by J. D. Robb
“I don’t want a damn blocker.”
He came back with one, walked up to her as she yanked on her weapon harness. “Take it, or I’ll make you take it.”
“Look, step back or—”
He cupped his hand on the back of her neck. She braced for him to try to force the pill down her throat. In fact, she welcomed the attempt and the battle. Instead, his mouth came down on hers.
The hands she’d lifted to fight dropped to her sides as lips simply defeated her with tenderness.
“Damn it,” she said when his lips left hers to brush her cheek.
“You hardly slept.”
“I’m okay. I just want to close it down, get it done.”
“Take the blocker.”
“Nag, nag, nag.” But she took it, swallowed it. “I can’t leave it open. I can’t pretend I don’t know. I can’t just let her do murder and turn away.”
“No. You can’t, no.”
“And even if I could, even if I could find some way to live with it, if I let her go, I let Penny Soto go. How can I?”
“Eve.” He rubbed at the knots of tension in her shoulders. “You don’t have to explain yourself, not to me. Not to anyone, but especially not to me. I could turn away. I could do that. I could do that and find some way outside the law to make sure the other paid. You never could. There’s that shifting line between us. I don’t know if it makes either of us right, either of us wrong. It just makes us who we are.”
“I went outside the law. Asked you to go outside it with Robert Lowell. I did that to make sure he paid for the women he’d tortured and killed. I did that because I’d given Ariel my word he’d pay.”
“It’s not the same, and you know it.”
“I crossed the line.”
“The line shifts.” Now he gave those shoulders a quick, impatient shake. “If the law, if justice has no compassion, no fluidity, no humanity, how is it justice?”
“I couldn’t live with it. I couldn’t live with letting him take the easy way out, letting the law give him the easy way. So I shifted the line.”
“Was it justice, Eve?”
“It felt like it.”
“Then go.” He lifted her hands, kissed them. “Do your job.”
“Yeah.” She started toward the door, stopped, and turned back. “I dreamed about Marlena. I dreamed about her and Quinto Turner. They were both the way they were after they’d been killed.”
“Eve.”
“But . . . she said she’d take him, and she did. She said there was a special place for the innocents, and she’d take him there. Do you think there is? A place for innocents.”
“I do, actually. Yes.”
“I hope you’re right.”
She left him, went to her office to prepare for what had to be done.
When Peabody and McNab came in, she simply gestured toward the kitchen. There were twin hoots of joy as they scrambled for the treasure trove of her AutoChef. She stuck with coffee. The blocker had done the job—and maybe the conversation with Roarke had smoothed the rest, at least a little.
She cocked her eyebrows when Peabody and McNab came back in with heaping plates and steaming mugs.
“Do you think you’ve got enough to hold you off from starvation during the briefing?”
“Belgian waffles, with seasonal berries.” Peabody sat down, prepared to plow in. “This may hold me forever.”
“As long as your ears stay as open as your mouths.”
She began with Ortega, took them through her premise.
“At the end of the seven years, he’d stand to inherit, by spousal right, upward of six hundred and eighty-five million—not including personal property, and the profits from the real property and businesses over the seven.”
“That’s a lot of waffles,” McNab commented.
“Set for life,” Peabody agreed. “Well, if he’d lived.”
“His bed buddy didn’t want to split. She wanted it all. We’re going to prove that, nail her for accessory after the fact on Ortega and Flores, fraud, conspiracy to murder on Lino, and being a basic skank bitch. We’ll meet with the lawyer later today, and set up a little sting.”
“We lay down on her,” Peabody added, “and get her to flip on her co-conspirator.”
“Don’t need it. Screen on,” she ordered, and Juanita’s data flashed on. “Juanita Turner. Her son was a victim in the second bombing.”
“How did you . . .” Peabody paused, narrowed her eyes at the image. “She looks a little familiar. Did we interview her? Was she at the Ortiz funeral?”
“If she was, and I think it’s likely, she slipped in and out before the scene was secured. We saw her at the youth center. The medical.”
“That’s it! I didn’t get much of a look at her there. Her son?”
“And her husband, a year later—to the day—by self-termination.” Eve ran through it, flatly. “Penny needed a weapon,” Eve concluded. “And Juanita fit the bill.”
“Man, man, it had to be horrible for her to realize this guy she’d thought was . . . that he was the one responsible for her son’s death.”
“Yeah. It’s rough.” But it couldn’t influence the work. “I’ve contacted Reo,” Eve said, referring to the APA she preferred working with. “We’ve got enough, in her opinion, to get the communications. Which is where e-boy here comes in. I want you to dig in, dig out,” she told McNab as he gorged on waffles. “Anything that so much as sniffs like it’s connected. We’re picking up Juanita. While we have her in the box, you find us a communication with Penny. Find a memo, a journal, a receipt for the cyanide. Find something hard, and find it fast.”
Peabody swallowed waffles and berries. “We’re picking her up before Penny?”
“Penny orchestrated it. Juanita executed it. I’ve contacted Baxter. He and Trueheart are keeping a tail on Penny. Now, if you’ve finished stuffing yourselves, let’s get to work.”
Peabody said nothing as they walked downstairs. She got into the passenger seat, finally turned to Eve. “Maybe we get Penny on conspiracy, but it’s a stretch. It’s more likely we get accessory after the fact there. And that’s a maybe. She can claim she let it slip out about Lino, or felt guilty and spilled it to Juanita Turner.”
Peabody put a hand on her heart, widened her eyes. “I swear, your honor and members of the jury, I didn’t know she’d do murder. How could I know?” Dropping her hand, she shook her head. “Juanita’s going to get hit with first degree, no way around it unless Reo wants to deal it down, but Penny? She’s likely to slither out of it.”
“That’s not up to us.”
“It just seems wrong. Juanita loses her son, her husband. And now, all these years later, she gets used. And she’s the one who’s going to go down the hardest.”
“You play, you pay. She killed a guy, Peabody,” McNab said from the back. “If Dallas has this right, and it sure fits nice and tight, she did the premeditated—cold-blooded killed his ass.”
“I know that. But she was set up to do it. Jesus, you ought to see the crime scene photos from that bombing. There wasn’t much left of her kid.”
“Vic was a downtown bastard, that’s coming crystal. And I give you she took the hardest of the hard knocks. But, come on, that gives her the go to poison him?”
“I didn’t say that, you ass, I’m just saying—”
“Shut up and stop arguing,” Eve ordered.
“I’m just pointing out,” Peabody said in the gooey tones of reason that told any detractors they were stupid, “that Juanita took some really mean hits, and Penny—who probably was in on them—used that. And—”
“I’m just pointing out, hello, murderer.”
Peabody swung around to glare at McNab. “You’re such a jerk.”
“Bleeding heart.”
“Shut up!” Eve’s snapped order had them both zipping it. “You’re both right. So stop bickering like a couple of idiots. I got rid of one headache this morning. If you bring one back, I’m booting both of
you to the curb and finishing this myself.”
Peabody folded her arms, stuck her nose in the air. McNab slumped in the backseat. It was, in Eve’s mind, a sulkfest all the way over to the East Side.
21
EVE DOUBLE-PARKED IN FRONT OF THE YOUTH center, flipped on her On Duty light. The same group of kids shot hoops on the court, while adults hustled, dragged, and carried smaller ones into the building.
The daily life of kids was a strange one, she thought. You got hauled to various locations, dumped there, hauled out again at the end of the day. During the dump time, you formed your own little societies that might have little or nothing to do with your pecking order in your home life. So weren’t you constantly adjusting, readjusting, dealing with new rules, new authorities, more power, less?
No wonder kids were so weird.
“You wait for the warrant,” she told McNab. “Once we confirm Juanita’s here, or confirm her location, Peabody will relay that information. You can make your way to her apartment.”
“I don’t see how I can relay information when I’m supposed to shut up—and if I wasn’t supposed to, I still wouldn’t be speaking to him.”
“Do you really want to experience the thrill of having my boot so far up your ass it bruises your tonsils? Don’t even think about it,” Eve snapped at McNab when he snickered. “Detective Jerk, stand by. Detective Bleeding Heart, with me.”
She strode off. In seconds, Peabody clipped along beside her, insult in every step. “Be pissed later,” Eve advised. “There’s nothing about this that’s going to be pleasant or satisfying. So do the job now, and be pissed later.”
“I just think I ought to be able to express an opinion without being—”
Eve stopped, whirled. Fire kindled and flashed in her eyes as she scorched Peabody with them. “Do you think I’m looking forward to hauling in a woman who had to bury the torn and bloody pieces of her son that could be scraped up off the floor? That I’m rubbing my hands with glee at the prospect of putting her in the box and sweating a confession out of her for killing the man who I believe was responsible for that?”
“No.” Peabody’s shoulders drooped. “No, I don’t.”
The fire shut down, and Eve’s eyes went cop flat. “Personal opinion, feelings, sympathy—none have any place in this. This is the job, and we’re going to do it.”
Eve pulled open the door and stepped inside to the morning chaos. Crying babies, harassed parents, squealing kids milled around—including one who appeared to be making a break for it, at surprising speed on all fours.
Peabody scooped it up before it could make it to the door, then passed it to the man rushing after it.
Eve wound her way through, caught Magda’s attention. “Juanita Turner.”
“Oh, Nita’s riding herd on the earlies in the activity room. That way.” Magda signaled. “Through the double doors, up the stairs one level. Second door, left. It’s open.”
When Peabody started to pull out her communicator, Eve shook her head. “Not until we see her. In all this insanity, she could have walked out.”
Eve followed the direction, and the noise. The activities room held tables, chairs, shelves full of what she supposed were activities. Sunlight blasted through the windows to wash a space done in aggressively bright primary colors. Six kids sat at tables, drawing, doing puzzles, and talking at the top of their lungs at the same time.
Juanita walked among them, looking over shoulders, patting heads. The easy smile she wore dropped away when she saw Eve. If guilt had a face, Eve thought, Juanita Turner wore it.
Eve gestured, stepped just outside the doorway. “Tag McNab,” she mumbled to Peabody. “Step off aways.”
She waited until Juanita walked to the doorway. “Is there something I can help you with?”
“You’re going to need to have someone cover for you, Mrs. Turner.”
“Why would I do that?”
“You know why. You have to come with us now. We can do it quietly.” Eve glanced beyond Juanita to the half a dozen kids. “It would be better for you, for the kids, if we do this quietly.”
“I’m not leaving the children. I’m not—”
“Do you want those kids to see me take you out of here in restraints?” Eve waited two beats, watched it sink in. “You’re going to get someone to cover for you, Mrs. Turner, and I’m going to arrange for you to be taken down to Central. You’re going to wait there until I come to question you.”
The thin skin of outrage couldn’t cover the bones of fear. They poked through, raw and sharp. “I don’t see why I should go with you when I don’t know what this is about.”
“I’m going to have Penny Soto in custody by the end of the day, Mrs. Turner.” Eve nodded at the jolt of awareness. “You understand exactly what this is about. Now choose how you want it to go down.”
Juanita walked across the hall, spoke briefly to the young man inside. He looked puzzled, and mildly irritated, but crossed over into the activities room.
“I don’t have to say anything.” Juanita’s lips trembled on the words.
“No, you don’t.” Eve took her arm, led her down the stairs, led her out of the building. And waited until they were on the sidewalk, away from the kids still shooting hoops, before she read Juanita her rights.
At Central, she had Juanita taken to an interview room and split off to her own office. She had some arrangements to make. As she turned toward the bullpen, she spotted Joe Inez and his wife on the waiting bench. Joe rose.
“Ah, the guy said you were on your way, so . . .”
“Okay. You want to talk to me, Joe?”
“Yeah, I . . .” He glanced toward his wife who nodded, a kind of support gesture. “We need to talk about before. It’s about before, about what happened. The 2043 bombings.”
Eve held up a hand. “Why did you come in? Why are you here, on your own?”
“We talked.” His wife laid a hand on Joe’s arm. “After you came by, we talked, and Joe told me about it. We’re here to do what’s right. Me and Joe. Together.”
“You answer this one question.” Eve stepped closer so that her face was close to Joe’s. She kept her voice low, her eyes hard on his. “I haven’t read you your rights. You know what that means?”
“Yeah. But—”
“I want an answer to this before we go forward, before anything you tell me is on the record. Did you kill anyone, or have part in killing anyone?”
“No, Jesus, no, that’s—”
“Don’t say anything else. Don’t tell me anything. I’m going to have you taken to an interview room. You’re going to wait there until I make some arrangements.” She poked her head into the bullpen, snagged a uniform. “Take Mr. and Mrs. Inez to Interview B. Sit with them.” Eve turned back to them. “You’ve got nothing to say until I tell you to say it.”
She went straight to her office, contacted APA Cher Reo. “You need to get down here, but before you do, I need you to approve immunity for a witness.”
“Oh sure.” The pretty blonde waved a graceful hand. “Just let me get my special magic immunity wand.”
“I’ve got a wit, one who just came in voluntarily that may close out two cases that’ve been open for seventeen years and involved six deaths. The wit may give information that leads to an arrest in those matters.”
“What—”
Eve plowed right over her. “In addition, I’m about to close the St. Cristóbal’s homicide with two arrests. The wit was a minor at the time of the earlier incident, and would likely fall under the idiotic Clemency Order, or it could so be argued if there were charges brought. You do deals with scum to get bigger scum every day of the goddamn week, Reo. I’m talking family man here, one who comes off as doing a one-eighty on where his life was going. You authorize immunity, or I’m cutting him loose.”
“I can’t just—”
“Don’t tell me what you can’t. Make it work. Get back to me.” Eve clicked off, contacted Mira’s office. “I don’t
care what she’s doing,” Eve began when the ferocious admin answered. “I need to speak with her now. Put me through, or I’m coming down there.”
The screen went to hot, waiting blue.
Moments later, Mira came on. “Eve?”
“I need you in Observation,” Eve began, and explained. “Maybe I’m wrong,” she added. “You’ll know if I’m wrong.”
“I can be there in about twenty minutes.”
“I’ll wait for you.”
She made the last call to Feinburg, and set in motion the last of her plan. When Reo tagged her back, Eve grabbed the ’link.
“I’m on my way. Immunity isn’t out of the question, but I need more information.”
“The wit was approximately seventeen years old, and a member of the Soldados when the bombings in 2043 occurred.”
“Jesus, Dallas, if he was part of that—”
“I believe his part, if any, was minor, and after the fact. And that he can give us information on the major players. Later today, I’m going to be picking up the only one of them I believe is still alive, as part of the St. Cristóbal’s arrest. They could skate on this anyway, Reo, but what he gives me would be another nail for you to hammer.”
“The Clemency Order’s a murky area as it was revoked. If a suspect wasn’t arrested and charged during the time it was in place, and information after its repeal—”
“Don’t lawyer me, Reo. You’re going to give my wit immunity.” No, she couldn’t stop them all, Eve thought. She couldn’t save them all. But she could save some. “I’m not taking this guy down for it.”
“What’s the wit’s name?”
“It’s going to be Mr. X until you give me the damn immunity.”
“Goddamn it, what is he, your brother? All right, conditional immunity. If he did murder, Dallas, I’m not giving him a wash.”
“Good enough.”
“I’ll be there in five minutes.”
“Interview B. You may want to clear your slate for the rest of the day. It’s going to be a long one.”
She swung out, met up with Peabody, and went in to talk to Joe Inez.