“You call it a crime scene,” she replied. “So you admit a crime was committed.”

“Yes. Obviously. But not by me. Roy called me and said he needed help. I think he’d already been shot when he called, but I didn’t realize that until I got there.”

“He called you?”

“Yes.” When she raised a brow in doubt, I added stridently, “Check the phone records. Go ahead. I have nothing to hide.”

“If you didn’t kill them, Angel, then who did?”

I paused just long enough to feel a trickle of perspiration itching its way down my right temple. I wished like hell I could scratch it. “I don’t know. Perhaps it was a random execution by drug dealers. Wrong-place-at-the-wrong-time kind of thing.”

“So your gun just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time as well?”

“My gun?” I repeated blankly. When she nodded, I said, “That’s impossible. My gun is locked up in a bank. I’m…semiretired.”

The image of the Diva faded to black and in her place I discovered a 3-D projection of a crime scene photo. A hand gingerly held a dangling semiautomatic weapon emblazoned with a lapis lazuli dragon imbedded in a pearl handle. There was no question that it was my gun.

“Where was this photo taken?” I demanded. “It could be anywhere.”

“True enough,” the Diva’s voice replied from the ether. “How’s this?”

Another photo appeared, a wider shot of the same pose. It was Marco holding the gun for the camera. Behind him you could see Victor Alvarez’s body.

I closed my eyes, wishing they could stay that way. Forever. What could I say to refute this photo? my mind frantically wondered. Deeper inside, I thought, Why didn’t Marco just cut my heart out with a knife? It would have been less painful than this. Clearly, he wanted me out of his life. Putting me behind bars was certainly one way to do that. Had he planted my gun at the crime scene?

“I don’t know how my gun got there,” I forced myself to say, though I felt like a dead woman walking, or rather sitting. “Contact my bank. Someone broke into my deposit box and stole it.”

The Diva threw her head back and laughed, her double chins shaking as her voice ran the musical scale from top to bottom. She finally settled on me with twinkling eyes. “Come now, Angel, you don’t expect me to believe that.”

“You seem like an intelligent woman, Diva,” I replied, daring a bit of reverse psychology with my computerized interrogator. “Surely you’ve figured out by now that sometimes people are set up for crimes they didn’t commit. Do you really think I would be stupid enough to risk an interrogation with you if I’d used my gun at that crime scene?”

“Someone used that gun.”

“But not me.”

The Diva looked back over her shoulder and appeared to be talking to someone, though no one else was projected in the hologram. She turned back to me with a look of grave doubt.

“Angel, Lieutenant Townsend informs me that his men have already run a computer check of your lapel phone records. There was no call from Roy Leibman.”

“That’s a lie!” I shouted.

Her expressive eyes couldn’t quite conceal a gleam of triumph. “Take a look for yourself.”

The Diva faded to black and an image of my phone records flashed in front of me. I squinted to make out the numbers that had come in over the last twenty-four hours. Not only was Roy’s call absent, there was no evidence of any incoming calls after 10:30 p.m. The only registered conversation was the one I had made when I called for emergency help at the Cloisters.

“This isn’t right!” I called out. I tried to look at the two-way mirror, but the padded clamp around my forehead stopped me cold. I moved to yank it off, but the straps around my wrists merely tightened. “There’s a mistake in those records.”

The Diva reappeared, fading in on a bubble like Glenda the Good Witch in The Wizard of Oz, though her change in demeanor reminded me more of Glenda’s evil sister from the east.

“What do you have to say for yourself, Angel?”

“I talked to Roy,” I said as calmly as I could. I had to remember that I wasn’t trying to convince the Diva. She didn’t exist. I was trying to prove to the camera lens hidden behind her image that I was telling the truth. “Roy asked me to come.”

“Is that so?” the Diva replied, all frowns and pinched lips. “Did Roy Leibman ever ask for your help before?”

I paused. “No. And I’m sure that in Lieutenant Townsend’s little logical manual on law enforcement that means it’s unlikely Roy would have called on me now. Am I right?”

“I’ll ask the questions, missy,” the Diva hissed. “Isn’t it true that you came to the Cloisters because you were jealous that Victor Alvarez had chosen Roy Leibman as a Certified Retribution Specialist instead of you?”

“What? No!”

“You wanted to be among the most prominent in your profession. That’s why you rescued those twelve Chinese orphans last month. Not because anyone was paying you to do that job, but because you wanted the publicity.”

“I wanted to help the girls,” I shot back.

“You were jealous and angry that when Victor needed a retribution job done, he didn’t turn to you like his father had.”

I frowned slowly. “Wait a minute. How did you know about—”

“You didn’t want Roy to horn in on your domain as CRS for the mayor’s family.”

“That’s absurd.”

“So when you found out that Roy was meeting Victor at the Cloisters, you came to express your anger. You were the only one with a gun. Before the night was through, you used it. You killed Roy Leibman and Victor Alvarez.”

I shut my eyes. I shouldn’t have. It would probably be construed as a sign of guilt. But suddenly my eyelids were too heavy to bear. I could take no more. It had become abundantly clear the Diva wasn’t going to cut me any more slack than Lieutenant Townsend had. No surprise there, since he was doubtless programming her with the questions.

The lights came on suddenly. I opened my eyes and found the Diva had disappeared. My chair righted itself and the restraints retreated with a slight hum. Townsend came out of a door near the three-way mirror.

“Speak of the devil,” I muttered to myself as I swung my feet to the floor and rubbed my wrists. When he came close enough for me to shiver at the sight of his gray, reptilian eyes, I said sarcastically, “So, did I pass the test?”

“Yes.”

I blinked twice and tried unsuccessfully to read his urbane, starched features. The Diva showed more emotion than this automaton. “I don’t understand.”

“Based on your eye movements, the D.I.V.A.S. program has come to the conclusion that you did not lie during your interrogation.”

I squelched the urge to say I told you so!

“However, there is a great difference between not lying and telling the truth. Normally, passing the D.I.V.A.S. test would be enough to free yourself from suspicion. But your phone records offer a compelling contradiction to your testimony. Combined with a compelling motive for the murders, that offers us enough evidence of probable cause to hold you over for trial.”

“But I passed the test.”

“Article 34.A of the new 2104 Interrogation Bill passed by the city council two weeks ago allows the lead investigator to override test results in the case of probable cause.”

I stared at him, speechless.

I was aware that the legislature had passed a law designed to add so-called teeth to the bill that had established Q.E.D. two years ago. But I hadn’t realized the “teeth” would be biting my rear end.

“I’m innocent, Townsend,” I said. “If you’re going to abuse due process in the name of public safety, you ought to at least wait until you have a real criminal at your mercy.”

His gray eyes glittered keenly. “Don’t tell me you didn’t consider the new law when you elected to face the Diva. Didn’t the public defender assigned to your case tell you that?”

I hadn’t given him a chance, but I wasn’t about to admit that to Townsend. “No, he didn’t.”