by J. D. Robb
Harrison Tibble was a thirty-five-year vet on the police force. He’d plodded his way up from beat cop, working the West Side barrios when cops and their quarries still carried guns. He’d even taken a hit once: three nasty rounds in the abdomen that might have killed a lesser man and would certainly have given most ordinary cops cause to consider their career choices. Tibble had been back on full duty within six weeks.
He was an enormous man, a full six foot six and two hundred sixty pounds of solid muscle. After the gun ban, he’d used his bulk and cold, terrifying grin to intimidate his quarries. He still had the mind of a street cop, and his record was clean enough to serve tea on.
He had a large, square face, skin the color of polished onyx, hands the size of steamship rounds, and no patience for bullshit.
Eve liked him and could privately admit she was a little afraid of him.
“What is this pile of shit we’ve got ourselves into, Lieutenant?”
“Sir.” Eve faced him, flanked by Feeney and Whitney. But at the moment, she knew she was very much alone. “David Angelini was on scene the night Louise Kirski was killed. We have that locked. He has no solid alibi for the times of the other two murders. He’s in debt big time to the spine twisters, and with his mother’s death, he comes into a nice, healthy inheritance. It’s been confirmed that she had refused to bail him out this time.”
“Look for the money’s a tried and true investigative tool, Lieutenant. But what about the other two?”
He knew all of this, Eve thought and struggled not to squirm. Every word of every report had passed by him. “He knew Metcalf, had been to her apartment, was working with her on a project. He needed her to commit, but she was playing coy, covering her bases. The third victim was a mistake. We believe strongly that the intended victim was Nadine Furst, who at my suggestion and with my cooperation was putting a great deal of pressure on the story. He also knew her personally.”
“That’s real good so far.” His chair creaked under his weight as he shifted back. “Real good. You’ve placed him at one of the scenes, established motives, dug up the links. Now we run into the hard place. You don’t have a weapon, you don’t have any blood. You don’t have diddly as far as physical evidence.”
“Not at this time.”
“You’ve also got a confession, but not from the accused.”
“That confession’s nothing more than a smoke screen,” Whitney put in. “An attempt by a father to protect his son.”
“So you believe,” Tibble said mildly. “But the fact is, it’s now on record and is public knowledge. The psych profile doesn’t fit, the weapon doesn’t fit, and in my opinion, the PA’s office was too eager to put the spotlight on. It happens when it’s one of your own.”
He held up a plate-sized hand before Eve could speak. “I’ll tell you what we’ve got, what it looks like to all those fine people watching their screens. A grieving family hammered by cops, circumstantial evidence, and three women with their throats cut open.”
“No one’s throat’s been cut open since David Angelini’s been locked up. And the charges filed against him are clean.”
“True enough, but that handy fact won’t get an indictment on the lessers—not when the jury’s going to feel sorry for him, and the counsel starts hawking diminished capacity.”
He waited, scanning faces, tapped his fingers when no one disagreed with him. “You’re the number whiz, Feeney, the electronic genius. What are the odds on the grand jury if we send our boy over tomorrow on the obstruction and bribery charges?”
Feeney hunched his shoulders. “Fifty-fifty,” he said mournfully. “At the outside, considering that idiot Morse’s latest news flash.”
“That’s not good enough. Spring him.”
“Spring him? Chief Tibble—”
“All we’re going to get if we push those charges is bad press and public sympathy for the son of a martyred public servant. Cut him loose, Lieutenant, and dig deeper. Put someone on him,” he ordered Whitney. “And on his daddy. I don’t want them to fart without hearing about it. And find the fucking leak,” he added, his eyes going hard. “I want to know what asshole fed that idiot Morse data.” His grin spread suddenly, terrifyingly. “Then I want to talk to him, personally. Keep your distance from the Angelinis, Jack. This isn’t any time for friendship.”
“I’d hoped to talk to Mirina. I might be able to persuade her not to give any more interviews.”
“It’s a little late for damage control there,” Tibble considered. “Hold off on that. I’ve worked hard to get the stink of the word cover-up out of this office. I want to keep it that way. Get me a weapon. Get me some blood. And for Christ’s sake do it before somebody else gets sliced.”
His voice boomed out, fingers jabbing, as he snapped orders. “Feeney, work some of your magic. Go over the names from the victims’ diaries again, cross them with Furst’s. Find me somebody else who had an interest in those ladies. That’ll be all, gentlemen.” He got to his feet. “Lieutenant Dallas, another moment of your time.”
“Chief Tibble,” Whitney began formally. “I want it on record that as Lieutenant Dallas’s commanding officer, I consider her pursuit of this investigation to be exemplary. Her work has been top rate despite difficult circumstances, both professional and personal, some of which I have caused.”
Tibble cocked a bushy brow. “I’m sure the lieutenant appreciates your review, Jack.” He said nothing more, waiting until the men left. “Me and Jack, we go back a ways,” he began conversationally. “Now he thinks since I’m sitting here where that corrupt pie-faced fucker Simpson used to rest his sorry ass, I’m going to use you as a handy scapegoat and feed you to the media dogs.” He held Eve’s eyes steadily. “Is that what you think, Dallas?”
“No, sir. But you could.”
“Yeah.” He scratched the side of his neck. “I could. Have you bumbled this investigation, Lieutenant?”
“Maybe I have.” It was a hard one to swallow. “If David Angelini is innocent—”
“The courts decide innocence or guilt,” he interrupted. “You gather evidence. You gathered some nice evidence, and the jerk was there for Kirski. If he didn’t kill her, the bastard watched some woman get slaughtered and walked away. He don’t win any prizes in my book.”
Tibble steepled his fingers and peered over them. “You know what would make me take you off this case, Dallas? If I thought you were carrying around too much baggage about Kirski.” When she opened her mouth, then shut it again, he gave her a thin-lipped smile. “Yeah, best to keep it shut. You laid out some bait, took a chance. There was a pretty good shot he’d come after you. I’d have done the same thing in my glory days,” he added with some wistful regret that they were over. “Problem is, he didn’t, and some poor woman with a tobacco habit gets hit instead. You figure you’re responsible for that?”
She struggled with the lie, gave up to the truth. “Yes.”
“Get over it,” he said with a snap. “The trouble with this case is, there’s too much emotion. Jack can’t get past his grief, you can’t get past your guilt. That makes the two of you useless. You want to be guilty, you want to be pissed, wait till you nail him. Clear?”
“Yes, sir.”
Satisfied, he leaned back again. “You walk out of here, the media’s going to be all over you like lice.”
“I can handle the media.”
“I’m sure you can.” He blew out a breath. “So can I. I’ve got a fucking press conference. Clear out.”
There was only one place to go, and that was back to the beginning. Eve stood on the sidewalk outside the Five Moons and stared down. Playing the route back in her mind, she strode to the subway entrance.
It was raining, she remembered. I’d have a hand on my umbrella, my purse over my shoulder with a good grip on that, too. Bad neighborhood. I’m pissed. I walk fast, but I keep an eye shifting for anybody who wants my purse as much as I do.
She walked into the Five Moons, ignoring the quick
glances and the bland face of the droid behind the bar as she tried to read Cicely Towers’s thoughts.
Disgusting place. Dirty. I’m not going to drink, not even going to sit down. God knows what I’d pick up on my suit. Check the watch. Where the hell is he? Let’s get this over with. Why the hell did I meet him here? Stupid, stupid. Should have used my office, my turf.
Why didn’t I?
Because it’s private, Eve thought, closing her eyes. It’s personal. Too many people there, too many questions. Not city business. Her business.
Why not her apartment?
Didn’t want him there. Too angry—upset—eager—to argue when he named the time and place.
No, it’s just angry, impatient, Eve decided, remembering the droid’s statement. She’d checked her watch again and again, she’d frowned, she’d given up, and walked out.
Eve followed the route, remembering the umbrella, the purse. Quick steps, heels clicking. Someone there. She stops. Does she see him, recognize him? Has to, it’s face to face. Maybe she speaks to him: “You’re late.”
He does it quick. It’s a bad neighborhood. Not much cruising traffic, but you can never tell. Security lights are dinky, always are around here. Nobody complains much because it’s safer to score in the dark.
But someone might come out of the bar, or the club across the street. One swipe and she’s down. Her blood’s all over him. The fucking blood’s got to be all over him.
He takes her umbrella. An impulse, or maybe for a shield. Walks away, fast. Not to the subway. He’s covered with blood. Even around here, somebody would notice.
She covered two blocks in either direction, then covered them again, questioning anyone who was loitering on the street. Most of the responses were shrugs, angry eyes. Cops weren’t popular on the West End.
She watched a street hawker, who she suspected was pushing more than fashion beads and feathers, skim around the corner on motor skates. She scowled after him.
“You been round here before.”
Eve glanced over. The woman was so white she was next to invisible. Her face was like bleached putty, her hair cropped so close it showed her bone-white scalp, and her eyes were colorless down to the pinprick pupil.
Funky junkie, Eve thought. They popped the white tablet that kept the mind misted and pigments bleached.
“Yeah, I’ve been around.”
“Cop.” The junkie jerked forward, stiff jointed, like a droid coming up on maintenance. A sign she was low on a fix. “Seen you talking with Crack a while ago. He’s some dude.”
“Yeah, he’s some dude. Were you around the night that woman got whacked down the street?”
“Fancy lady, rich, fancy lady. Caught it on the screen in detox.”
Eve bit back an oath, stopped, and backtracked. “If you were in detox, how’d you see me talking to Crack?”
“Went in that day. Maybe the next day. Time’s relative, right?”
“Maybe you saw the rich, fancy lady before you caught her on the screen.”
“Nope.” The albino sucked her finger. “Didn’t.”
Eve scanned the building behind the junkie, gauged the view. “Is this where you live?”
“I live here, I live there. Got me a crash flop upstairs.”
“You were there the night the lady got slashed?”
“Probably. Got a credit problem.” She flashed tiny, round teeth in a smile. And her breath was awesome. “Not much fun on the street when you ain’t got a credit.”
“It was raining,” Eve prompted.
“Oh yeah. I like the rain.” Her muscles continued to jerk, but her eyes went dreamy. “I watch it out the window.”
“Did you see anything else out the window?”
“People come, people go,” she said in a singsong voice. “Sometimes you can hear the music from down the street. But not that night. Rain’s too loud. People running to get out of it. Like they’d melt or something.”
“You saw someone running in the rain.”
The colorless eyes sharpened. “Maybe. What’s it worth?”
Eve dug into her pocket. She had enough loose credit tokens for a quick, small score. The junkie’s eyes rolled and her hand jerked out.
“What did you see?” Eve said slowly, snatching the credits out of reach.
“A guy pissing in the alley over there.” She shrugged, her eyes focused on the credits. “Maybe jerking off. Hard to tell.”
“Did he have anything with him? Was he carrying anything?”
“Just his dick.” She laughed uproariously at that and nearly tumbled. Her eyes were beginning to water heavily. “He just walked away in the rain. Hardly anybody out that night. Guy got in a car.”
“Same guy?”
“Nah, another guy, had it parked over there.” She gestured vaguely. “Not from ’round here.”
“Why?”
“Car had a shine to it. Nobody got a car with a shine to it ’round here. If they got a car. Now Crack, he’s got one, and that pissant Reeve down the hall from me. But they don’t shine.”
“Tell me about the guy who got in the car.”
“Got in the car, drove away.”
“What time was it?”
“Hey, I look like a clock. Ticktock.” She snorted another laugh. “It was nighttime. Nighttime’s the best. My eyes hurt in daytime,” she whined. “Lost my sunshields.”
Eve dragged a pair of eye protectors out of her pocket. She never remembered to wear the damn things, anyway. She shoved them at the albino, who hooked them on.
“Cheap. Cop issue. Shit.”
“What was he wearing? The guy who got in the car.”
“Hell, I don’t know.” The junkie toyed with the sunglasses. Her eyes didn’t burn quite so much behind the treated lenses. “A coat maybe. Dark coat, flapped around. Yeah, it flapped around when he was closing the umbrella.”
Eve felt a jolt, like a punch in the stomach. “He had an umbrella?”
“Hey, it was raining. Some people don’t like getting wet. Pretty,” she said, dreaming again. “Bright.”
“What color was it?”
“Bright,” she repeated. “You going to give me those credits?”
“Yeah, you’re going to get them.” But Eve took her arm, led her to the broken steps of the building, and sat her down. “But let’s talk about this a little more first.”
“The uniforms missed her.” Eve paced her office while Feeney lolled in her chair. “She went into detox the day after the first murder. I checked it. She got out a week ago.”
“You got an albino addict,” Feeney put in.
“She saw him, Feeney. She saw him get in a car, she saw the umbrella.”
“You know what a funky junkie’s vision’s like, Dallas. In the dark, in the rain, from across the street?”
“She gave me the umbrella. Goddamn it, nobody knew about the umbrella.”
“And the color was, I quote, bright.” He held up both hands before Eve could snap at him. “I’m just trying to save you some grief. You got an idea of putting the Angelinis in a lineup for a funky junkie, their lawyers are going to whip your little ass, kid.”
She had thought of it. And she, too, had rejected it. “She wouldn’t hold up on direct ID. I’m not stupid. But it was a man, she’s damn sure of that. He drove away. He had the umbrella. He was wearing a long coat, dark.”
“Which jibes with David Angelini’s statement.”
“It was a new car. I juggled that out of her. Shiny, bright.”
“Back with bright.”
“So, they don’t see colors well,” she snarled. “The guy was alone, and the car was a small, personal vehicle. The driver’s side door opened up, not to the side, and he had to swivel down to get in.”
“Could be a Rocket, a Midas, or a Spur. Maybe a Midget, if it’s a late model.”
“She said new, and she’s got a thing for cars. Likes to watch them.”
“Okay, I’ll run it.” He gave a sour smile. “Any idea how
many of those models been sold in the last two years in the five boroughs alone? Now, if she’d come up with an ID plate, even a partial—”
“Quit bitching. I’ve been back over Metcalf’s. There’s a couple dozen bright new cars in the garage there.”
“Oh joy.”
“Possibility he’s a neighbor,” Eve said with a shrug. It was a very low possibility. “Wherever he lives, he has to be able to get in and out without being noticed. Or where people don’t notice. Maybe he leaves the coat in the car, or he puts it in something to get it inside and clean it up. There’s going to be blood in that car, Feeney, and on that coat, no matter how much he’s scrubbed and sprayed. I’ve got to get over to Channel 75.”
“Are you crazy?”
“I need to talk to Nadine. She’s dodging me.”
“Jesus, talk about the lion’s den.”
“Oh, I’ll be fine.” She smiled viciously. “I’m taking Roarke with me. They’re scared of him.”
“It’s so sweet of you to ask for my company.” Roarke pulled his car into the visitors’ lot at Channel 75 and beamed at her. “I’m touched.”
“All right, I owe you.” The man never let her get away with anything, Eve thought in disgust as she climbed out of the car.
“I’ll collect.” He caught her arm. “You can start paying off by telling me why you want me along.”
“I told you, it’ll save time, since you want to go to this opera thing.”
Very slowly, very thoroughly, he scanned over her dusty trousers and battered boots. “Darling Eve, though you always look perfect to me, you’re not going to the opera dressed like that. So we’re going to have to go home to change, anyway. Come clean.”
“Maybe I don’t want to go to the opera.”
“So you’ve already said. Several times, I believe. But we had a deal.”
She lowered her brows, toyed with one of the buttons of his shirt. “It’s just singing.”
“I’ve agreed to sit through two sets at the Blue Squirrel, with the idea of helping Mavis into a recording contract. And no one—no one with ears—would consider that singing of any kind.”
She huffed out a breath. A deal was, after all, a deal. “Okay, fine. I said I’m going.”