by J. D. Robb
“Coffee? Tea?”
“I’m good.”
“I’ll leave you to talk.”
“Sissy, sit down and have a glass of wine with me since Lieutenant Dallas can’t. Is it all right?” Alva asked Eve. “I’ve already told Sissy the whole story.”
“It’s fine,” Eve said. “I’m just here to follow up. Maybe you can tell me a little more about your relationship with Bradley Whitestone.”
“We met at a fund-raiser a few weeks ago. He’s courting me.” She smiled as she poured wine in two glasses. “My portfolio anyway. I don’t mind. He has good, fresh ideas, an appealing approach.”
“So it’s not a personal relationship.”
“Not yet determined. I like him, but I’m careful. I wasn’t always, was I?” She patted Sissy’s hand, got a quiet smile.
“You were young, perhaps a bit headstrong.”
“A bit?” Alva tossed back her head on a laugh. “Sissy’s discreet. I went through a wild stage, not that long ago in the scheme of things. Clubs, clubs, more clubs, parties, men. Even a couple of women just to say I had. Throwing money away because it was there. Then I was wild with the wrong man. He hurt me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“To keep the story short, he beat me unconscious, raped me, then beat me again. He stole from me, tossed me out of my own apartment—naked. If one of the neighbors hadn’t heard me, gotten me inside, called the police, I don’t know what might have happened.”
“Did they get him?”
“They did. It was an ugly trial. I was on trial as much as he was. My family, which includes Sissy, stood by me. Even after everything I’d said and done.”
“I don’t remember hearing about this.”
“It was in London. I’d moved there, more or less. It was about four years ago. Sissy moved in with me, took care of me. I went to counseling, and I came home. I came home a different person, and a better one than when I left.”
“You came home the person you always were,” Sissy corrected. “It just took you some time to find her.”
“I didn’t want to lose that person again, so I asked Sissy to come back with me, stay with me. She’s my compass. I bought this place, and I’m trying to deserve the second chance. Which concludes the condensed version of my life story.”
“It’s a nice place. It feels . . . content.”
“Thanks, that’s exactly what we want.”
“I just came from one that didn’t feel so content. Do you know Candida Mobsley?”
“Yes, I do.” With another quick look at Sissy who only sighed, Alva sipped more wine. “She was one of the women I spent time with so I could say I did. We cut quite a foolish swath for a few months back in the bad old days. We don’t, let’s say, have the same lifestyle anymore, but I see her now and again at an event or a party. She hasn’t changed much. Is she . . .” As surprise flickered across her face, Alva lowered her glass. “Candida’s not involved in this?”
“I don’t think so, no.”
“She’s wild, and a little crazy, and frankly not very bright.”
“Yeah, I got all that.”
“She’s the person she wants to be,” Sissy added, then immediately straightened. “I’m sorry. That was harsh and unnecessary.”
“And true,” Alva added. “If she’s using, which is a lot, she might pick a fight. Slap someone, throw things—actually more a tantrum than a fight. But I can’t see her doing anything like this, not what was done to that woman.”
“She has enough money, and connections, to hire someone to do it for her,” Eve pointed out.
“No, not even that. If she had a problem with someone, she’d have her tantrum, throw money around, threaten, throw more money. But murder?”
Alva picked up her wine again, settled back. “Honestly, I don’t think it would occur to her, or that she has it in her. If for some reason she did, she—not being very bright—would brag about it.”
“Interesting,” Eve commented. “That was exactly my take.”
“Maybe I should try law enforcement.” Alva laughed again. “And not in a million years. So . . . You haven’t asked, but I’ll answer. I can’t see Brad doing anything like this either. It’s true I’ve only known him a few weeks, but I’m a much better judge of character than I used to be. And Sissy?”
“Yes. I like him. He has manners, humor, and enthusiasm.”
“My compass,” Alva repeated. “Last night, we had a really good time, relaxing, fun, easy. Dinner, then drinks. I said something about how interesting it must be to refurbish an entire building. I liked that he’d built his company with his friends, that they were revitalizing this building. We talked about it a little, and he said since the building was just a couple blocks away, maybe I’d like to see it.”
“So the idea evolved,” Eve prompted.
“Yes, exactly. And I did want to see it, to see what he and his partners had done. He was excited to show me, pleased I wanted to see it. And I think, possibly, we might have shifted that relationship into the personal. But after . . . We were both so shocked. He took me home, came in awhile. Neither of us wanted to be alone. He caught a couple hours’ sleep in the guest room.”
“What about his partners? What do you know about them?”
“I’ve met them. The Bod—” Laughing, Alva fanned her hand in front of her face. “We had dinner with him—Rob and his fiancée, and Jake and a date. No business. Part of the courtship, I’d say, but very pleasant. I’ve also had my father do some research on them, professionally, and personally. I don’t take chances anymore. He likes what he sees. It’s unlikely he’d shift his allegiances, but he’s fine with them if I decide to.”
“All right. That should do it.”
“Have you been working since I saw you this morning?”
“That’s the job.”
“I can’t imagine it. Sissy and I read the Icove book. We’re going to the premiere.”
“Alva, you take a date.”
“I am.” Alva slid her arm through Sissy’s. “My choice. We really enjoyed the book.”
“It was fascinating,” Sissy said. “I feel sorry for those women, the young girls, the children.”
“So do I.” Eve got to her feet. “I appreciate the time, and the candor. From where I’m standing, you’re doing a good job with that second chance.”
• • •
She put her vehicle on auto, partly because she was bone-ass tired and because she wanted to do a few more runs on the way home. She started standards on every member of the victim’s firm, every member of Whitestone’s firm.
What she needed, Eve decided, was to dig into the files McNab had copied from the victim’s home office unit. That gave them a leg up until Yung finessed a warrant.
And, she admitted, there was no way she could comprehensively analyze financials, numbers, audits, whatever the hell it was unless she cleared her head, recharged.
As she drove through the gates, she rubbed her gritty eyes and thought home had never looked so good.
November’s cold and blowing winds stripped the last of the leaves from the trees rising over the wide green lawn. But that just left the view of the house, its towers and turrets, the castlelike gray stone, open. She could already imagine herself inside—in the warmth, the color, the quiet.
She’d grab a shower first, hot, hot, hot, with all those jets pounding the endless day from her body. Maybe twenty minutes down for a quick power nap. Then some food at her desk while she trudged her way through a bunch of numbers she hoped she’d understand.
She pulled up to the grand front entrance, left her car and, so relieved to just be there, all but sleepwalked into the house.
Summerset stood in the foyer, the nightmare in her dreamscape. His bony body clad in his habitual black suit, he eyed her critically while the fat cat Galahad sat a
t his heel.
“If the cat had dragged anything in, it would be you.”
Deliberately, she stripped off her coat, tossed it over the newel post. “Only because he’d have figured you weren’t worth the effort.” A little lame, she thought, but coherent.
The cat in question trotted over, started to rub against her leg. He froze, arched, sniffing at her with a wild gleam in his bicolored eyes.
Then he backed up, stared up at her. And hissed.
“Hey!”
“Apparently it’s you he doesn’t appear to think worth the effort.”
For a moment she was both puzzled and mortified. This was her cat—and he had very genuinely saved her life. Twice.
Now he stood like a bloated version of a Halloween cat, back arched, hair on end, snarling.
And she remembered the panther cub.
“It’s not my fault. I was conducting an interview. She had a freaking baby panther. I didn’t invite it over for milk and kibble.”
Galahad, obviously finding her excuses as lame as her daily insult, turned away, stuck up his tail in a nonverbal fuck you, and padded back to Summerset.
“Fine. Be that way.”
Grumbling to herself she stalked upstairs. “Who brought you into this cat palace anyway?”
She sulked her way to the bedroom. Stopped long enough to turn to the house comp.
“Where’s Roarke?”
Good evening, darling Eve. Roarke is not in residence at this time.
“Fine.” So she couldn’t even bitch about the cat to her husband.
Fine.
She stepped onto the platform, sat on the edge of the huge bed to take off her boots. She kicked them aside.
“Hell with it,” she managed before she crawled on, lay facedown across the bed, and tuned out.
• • •
An hour later, Roarke walked in. He’d had a long, rough day of his own, wanted his wife and a large glass of wine, more or less in that order.
The same tableau greeted him.
“The lieutenant’s upstairs,” Summerset began as Galahad—semi-arched now—crept over to sniff at Roarke’s trousers.
“Good.”
“She looked exhausted.”
“Small wonder. What’s this?” He bent to scratch at the cat who continued to sniff.
“Apparently he’s mistrustful you’ve been loyal, as he smelled another cat on the lieutenant.”
“Ah. Well, I haven’t had time for cats today.” As Roarke stripped off his topcoat, Summerset held out a hand for it. “Thanks. Let’s go up then,” he said to the cat. “I’m sure she’ll make it up to you.”
He started up, the cat strolling behind him.
If she’d gone to her office, he’d pour some wine into both of them, Roarke determined. And talk her into a short lie-down. He could use one himself. But he wanted out of the bloody suit first.
And he found her, still facedown across the bed.
“That works.”
He took off the suit, changed into loose pants and a long-sleeved T-shirt. Wine could wait, he decided, and slid onto the bed beside Eve. She stirred a little when he wrapped an arm around her, muttered something that sounded like numbers, then settled again.
The cat took a running leap, bounced on the bed beside Roarke’s hip. With his wife curled to his front, the cat to his back, Roarke, in turn, tuned out.
Dreams took her through the day, in their own strange way, into white landscapes, onto frigid sidewalks, through empty offices where weeping echoed and echoed.
She stood in the Dickenson penthouse, hands on hips.
“It’s not here,” she said to Galahad, who ignored her. “Nobody asked you to come, but I’m telling you it’s not here. Nothing’s here but grief. Here’s clear.”
She stepped out of the door and into the apartment still under construction. “Just a little blood, but they shouldn’t have missed it. Sloppy, sloppy. Leave her on the doorstep? Was that a statement, and if so, for who?”
For Whitestone? But he shouldn’t have found the body. An early morning passerby, maybe, more likely one of the construction crew.
And she couldn’t see a link between her vic and anyone on that crew.
She turned a circle, saw the framed photographs of the victim’s kids, the husband. Happier days.
“Family meant everything.” Daniel Yung sat on the comfortable sofa, his hands neatly folded in his lap. “She’d have done, given, said anything to protect them.”
“Yeah, she’d have thought of them after the snatch, of getting home to them. Of the kids, especially. That’s what mothers do, right?”
She smelled her own, saw Stella sneering from the doorway. “She’d have thought about herself, like everybody. She hated being stuck in this place with a sniveling kid. Just like me. She’s no better than me.”
Eve studied her a moment, the bitter eyes, the sneering mouth, the bloody throat slit by McQueen’s blade. And felt little but mild annoyance.
“Fuck off. I don’t have time for you. Everything’s not about you.”
“You think she thought of a couple brats, or the asshole who stuck them in her?”
“Yeah, I do. She thought of her kids, her life, and she gave the bastards who killed her whatever they wanted. But she still knew whatever it was, or enough of whatever it was. Money, audits, portfolios, investments. It’s numbers. Somewhere they won’t add up. How the hell do I find the right ones, the wrong ones?”
Roarke stepped beside her, stroked a hand down her hair. “Do you really have to ask?”
“Oh yeah. I’ve got you.”
She opened her eyes, looked directly into the wild, wild blue of his.
“You’re muttering in your sleep.”
“I am? Was?”
“I’ve got you, you said, and so you do. I have your back.”
Still groggy she stroked his hair as he had hers in the dream. “I was sort of running the case in my sleep. It’s about money, big money, I think. The kind that gets invested and audited and tucked around in special accounts. So you were there, in the dream. At the crime scene.”
“And what did I have to say?”
“Just reminded me that I have an expert on big money in my pocket. I’m pretty sure I’m going to need one.”
“Always happy to serve.”
“McNab found a file I need to look at, or have you look at.”
She started to push up. He simply rolled on top of her.
“I want my fee in advance.”
“I warned somebody about bribery just today.”
“You can arrest me after.” He hit the release on the weapon harness she hadn’t taken off. “I’d prefer you unarmed at the moment. And undressed.”
“You always prefer me undressed.”
“Guilty as charged.” He laid his lips on hers. “There you are.”
It felt like days since she’d been home, in bed, with him. It felt like a gift to be back, to have her body respond, to allow her mind to turn away from the work, from blood and death and grief, and toward pleasure.
“For once you’re not wearing too many clothes.” She tugged the shirt up and off, then slid her hands down his back.
“I thought ahead.” He pulled her up to slip off the harness, peel off her jacket. “You didn’t.”
“I was just going to recharge.” She grinned as he dragged off her sweater. “Still am.” She wrapped around him, still wearing her tank, trousers, and the baby-fist diamond on a chain he’d given her.
Hooking her legs around his waist, she over-balanced him, reversed positions until she straddled him. “I think the power nap set me up.” She pulled off the tank, tossed it aside. “But I could use a hand.”
“I have two.” He closed them over her breasts.
“Yeah, you do.”
She closed her eyes, let the sensations soak in.
She leaned down to him, sank into a kiss that was welcome and lust wrapped in promise.
Slim and strong, he thought. Shadows of fatigue dogging her eyes, but energy revving in her body. His Eve, his gift at the end of a long, hard day.
When he flipped her he heard the laugh in her throat, heard it go to a purr as he replaced his hands with his mouth. Her heart beat under his lips, its pace kicking up as his hands roamed over her. She boosted up her hips when he tugged at the trousers, and his lips trailed down—torso, belly. As he teased, glided, possessed, her breath caught and the fingers stroking his back dug in.
She coiled, released. Moaned soft as silk with pleasure.
He knew what to give, what to take. He always knew. With him, she could love, without fear, without doubts and know she was loved the same way. She reached for him, reached for that love, for the welcome, and once more looked into the wild, wild blue of his eyes.
When he filled her, joy married pleasure. Movement echoed need. Slow, slow, then building into a rise and fall that shut out everything but that mating, that merging. She took his face in her hands as each thrust took her higher.
In his eyes she saw herself fly. And saw him fly after her.
• • •
Since her body clock was already inside out and backwards, she didn’t see any reason not to just lie there a few more minutes. Maybe the mind-clearing/recharging agenda hadn’t gone exactly as she planned.
But this was better.
“I’ve talked to too many people today,” she commented.
“Tell me about it.”
She stared up at the sky window above the bed, wondered when it had gone full dark. “You never get tired of talking to people.”
“You’d be wrong about that.”
“You can pay people to talk to the people. Even pay people to talk to the people talking to the people you don’t want to talk to.”
Amused, he linked his fingers with hers. “And who would talk to them?”
“You could do it all by text or e-mail and never have to speak to a living soul. I can only dream of days like that.”
“Ah, but if I paid people to talk to the people—which I actually do when necessary, and then paid more people to talk to the people I paid, there’s no doubt some things would be lost in translation, and I’d end up having to talk to even more people after it all got bollocksed up.”