by J. D. Robb
There was a data unit on a workstation in the bedroom—bed tidily made—and two boxes of discs, clearly labeled.
“Kinda sad, isn’t it?” Peabody glanced around. “Thinking about the different places we’ve been in today. Say, Mrs. Grentz’s insane treasure house, the wild space where Hildy lives below. Even Minnie Cable’s pitiful little rooms. People lived there, you could see. Stuff happened there. This is like a vid set. Single professional female with no life.”
“Why didn’t they take her here, Peabody? Why risk a street grab when they can slide into a secured family dwelling and kill five people in less time than it takes to get pizza delivered?”
“Um. They’d be in a hurry. They’d want to get her fast, see what she knows.”
“Part of it. Yeah, part of it. Maybe this place looks dead, feels dead, but she was smart enough, careful enough to rent in a building with good security. Still, no real problem for our boys. But they didn’t wait until she got home, didn’t take her here. They want her awhile. That’s what I’d want. Want to make sure they get it all out of her, and that might take some time. Take privacy. And there’s more.”
She turned a circle, thinking. “Because they can. They know how to move fast, to do a job like this fast, so any potential witnesses see mostly a blur. Couple of guys in black, big black van. Pow, pow. Might not have figured that anybody’d do more than scratch and spit over it in that neighborhood, too. Nobody reports, it takes more time for anybody to realize Newman’s among the missing. Longer yet to make any connection to the Swisher murders.”
Eve looked at the blank walls, the lonely, neatly made bed. “They’ve got her somewhere, right now. When they’re done with her, she’ll be as dead as this room.”
Eve pulled out her communicator. When Baxter came on, she snapped: “Private communication. Get to a secure location or go to text only.”
“Just me and Trueheart here, Dallas. Kid’s downstairs. We’ve got her on monitor.”
“The social worker on her case has been grabbed. Unsubs match description of our suspects. I don’t want the wit out of your sight.”
“She isn’t and won’t be. Do you expect they’ll come after her?”
“If they can find out where she is, they’ll try. I want her inside, at all times. Stay on this until the next time you hear from me.”
She clicked off, called Roarke. “They’ve got the social worker,” she said when he went to private. “She doesn’t know the location, and it’s a big leap. But I’ve alerted Baxter.”
“Understood. I’ll pass this on to Summerset,” he added in a tone that told her he was in a meeting. “I can be there myself in thirty minutes.”
“I don’t think they can move faster—and Newman just knew I took her, not that I took her home, but watch your back. They put the kid with me, they put you with me. Another grab isn’t out of the question.”
“I’ll offer you the same advice, and say that in both cases it’s unnecessary.”
This time it was Roarke who ended transmission.
“Scoop up her discs, address books, memo books. Contact EDD for a pickup on her equipment. Let’s do this by the book.”
“How long do you think she’s got?”
Eve looked around the stark, soulless room. “Not long enough.”
When Meredith surfaced, she thought there was an ice pick dead center of her forehead, radiating sharp shards of pain. The headache was so blinding, she assumed at first that was the reason she couldn’t see.
Her stomach rolled a bit, as if she’d eaten something past its expiration date, but when she tried to press her hand to it, her arm wouldn’t move.
From somewhere, far off, she heard voices. A watery echo of voices.
Then she remembered. She’d been walking on Avenue B, on her way to a home check, and something . . . someone . . .
The fear came fast, spearing through the pain. When she tried to scream, the only sound she could make was a wild, whimpering moan.
She was in the dark, unable to move her arms, her legs, her head. Unable to see or speak, and when something brushed her cheek, her heart punched against her ribs like a fist.
“Subject’s conscious. Meredith Newman, you are in a secured location. You will be asked questions. If you answer these questions, you will not be harmed. I’m going to remove the tape from your mouth at this time. Once I do, tell me if you understand.”
Having the tape ripped off in the solid dark brought on a scream that was more from utter terror than pain. She was slapped, open-palm, on one cheek, followed by a quick answering backhand on the other.
“I said tell me if you understand.”
“No. I don’t. I don’t understand. What’s the matter? Who are you? What—” She screamed again, her body straining against the restraints as pain exploded. Like a thousand hot needles jabbed into her bones.
“It will hurt every time you refuse to answer, any time you lie, any time you don’t do as you’re told.” The voice was quiet, flat. “Do you understand?”
“Yes. Yes. Please, don’t hurt me.”
“We’ll have no reason to hurt you if you answer our questions. Are you afraid, Meredith?”
“Yes. Yes, I’m afraid.”
“Good. You’ve told the truth.”
She couldn’t see, but she could hear. She heard little beeps and pings, his breathing—steady. No, someone else, too. She could hear, she thought, movement—but not where the breathing was. Two of them. There’d been two of them.
“What do you want? Please tell me what you want.”
There was another jolt, shocking, quicker, that left her gasping. She thought she smelled something burning, like raw meat. And thought, through the shocking pain, she heard a woman laugh.
“You don’t ask questions.”
A second voice. A little deeper, a little harsher than the first. Not a woman. Must have imagined. What does it matter?
God, oh God, help me.
Her eyes wheeled, and she saw there was faint light, just a slit of light to her left. Not in the dark. Thank God, not in the dark. Her eyes were taped as her mouth had been.
They didn’t want her to see them. Didn’t want her to be able to identify them. Thank God, thank God. They weren’t going to kill her.
But they would hurt her.
“I won’t. I’ll answer. I’ll answer.”
“Where is Nixie Swisher?”
“Who?”
The pain struck like a fiery ax, slicing her up the center. Her screams burst into the air, and tears of shock spilled down her cheeks. Her bowels went to water.
“Please, please.”
“Please, please.” It was a woman’s voice, a sneering mimic of her own. “Jesus, she shit herself. Pussy.”
Meredith screamed again when the icy water struck her. She began to weep now, thick, wet sobs, as she realized she was naked, wet, soiled.
“Where is Nixie Swisher?”
“I don’t know who that is.”
And sobbing, she braced for the agony that didn’t come. Her breath came in pants now, her eyes tracking back and forth, from the dark, to the sliver of light, to the dark, to the light.
“Your name is Meredith Newman.”
“Yes. Yes. Yes.” Her skin was on fire, her bones were like ice. “God. God.”
“Is Nixie Swisher one of your cases, as an employee of Child Protection Services?”
“I—I—I get so many. There are so many. I can’t remember. Please don’t hurt me, please, I can’t remember.”
“Register blue,” one of them said from behind her.
“Overworked, Meredith?”
“Yes.”
“I understand that. The system sucks you up, sucks you dry. The wheel of it runs over and crushes what’s left of you. Revolution comes because of all it crushes. You’re tired of the wheel, aren’t you?”
“Yes. Yes.”
“But it’s not done with you yet. Tell me, Meredith, how many families have you destroyed?”<
br />
“I—” Tears spilled into her mouth. She swallowed the salt of them. “I try to help.”
Impossible, unspeakable pain seared into her. Her screams were mindless pleas for mercy.
“You’re a cog on that wheel. A cog on the wheel that crushes out the lifeblood. But now it’s turning around to crush you, isn’t it? Do you want to escape, Meredith?”
She tasted vomit on her tongue, in her throat. “Yes. No more, please, no more.”
“Nixie Swisher. Let me refresh you. A girl, a young girl who wasn’t in her bed as she was told to be. Disobedient child. Disobedient children should be punished. Isn’t that right?”
She opened her mouth, unsure. “Yes,” she said, praying it was the answer he wanted.
“Do you remember her now? Do you remember the little girl who wasn’t in her bed? Grant and Keelie Swisher, deceased. Executed for heinous acts. Their throats were slit, Meredith. Do you remember now?”
His voice had changed, just a little. There was a fervor that hadn’t been there before. Part of her brain registered the fact while the rest gibbered in fear. “Yes. Yes, I remember.”
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know. I swear I don’t know.”
“In the blue,” the other voice reported.
“Jolt.”
She screamed and screamed and screamed as the pain tore into her.
“You reported to the Swisher residence on the night they were executed.”
Her body continued to shudder. Spittle dribbled down her chin.
“Did you speak with Nixie Swisher?”
“Interview, exam. Exam, interview. Standard. No injuries, no molestation. Shocky.”
“What did she see?”
“I can’t see.”
“What did Nixie Swisher see?”
“Men. Two men. Knives, throats. Blood. We’ll hide now. Hide and be safe.”
“Losing her.”
“Stimulant.”
She wept again, wept because she was back, aware, awake, and the dregs of pain still lived in her. “No more, please. No more.”
“There was a survivor of the Swisher execution. What did she tell you?”
“She said . . .” Meredith told them everything she knew.
“That’s very good, Meredith. Very concise. Now where is Nixie Swisher?”
“They didn’t tell me. The cop took her. Against procedure, but she had weight.”
“As her caseworker, you must be informed of her location. You must supervise her.”
“Over my head. Under the table. I don’t know. Cop took her. Police protection.”
She lost track of the pain now, of the times it ripped through her like burning arrows. Lost track of the times they brought her back from the edge of oblivion, pounded her with questions.
“Very well, Meredith. I’ll need the address of every safe house you know. Every hidey-hole the system digs.”
“I can’t—I’ll try,” she screamed against the next wave of agony. “I’ll try to remember.” She blurted out addresses between sobs and whimpers. “I don’t know all of them, I don’t know all. Only what they tell me. I’m not in charge.”
“Just a cog in the wheel. Who took Nixie Swisher?”
“The cop. Homicide cop. Dallas. Lieutenant Dallas.”
“Yes, of course. Lieutenant Dallas. That’s very good, Meredith.”
“I’ve told you everything. Everything I know. Are you going to let me go?”
“Yes, we are. Very soon.”
“Water, please. Could I have some water?”
“Did Lieutenant Dallas indicate where she could take Nixie Swisher?”
“No, no. I swear, I swear. Into her custody. Not regs, but she pushed it through. I wanted to get home. It was a bad place to be. I wanted to get out. Supposed to check into the safe house with the subject, but Dallas overrode me. I let her.”
“Have you been in contact with Lieutenant Dallas since that night?”
“No. The bosses took it over. They don’t tell me. It’s high-profile. It’s sensitive. I’m just—”
“A cog on the wheel.”
“I don’t know anything. Will you let me go now?”
“Yes. You can go now.”
The knife slashed so fast, so cleanly across her throat, she never felt it.
9
EVE WALKED INTO HER OWN HOME AS IF SHE were walking into an op. “No one comes in, no one goes out,” she snapped to Summerset, “without my clearance. Savvy?”
“Certainly.”
“Where’s the kid?”
“In the game room with Officer Trueheart.” Summerset hitched back the cuff of his black jacket to reveal a wrist unit. Not a time piece, Eve noted, but a monitor. On it, she saw Trueheart and Nixie battling it out on one of Roarke’s classic pinball machines.
“I took the precaution of pinning a homer on her sweater,” he added. “If she moves from one location to another, it signals.”
Despite herself, Eve was impressed. “Sweet.”
“They will not lay a hand on that child.”
She looked at him. He’d lost a child, a daughter, not that much older, really, than this one. Whatever else she thought of him, she understood he would stand as Nixie’s shield.
“No, they won’t. Roarke?”
“He’s here. In his private office.”
“Right.” The office where he kept his unregistered—and therefore illegal—equipment. However much she trusted Peabody, there were lines. “Head up, will you,” she said to Peabody. “Give Baxter the current. I’m going to update Roarke, then we’ll conference. My office.”
As her partner started up the steps, Eve moved out of the foyer and to the elevator. There she paused. “I need them alive,” she said to Summerset. “Best-case scenario.”
“One of them alive would do.”
She turned back. “She will be protected. Extreme measures, including termination, will be employed if necessary. But consider this before you get your juices up. Two men grabbed Meredith Newman off the street—and one to drive, so that makes three. There may be more. I don’t get one healthy, that I can sweat, she may never be safe. The more of them I get healthy, the better chance I have to get them all. To get the why. Without the why, she may never be safe. And she’ll never know. You don’t know the why, you don’t always heal.”
Though his face remained unreadable, Summerset nodded. “You’re quite right, Lieutenant.”
She stepped into the elevator, ordered Roarke’s private office.
He knew when she came through the gates, and that she’d come up before much longer. So he closed the file, went back to evaluating his security.
He didn’t think it was appropriate right at the moment to tell her one of the tasks he’d chosen for the unregisters was in-depth—and technically illegal—background checks on all of Nixie’s family connections.
The grandmother was out. She’d had a few misdemeaner illegals charges, any number of cohabs, and had a part-time licensed companion standing.
Perhaps the moral judgment was ironic as he was currently an official guardian for the child and had done worse. Considerably worse.
But he was making it nonetheless. He wouldn’t see a child turned over to a woman of that sort. She deserved better.
He’d found Grant Swisher’s biological father. It had taken a bit of time, but the moral judgment there had come swiftly.
The man was rarely employed, had done a short stint for petty theft, and another for jacking vehicles.
The step-sister looked more promising. She was married, a corporate lawyer out of Philadelphia. Childless. No criminal on record, and financially solvent. She’d been married, to another lawyer, for seven years.
The child could have a home with her, temporarily, even permanently should it become necessary. A good home, he thought, with someone who’d known her parents, who felt some connection.
He sat back, tipped back in the chair. It was none of his business. Not a bit of it
.
The hell it wasn’t. He was responsible for that child now, whether he’d chosen to be or not. Whether he wanted to be or not.
He had stood outside her bedroom, had seen what had nearly been done to her.
He had stood outside her brother’s room, had seen what had been done. A young boy’s blood drying to rust on the sheets, the walls.
Why was it that seeing it made him see his own? He didn’t think of those days, or so rarely it didn’t count. He wasn’t—wouldn’t be—haunted by nightmares as Eve was. He was done with those days, and what had been.
But he thought of them now, had thought of them too many times since he’d been inside the Swisher home.
He remembered seeing his own blood. Coming to, barely. Obscene pain swimming through him as he stared at his own blood on the filthy ground of the alley after his father had beaten him half to death.
More than half, come to that.
Had he meant to kill him? Why hadn’t he ever wondered that before? He’d killed before.
Roarke looked at the photo of his mother, of himself as a baby. Such a young, pretty face she’d had, he thought. Even bruised by the bastard’s fists, she’d had a pretty face.
Until Patrick Roarke had smashed it, until he’d murdered her with his own hands and tossed her in the river like sewage. And now her son couldn’t remember her. He’d never remember her voice, or her scent. And there was nothing to be done about it.
She’d wanted him, this pretty girl with the bruised face. She’d died because she’d wanted to give her son family.
Those few years later, had Patrick Roarke, God rot him, meant to leave his own son for dead, or had he simply used his fists and feet as usual?
A lesson for you, boy-o. Life’s full of hard lessons.
Roarke dragged his hands through his hair, pressed them to his temples. Christ, he could hear the cocksucker’s voice, and that would never do. He wanted a drink, and nearly rose to pour himself a whiskey, just to take off the edge.
But that was a weakness—drinking because you wanted to blunt the edge. Hadn’t he proved every day, every bloody day of the life he’d been given that he wouldn’t be weak?