by J. D. Robb
Why the hell did he have to be so good-looking, and so good in bed?
Down to the D done, she reminded herself, blinking back tears and taking her lumps by texting her roomie.
On my way home – done with this crap. Wait up, okay, if you’re not in bed? Get up if you are. I want wine and whine. J
She blinked at tears that came as much from anger as the loss of the cheating dickwad.
“Hey, miss! Hey, sorry!”
She heard the voice – major twang in it – and kept walking.
“Please, I’m sorry, but I’m really lost. Can you just tell me how to get to Broome? Is that right? Is Broome right?”
The twangy voice hurried up to her, and the woman owning it shivered and bit her lip. “I’m just lost, and I’m awful nervous. If you could just tell me which way to go. It’s so cold, and I can’t find a taxicab.”
“Tell me about it.” Jayla sighed. “Did you say Broome?”
“Yes, with an ‘e,’ is that right? I’m not from New York.”
“Shocked face.”
The woman smiled, then looked down. “Oh, would you look at that?”
Instinctively Jayla looked down, bent over a little.
It hit her like a hammer. Maybe it was a hammer. Pain exploded, the world spun, going red at the edges. She tried to cry out, but only managed a moan.
Something – someone – shoved her, yanked her. She fell hard, hard enough to steal what little breath she had still in her lungs.
“I’ve got her, honey!” The twangy voice came as though through a tunnel, a tunnel flooded with water. “Let’s go, I’ve got her. Told you to let me pick ’em, Darryl. I’ve got a knack.”
Somebody laughed. Even as she whimpered, tried to turn over, the hammer struck again, and knocked her into the dark.
8
Eve woke to the familiar. The scent of coffee, Roarke, already dressed in one of his master-of-the-business-universe suits on the sofa in the sitting area working on his PPC as the screen, on mute, scrolled with financial data she’d never understand. And the cat sprawled over the top of the sofa like some feline potentate.
Really, it didn’t get much better.
She lay still a moment, taking it all in – and still he sensed she’d waked as his gaze shifted to hers.
“Good morning.”
“It feels like one,” she decided.
She pushed up as nothing beckoned more alluringly that the scent of coffee. Since he’d gone for a pot, she walked over, poured an oversized mug, and gave herself that special glory of the first morning sip.
“How many countries and/or off-planet stations have you talked to this morning?” she wondered.
“Only Italy and Olympus. It’s a slow day.”
“In your world,” she countered as it was barely six a.m. “Shower,” she declared, and took her coffee with her.
Next to coffee, real coffee, pulsing jets and raining showers of steaming hot water equaled the finest start to any morning. There were days she didn’t think twice about it – such things had become routine. And other days she remembered, with brutal clarity, the cold, the hunger, the dark spaces, the painfully bright ones.
She had a flash of the room in Dallas – red light from the sex club blinking, the frigid cold because the temperature gauge was broken, the hunger gnawing like a rat in her belly fighting with the avid fear her father would come back drunk, but not drunk enough, and hurt her again.
She’d been eight, with hunger, fear and pain her constant companions.
Why should she think of that now, on a good morning with hot water flooding all over her and the clean, faintly green scent of the shower gel rising up with the steam?
She’d dreamed, Eve realized. No, not her old nightmare, not that horrible night she’d killed Richard Troy as he’d raped her. But he’d been in there, somewhere.
Her first instinct was to dismiss it – she couldn’t claim to be over the years of trauma, but she’d learned how to cope with it, to put it in its place and move on. But dismissing it gave it – him – too much power, and might subvert whatever her subconscious had worked on while she slept.
So she let her mind drift, let her thoughts play back as she stepped from the shower into the drying tube. And while the warm air blew around her, she heard music.
The cello. He’d played the cello. A requiem, Dorian Kuper had called it as he sat, wearing black tie, teasing mournful notes out of the instrument with the bow and his skilled fingers.
A requiem for all.
She’d seen the faces of the dead, sitting quietly in the audience of what had been the opera house, all dripping, glittering chandeliers and gilt. With each of the dead spotlighted in icy-blue light.
See me. Stand for me.
So many of them, she’d thought. Those known victims, the others she believed had been.
And empty seats – for those yet to be known, or worse, those yet to come.
Too many empty seats, she thought as she stepped out of the warm air, took down the robe tidily hanging on its hook.
Richard Troy had walked onstage, grinning that wild grin, a conductor’s baton in his hand.
Let’s liven it up! Time for a happy tune. Killing pumps you up and puts a spring in your step. You should know that, little girl.
“Fuck you back to hell,” she muttered, and heard her dream voice echo the sentiment.
That made her smile, if a little fiercely. He couldn’t get to her anymore, couldn’t make her quake and shake.
But the dream, or the memory of it, told her nothing she didn’t already know. There were many, and there would be more.
She went back into the bedroom, noted Roarke had two covered dishes on the table.
It would be oatmeal – something else she’d resigned herself to.
When she walked over, sat beside him, he took her chin in his hand, turned her face to his for a kiss.
Another fine way to start the day. Even when oatmeal followed.
When he removed the warming lids, she saw she hadn’t been wrong. But he’d added a side of bacon, a bowl of fat berries, and another bowl of the crunchy, caramelly stuff. When you added the berries and the crunchy stuff to the oatmeal, had bacon, it all went down easy enough.
“Why does stuff like oatmeal that’s good for you have to be weird?”
“There are many among us who don’t consider oatmeal weird at all.”
“I bet there’s more of us who do,” she mumbled, and disguised it with the berries and crunch.
“It’s a fine way to start a snowy day.”
“Snow?” She looked up, looked toward the window into the gray and the white.
Not the thin spit of yesterday’s snow, she saw. But thick, fast white flakes.
“Shit.”
“It’s lovely from here, with breakfast on the table and the fire crackling.”
“Which would be great if we could sit right here until it stops.”
“Is there anything you can’t do here through the morning?”
She could probably work at home. Her equipment here – and the other equipment available to her – put what she had at Central to shame. But —
“I need Peabody,” she began.
“I can arrange transportation for her.”
He could, she thought, and would. And still but.
“I just got back from leave. My people need me around, as much as I can manage. And Trueheart takes his detective’s exam tomorrow. Baxter’s a wreck over it.”
“Being a wreck over his young aide speaks well of him. And don’t claim you didn’t fret about it when Peabody took hers.”
“I trained her. If she’d bombed it, I’d have kicked her ass.”
“How do you think our young Trueheart will do?”
“He’ll pass. If he doesn’t it means he’s not ready. It means he let nerves screw him up. A cop can’t let nerves screw him up, so that would be not ready. Unless he and Baxter catch a hot, I’m going to use them on my investigation
. It’s more hands and eyes, and it’ll keep them both busy and occupied.”
“You’re a good boss, Lieutenant.”
“The cops under me deserve one, so I need to be. If Trueheart makes it I’m going to request another uniform.”
“Anyone in mind?”
“A couple I’ll look into, if and when.” She felt the cat start to slink down the sofa like a snake when she picked up some bacon. “What’s on your plate today?”
“A number of meetings, reviews – much of which, lucky for me, I can handle from here via ’link or holograph. I’ll venture out later. I want to go by the youth shelter – work’s progressing very well there. And as I’ve also been away, I’ll want to spend time at my office.” He scooped up oatmeal happily enough. “I’m also a good boss.”
“Of legions.”
As the cat bellied over, eyes fixed on bacon, Roarke merely turned his head, raised an eyebrow. Galahad rolled onto his back, yawned hugely.
“Why does he think he’s going to get away with it?” Eve wondered. “He never does.”
“You can’t get the prize without reaching for it.”
Acknowledging the point, she reached for the prize of more coffee – and her communicator signaled.
“Hell.” She rose, went over to pick it up from the dresser. “Dallas.”
“Dispatch, Dallas, Lieutenant Eve. See the woman at 623 Bond, apartment 902. Whittiker, Kari has reported a possible missing person. Notification of possible missings flagged at your request.”
“Right. Who’s missing?”
“Campbell, Jayla, age twenty-four, mixed-race female. Last seen, 754 Carmine, apartment 615, at approximately twenty-four-thirty hours.”
“Acknowledged. I’ll take it. Dallas out.”
She frowned at the comm before setting it down again. “Probably nothing. Probably hooked up with somebody, but I had them flag any missings or possible missings over the age of sixteen. They’ve never gone for kids, that we know of.”
“Small blessings. Do you want me to go with you?”
“No point. I’ll take it solo, just meet up with Peabody at Central. The woman hasn’t been out of touch for even eight hours, so it’s probably nothing.”
“And yet.”
“And yet.” She headed for the closet. “If this turns out to be one of theirs, we’ve got a hell of a lot more time than anybody’s had before. That’s a start.”
She came out with a navy-blue crew neck sweater, brown trousers and a brown jacket. And frowned again when he gave her the Galahad/bacon raised eyebrow.
“What? What’s wrong with this stuff?”
“Keep the sweater and trousers.” He rose, plucked the jacket away from her, and strolled into the closet.
“Why can’t I get it right?” she demanded. “I think I do get it right, but you like to make me think I don’t get it right.”
“It’s not altogether wrong. There’s just a better choice.”
She yanked on a support tank, muttering about better choices, wriggled into underwear, and was hooking the trousers when he came out with a jacket – a brown one, damn it.
But one that had a subtle needle-stripe of navy. The boots were navy, too, with a wider brown stripe up the sides to the ankle.
She knew she’d never seen them before.
“Waterproof, insulated,” he told her. “Your feet will be happier.”
“How many pairs of boots do I have in there?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“You keep buying them, so you ought to know.” She tugged the sweater on, shoved at her hair when her head came out.
And he kissed her. “One of my small pleasures. Would you deny me?”
She took the boots, sat down. Felt the warmth, the solid support the minute her feet were inside. “Do you know how many pairs of boots I had before I met you?”
He only smiled as she rose, reached for her weapon harness – which told her he undoubtedly did.
“Two, and one pair didn’t really count as they were emergency use only because they were trashed. I still caught the bad guys.”
“You did. Now you get to catch them with more comfortable and stylish feet.”
She took the jacket from him, put it on and began to stow what she needed in various pockets. “You know I married you for sex and coffee, not boots.”
“Isn’t it nice, then, to have the bonus?”
This time she grabbed his face, kissed him. “Yeah. I’m going to grab a few things from the office here, then I’m in the field. See you tonight.”
“I’ll be here until about eleven, I’m thinking, if you’ve need of me. Meanwhile, take care of my cop.”
“Nearly top of my list,” she said and strode out.
“It’s not, no, not nearly top.” He glanced over, saw the cat had managed to take advantage of the distraction and snag the bit of bacon still on Eve’s plate. “And that’s why you continue to try, isn’t it? Now and again, you hoist the prize.”
Galahad ran his tongue over his whiskers, and belched.
By the time she got downstairs her coat lay draped over the newelpost with the Peabody scarf folded neatly over it, the Mr. Mira snowflake hat on that, and a fresh pair of gloves added to the mix.
She thought to stuff the hat in her pocket, thought of the thick snow, reconsidered. She’d just look at it like a good-luck charm, she decided. Until she managed to lose it like she lost every hat and every pair of gloves she’d ever owned. She wound the scarf on, and because dangling ends were – to her mind – an opponent’s opportunity to strangle in any hand-to-hand, tucked them inside the coat.
Pulling the gloves on, she walked out into the wall of snow where her car already sat running, heaters, she imagined, turned to blast.
Routine, she thought again. Such things had become routine. That didn’t mean she took them for granted.
She imagined Summerset had given a dry, ghoulish snicker as he set out the snowflake hat, and sniffed when he’d set out the surely doomed gloves. But he’d put them out.
“So thanks,” she muttered, and drove off in her warm, ugly car.
She sent Peabody a voice mail, letting her partner know she was checking out a possible missing persons, and to plan to report to Central as usual.
“Push on the potentials I copied you on,” she added. “Let’s get a sense of the vics, and the local cops on them. If anything rings on this possible I’m checking, I’ll bring you in.”
She could have Baxter and Trueheart start on the two she hadn’t reviewed thoroughly, she considered. But it could wait.
She worked her way down to NoHo, forced to drive defensively on every block. Because there were snow-phobic morons on every block, she concluded. Which included pedestrians in such a hurry to get out of the snow, they didn’t bother to look when they used the crosswalk.
Maxibuses inched along until she wanted to obliterate every last one of them – and she comforted herself that at least the weather held off the hyping ad blimps.
It took her twice as long as it should have to get to Bond, and the shock of finding a parking space nearly in front of the building almost caused her to lose it to a sneaky sedan.
She hit the sirens, shocked the sneaky sedan, and slid smoothly into the space.
The sedan, obviously pissed and suspicious, remained inches away. Eve stepped out of the car, thinking: Want to take me on, pal?
She opened her coat, flashing her weapon in its harness, held up her badge. Stared.
The sedan moved along.
Another nice note to the morning, she decided, and trudged through the snow to the entrance of the building with its nicely repointed brick, snow-covered steps and curly iron rail.
A solid building, she determined, carefully rehabbed, decent security with cams and palm plates.
She started to use her master, thought better of it, and pressed for 902.
The answer was quick enough to tell her whoever was on the other end had been standing close.
&n
bsp; “Yes.”
“Lieutenant Dallas, NYPSD. Ms. Whittiker.”
“Yes. Yes. I’m buzzing you in. Please come right up. I’m waiting. Come right up.”
Eve pushed in the door at the buzz, at the thunk of locks deactivating. The small lobby showed the same care as the exterior with clean fake wood floors and a pair of elevators with shiny black doors.
She took one to the ninth floor, pleased when it ran smooth and nearly soundlessly. Even as she stepped out, a door down the corridor opened.
The woman wore short, stylish dreds around a carved-in-ebony face. Huge brown eyes looked exhausted and worried as she gripped her hands together.
“Are you the police?”
Eve took out her badge. “Lieutenant Dallas. You’re Kari Whittiker?”
“Yes, come inside. They said, when I contacted the police, they said Jayla hadn’t been out of touch long enough to be considered missing. Even when I explained everything, they said to wait another day, to try contacting her ’link, other friends. Then they tagged me just a little while ago, and said somebody was coming.
“Did you find her? Is that why you’re here?”
“No. I’m just following up.”
“You’re a lieutenant.” Those tired, worried eyes sparked. “Lieutenants don’t just follow up. My father’s a Marine, so’s my brother. I know how rank works.”
“I’m following up as I’m checking into any reports of missing persons in connection with another case. Why don’t we sit down, and you can explain to me what you explained when you called this in?”
“What other case?”
Smart and sharp, Eve thought, which might be helpful. But right now she needed data. “Ms. Whittiker, asking me questions isn’t going to help locate your friend. Answering mine might.”
“Okay, you’re right. I’m sorry. I didn’t get any sleep.”
She gestured to a chair in a living area that said female without the frills. Warm colors, a multitude of pillows, soft throws, flowers and candles.
“When did you last see Ms. Campbell?” Eve asked.
“She went out about nine last night, with Mattio. Mattio Diaz. They were going to a party, I’m not sure where. In the West Village, I think.”