have you caught up with me yet?”

“You want me to hide from the police,” I said in an accusatory voice.

“At least for the moment,” he agreed. “If anyone saw us go in there tonight and they tell the police, I’m betting you’ll get promoted from ‘person of interest’ to ‘suspect’ in no time flat. We can’t afford to have you locked up.”

“Running away is just going to make me look guilty!” I protested, but I wasn’t surprised that Raphael didn’t budge.

“Better to look guilty than get thrown in jail,” he said. “We need Adam’s input. Do you want to call him, or shall I?”

Control freak that I am, I should have insisted on making the call myself. But I just couldn’t psych myself up to do it. I was too tired, too stressed, to deal with Adam, who would probably find some reason why this fiasco was all my fault.

“You do it,” I said flatly.

To my surprise, Raphael reached out and gave my arm a squeeze, and it didn’t feel like he was trying to crush my bones into powder.

“We’ve gotten through worse situations,” he said. “We’ll get through this, too.”

I wanted to object to the word “we,” didn’t want to admit that Raphael and I were in any way in this together, but for once I managed to keep my opinion to myself. I gave a brisk nod that Raphael took as agreement of some kind. Then he parked me in his living room with a strong rum and Coke by my side and called Adam for advice.

Despite my desire to retreat into my personal cone of silence, Adam demanded to speak to me after Raphael finished briefing him on the situation. There was nothing in the world that could force me to give in to Adam’s demand, except for the knowledge that not talking to him would be a form of cowardice.

“Please don’t tell me the situation is any worse than we already know,” I begged him.

“Sorry, love,” he answered, and he did actually sound sorry. “The late Mr. Keller ‘found’ a thumb drive belonging to Hillerman, and when the police looked at it, they found the letter Hillerman had sent to Brian, as well as the doctored photo.”

“Shit.” There wasn’t anything else I could add.

“Yeah. My esteemed colleagues have had some questions for me now that they’ve seen the photo. I told them it was a fake, but they’re starting to wonder about the times I’ve taken statements from you.”

“Shit.” A good, all-purpose cuss word always comes in handy.

“I don’t think they’re going to find anything that would hurt me too badly, but it does mean I have to step back even further in this case.”

Once upon a time, I’d been a bit shocked by Adam’s casual disregard for the law, but right now, I’d have loved to have that back. He’d kept me out of more trouble than I could believe, and I couldn’t help being terrified that I’d end up in prison without his help.

“I tried to talk to Maguire’s ex-girlfriend earlier today,” Adam said in what seemed like a non sequitur, “but I never managed to reach her, and now that I’m under a microscope, I don’t think it would be a good idea for me to be seen talking to her.”

Great. Now that the demon had fled his second murdered host, we needed information to help identify him more than ever. I doubted, however, that anyone in our merry band other than Adam had the requisite skills to question the girlfriend with any success. I glanced at Raphael and amended my thought: No one but Adam could question the girlfriend without getting us into even worse trouble.

Adam read my mind. “We need to get answers from her, see if she knows anything that could help us identify our rogue.”

“Are you suggesting I go talk to her?” I asked doubtfully.

His snort of derision would have hurt my feelings—or pissed me off—if I didn’t know how badly suited I was for the job, and how conspicuous I would be if I tried to approach the girlfriend.

“No, I’m suggesting we get Barbie to go talk to her.”

“What? Are you crazy?”

“Just hear me out. It’s very important to her to keep her nose clean. If she loses her license for some reason and can’t keep up her payments to The Healing Circle, Blair’s going straight to whatever crappy nursing home has an open bed. Barbie knows it’s in her best interests to keep you out of jail, since you can so easily take her down with you.”

“And just how does she know that?” I growled, although I knew Adam far too well not to guess the answer.

“Because I drew a picture for her.”

“In other words, you’ve already sent her on a mission to interview the ex.”

I could almost hear the smug grin on his face. “I didn’t think asking your permission would be in our best interests.”

“Asshole,” I muttered. “You know you’re just handing her rope she can hang us all with.”

“I don’t get the impression she’s anxious to hang us, even if it wouldn’t have such serious repercussions for her.”

I wasn’t sure how good a judge of character Adam was, but since he’d already had his little talk with Barbie, it wasn’t looking too likely that I’d be able to undo whatever damage he may have done.

“You’d better hope you’re right,” I said, resigned.

“I do indeed,” he answered, then hung up—as usual—without saying good-bye.

The evening was already majorly sucky even before Saul arrived at Raphael’s place, but the minute he stepped through the doorway, the tension that filled the air quadrupled in intensity. Raphael acted like he didn’t notice, calmly filling Saul in, telling him about the murder of David Keller.

Saul was quiet for a couple of minutes as he absorbed the story, then he nodded briskly.

“All right,” he said, “I guess I’ll go back to Adam’s place.”

“No, you won’t,” Raphael said, and that was all it took to get Saul’s eyes glowing.

I considered attempting to take on the role of peacekeeper, but I didn’t have Dominic’s bravery or tact. Instead, I took a couple of steps backward to put some space between me and them, and I scouted out my escape route should the fur begin to fly.

Raphael’s voice remained calm, and there was no outward sign that he was preparing to defend himself. “Adam’s now under some scrutiny himself. If you go stay there, they may become curious about your identity, and that would be bad.”

“I’ll take my chances,” Saul said, then tried to duck around his father to reach the front door.

Raphael stepped between Saul and the door. “Use your brain. If they can’t identify you, they’re going to be even more curious, and they’ll start asking Adam and Dominic some difficult questions. If they aren’t satisfied with the answers, they might even bring in an exorcist to examine your aura.”

For the first time, a hint of alarm entered Saul’s face. I clamped my teeth together to keep from blurting out a stream of expletives, because Raphael was right. If Saul acted like he was hiding something, it was certainly possible they’d call in an exorcist. Pennsylvania is one of the least demon-friendly states, and it was fairly routine to submit suspects to an examination by an exorcist. After all, if you locked someone up thinking he was just your average, everyday human, and he turned out to be possessed, you were pretty likely to find yourself with an escaped prisoner and a bunch of dead guards. All it would take was the slightest pretext for the court to order an examination—which was generally considered a minor inconvenience rather than a violation of privacy—and when the exorcist found Saul was possessed and he didn’t have any paperwork to prove it was legal …