by J. D. Robb
“You’re tossing us out on the street on Christmas Eve—Eve . . . Eve.” Baxter grinned. “Somebody had to say it.”
“It would be you. They split up, you split up. You stay in contact with each other, and with me. This is low risk, but I don’t want sloppy. They may be approached. It’s unlikely they’ll be harmed. Probability’s in the low twenties. Let’s take that down to zero and keep sharp.”
“Lieutenant?” As was his habit, Trueheart raised his hand. He wasn’t as green as he once was, Baxter was ripening him. But a little color rose up his throat over his uniform collar when Eve turned to him.
“If they are approached, do we move in to apprehend?”
“You observe, use your own judgment. I don’t want you giving chase and losing this guy on the street. You take him if you’re close enough to do so without risk. Otherwise, you follow, give me the coordinates. From all evidence, the victim was target specific. There’s little risk to the populace, so let’s keep it that way.”
She gestured to the board, and Trudy’s picture. “Still, he did that, so we’re dealing with someone who can and will kill if motivated. I want everybody home for Christmas.”
She held Peabody back when the others left. “I’m going to see Mira, run this by her and get her behind me on this warrant. I’ve got names of former fosters. The ones I was unable to reach are marked. See what you can do with them. But first, contact Carly Tween from that list. She wouldn’t talk to me. She’s eight months pregnant, scared, and cranky. Use your soft sell. If you can confirm her husband’s whereabouts for the murder, so much the better.”
“She got a father? Brothers?”
“Shit.” Eve rubbed her neck. “Can’t remember. Doubtful on the father as she was in foster, but check it out.”
“On that. Good luck with the warrant.”
To Eve’s shock and surprise, Mira’s admin didn’t throw herself bodily in front of the office door. Instead, she beeped through, got the okay, then gestured Eve in.
“Oh, Merry Christmas, Lieutenant, if I don’t see you before.”
“Ah, thanks. Same to you.”
She glanced back, still baffled, as the dragon at the gates began to hum “Jingle Bells.”
“You’d better do a head exam on your admin,” Eve said to Mira as she shut the door. “She’s suddenly perky and she’s out there singing.”
“The holidays do that to people. I told her to put you through at any time, unless I was in session. It’s important that I keep up, not just with the progress of your investigation, but with your emotional state.”
“I’m fine. I’m good. I just need—”
“Sit down, Eve.”
Because Mira turned to her AutoChef, Eve rolled her eyes behind Mira’s back. But she sat, dropping into one of the pretty blue scoop chairs. “I’m hitting snags and dead-ends on the investigation, so I’m pushing it open. I want to—”
“Have some tea.”
“I really don’t—”
“I know, but indulge me. I can tell you didn’t get much sleep. Are you having nightmares?”
“No. Not exactly. I worked late last night.” She took the tea—what choice did she have? “I dropped off for a few minutes. Had a weird dream. Nothing major.”
“Tell me anyway.”
She hadn’t come for a session, damn it. But she knew that arguing with Mira on her own turf was like beating your head against rock.
She described the dream, shrugged. “Weird, mostly. I didn’t feel threatened or out of control.”
“Even when the other women stampeded you?”
“No, that just pissed me off.”
“You saw yourself, as a child, through the glass.”
“Yeah. Having a sandwich. I think it was ham and cheese.”
“And, at the end of it, your father.”
“He’s always there. Can’t get around it. Look, I get it. Him on one side, her on the other. Me in the middle. Then and now. I’m squeezed on this, but it’s not a problem. For once, nobody’s trying to kill me.”
“Do you really feel that different—that distance from the others? The other women?”
“I feel different from most of the women I know. Never can figure out how I end up pals with them, when half the time they’re like another species. Okay, I understood where Maxie was coming from. I know why she felt the way she did, at least initially. Somebody who screwed with her is dead. I don’t feel the same way. Not like busting out the champagne. If I wanted everyone I disliked dead, the city’d be a bloodbath.
“I don’t blame her, but I don’t agree with her. Death isn’t an answer, it’s an end. And murder’s a crime. That makes Trudy, whether I liked her or not, mine. Whoever ended her has to pay for it.”
She hesitated a moment, then decided to finish it out, to close it off with what had just gone through her mind. “I wish I’d had the chance to say what I went there to say to her. To face her like that. More, I wish she were alive so I could help put her away for dogging those women all these years, exploiting them, taking their money and their peace of mind.”
“And you can’t.”
“No. Life’s full of disappointments.”
“Cheery thought,” Mira added.
“Here’s a cheerier one, then: She can’t take from me what I’ve got. I know that. She didn’t. She thought she could get under me, use me. She wouldn’t have. It helps knowing that. Part of what she couldn’t take was what I am. What I am is the cop who’s going to close this case. That’s it.”
“All right. What do you need from me?”
Eve told her of the plans to try for a warrant.
Mira sipped at her tea, and from the expression on her face, Eve knew she was far from convinced. “That’s a shaky line, Eve.”
“I’m freezing the accounts. Money’s cut off. Nobody can get to them in the hotel. Sooner or later I’ve got to spring them. So maybe he waits until I do, until they’re back in Texas. Maybe he goes after one of them there, when they’re not being protected. There’s no motive, at this point, to attack them. Approach, yes, but not attack. Not if money’s the root.”
“What else?”
“Payback, maybe. But I’m hitting dead ends there. The fact is, she could’ve—and probably did—piss off a lot of people we don’t know about. But Zana’s abduction points to money. So that’s our first stop.”
“I’ll back you on this since I agree the physical jeopardy is low. It could be argued that their emotional state is exacerbated by being kept in the hotel, under guard. Some return of normalcy could benefit them, while aiding your investigation.”
“That’s good enough. I’ll get on it.” She rose. “Peabody and McNab are heading for Scotland tomorrow.”
“Scotland? Oh, his family, of course. They must be excited.”
“Peabody’s running on nerves over it. His family and all that. If nothing breaks today, this is going to cool on me over the holiday. Right now, this is my best chance to keep it hot.”
“Then I wish you luck. And if I don’t see you, have a lovely Christmas. Both you and Roarke.”
“Yeah, thanks. I’ve got to take care of a couple things regarding that yet.”
“Ah, another last-minute shopper.”
“Not exactly.”
She started toward the door, then turned back and took another study. Mira wore a suit in a kind of rusty red today, and the shoes matched. Her necklace was short, thick gold with a lot of little stones sparkling in it. Multicolored, triangular shape. Her earrings were thick gold triangles.
“Something else?”
“Just a passing thought,” Eve began. “How much time and thought did it take for you to deck yourself out this morning?”
“Deck myself?” Mira looked down at herself.
“You know, to pick the outfit and the stuff, to fiddle with your hair and face. All that. So you’re all put together just so.”
“I’m not entirely sure that’s a compliment. Probably the best part of a
n hour. Why?”
“Just wondering.”
“Wait.” Mira held up a hand before Eve opened the door. “How long did it take you?”
“Me? I don’t know. Ten minutes?”
“Get out of my office,” Mira said with a laugh.
Eve gave the warrant a good, solid push. It took over an hour, a lot of tap dancing, but at the end she got what she wanted.
She was told to consider it a Christmas present.
Satisfied, she headed out to the bull pen. “Suit up,” she told Baxter. “Get your boy. I want you in position, at the hotel, in thirty.”
“It’s going to snow. Did you know it’s supposed to start snowing?”
“Wear boots, then.”
Ignoring his whine, she walked to Peabody’s desk, got a little brush-back. “I hear you, Carly.”
Peabody used an earpiece on privacy mode. “You’ve only got one thing to worry about now, and that’s your family. Having another beautiful, healthy baby boy. It’s a big help to us that you cooperated. Now I want you to put it out of your mind, and go enjoy the holidays.”
She listened for a moment, smiled. “Thanks. I’ll be in touch when we have more information. Merry Christmas to you and your family.”
Peabody pulled off the earpiece, then made a show of buffing her nails on her shirt. “I’m good.”
“Did you stop short of sending her a gift? Jesus. What’d you get?”
“Husband’s out of it. He was with her Saturday, in the hospital. She had false labor, and they were there several hours. I ran a secondary check on that while I had her on ’link. Pans out. No brother, no father. Only child. Jeez, Dallas, she had it rough.”
“Walk and talk. We’ve got a warrant coming through, and I want to head up, see what toys Feeney’s picked out for me.”
“Mother was a junkie. Used while she was pregnant, so Carly was born an addict. She got passed around, various relatives. Too much for them to handle, too much expense, too much trouble.”
They hopped on a glide, blissfully uncrowded as the holidays had everyone who could manage it copping time off.
“She’s dumped in the system. Her physical problems are dealt with, but she’s a hard placement. Scrawny, possible physical complications. Mother cleans up, supposedly—at least enough to get the courts to put the kid back in her care. Then she starts using again, turning tricks. Kid’s ten, and it’s a bad life. Mother gets popped again, but not before she uses the kid to sell a little kiddie porn on the ’net. Back in the system, and she ends up with Trudy.”
“Who made things worse.”
“I’ll say. Made her scrub in cold water every night. And other various torments. Kid squeals, but nobody’s buying. Not a mark on her. No outward signs of abuse, and it’s all put down to her prior difficulties. Until she tried to off herself. Slashed her own wrists with a kitchen knife.”
Eve paused long enough to breathe out. “Oh, hell.”
“Said it was Bobby who found her, called an ambulance. When she woke up in the hospital, they told her she’d attacked her foster mother. She swore that was a lie, but Trudy had superficial stab wounds on her forearms.”
“Bitch did it to herself.”
“I’m with that. But she’s back in the system again, and this time she stays in state schools until she’s of age.
“She turned her life around, Dallas, you gotta admire it. Scraped it together to go to college for a degree in Elementary Ed, snagged a couple scholarships. She settled out in Iowa, said she just wanted to put it away. Close that door. Met her husband five years ago, got married.”
“Then Trudy comes back.”
“Parents might not like the idea of someone with her background teaching their tots, that’s how Trudy put it. If she wanted to keep all that boxed up, it would cost. These aren’t wealthy people, but Carly was scared. They paid. When I told her we were going to try to get the money back, she cried.”
“How much did Trudy take her for?”
“Over the years, about a hundred and fifty thousand.”
There was an account Roarke had opened in her name when they’d married. She’d never touched it, had never intended to do so. But, she thought now, if the system didn’t do right by Carly Tween this time, she’d do it herself.
In EDD, Eve studied the homers Feeney offered. They were bigger than she’d wanted, almost thumb-sized.
“How am I supposed to get these on the subjects without them being aware?”
He gave her one of his morose scowls. “Hey, that’s your part of the show. You wanted audio. You settled for a simple beacon, I get you something not much bigger than a piece of lint.”
“I want audio. I’ll figure it out.”
“You’re welcome,” he muttered.
“Sorry, sorry. Jesus. You’re the god of electronics. Appreciate you doing this. I know you’re shorthanded.”
“Might as well be doing something.” He nodded toward his office door where the sounds of loud music, loud voices pressed.
“They’re having a party. A quick one. I gave them an hour to blow off the steam, do the Secret Santa crap. Anybody who’s not on an active’s not coming in next two days.”
“Cops know better than to figure crime takes holidays.”
“Yeah, yeah. I got some boys on call. I’m coming in a half-day, just to round things up. Wife’s making Christmas dinner, and you’d think she was cooking for the royal freaking family. Says we gotta dress for it.”
“What, you generally eat naked?”
“Dress, Dallas. Like formal or some shit.” His already droopy face sagged. “She got the damn idea from you.”
“Me? Me?” Insult, and a little fear, jumped into her voice. “Don’t hang your marital weirdness on me.”
“It was the party at your place did it. Everybody all duded up and sparkly. Now she wants us all to get fancy. I gotta wear a suit in my own house. At my own table.”
Because she felt guilty, Eve pulled her hands through her hair, and struggled to tug out an idea. “You could spill gravy on it right off.”
His eyes brightened. “I knew I kept you around for something. The wife’s gravy’s lethal, too. I spill that on the suit, it’ll practically eat through the lining. Hey, Merry freaking Christmas, kid.”
“Back atcha.”
She toted the homers out, and had to slap a hand to her cheek as a muscle twitched. Straight in her line of vision, Peabody and McNab were locked in a big, sloppy kiss, hips grinding together as they used the music as an excuse for vertical humping.
“Stop! Cease and desist, or I’m locking you both in separate cells for public lewdness.”
She kept walking. When Peabody caught up, she was huffing. Eve didn’t think it was the quick trot that had her breathing heavy.
“We were just—”
“Say nothing,” Eve warned. “Do not speak. We’re heading to the hotel. I’m going to get these wires planted, give the subjects the talk. You’re going to check out the banks on the list I’m going to give you. Show them Trudy’s picture. See if anyone remembers her coming in for a big bag of credits on Thursday or Friday.”
“Where do you want me after?”
“I’ll tag you, let you know.”
She dropped Peabody off, continued to the hotel. Spotting the security, she walked over.
“I’m pulling my uniform. At least I want it to look that way. Can I plug him into one of your security areas, give him access to the cam on the fifth floor?”
“We can do that.”
“I’m keeping the Lombards unapprised.”
“No problem. Just send him to me when you’re ready.”
“Thanks.” She moved to the elevator, going over the steps in her head as she rode up.
Once the uniform was given his orders, she knocked.
Bobby answered. “You’ve got news.”
“We’ve had some progress. Nothing much I can tell you at this point. All right if I come in?”
“Sure, sure.
Sorry. Zana’s in the shower. We slept in. Not much else to do.”
“I want to talk to you about that,” Eve began. “Why don’t you go in and tell Zana I’m here.”
“Oh. Okay. Be right back.”
“No rush.”
The minute he went into the bedroom, Eve hurried to the closet by the door. The tidy state of the suite told her these were people who put things in their place. She found their coats where she expected.
She took out the two homers, slid one under the collar of each coat, secured them, then engaged. There were two jackets as well, and she considered.
It was cold, she thought. They were from Texas. They’d wear the coats.
She glanced toward the bedroom doorway. “Feeney, if you read, beep my communicator.”
When the beep sounded, she closed the closet door, stepped away. Moments later, Bobby came out.
“She’ll be done in a minute.”
“I guess the two of you are getting antsy, stuck in here.”
“Maybe.” He smiled a little. “I can do some work from here. And I’ve been making arrangements. For my mother. Zana’s been a big help. I don’t know what I’d do without her, don’t know how I managed before she came along. Lousy Christmas for her. I thought maybe I could order a little tree. Or something.”
“I’m going to clear you to go out.”
“Out?” He looked toward the windows as if they were prison bars. “Really? You think it’s safe, after what happened?”
“I think the chances of you being approached or accosted, especially while you’re together, are pretty low. Basically, Bobby, I can’t keep the two of you holed up like this as material witnesses when you didn’t see anything in the first place. If you’ve thought of anything else, remembered anything, that might help.”
“I’ve gone over it and over it. Not doing a lot of sleeping since . . . since it happened. I don’t understand why my mother would’ve gone to you for money. She’s—she was—pretty well set. And I’m doing good. Good enough, and better now that we closed that big deal. Somebody must’ve pushed her to do it. But I don’t know who’d do that. I don’t know why.”