Born in Death

by J. D. Robb

  “Huh? What?” She yanked herself back to the moment, then immediately regretted it. He was in her moment, the bony, black-suited pain in her ass. “Can’t you find another place to haunt? I hear there’s one available down on East Twelfth.”

  His lips thinned—if, she thought, it was possible for what passed as his lips to compress in an even tighter line. “I assumed as you no longer appear to live here, you’d need the proper forms.”

  She pulled off her coat, tossed it on the newel post. “Yeah, get those forms, I’ll fill them out.” She started up the stairs. “How many M’s in Summerset anyway?”

  She left him behind in the grand foyer. Roarke was probably home, she decided, but she’d wait until she was out of the hearing of those demon ears before she checked on one of the house scanners.

  She was tempted to go straight into the bedroom, fall flat on the bed for twenty minutes. But with the case weighing on her, she continued up to her office.

  He was there, pouring wine.

  “Long day for you, Lieutenant. Thought you could use this.”

  “Couldn’t hurt.” Either the man was psychic or she was pretty damn predictable. “Been home long?”

  “A couple of hours.”

  She frowned, checked the time. “It’s later than I thought. Sorry. I should have done the call home thing, probably.”

  “Couldn’t have hurt.” But he moved to her, handed her the glass. Then he took her chin in his free hand, studied her face before he touched his lips to hers. “Long, hard day.”

  “I’ve had shorter and easier.”

  “And from the look of you, you’re going to make it longer. Red meat?”

  “Why is everyone speaking in code around here?”

  He smiled, ran his fingertip along the dent in her chin. “You could use a steak. Yes, pizza would be easier to eat at your desk,” he continued, anticipating her. “Consider having a meal that requires utensils payment for not checking in.”

  “I guess that’s fair.”

  “We’ll have it up in the conservatory.” To avoid protest, he simply took her arm and led her to the elevator. “It’ll clear your head.”

  He was probably right, and in Roarke’s world it was a simple matter to order real meat and all the trimmings, have a meal with wine, even candles, in a lush setting where the lights of the city twinkled and gleamed beyond black glass, and a cheerful fire crackled away.

  There were times she wondered that she didn’t get whiplash from the culture shock.

  “Nice,” she said and tried to adjust her mind, her mood.

  “Tell me about the victim.”

  “Victims. It can wait.”

  “They’re in your head. We’ll both do better if you talk it through.”

  “So, you don’t want to chat about politics, the weather, the latest celebrity gossip over dinner?”

  He smiled, sat back, gestured with his glass.

  She told him, going step by step through both murders, the timing, the method, the background.

  “Listening to them talk to each other? It just hit. They had something. It went beyond the surface, you get me? Beyond that gooey first stage of attraction.”

  “The potential they had…It’s not just one or even two people being snuffed out, but the potential of what they might have made together.”

  “Yeah, I guess that’s it.” She stared through that black glass to the lights of a city that offered the very best, and the very worst. “Pisses me off.”

  “You’re rarely anything but pissed at murderers.”

  “That’s a given. I mean they piss me off, the vics. What the hell were they thinking?” Frustration rippled through her, into her eyes, her voice. “Why didn’t they go to the cops? They’re dead not only because somebody wanted them dead, but because they were playing at something they couldn’t possibly win.”

  “Many of us don’t automatically run to the police.”

  “Some of you run from them,” she said dryly. “She had that new lock installed just two days before. Tells me she’s got some concerns. She takes a knife into the bedroom with her—or I have to assume she did from my read of the scene. Tells me she was scared. But…” She stabbed viciously at a bite of steak. “At the same time she says nothing to her defenseless sister who’s coming to spend the night. She doesn’t, at the very least, hole up with her boyfriend.”

  And you’re suffering some, Roarke thought, because it could have been prevented if she’d come to someone like you. “She had a sense of independence, then, and an underlying certainty she was handling and could handle the situation.”

  Eve shook her head. “It’s that ‘It can’t really happen to me’ attitude. The same one that gets people to stroll around in bad neighborhoods or flip off the expense of decent security. Violence happens to the other guy. And you know what else?” she added, waving her fork. “They were into it. Wow, look what we’ve uncovered. We’re going to blow it open—and do interviews, be important.”

  “Ordinary people, ordinary lives, and then something that pulls them out of that. The accounting firm has an excellent reputation.”

  “But you don’t use them. I checked. Mostly because I thought what a big, complicated mess if you did.”

  “I considered them once upon a time. I found Sloan too stuffy and rigid.”

  “Isn’t that the definition of accountants?”

  “Shame on you,” he said with a laugh. “Such a cliché. There are people, darling Eve, who enjoy and are skilled with numbers and finance who are neither stuffy nor rigid.”

  “And here I figured you were the exception to the rule. No, I’m just being pissy,” she admitted. “Feel pissy. The firm’s had their lawyers tangling up the warrant all damn day. They’ve got two employees murdered and they’re blocking me from doing my job.”

  “By doing theirs,” he pointed out. “Sorry, Lieutenant, but if they didn’t use their muscle, and the law, to do whatever possible to protect their clients’ privacy, they wouldn’t have the reputation they hold.”

  “Somebody in there knows what Copperfield and Byson knew. They were cogs, moving into the center of the wheel, but still cogs. Somebody closer in knows.”

  He cut another slice of steak. “It wouldn’t be impossible for someone with superior hacking skills to access the files on Copperfield’s office unit.”

  She said nothing for a moment because she’d thought the same. She’d considered this streamlined approach. “Can’t do it.”

  “Didn’t think you could. And the why is the same as why the firm is paying their lawyers to paper the PA. It’s the job. At this point, you aren’t aware of other lives on the line. You can’t justify the shortcut.”

  “No, I can’t.”

  “You would be, I imagine, working your way into the wheel. Copperfield’s immediate supervisor.”

  “Interviewed her, ran her. I’m not crossing her off, but if she wasn’t genuinely shocked and distressed about Copperfield’s death she’s missed her calling. Doesn’t mean she isn’t aware of, potentially, part of what Copperfield discovered. Why wouldn’t Copperfield go to her supervisor, with whom she had—allegedly—a friendly relationship? Had to assume Greene, the supervisor, knew the secret. Or was afraid of that.”

  “You’re so sure it was something discovered at the firm?”

  “It all points there. Money laundering, tax evasion, fraud, skimming? Some legit front for something not legit.” She shrugged. “Could be all manner of things. You probably know people who use the firm.”

  “I’m sure I do.”

  “Something for the back pocket,” she added. “Not just a little skimming or whatever,” she continued. “Not with the level of nerves and excitement it generated, not with the violence of the murders. A big deal. Something that drew an offer of a bribe, and ended with two deaths.”

  He considered topping off their wine, but it would be wasted. His dedicated cop wouldn’t indulge herself in a second glass if she was going back to work. �
��Are you looking at professional hits?”

  “Doesn’t feel like it, doesn’t look like it. And why cover that up, if so, and not go further? Make it look like burglary. Rape, personal vendetta. But it wasn’t sloppy either. When I get him, I’m going to be surprised if these were his first kills.”

  Down in her office again, she set up a board as she had at Central. With the cat ribboning between his legs, Roarke stood and watched. And studied.

  “Hot-tempered and cowardly.”

  She stopped, turned. “Why do you say that?”

  “Her face, for one. It took several blows to do that to her face. That wouldn’t have been necessary. Would it?”

  “No. Keep going.”

  Roarke lifted a shoulder. “Binding her hands and feet tightly enough to leave those bruises. That’s anger, I’d think. The burns, bottoms of her feet. There’s a meanness there. And it’s cowardly to strangle her when she was bound—same with the male victim. And the use of the stunner. It just strikes me.”

  “Struck me the same. But you missed one. He got some kick out of it. No point seeing their faces when he killed them otherwise. Makes it intimate. Not sexual, but intimate. And he pulled the tape off their mouths before he killed them. Took that extra step. It’s powerful to watch the life go out, to see it and hear it while you cause it. Could’ve done it a lot of other ways, but this method?”

  Her eyes flattened as she looked at the pictures she’d tacked up. “You feel it, your muscles, your hands. You hear the chokes, the gasps the tape would’ve muffled. Yeah, there’s temper here, but the power’s bigger.”

  She settled into work, unsurprised when the cat padded out after Roarke—who would no doubt be more attentive than she would for the next couple of hours.

  She studied the data Peabody had sent to her unit. Copperfield’s neighbors were low on the list, in her opinion. Why bother with a new lock when your potential problem could just make a grab at you in the hallway, in the elevator?

  As for Byson’s, they didn’t fit for her either. The source was Copperfield, not her fiancé.

  International accounts, Eve thought. That had been Copperfield’s bailiwick. Smuggling was always popular. A glossy client fronting illegals, arms, people smuggling?

  She replayed the conversations between the two victims, watched faces, tuned in to voices. Upset, she concluded, some shock, excitement, but not horror or real fear.

  Wouldn’t there have been if what they’d found had involved loss of life?

  It said white-collar crime to her. High-dollar, white-collar, and at least to their knowledge, nonviolent.

  A thought occurred that had her getting up, walking to the door between her office and Roarke’s. But his was empty. Even as she frowned, he spoke from behind her.

  “Looking for me?”

  “Jesus, you make less noise than the damn cat.”

  “Tubs of lard aren’t particularly stealthy. Come to bed.”

  “I just wanted to—”

  “Twenty hours is enough.” Once again, he took her arm. “Did your warrant come through?”

  “About a half hour ago. I’m just going to—”

  “Get back to it in the morning.”

  “Okay, okay.” She agreed because if he could drag her off without her blocking the move, fatigue was slowing her reaction time. “I was just wondering, as a mogul and all, how many layers does one of your minions have to go through to get to you?”

  “It would depend on the minion and the reason he or she wanted to get through to me.”

  “But whatever, whoever, there’d be the Caro layer, right?” she asked, referring to his admin.

  “Yes, in all probability.”

  “Even if the minion made up a bullshit reason, Caro would know there was an appointment, a meeting.”

  “Certainly.”

  “And each one of those top guys at the firm would have a Caro.”

  “There’s only one Caro, and she’s mine. But again, yes, they’d have an admin, and I’d assume an efficient one.”

  In the bedroom, she pulled off her boots, then began to undress in a haze that told her whatever she’d had left had dropped out when she’d walked away from the work.

  “Going there bright and early,” she mumbled. “Get my hands on those damn files. Asshole lawyers cost me a damn day. Like to kick their asses.”

  “That’s right, darling.”

  “I heard that smirk.”

  She slid into bed, let him draw her in so they were close and warm. “Bought the baby shower present thing today.”

  “Good.”

  She had a little smirk of her own in the dark. “If Mavis goes into labor during the deal here, you have to drive her to the birth center.”

  There was utter silence for a solid ten seconds. “You’re trying to give me nightmares. Very small of you.”

  “Somebody told me today you take your fun where you find it.”

  “Is that so? Well then.” His hand slid slickly under her nightshirt and cupped her breast. “Look what I found.”

  “Sleeping here.”

  “I don’t think so.” His thumb stroked over her nipple as his teeth nipped into the nape of her neck. “But go on to sleep if you must. I’ll just have my fun and ward off nightmares. Multitasking.”

  As his mouth and hands were all very busy, she could state without question the man knew how to multitask. And the slow, steady simmer of arousal burned away at fatigue until she arched from the pleasure of it.

  Her mind went quiet; her blood went hot.

  She turned to him, reached for him, her mouth seeking his.

  The taste of it, of her, seeped into him until he was drenched in her. With the long line of her pressed against him, her hands gliding, the feel of her seduced the seducer.

  He wanted her skin, the rapid beat of the pulse in her throat, the firm curve of her breast. Soft and strong and warm. Her breath caught, released on a low sound of approval; her hips rose in both invitation and demand.

  As she moved with him, trembled for him, the need inside him that was never quite tamed leaped free.

  Yes, now, she thought. Right now.

  It was flash and burn when he plunged inside her, the glorious shock of being taken. She could see his eyes, watching her, even as she flew over the crest. Over it and into a storm of speed and heat.

  “With me,” she managed. “Come with me.”

  When his lips crushed down on hers, and the storm reached its peak, she felt him fly with her.

  Breathless, with her system starting its long slide back, she blinked up at the dark sky window over the bed. He lay over her, his weight pressing hers into the mattress, his heart drumming with hers.

  She felt wonderfully sleepy again, as she imagined Galahad might if he came across an unexpected bowl of cream and gorged himself.

  “Guess you never know where you’ll find the fun.”

  His lips brushed her hair, then he shifted, drawing her back against him again. “I do.”

  Snuggled against him, she fell asleep with a smile on her face.

  When she woke, Roarke was in the sitting area of the bedroom, scanning the morning reports as was his habit. She smelled coffee, but headed in to shower first.

  When she stepped out of the shower, the scent struck her again. Sniffing like a hound she turned and saw a thick mug of it sitting on the counter by the sink.

  It made her smile, and go a little soft inside just as she had as she’d drifted into sleep. She took the first glorious hit of coffee naked and dripping, then left it to use the drying tube and pull on a robe.

  Carrying the mug with her, she came out, went directly to him. Bending down, she gave him a kiss nearly as strong as the coffee.

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome. I did consider joining you and getting your blood moving in a different manner, but I’m already dressed.” Still looking at Eve, Roarke shot out a finger to his left, and warned Galahad as the cat tried to belly his way toward a
bowl of berries. “You look fairly well rested.”

  “Sleepy sex then six solid. Not shabby.”

  “Said with a smug smile, just to finish off your alliteration.”

  “Hah. You’re a sharp, sexy son of a bitch. See, I finish my own alliterations.”

  He had to laugh. “Now that you have, sit and have some breakfast, and I’ll tell you what I learned of your top accountants from a business associate.”

  “What associate?” She lowered the coffee she’d started to drink. “When?”

  “You wouldn’t know him, and shortly ago.”

  “Tell me while I get dressed.”

  “Eat.”

  She heaved a sigh, but dropped down and scooped some of the berries into a smaller bowl. “Spill.”

  “Jacob Sloan founded the firm with Carl Myers, the father of the current Carl Myers on the letterhead. Sloan has a very small handful of accounts he continues to oversee personally. He does, however, according to my source, take a very active part in the running of the firm.”

  “His ball, he wants to watch where it bounces.”

  “I’d say so, yes. Myers handles domestic, corporate, and individual—as did his father—more of the very top individual accounts. Robert Kraus—who was made partner about a decade ago—heads up the legal department, and oversees some of the cream of the foreign and international.”

  Roarke nudged a bowl of what looked suspiciously like flakes of tree bark toward her.

  “Does he, your associate, know how active any or all of them are in the day-to-day?”

  “He tells me very. While they are a layered and multifaceted firm with various departments, department heads, and so forth, they hold a weekly partners’ meeting—that would be only the three of them—a daily briefing, and there are quarterly account reports and employee evals, which each partner is copied on. Very hands on.”

  “And if so, difficult for one to slip something shaky by the other two.”

  “It would seem, but difficult isn’t impossible or even improbable.”

  “Sloan’s the top dog,” Eve muttered. “Probably the hardest for an account exec to get to, one-on-one. And the one who’d make the most sense to try to seek out if you hit on something that seemed off. At least if you believed he wasn’t in on it.”