Delusion in Death edahr-44

by J. D. Robb

  “I can tell Reo to take care of that.”

  “That works. For now, get a uniform to get over there, seal it. Once the news hits, some big nose is bound to go in there and poke around.”

  “I’m all over it. You know, it feels good, Dallas, but …” With a sad little shrug, Peabody looked down at the papers on Eve’s desk.

  “You wished it felt better. I’m betting there’s a hit list on his comp, where he planned to target, who he’d earmarked to take out. Once you read that, think about all those people who can just go on living their lives, it will feel better.”

  “Yeah. You know, thinking about that, it already does.”

  “Then get out of here so I can work.”

  She slogged her way through the arrest report, copied, filed, added it to her book. She considered the other journals. Not exactly light reading, she thought, but she wanted to know, to see.

  She rose, intended to give herself a lift with another hit of coffee, and turned back to her signaling ’link.

  “You’re to report to the main media room, Lieutenant, along with Detective Peabody and any other officer you deem appropriate.”

  “On my way.”

  Coffee later, she promised herself. Better a nice cool glass of wine, or two. And that so much sex.

  Then sleep. Lots and lots of sleep.

  She stood, scanned the bullpen. “Good work, all around. That includes Detectives Carmichael and Sanchez, and the other officers who took on the load so we could bag this fucker. Anyone who wants or needs some personal time or leave … Get real. We’ve got a lot of catching up to do.”

  She appreciated the moans, the muttered curses. “Commander Whitney’s called for a media conference.” She appreciated the mild panic, the hunched shoulders as perfectly sane cops slid down in their chairs as if it would make them invisible.

  “Peabody and I will take that as I have other assignments for the rest of you. When you’ve completed your current paperwork or at end of shift—whichever comes first—get the hell out of here and go have a beer.”

  Baxter slapped his hands together. “That’s what I’m talking about! The Blue Line, Dallas. Bring Roarke.”

  “So he can pick up the tab? I don’t think so. I’m going home to the quiet.” She caught Reineke’s eye roll to the ceiling.

  “Problem, Reineke?”

  “What?” He blinked at her, then averted his eyes. “No, sir. No problem here.”

  “Good. Peabody, with me.”

  As she expected, the media prep room buzzed. Tibble, Whitney, Mira, Teasdale, and the ever-sharply dressed Kyung.

  Tibble glanced up from his notes, pocketed them before crossing to her to extend a hand. “Congratulations, Lieutenant, Detective. Solid work.”

  “We had a solid team.”

  “A show of all the officers who participated in the investigation would make a good visual,” Kyung commented.

  “They need a break.”

  “Of course. For myself, I know I’ll sleep easier tonight knowing Lewis Callaway is behind bars.”

  “I need a little more than that. Sir,” Eve said to Tibble. “You know Director Hurtz. Agent Teasdale says he’s an honorable man. There’s a formula capable of killing masses of people. As Menzini has been in custody until his recent death, I have to believe that formula exists, and is buried somewhere deep in HSO’s files.”

  “I’ve never seen nor heard of this substance,” Teasdale insisted, “until this case.”

  “I believe you,” Eve told her. “That doesn’t mean it’s not sealed up somewhere. There’s also a copy in a journal secured in my office. Our chief lab tech is working on an antidote, and he’ll probably come up with one—whether or not HSO already has. We need an agreement, Agent Teasdale, between your honorable man and mine. I’m not naive enough to believe your people will destroy all trace of said formula, but there has to be an agreement said formula will remain sealed and buried.”

  “You’ll have it.” Tibble looked from Eve to Teasdale and back again. “My word.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  She believed he’d keep his word. As for Hurtz, she wanted to believe it. But … politics and positions changed. She’d have Roarke keep an eye on things on his unregistered equipment—and she had an ace reporter in the back pocket, should the time come to do that shouting from the rooftops.

  “We’ll all sleep better now.” She looked back at Kyung.

  “I’m told you have Callaway’s parents,” he said.

  “I’ve had them transported to a safe house for tonight. Commander, I’d like to have them taken back to Arkansas in the morning, quick and quiet, and arrange for the locals to provide some protection until we see how that wind blows.”

  “HSO will take care of that,” Teasdale told her.

  “They’ll need to issue a statement,” Kyung considered. “I could help them with that if they’re willing.”

  “That would be good. They’re decent people. It’s going to be hard enough for them. Peabody, pave that road when we’re done here.”

  “We’d intended to wait for the mayor.” Kyung smiled. “But he’s been held up as the news of the arrest leaked.”

  “Did it?”

  His smile widened. “Channel Seventy-five broke the story some thirty minutes ago. They’re short on details, but it was enough to have reporters swarming the mayor’s office. He’ll link up with us from there. Now then, Chief Tibble will make a brief statement, followed by Commander Whitney. You and your investigative team will be acknowledged, as will Agent Teasdale and the HSO. Ah, APA Reo.”

  “Sorry, I was delayed.” She hurried in, fluffing back her cloud of blond hair. “The news broke as my boss was leaving court. He’s dealing with reporters there. I’ll represent the prosecutor’s office here.”

  “Perfect.” Kyung angled his head, gave them all a glowing smile. “Five strong, beautiful women—all playing a part in securing the safety of the city. It’s an excellent visual. Shall we go in?”

  The room was packed, but she’d expected that, too. Cameras whirled and clicked, recorders blinked as Tibble stepped to the podium. Tall, lean, imposing, he stood in silence until the room quieted.

  “Today, after an exhaustive and intense investigation, the New York City Police and Security Department, with cooperation from the HSO, arrested and charged the individual allegedly responsible for the deaths that occurred at On the Rocks and Café West. Faced with the preponderance of evidence gathered by the investigative team headed by Lieutenant Dallas, in consultation with Agent Teasdale of HSO, Lewis Callaway has confessed to the planning, the intent, and the execution of these crimes.”

  Eve let it roll over her—Tibble’s statement, Whitney’s, then the questions that flew like crazed crows. She wanted home, she realized, intensely. The quiet of it, the comfort, the indulgence of familiarity.

  She answered questions when called on, and wondered—as she always did—why so many of them asked the same damn thing with slightly altered phrasing.

  “Lieutenant, Lieutenant Dallas! Kobe Garnet with New York News. You interrogated Callaway.”

  “I interviewed the suspect, along with Detective Peabody, Agent Teasdale, and Doctor Mira.”

  “Did he tell you why? Why he did it?”

  “Yes. I’m not authorized to relate the details of the interview or the suspect’s confession that may deter from the prosecution’s case, should this matter go to trial.”

  “People want to know why.”

  “Callaway’s motives will be disclosed at the prosecutor’s discretion. The why matters. It matters not only to this department in order to secure arrest and confession, to the prosecutor to secure a verdict, but to the survivors of the attacks, and the families of those who didn’t survive. They should know it matters to us. More, and for now, they should know Lewis Callaway is behind bars. The NYPSD and the prosecuting attorney will do everything within their power to see he stays behind bars.”

  She fielded more, as did the o
thers, until she felt like a bone, picked clean to the marrow.

  When her ’link vibrated in her pocket, she started to pull it out. Maybe she could use it as an excuse to step away, get out. But as she slid her hand into her pocket, Kyung stepped up to end the media torture.

  Some reporters scrambled out, others continued—ever hopeful—to lob questions. Relieved, Eve walked out behind Whitney.

  “Well done,” he told her. “Go home, get some rest.”

  “More than happy to, sir.”

  She turned away, reached for her still vibrating ’link, noted Peabody doing the same.

  Something in her guts churned.

  Even as she pulled out her ’link, McNab—his own in his hand—burst in. “Lieutenant, we need you in EDD, now.”

  Whitney laid a hand on her shoulder to hold her in place. “What is it, Detective?”

  “Sir. We cracked the encryption. Callendar took the journal entries, and she’s got entries detailing Callaway’s meetings with his grandmother. Gina MacMillon. She’s still alive.”

  “Peabody, get me everything we’ve got on Gina MacMillon. Teasdale, get me more. When and where did they meet?” Eve demanded.

  “I didn’t get all the details. As soon as Callendar hit, she alerted Feeney. We tried to tag you, hoping we’d catch you before any release.”

  “Too late. His name’s out. Commander, I’ve got to get on this.”

  “Go. I’ll be there myself as soon as I can.”

  “I’ve got her basic data,” Peabody said on the run. “She was reported killed in the attack where her daughter—now Audrey Hubbard—was abducted. Her remains were cremated, per her wishes, and as was more usual in those circumstances.”

  “Cause of death,” Eve snapped as she shoved onto an elevator.

  “Who ID’d the body?”

  “It’s going to take longer to—”

  “Gunshot to the face,” Teasdale stated, reading her PPC. “Both William and Gina MacMillon were identified by a neighbor, an Anna Blicks, who died of natural causes in 2048.”

  “Face blown away. Your neighbor IDs by body type, hair, clothes, jewelry, and because you’re in the house, because who the fuck else would you be? Goddamn it. She started him up. That was the trigger. Not finding out about the grandfather, not initially. But the grandmother.”

  “Why would she fake her own death?” Peabody demanded.

  “Let me think. Let me think. Put extra guards on Callaway. Now!”

  “Menzini might have arranged it,” Teasdale considered. “He wanted her and the child back, located her, killed someone in her place so no one would look for her.”

  “No. No. Women didn’t matter that much. The kid—she’s his blood, and part of the new world order, part of the new beginning. But not the mother. She did it. She went home for something, under Menzini’s orders, had to convince her husband she was contrite—or she’d been brainwashed, abused. She’s terrified, and there’s this baby. He opens the door.”

  “For all those months?” Teasdale began.

  “Menzini needed someone on the outside, someone who could funnel him money, supplies, information. How the hell do I know, I wasn’t there. Isn’t that how it works—moles, sleepers, double fucking agents?”

  She bulled off the elevator, tore toward EDD.

  “In the lab, Dallas.” Fast on his feet, McNab passed her, led the way.

  She spotted Feeney through the glass, pacing, his hair in wild silver and gray wires, and Callendar, her face grim in contrast to the sassy butt wiggle she performed in front of a swipe screen.

  She didn’t see Roarke until she’d pushed through the doors behind McNab. He huddled at a comp station, working manually and by voice. The muttered Irish curses she caught meant he battled the work.

  “I’m sorry, Lieutenant.” Callendar broke off the work and wiggle. “If I’d been faster—”

  “Forget that. Run it through.”

  “Once we broke the code, I took the journal entries. I was taking my time because … we had him. The first bit was just long, rambling bullshit about how he was special, different, important. It was just full of the E and the Go, and how now he knew why he’d always known it. Then he started talking about the grandmother. She set up a meeting, posing as a client, St. Regis Hotel bar. You should read it for yourself, Dallas.”

  She ordered the segment on screen.

  She was beautiful for a woman of her age. A strong face with piercing blue eyes. Her jewelry was understated, but good. I could see she was a woman of means and taste. She ordered a martini, and it suited her. I admit I found her fascinating even before I knew the truth. She kept her voice, strong like her face, low and intimate. I had to lean toward her to hear.

  She asked me what I knew about my heritage. It seemed a strange question, but clients often ask strange questions, and she was picking up the tab. I told her of my grandfather—the war hero bit always impresses. How he and my grandmother had left England for America with my mother to start a new life.

  Before I could begin on my parents—I always embellish there as they’re tedious, ordinary people in reality—she told me everything I knew was a lie.

  She told me her name—Gina MacMillon—not the name she’d given me to arrange the meeting. I had some vague recollection of that name, but didn’t, right away, connect it to the woman I’d been told was my great-aunt who died in the Urbans.

  She, this woman with the compelling eyes, told me she was my true grandmother. That my grandfather had been a great man. Not the soldier who’d done no more than follow the orders of other men, but a great man. A visionary, a leader, and a martyr.

  I shouldn’t have believed her, but I did. It explained so much. She and this great man had worked together, fought together, had been lovers. The child they’d created, my mother, had been stolen, and she herself, taken and kept prisoner by her former husband. She’d tried to escape, many times, with the child. Eventually, her captor beat her, left her for dead. Though she tried to find her way back to the child, back to my grandfather, the world was in pieces. She learned the government had captured my grandfather, and she had no choice but to go into hiding.

  With a new name and identity, she’d struggled to survive. Eventually she’d married, and well, and used the resources gained there to try to find the child stolen from her. Years of searching led her to me. She understood now the daughter was lost to her. Women were weak—most women—but her grandson, so like the man she’d loved, was found.

  I asked what she wanted from me. Nothing, she claimed. Instead she had much to give me, to tell me, to teach me. In me she saw the potential and the power taken from her and my grandfather.

  His name was Guiseppi Menzini.

  “There’s more, Lieutenant,” Callendar told her. “A lot more.”

  “I need the name she’s using, a description—where she’s living.”

  “He doesn’t list any of that, at least not that I’ve found. I haven’t gotten through it all, but I did searches. He refers to her as Gina or Grandmother. I’ve got that he started the journal because she told him Menzini kept journals, and he went on a hunt for them when she told him to. She said they were his legacy, and his gateway to power. And she knew his mother kept them.”

  “She spun him a bunch of lies. Menzini’s the hero, and MacMillon, who gave her forgiveness and took another man’s kid for his, the villain. And she counted on sentiment and loyalty—her half-sister’s for her, to keep her things, her papers, to believe she’d died trying to save the kid. Bitch. Peabody, get Baxter and Trueheart to the St. Regis bar, with a picture of Callaway. Maybe somebody remembers who he sat with on the date of the journal entry. It takes awhile to tell that story. Callendar, where else did they meet?”

  “Her place. He doesn’t say where it is. But he talks about her sending a limo to pick him up. Makes him feel like a BFD. The way he talked about it, driving along the river, the views from her place—totally fancied-out—it sounds Upper East Side. Doorman, bi
g lobby, private elevator. So a condo. Oh, and he liked that she had droids—no live help.”

  “So she’s got money, or access to it. She sought him out. She’s got an agenda. She made him important, exactly what he wanted. She knew that. She knew which notes to play.”

  “She’s been studying him,” Teasdale put in.

  “It’s why the banking for the drugs, the equipment didn’t show on his financials. She’s fronting all that. She may have gotten the makings for him, may have sources there Strong couldn’t find. Out of the country, or deep down—some of her old contacts from Red Horse.”

  “Why, after all these years?”

  “Menzini died a few months ago, right? Maybe that was her trigger. I’ll ask her when I find her. She coached him, taught him. She lit the match.” As she calculated, Eve’s eyes narrowed, flattened. “He’s sitting down there now figuring out the best way to contact her. He’s got to figure his rich grandmother will buy him top lawyers, get him off. He’ll be thinking that.”

  “But she won’t,” Teasdale said.

  “No, hell no. He’s caught. No more use to her. Did Menzini’s death start this?” Eve wondered. “Is this some kind of revenge on her part? Or maybe a tribute. Fuck it.” She pushed her hands through her hair.

  “We did an aging program,” Feeney told her. “We’ve got what she should look like now, but—”

  “She’d have changed her face,” Eve finished. “A long time ago.

  She faked her own death, she can’t keep the same face. She’ll have heard we’ve got him. Will she worry he’ll give her up?”

  “Why didn’t he?” Teasdale demanded, and for the first time since Eve met her, the agent looked mildly distressed. “It would have given him a bargaining chip.”

  “He’s smart enough to know that, and to keep that chip in his pocket. If she doesn’t come through for him, buy his way out, he’ll roll on her.”

  “She’ll poof. Not your fault,” McNab said to Callendar. “Just bad luck. But she’s got the money and resources, so she’ll blow.”