by J. D. Robb
Palma started to cry again, the tears running fat and steady down her cheeks. “It was all bruised and red and her eyes…I ran over and I called her name. I think I called her name and I tried to wake her up. Pull her up. She wasn’t sleeping. I knew she wasn’t sleeping, but I had to try to wake her up. My sister. Someone hurt my sister.”
“We’re going to take care of her now.” Eve thought of the time it would take for her, then the sweepers, to process the scene. “I’m going to need to talk to you again, in a little while, so I’m going to have you taken down to Central. You can wait there.”
“I don’t think I should leave Nat. I don’t know what to do, but I should stay with Nat.”
“You need to trust us with her now. Peabody.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
Eve glanced at the uniform who nodded toward a doorway.
Eve walked away from the weeping. Then, sealing up, walked into death.
2
IT WAS A GOOD-SIZED BEDROOM WITH A COZY little sitting area on the street side. She imagined Natalie had sat there to watch the world go by.
The bed looked female and fussy. Lots of pillows scattered around the room—some of them bloody now—that had likely been piled on the lacy pink-and-white spread, as some women loved to do.
There was a small wall screen angled to be seen from either bed or sitting area, framed pictures of flowers, a long dresser. There were bottles and whatnots on the floor—several broken—that had probably sat in some girlie arrangement on the dresser.
A couple of fluffy rugs graced the floor. Natalie was sprawled over one of them, legs twisted and bound at the ankles, her hands bound in front and clenched together as if in desperate prayer.
She wore pajamas, blue-and-white checked. They were spotted and streaked with blood. A robe, also blue, was tossed in a corner. The matching tie was wrapped around the woman’s throat.
Blood stained both fluffy rugs, and a splotch of vomit pooled near the door. The room reeked of both, and of urine.
Eve moved to the body, crouched to do the standard ID test and gauge for time of death.
“Victim is Caucasian female, age twenty-six, identified as Copperfield, Natalie, residing this location. Facial bruising indicates trauma perimortem. Nose looks broken. Two fingers of the right hand also appear broken. There are burns visible on the shoulder where the pajama top is torn. More burns on the bottoms of both feet. Skin has a blue-gray cast consistent with strangulation. Eyes are bloodshot and bulging. Wit touched the body upon discovery, some scene contamination. TOD, one forty-five A.M., approximately two hours before discovery.”
She shifted as Peabody started in. “Watch the puke,” she warned.
“Thanks. I’ve got two uniforms and a departmental counselor picking up the sister.”
“Good. Vic’s still wearing her pj’s. Sexual assault isn’t likely. Look here, around the mouth. See, was gagged at one time. Got some of the tape adhesive on her face. See the right pinky and ring fingers?”
“Ouch. Snapped them.”
“Broke her fingers, broke her nose. Burned her. Lot of damage to her things that could have been caused in a fight, or by the killer to make a point.”
Peabody crossed to a doorway. “Bath through here. No ’link in place by the bed, and one on the floor here.”
“What does that tell you?”
“It looks like the vic grabbed the ’link, made a run for the bathroom. Maybe hoping to lock herself in, call for help. She didn’t make it.”
“Looks like. Wakes up, hears somebody in the apartment. Probably figures it’s the sister. Maybe she calls out, or just starts to roll back over. Door opens. Not the sister. Grabs for the ’link, tries to run. Could be. New lock on the door—a good one, with a security peep. Maybe somebody’s been bothering her. Run her, see if she’s made any complaints in the last couple months.”
She rose, walked to the hall door. “Killer comes in this way, she’d see him from the bed. Smart to grab the ’link, sprint off in the opposite direction toward a room with a lock. Pretty smart—quick thinking, too, if you’ve just woken from a sound sleep.”
She moved back to the bed, walked around it, judging the distance toward the bath, and saw something glint just under the bed. She crouched down, then lifted a kitchen knife with her sealed fingers. “Now why would she have a carving knife in the bedroom?”
“Big-ass knife,” Peabody returned. “Killer’s?”
“Then why not use it? I bet it’s from her kitchen. New locks,” Eve continued, “and a knife by the bed. She was worried about someone.”
“No complaints on file. If she was worried, she didn’t report it.”
Eve searched the bed, under the mattress, shook the pillows. Then walked into the bath. Small, tidy, girlie again. Nothing to indicate the killer had been in it. But Eve pursed her lips when she went through the cabinet and found men’s deodorant, Beard-B-Gone, and men’s cologne.
“She had a guy,” Eve said, moving back in to riffle through the nightstand drawers. “Condoms here, edible body oil.”
“Bad breakup, maybe. New lock’s a given if you’d given an ex access prior to. Could be he didn’t like being dumped.”
“Could be,” Eve repeated. “That sort of deal usually includes sexual assault. Check her ’link for the incomings and outgoings last couple of days. I want to see the rest of the place.”
She stepped out, reexamined the living area. Bad breakup, she’d expect the ex to bang on the door awhile. Come on, Nat, goddamn it! Let me in. We gotta talk. Guy’s pissed enough, and the door’s flimsy enough, most likely kick it down. But you never knew. She went into the kitchen. Good-sized, and from the looks of it, a place the vic had used. A knife block, with one missing, sat on the spotless white counter.
She worked her way into the second bedroom, set up as a home office. Lifted her brows. The place had been thoroughly tossed. The data-and-communication center Eve imagined had sat on the glossy steel desk was missing.
“No d-and-c unit in the office,” she told Peabody.
“What kind of office is that?”
“Exactly. Not a single disc in there, either. As other electronics, just as easily lifted and hocked, are still on-scene, the comp was the target. The comp and the vic. So what did Natalie have that someone else wanted?”
“Not only enough to kill her, but to make sure she hurt first.” Pity edged Peabody’s voice as she glanced back toward the body. “Nothing on this ’link but the call from the sister, ten this morning, and a call out, at seven-thirty A.M., to Sloan, Myers, and Kraus. She called in sick. It’s an accounting firm, offices on Hudson. Entries prior to this—actually yesterday morning—were deleted. EDD can dig them out. You want to listen to what there is?”
“Yeah, but let’s take them in. I want a run at the sister again.”
On the way to Central, Peabody read off background data on the victim from her PPC. “Born, Cleveland, Ohio. Parents—both teachers—still married. One sib—the sister, three years younger. No criminal. Accountant with Sloan, Myers, and Kraus the past four years. No marriages, no cohabs on record. Resided the Jane Street address past eighteen months. Previously on Sixteenth in Chelsea. Previous to that was Cleveland, parents’ addy. She worked for an accounting firm there, part-time. Looks like a kind of internship while she was in college.”
“Numbers cruncher, moves to New York. What’s the lowdown on the firm here?”
“Hold on. Okay, big-deal firm,” Peabody began, reading the data from her PPC. “High-dollar clients, several corporations. Three floors at the Hudson Street addy, employing about two hundred. Been around for over forty years. Oh, the vic was a senior account exec.”
Eve chewed on it as she angled into the underground parking at Cop Central. “Guess she could get the skinny on some of those high-dollar clients. If somebody was running a second book, laundering. Tax evasion. Mobbed up. Another employee skimming. Blackmail, extortion, embezzlement.”
“Firm
’s got a good rep.”
“Doesn’t mean all their clients or employees do. It’s an angle.”
They parked, headed toward the elevators. “We need the name of the boyfriend—past or present. Do the knock-on-doors at her building. See what she may have mentioned to her sister about work, or personal troubles. Way it looks, the vic was expecting or prepared for a problem—and one she didn’t want to report, or hadn’t decided to report. To the cops, anyway.”
“Maybe to a coworker, though, or a superior, if it was work-related.”
“Or a pal.”
The higher they rose in the elevator, the more people jammed on. Eve could smell minty soap from someone coming on tour, and old sweat from someone going off a long one. She muscled her way off on her level.
“Let’s set up an interview room,” Eve began. “I don’t want to talk to her in the lounge. Too many distractions. She needs the grief counselor, she can have him with her.”
Eve swung through the bull pen, and on into her office first. Ditched her coat, then did a check on the witness’s alibi. Palma Copperfield had worked the shuttle in from Las Vegas, and had been touching down in the downtown flight center just about the time her sister was strangled.
“Dallas.”
Eve glanced over at Baxter, one of the detectives in her squad. “I haven’t had coffee in two hours,” she warned. “Or maybe three.”
“I heard you had a Palma Copperfield up in the crib.”
“Yeah, witness. Sister was strangled early this morning.”
“Ah, shit.” He scooped a hand back through his hair. “I was hoping I got it wrong.”
“You know them?”
“Palma, a little. Not the vic. Met Palma a few months back—friend of a friend of a friend—at a party. We went out a couple times.”
“She’s twenty-three.”
He scowled. “I’m not filing for frigging retirement any time soon. Anyway, it was nothing major. Nice woman. A real nice woman. Was she hurt?”
“No. Found her sister dead in the sister’s apartment.”
“Rough. Damn it. They were tight, I think. Palma said how she stayed with her sister when she came to New York. I dropped her off at the building—Jane Street—after we had dinner once.”
“You still involved?”
“No—we weren’t. Went out a couple of times, that’s all.” As if he didn’t know quite what to do with them, Baxter slid his hands into his pockets. “Listen, if a familiar face would help, I can talk to her.”
“Maybe. Yeah, maybe. Peabody’s setting up an interview room. Lounge is too public for this. She was in bad shape when I took her initial statement. She mention if her sister was involved with anyone?”
“Ah, yeah. Had a guy—money manager, broker, something like that. Serious, I think, maybe engaged. Can’t say that I paid much attention to that. I wasn’t after the sister, you know?”
“You catch the wit, Baxter?”
“Nah.” He smiled a little. “Like I said, she’s a nice woman.”
Which translated to they hadn’t slept together, and made it less sticky to have him in on the interview. “Okay, let me get Peabody working the ’link. We’ll take the wit.”
Eve let Baxter walk into Interview ahead of her, studied Palma’s tear-splotched face when the woman looked over. She blinked a few times as if trying to process new information, then a series of emotions streaked over her face. Recognition, relief, dismay, and finally the grief settled on it again.
“Bax. Oh, God.” She held out both her hands, so when he crossed to the table, he took them in his.
“Palma, I’m so sorry.”
“I don’t know what to do. Nat. My sister, somebody killed her. I don’t know what to do.”
“We’re going to help you.”
“She never hurt anybody. Bax, she never hurt anybody in her whole life. Her face…”
“This is hard. The hardest thing. But you can help us help her.”
“Okay. Okay, but you can stay, right? He can stay?” she asked Eve.
“Sure. What I’m going to do is turn the recorder on, and ask you some questions.”
“You don’t think that I…You don’t think that I hurt her?”
“Nobody thinks that, Palma.” Baxter gave her hand a quick squeeze. “We have to ask questions. The more we know, the faster we can find the person who did this.”
“You’re going to find them.” She said it slowly, as if that, too, had to process. Then she closed her eyes for a moment. “You’ll find them. I’ll tell you everything I can.”
Eve engaged the recorder, read in the necessary data. “You landed in New York early this morning, is that correct?”
“Yes, on the Vegas run. We got in around two, clocked out, I don’t know, about twenty minutes later maybe. That’s about right. Then Mae—she had the run with me—we stopped at the bar in the airport for a glass of wine. Unwind a little. We shared a cab into the city. I dropped her first. She keeps a place with a couple other attendants, over on the East Side. Then I went on to Nat’s.”
She stopped, took a breath, then a sip from the plastic cup of water on the table. “I paid off the cab, and started in. Had my key out, and I know Nat’s code. But the lock was broken. It happens sometimes, so I didn’t think that much about it. Not then. But when I got to her apartment, her lock—she told me she’d put in a new lock—that was broken, too. I had this little jump in my belly. But I thought, I don’t know, I told myself she hadn’t gotten the lock installed right.”
“Did you notice anything off when you went inside—the living area’s first,” Eve said.
“I didn’t really pay attention. I put the security chain on—she’d have left that off for me. And I left my overnight bag there by the door because I thought I’d just peek in, make sure everything was okay. But it wasn’t.”
Tears trembled, spilled again, but she kept going. “She was on the floor, and there was blood, and the room was—it was like there’d been a fight. Broken glass from her perfume bottles and the little bowls she liked to collect. She was on the floor. The pink rugs. I was with her when she bought them. They were soft, like a cat. She couldn’t have pets. The rugs were soft. I’m sorry.”
“You’re doing fine,” Baxter told her. “You’re doing just fine.”
“I ran. I think—it’s all blurry. Did I scream? I think I screamed her name and I ran and I tried to lift her up, to shake her awake, even though I knew…I didn’t want her to be dead. Her face was bruised and bloody, and her eyes. I knew she was dead. There was tape around her hands.”
As if she’d just remembered, she sent Eve a shocked look. “Oh, God, her hands, her ankles. They were taped.” Palma pressed a trembling hand to her mouth. “I needed to call for help, but I got sick before I could get out, get my ’link out of my bag, I got sick. Then I ran out. I couldn’t stay in there, so I ran out and called nine-one-one, and I sat down on the steps. I should’ve gone back in, stayed with her. I shouldn’t have left her alone like that.”
“You did exactly the right thing.” Baxter picked up the water cup, handed it to her again. “Exactly the right thing.”
“Did she tell you anyone was bothering her?” Eve asked.
“No, but something was bothering her. I could tell. She looked upset when I talked to her earlier, but when I asked what was wrong, she said it was nothing to worry about. She just had a lot on her mind.”
“She was seeing someone? A man?”
“Bick! Oh, my God, Bick. I didn’t even think of him.” Eyes flooded again; she pressed both hands to her mouth. “They’re engaged. They’re going to be married next May. Oh, my God, I have to tell him.”
“What’s his full name?”
“Bick, Bick Byson. They work together—well, for the same company. Different departments. Nat’s a senior account executive at Sloan, Myers, and Kraus—accounting. Bick’s a money manager there. They’ve been together almost two years now. How can I tell him?”
“It
’d be better if we did that.”
“And my parents.” She began to rock, back and forth, back and forth. “I have to tell them. I don’t want to do it over the ’link. Do I have to stay here? I need to go home, to Cleveland, and tell them Nat’s gone. Nat.”
“We can talk about that after we’re done here,” Eve told her. “Were your sister and her fiancé having any problems?”
“No. I don’t know of any. They’re crazy about each other. I guess I thought maybe they’d had a fight and that’s why she was upset earlier. All the wedding plans, you get stressed out. But they’re really happy together. They’re great together.”
“Did she have an engagement ring?”
“No.” Palma took another long breath. “They decided against one—saving their money. Bick’s great, but he’s pretty frugal. Nat didn’t mind. Well, Nat’s the same way, you know? Save it for a rainy day.”
“He didn’t live with her? Save money paying rent.”
“She wouldn’t let him.” For the first time Palma smiled again, and Eve could see how Baxter had been attracted. “She said they were going to wait for that until they were married. We’re pretty old-fashioned in my family. I think my parents like to believe Nat wasn’t even having sex with Bick. They loved each other,” she murmured. “They were good together.”
“Were there any problems at work?”
“She never said. I haven’t seen her for about three weeks. I had a chance to take the New L.A. to Hawaii run for ten days, then I took a vacation out there with a couple of girlfriends. I’d just gotten back on the Vegas to New York run. I talked to her a couple of times, but…We were going to catch up, go shopping, go over wedding plans. She never said anything about a problem, work or otherwise, but I know something was wrong. I just wasn’t paying enough attention.”