by J. D. Robb
“Was it a bump or a push?”
“Oh, I don’t know. A bump, I guess. So many people. In part of my head I was thinking it was so exciting. Being out, the crowds, the windows, the noise. We had the soy dogs, and the packages. We should’ve gone back. I know Bobby wanted to. But—”
“You didn’t. Did Bobby say anything? Did you see anything, before he fell?”
“No . . . I was fussing with my coat, looking down and thinking how I hoped it would come out. I think he held a hand out, like he was going to take the coffee so I could deal with the stain. Then he was falling. I—I grabbed for him,” she managed, as her voice began to break. “Then the horn, and the squealing. It was horrible.”
Her shoulders shook as she dropped her face in her hands. Peabody stepped up with a cup of water. Zana took a sip and a couple of shuddering breaths. “People stopped to help. Everyone says how New Yorkers are cold and kind of mean, but they’re not. People were nice, they were good. They tried to help. The police came up. The ones who came with us. Bobby was bleeding, and he wouldn’t wake up. The MTs came. Do you think they’ll let me see him soon?”
“I’ll check.” Peabody turned toward the door, stopped. “Do you want some coffee?”
“I don’t think I’ll ever drink another cup.” Zana dug in her pocket, pulled out a tissue. And buried her face in it.
Eve left her there, stepped out with Peabody.
“I didn’t get any more out of her either,” Peabody began. “She’s clueless about the fact that it may have been a deliberate attack.”
“We’ll see what Bobby says. The record?”
“Baxter was taking it to the lab personally and I got the homers off the coats.”
“Good thinking.”
“I’ve got his list of wits, and copies of statements taken on-scene. The cabbie’s holding at Central. His license is valid. Been hacking for six years. Few traffic bumps. Nothing major.”
“Head down there now. Get his initial statement, and his particulars for follow-up. Spring him. Write it up, copy to me, copy to Whitney.” Eve checked the time. “Shit. Nothing more to be done. I’m sticking here until I interview Bobby. Get it wrapped back at the house, then go home. Merry Christmas.”
“You sure? I can wait until you report in.”
“No point. If there’s anything, I’ll let you know. Finish packing, go to Scotland. Drink . . . what is it?”
“Wassail. I think it’s wassail, especially over there. Okay, thanks. But I’ll consider myself on call until the shuttle takes off tomorrow.
“Merry Christmas, Dallas.”
Maybe, she thought, and looked back toward the break room as Peabody walked away. But some people were going to have the crappiest of holidays.
She waited an hour while Bobby was tested, transferred, and set up in a room. When she walked in, he turned his head, tried to focus with glassy eyes that were rimmed with red. “Zana?” he said in a voice slurred with drugs.
“It’s Dallas. Zana’s fine. She’ll be here in a minute.”
“They said . . .” He licked his lips. “I got hit by a cab.”
“Yeah. So how’d that happen?”
“I dunno. It’s mixed up. I feel really weird.”
“It’s the meds. The doctor says you’re going to be fine. Got some broken bones, and took a good crack on the head. Concussion. You were waiting for the light. To cross the street.”
“Waiting for the light.” He closed his bruised eyes. “Packed in on the corner like, what is it, sardines. Lots of noise. Zana made a noise. Scared me.”
“What kind of noise?”
He looked up at her. “Like, ah . . .” He sucked in his breath. “Sorta. But she just spilled some coffee. Coffee and dogs and bags. Arms loaded. Gonna get a hat.”
“Stick with me here, Bobby,” she said as his eyes fluttered closed again. “What happened then?”
“I . . . she gave me that smile. I remember that smile—like, ‘Oops, look what I did now.’ And I dunno, I dunno. I heard her scream. I heard people yelling, and horns blasting. I hit something. They said it hit me, but I hit, and I don’t remember until I woke up here.”
“You slip?”
“Musta. All those people.”
“Did you see anyone? Did anyone say anything to you?”
“Can’t remember. Feel weird, out of myself.”
His skin was whiter than the sheets that covered him, so that the bruises and scrapes seemed to jump out—and slapped straight into her guilt.
Still, she pressed. “You’d been shopping. You bought a tree.”
“We had the tree. Cheer ourselves up some. What happened to the tree?” His eyes rolled, then refocused on her. “Is this really happening? Wish I was home. Just wish I was home. Where’s Zana?”
Useless now, Eve decided. She was wasting her time and his energy. “I’ll get her.”
Eve stepped out. Zana stood in the corridor, wringing her hands. “Can I go in? Please. I’m not going to upset him. I’ve got myself settled down. I just want to see him.”
“Yeah, go on in.”
Zana straightened her shoulders, put a smile on her face. Eve watched her go in, heard her say, in cheerful tones, “Why, just look at you! You got some way of getting out of buying me a hat.”
While she waited, she tried the lab. Bitched when she was informed she couldn’t have what she wanted until the twenty-sixth. Apparently Christmas overrode even her wrath.
She might not be able to make a dent there, but Central was another matter. From there, she ordered up uniforms in rotation to stick with Zana at the hotel, with Bobby at the hospital, twenty-four hours.
“Yes,” she snapped. “That includes Christmas.”
Irritated, she tagged Roarke. “I’m going to be late.”
“Aren’t you cheerful. What are you doing in the hospital?”
“It’s not me. Fill you in later. Things have just gone to shit, so I have to shovel it clear before I clock out.”
“I have a considerable amount to clear myself in order to take time off. Why don’t I meet you somewhere for dinner? Get back to me when you’ve made a path.”
“Yeah, okay. Maybe.” She glanced over as Zana came out. “Gotta go. Later.”
“He’s tired,” Zana said, “but he was joking with me. Said how he was off soy dogs for life. Thanks for staying. It helped to have somebody here I know.”
“I’ll take you back to the hotel.”
“Maybe I could stay with Bobby. I could sleep in the chair by his bed.”
“You’ll both do better if you’re rested. I’ll have a black-and-white bring you back in the morning.”
“I could take a cab.”
“Let’s take precautions now. Just to be on the safe side. I’ll put a cop back on the hotel.”
“Why?”
“Just a precaution.”
Zana’s hand shot out, gripped Eve’s arm. “You think somebody hurt Bobby? You think this was deliberate?”
Her voice rose several octaves on the question, and her fingers dug through to skin.
“There’s nothing to substantiate that. I’d just rather be cautious. You need to pick up anything for back at the hotel, we’ll get it on the way.”
“He slipped. He just slipped, that’s all,” Zana said definitively. “You’re just being cautious. You’re just taking care of us.”
“That’s right.”
“Could we see if they have a store, like a gift shop here? I could get Bobby some flowers. Maybe they even have a little tree. We bought one today, but I think it got smashed.”
“Sure, no problem.”
She fought back impatience, went downstairs, into the gift shop. Waited, wandered, while Zana appeared to agonize over the right flowers, and the display of scrawny tabletop trees.
Then there was the matter of a gift card, which meant more agonizing.
It took thirty minutes to accomplish what Eve figured she could have done in thirty seconds. But there was color
back in Zana’s cheeks as she was assured the flowers and tree would be delivered upstairs within the hour.
“He’ll like seeing them when he wakes up,” Zana said as they walked outside. With the wind biting, she buttoned her stained coat. “You don’t think the flowers are too fussy? Too female? It’s so hard to pick out flowers for a man.”
What the hell did she know about it? “He’ll like them.”
“Gosh, it’s cold. And it’s snowing again.” Zana paused to look up at the sky. “Maybe we’ll have a white Christmas. That’d be something. It hardly ever snows where we are in Texas, and if it does, it usually melts before you can blink. First time I saw snow, I didn’t know what to think. How about you?”
“It was a long time ago.” Outside the window in another nasty little hotel room. Chicago, maybe. “I don’t remember.”
“I remember making a snowball, and how cold it was on my hands.” Zana looked down at them, then tucked them in her pockets out of the chill. “And when you looked outside in the morning, if it had snowed at night, everything looked so white and clean.”
She waited by the car while Eve unlocked the doors. “You know how your stomach would get all tied up with excitement, because maybe there’d be no school that day?”
“Not really.”
“I’m just babbling, don’t mind me. Happens when I’m nervous. I guess you’re all ready for Christmas.”
“Mostly.” Eve maneuvered into traffic, resigned herself to small talk.
“Bobby wanted to have his mama’s memorial before the end of the year.” As if she couldn’t keep her hands still, Zana twisted the top button of her coat. “I don’t know if we can do that, now that he’s hurt. He thought—we thought—it’d be good to do it before. So we’d start off the new year without all that sorrow. Are we going to be able to go home soon?”
Couldn’t keep them, Eve thought. Could stall, but couldn’t reasonably demand they stay in New York once Bobby was cleared for travel. “We’ll see what the doctors say.”
“I don’t think we’ll ever come back here.” Zana looked out the side window. “Too much has happened. Too many bad memories. I guess I’ll probably never see you again either, after we go.”
She was silent a moment. “If you find out who killed Mama Tru, will Bobby have to come back?”
“I’d say that depends.”
Eve went into the hotel, up to the room to satisfy herself nothing had been disturbed. She asked for and received a copy of lobby security, posted her man, and escaped.
She went back to Central and found two gaily wrapped boxes on her desk. A glance at the cards told her they were from Peabody and McNab. One for her, one for Roarke.
Unable to drum up enough Christmas spirit to open hers, she set them aside to work. She wrote her report, read Peabody’s, and signed off on it.
For the next half hour, she sat in the relative quiet, studied her murder board, her notes, and let it all circle.
Before she left, she hung the prism Mira had given her.
Maybe it would help.
She left it shimmering dully against the dark window as she pulled out her ’link, tucked the presents under her arm, and left the office.
“I’m clear.”
“What are you hungry for?” Roarke asked her.
“That’s a loaded question.” She held up a hand, acknowledging Baxter, and stopped. “Let’s keep it simple.”
“Just as I thought. Sophia’s,” he told her, and rattled off an address. “Thirty minutes.”
“That’ll work. If you get there first, order a really, really big bottle of wine. Big. Pour me a tumbler full.”
“Should be an interesting evening. I’ll see you soon, Lieutenant.”
She pocketed her ’link, turned to Baxter.
“Don’t suppose I could tag along, share that really, really big bottle.”
“I’m not sharing.”
“In that case, can I have a minute? Private?”
“All right.” She walked back to her office, called for lights. “I’ll spring for coffee if you want it, but that’s my best offer.”
“I’ll take it.” He went to the AutoChef himself. He was still wearing his soft clothes, Eve noted. Light gray sweater, dark gray pants. He’d gotten some blood—Bobby’s blood, she imagined—on the pants.
“I don’t know what to think,” he told her. “Maybe I was too loose. Maybe I’m just fucking losing it. I’ve gone over it in my head. I wrote it up. I still don’t know.”
He took out the coffee, turned. “I let the kid take point. Not blaming him, it was my call. I sent him down for dogs, for Christ’s sake. Figured they were just getting theirs, and it put him in a decent position. And screw it, Dallas, I was hungry.”
She knew guilt when she saw it, and at the moment, it was like looking in a mirror. “You want me to ream you for it? I’ve got some left.”
“Maybe.” He scowled into the coffee, then downed some. “I’m listening to them, and there’s nothing. Just chatter. Can’t get a full visual, but he’s tall enough I can see the back of his head, his profile when he turns to her. I moved forward when she spilled the coffee, then I relaxed again. If they’re at noon, Trueheart’s at ten o’clock. I’m at three. Then she’s screaming in my ear.”
Eve sat on the edge of her desk. “No vibe?”
“None. Blimps are blasting overhead. One of those street-corner Santas ringing his damn bell. People are streaming by, or crowding in to get the light.”
He drank more coffee. “I pushed in, soon as she screamed. I didn’t see anybody take off. Bastard could’ve stood there. Could be one of the wits, far as I know. Or he could’ve just melted back. It was a freaking parade on Fifth today. And some people slipped, tumbled.”
Her head came up, lips pursed. “Before or after?”
“Before, during, after. Putting it back, I see this woman—red coat, big blonde ’do. She slips a little. Right in back of where Zana was standing. That’d be the initial bump. Spilled coffee. I can see the male sub turn. I hear him ask her what happened. Anxious. Then he relaxes when she says she got coffee on her coat. So do I. Then he pitches forward. Chaos ensues.”
“So maybe we’re both beating ourselves up because the guy lost his footing.”
“Coincidences are hooey.”
“Hooey.” At least she got a short laugh out of it. “Yeah, they are. So we’ll run the record backward and forward. He’s tucked up. Nobody’s getting near him. So’s she. We’ll run it when the damn lab stops playing Christmas carols. No point slapping ourselves, or me slapping you, until we know if this is the one in a million that actually is coincidence.”
“If I screwed this up, I need to know.”
She smiled thinly. “On that, Baxter, I can promise you. I’ll let you know.”
16
ROARKE WATCHED HER COME IN, HIS TALL, lanky cop in the rather spectacular black leather coat. Her eyes were tired, the stress showing in them even as he noted the way she scoped the room.
Cops were cops, he knew, 24/7. She’d be able to tell him, should he ask, how many were in the booth at the opposite corner, what they were wearing, possibly what they were eating. And she’d be able to do so with her back to them.
Fascinating.
She checked her coat, brushed off the waiter who must have offered to escort her to their table. And crossed the restaurant alone, in that long, loose stride he loved.
“Lieutenant,” he said, rising to greet her, “you make a picture.”
“A picture of what?”
“Confidence and authority. Very sexy.” He kissed her lightly, then gestured to the wine he’d poured when he’d seen her come in. “It’s not a tumbler, but you can consider it a bottomless glass.”
“Appreciate it.” She took a good slug. “Crappy day.”
“So I gathered. Why don’t we order, then you can tell me about it?”
She glanced up at the waiter who materialized at her side. “I want spaghetti and meatba
lls, with the red sauce. You got that here?”
“Of course, madam. And to start?”
She lifted her wine. “I’ve started.”
“Insalada mista,” Roarke told him. “Two. And I’ll have the chicken Parmesan.” He dipped some bread in the herbed oil already on the table, handed it to her. “Sop some of that wine up, why don’t you?”
She stuffed the bread in her mouth.
“Describe the waiter for me.”
“What? Why?”
“It’s entertaining. Go ahead.” And it would settle her down, he thought.
She shrugged, took another good swallow of wine. “Caucasian male, mid-thirties. Wearing black pants, white shirt, black loafer-style shoes. Five eight, a hundred and fifty. Brown and brown. Smooth complexion. Full bottom lip, long nose with a good-sized hook to it. Crooked eyetooth on the left. Straight, thick eyebrows. Bronx accent, but he’s working on losing it. Small stud, right earlobe—some kind of blue stone. Thick silver band, ring finger, left hand. Gay. He’s probably got a spouse.”
“Gay?”
“Yeah, he checked you out, not me. So?”
“So. As I said, entertaining. What went wrong today?”
“What didn’t?” she answered, and told him.
The salads arrived before she’d finished, so she stabbed at hers.
“So, that’s where I’m at. Can’t beat up Baxter or Trueheart, because—as far as I can see—they did the job. Wouldn’t have been a job if I hadn’t worked it.”
“Which means you beat up on yourself. What’s the point, Eve? If he was pushed, where does it come from? Where’s the gain?”
“You can go back to money. Trudy was pretty well set, and he’s doing okay. Or you go back to revenge. He was there, living in the house, her blood relation, when she was fostering.”
“He brought you food,” Roarke reminded her. “You wouldn’t have been the only one he’d done that for.”
“Probably not. But he didn’t stand up. Maybe somebody figures he should have.”
“Do you?”
She stabbed more salad, drank more wine. “No. Blood’s thicker, and so’s self-preservation. I don’t blame him for anything. But he was a kid when I was there, just another kid. He was older before she gave up fostering. Someone could figure he should pay, too.”