A/N: I'm not a psychological profiler or a forensic pathologist, but I am a deft hand at the internet. If I hosed up the science too badly, please let me know.

The conversation with Todd Walters had gone downhill in a hurry. The handsome man with the lecherous nature and giant ego had very little time for Mike and Steve and even less information. He was dismissive of Steve and openly challenged Mike for dominance in the conversation, which resulted in zero information.

"Nice guy," Mike said as they walked to the car.

"Oh, I've run into his type before at Berkeley. The enfant terrible, this version, art rock star. I bet he's sleeping with half the girls in the class. Ego the size of all outdoors, everything, including morality and the law is beneath his lofty perch. This type of guy is one of the reasons I left college."

Mike and Steve departed the school. A quick pause at the locked-up tight Campbell Gallery followed by a stop at the deli at Chestnut and Mason for lunch left them with no more information than they had when they'd left the apartment.

Steve pulled the LTD into the garage and the two inspectors headed for the morgue for an update. Steve had wisely passed on eating at their deli side trip on the way back to Bryant Street. For him, a visit to the morgue on a full stomach was always a huge mistake.

Charlie looked up from the autopsy table on which a naked Ted Brooks was displayed in his final pose or more accurately final repose. Steve hung by the door while Mike strode in for a better look.

"I don't have much yet. The blood work isn't done, but I thinks it's safe to say he was out cold when he was shot and the killer knew what he or she was doing." Charlie turned the body to the side to display a wound at the top of the neck. Mike leaned in for a closer look.

"My best guess is our vic was incapacitated and lying face down of the floor." He indicated the path of the shot entering at the base of the skull. "The gun was close, but not so close as to blow off the face or the top of the head. The small caliber helped with that as well. The shot took out the autonomic nervous system, death was pretty much instantaneous. There wouldn't have even been a lot of blood, because the heart stopped almost immediately and gravity would have pulled any blood into the skull. This is a really effective way to do somebody in, if you ask me."

He handed a metal tray that contained a .22 slug to Mike. "It's amazing how much damage that little baby does when it's delivered strategically. I'm fairly certain the ballistics will match the other two victims."

"How soon after death was the body posed?" Steve asked his question from the other side of the room.

"Same as the others, pretty quick. There's no sign of lividity contrary to the position he was found in and rigor was definitely not set when he was displayed, so I'd say he was posed less than an hour after he was killed."

"Quick. That points to something that was meticulously arranged in advanced. We'll have to let Lenny know about that." Steve rubbed the back of his neck, anxious to depart the autopsy suite.

"Anything else?" Mike asked.

"Yeah, I did find something odd on the drape. It's some kind of oil. We haven't had time to analyze it yet, but my guess is it's either linseed oil or a low grade filtered olive oil. I'm going to recheck the other two to make sure, but since number one was found au natural and two was in the water, we might have missed it."

00000

Steve poured two cups of coffee and entered the glass enclosed office. Lenny was already seated in Steve's usual chair, so after handing Mike a cup, he leaned on top of the file cabinet in the corner.

"Can you give us something beyond nut job now, Doctor?" Mike asked sarcastically.

The doctor rolled his eyes, "I can give you some generalizations, but until we can connect the dots between the victims, that is all they are, generalizations. Your killer is smart, knows at least a little bit about anatomy and is very organized. To kill that efficiently and display the bodies in public in under an hour is quite the high wire act. Tells me he or she, and I'm thinking he, has quite the ego, there is a certain, l am so smart and clever, vibe in play."

Steve looked Mike, "Todd Walters?"

"Too easy, go on Lenny."

"He obviously knows about art. The Vitruvian Man and Ophelia are fairly common images, but St. Sebastian is a little more arcane. The works don't seem connected to the victims at all. It's more about the tableau, creating a public spectacle.

Your killer knows his victims well enough to catch them unaware and drug them before killing them. So he either lives or works in the area, maybe even both, and he's not afraid to kill in his own back yard. He doesn't have a lot of respect for his victims, they are either in his way toward some other goal or they just serve as media for creating his own twisted brand of performance art.

He will kill again, and soon. His time line seems to be compressing, if you don't catch him quickly, expect to find more bodies."

Mike paused a moment before asking his next question. "Any thoughts on the oil, Lenny?"

"I doubt it has any symbolic meaning, it seems to me it might just be transfer from where he is dispatching his victim. Linseed oil is the type of oil used by artists, so if that's what it turns out to be, I think that leads you back to the Gallery or the Institute."

Steve looked at him with quizzical eyes. "And you know this because?"

"Art History minor, remember." Lenny paused briefly, "The only thing I know about olive oil is that it's good on salads."

"And you call me a wise guy!" Steve said in response to Lenny's last comment with an eye towards Mike. He looked at his watch as the doctor left the office. It was already past 4 pm. "Where do we go from here?"

"I think we have to look at our victims' movement before they got killed. There was nothing at Kohler's place. Nobody at the Warf, where he has his kiosk, could tell us anything. We have Kearns' address books so we can at least call her friends. The lab is following up on the note. We've got nothing on Brooks and a trip to Berkeley will have to wait till tomorrow."

"Do you think the dean will give us the list for Walters' Thursday class? Maybe one of them knows something about Brooks' last day."

"I don't think we can count on any help from the school, and we can't compel them to release that information without a court order. Walters definitely won't give us any help. We're going to have to find another way."

"What about the gallery?" Steve asked, secretly hoping his assignment would include a visit to the opening reception tonight.

"I think it's worth checking out." Mike slid the invitation over to Steve. "Perhaps a little subtle reconnaissance is in order this evening."

Steve smiled widely, "If you think it's absolutely necessary, I guess I can handle it."

"Just don't forget you're a cop, buddy boy," said Mike with a smile and the wag of a finger.

"Yes, mother." Steve replied laughing as he left the office.

00000

Steve drove home with the invitation in his coat pocket. He stopped by the lab to see if they had any new information on the note before he left for the day. Mike was busy making phone calls, trying to get a fix on Anna and Ted's movements just before their deaths.

He parked the LTD at the curb in front of his Union Street apartment and took the steps two at a time. After ditching his tie and jacket he went to the fridge to see if it contained anything edible, his appetite back in full following the morgue visit. After striking out in the food department he grabbed a beer and flopped on the couch. He retrieved the invitation and tossed it on the coffee table with his keys, suddenly perplexed as to what one would wear to such an event. His sport coat and tie "cop suit" was totally out. That may have flown for a regular opening, but he was sure this was not going to be a suit and tie crowd. He shook his head and laughed, geez, is this what women worry about before they go out. Maybe he would have to give his next date a pass if she was running late. Daylight was dwindling in his apartment and after skipping lunch, the beer made him incredibly sleepy. He laid his head back and closed his eyes.

A car horn blared in the street and Steve awoke with a start. He looked at his watch and saw that it was nearly nine. Great, he thought as he ran upstairs swapping his work clothes for jeans, boots, a black t-shirt and tweed sports jacket. It would have to do. He grabbed the invitation and the keys to his Porsche, hopping that any sartorial mistake was compensated for by turning up in his beloved, and really cool, car. As an afterthought, he slipped his sunglasses into this pocket before he blew out the front door.

00000

The dinner crowd was waning and her boss told her she could knock off early. Lizzy went into the restroom and stripped off her waitress uniform. She put on the turtle neck, maxi skirt and chucky-heeled lace up granny boots, attempting to transform herself into something a little more appealing. Unbraiding her hair, she used her fingers to comb through the matted curls, looking in the mirror and groaning. She grabbed the whole mop and coiled it into a sloppy twist, holding it while she dug for the chopsticks she kept in her bag. She shoved them through the knot, pinning it in place. She looked back into the mirror at the circle under her eyes and silently wished she'd listened when her mom had attempted to teach her to apply make-up. The natural look was not kind to people who didn't get enough sleep.

She really didn't want to hike back to gallery after 9 o'clock at night. Opening her wallet, she pulled out the 10 dollar bill she kept stashed for emergencies, walked out to the front of the restaurant and hailed a taxi. I guess I'll skip a few meals next week. After the brief ride, she jumped out of the car, surprised at the hubbub of cabs, limos and expensive foreign cars in the normally quiet neighborhood. She pulled the invitation from her purse. OK Alice, she said to herself as she paid the cab driver, time to head through the looking glass.