by J. D. Robb
“Yes,” Whitney agreed. “I expect she will.”
“I request permission, due to the evidence so far compiled, for EDD to install a tracer and recorder on her vehicle. It’s department issue, sir, and not her personal property.”
“So we slip around the need for a warrant.”
“Slip’s the word,” Webster put in. “She can give you grief on that at the end of the day. It’s questionable, and lawyers love questionable.”
“How about this? Her current vehicle experiences some mechanical problems. She has to requisition a replacement. When she accepts said replacement, she signs a waiver. Who reads those things? We cover it—carefully—and if she signs, she’s agreed to accept said vehicle as it comes to her.”
“That’ll work.”
“Feeney, who can you glad-hand in the vehicle pool to find out what gets earmarked for her?”
“I’ve got a couple guys. That’s not a problem.”
“Can you and McNab get to the vehicle, wire it up so it doesn’t show on a standard sweep?”
He tipped his head down, eyes narrowed on her. “I’m insulted you’d even ask.”
“Fine. Peabody, generate a standard vehicle waiver, and we’ll make a few amendments.”
“How are you going to decommission her vehicle?” Webster demanded. “Much less slip her the doctored form?”
“I’ll take care of it,” Eve told him, careful not to so much as glance at Roarke. “Feeney, just let me know, asap, when you nail down the vehicle—and you could use your geek magic to get me the exact location of her old one.”
He loved to watch her work like this, Roarke thought. How she laid it out, ran it through, timed it—even down to giving the nod for pie to relieve some of the tension in the room.
He looked at her board now, thought of how deliberately she’d added one name, one image at a time so each had its own specific impact. So each mattered as much as the next. Not one melded group of bad cops, but individuals.
Now, with the pie lending a less formal mood, she brought him into it. Clever girl.
“From the conversation between Renee and Garnet Peabody overheard, we know Garnet owns property—tropical, beachy. I’ve asked Roarke, as expert consultant, civilian, to try to locate that property. If Garnet owns a little tropical paradise and has gone to any lengths—perhaps illegal lengths—to conceal that ownership, it’ll help wrap him up. It may help flip him, if and when we need one of her crew to flip on her.”
“Not that I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Webster began, “but anything that scratches too deep at his financials, his assets—without the filter of a warranted search or IAB status, is going to alert him. Even with those, if he’s taken the precautions, he could catch wind of a sniff.”
“Which is why I’ll have to be very quiet about it,” Roarke returned.
“Listen, if you obtain any data by questionable means, the data becomes questionable when the lawyers start on it.”
“I’m aware of that.” Roarke angled his head. “I’m married to a cop. Would you like me to tell you how it might be done, Detective?”
“Go ahead.”
“One might, particularly as a businessman with many interests and investments in transportation, generate a kind of survey. And as an example, we might collect data on how many men, with a certain demographic, travel from New York to a tropical location more than three times a year—the same location. It might be worth our while to increase our transportation services to those locations, and offer incentives to that specific demographic.”
“Yeah.” Webster began to smile. “I could see it might.”
“As our services include private transports, and it always pays to offer perks to those who could afford them anyway, we’d look at those individuals, particularly if we found those individuals owned property. People who own multiple homes and can afford to travel to them regularly are excellent customers.”
“I bet they are. It’s a good angle. If you get a hit, let me know. I could work a filter from there, so you could take it down a few levels.” When Roarke lifted a brow, Webster nodded. “A filter sanctioned by IAB keeps it from edging into questionable.”
“Understood.”
“If that’s all for tonight, I’ve got to take off.” Webster pushed to his feet. “I’m meeting someone.”
“As pertains to this?” Eve demanded.
“No, as doesn’t pertain to this.” He shot Roarke a quick grin. “Thanks for the pie.”
“I’ll thank you, too.” Mira stepped up as Webster left. “I’ll have profiles on the other officers, get them to you tomorrow. I’d suggest you find a way to talk with members of the squad prior to Renee’s command there, get a sense from them.”
“It’s on my slate,” Eve told her.
When the room finally emptied of cops, Roarke leaned back on Eve’s desk. “Alone at last. And I suppose we’ll be leaving shortly so I can decommission Renee’s official vehicle.”
“I figured you’d enjoy it. A nostalgia thing.”
“It would be more enjoyably nostalgic if I stole it.”
She actually considered it for a moment. “No, it’s better to just take it out. But you need to do it so it looks like a regular—but severe—mechanical problem, not tampering. I don’t want her to be able to use it for, say, a week—and I want diagnostics to see it as a normal breakdown.”
“Well then, at least there’s a tiny challenge involved. I’ll need to change. While I do you can tell me how you plan to fix it so Renee signs your doctored waiver.”
“You should know when you need to run a con, you hire a grifter.”
10
VEHICULAR TAMPERING WASN’T SOMETHING she did every day, particularly with departmental approval. She wondered just how she’d write it up in her report.
Assigned expert consultant, civilian (former thief), to debilitate the official vehicle of a ranked NYPSD officer.
Probably not quite that way.
“She doesn’t deserve to be a ranked NYPSD officer,” Eve muttered.
Roarke glanced over as he drove. “You’re not actually feeling guilty about this?”
“Not guilty. Uncomfortable,” she decided. “It was my idea, and it’s a good step. It’s department property, so the commander can order or approve said step, and we have tacit IAB sanction with Webster’s attachment. But I’m still a cop deliberately and covertly disabling another cop’s ride. So I have to remind myself she doesn’t deserve to be a cop.”
“Whatever gets you through, darling. You might try to enjoy it, as I intend to.” He flashed her a grin, gave her a playful finger in the ribs. “Criminal activity does have its appeal. Otherwise there wouldn’t be so many criminals.”
“It’s not a criminal activity. It’s department sanctioned.”
“Pretend.”
She only rolled her eyes. “The building has—as you’d expect with a cop, and a dirty one at that—solid security. Underground parking for tenants is assigned—”
“Which you already told me, and is the reason I took a little walk through the records for said garage and identified her slot. Level two, slot twenty-three.”
“I’m just going over it.” Because, she admitted, it made it seem less criminal. “Visitor parking is limited to level three. Visitors have to clear garage security. The simplest way is to key in a name and corresponding apartment.”
He tipped her a glance, quick and full of humor. “No, there are simpler.”
“Which I have here,” she added, willfully ignoring him, “from your little walk-through. Apartment 1020, Francis and Willow Martin. There’ll be cams at the entrance to the garage, and on all levels.”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“They’ll document the vehicle and tag going in and out,” she continued. “But Renee will have no reason, if you do the job right, to suspect tampering and request a review of the discs.”
“I’ve often wondered what sort of partner in crime you’d make, should we have m
et back in the day. Now I see, sadly, it would never have worked. I fear, darling Eve, you’re much too tight-assed.”
“I take that as a compliment,” she said between her teeth.
“Which proves the point.”
“Listen, smart-ass, I don’t want to give her any reason to question the disabled ride, or to take too hard a look at the new one.”
“Trust me,” he said simply, and turned to the gated doors of the garage.
“Apartment 1020,” she reminded him.
He said, “Mmm-hmm,” even as the gates lifted.
“How the hell did you do that?”
“I could cite professional secret, but since I’m among friends, I activated a jammer just before I pulled up. It released the gate while it briefly disabled the cam. They’ll have a bit of a video snag—the cams flicking for a time. On the way down,” he continued as he snaked the downward curve. “Then when we’re done, on the way up.”
Slick, she thought. Pretty damn slick. But still. “I don’t know why that’s simpler than just keying in some data.”
“Well now, we don’t know Francis and Willow, do we? Whether they’ve got a visitors’ block up, or are off in Saint Maarten’s having manic sex on the beach.”
“I checked their data—I’m not an idiot. She’s an OB, and she has regular office hours tomorrow. They’re not in freaking Saint Maarten’s having any kind of sex.”
“More’s the pity for them. Maybe they’re out for the evening. Perhaps she’s delivering a baby as we speak, and taking advantage of her absence, Francis slipped out to visit his young, nubile mistress for a bit of that manic sex.”
He stopped the car, aimed his PPC out the window. “Point being, we don’t know what Francis and Willow are up to, so why risk it?”
“What are you doing?”
“Just a minute.”
She shifted in her seat. He’d tied his hair back—work mode—and was keying a series of numbers, letters—who could tell—into his handheld. He had a half smile on his face, but she knew those eyes. He was focused on whatever the hell he was doing.
“That should take care of it.”
“Of what?”
“For the next five minutes the cameras on this level will record the area as it is now—without us in it.” He drove on. “It’s not the Royal Museum, but still it would be awkward if a security man decided to check the garage and saw me fiddling with Renee’s vehicle.”
He pulled in longways behind it. “This won’t take long,” he told her as he got out.
Frowning, Eve shoved open the passenger door. She followed him around to the hood. She started to remind him the hood would be secured, but was glad she saved her breath. He had it open in seconds.
“How did you deactivate the alarm without—”
“Quiet.”
He took another of his little toys from his pocket, attached it to something under the hood with a thread-thin wire. He keyed in a command that had numbers and symbols flashing by in red on the miniscreen. He watched them, then paused the sequence. He keyed in another command, generated another series of codes.
Smiling, he held out the device. “Here, push ENTER.”
“Why?”
“Partners in crime.”
“Crap.” She pushed ENTER and distinctly heard several sharp electrical snaps.
“Nicely done. You’re a natural.”
“Bite me.”
“One of my favorite activities.” He entered yet another series, another command, then detached the device. Secured the hood.
“That’s it?”
“It is. I put the extra time blocking the cams in case you want to search the vehicle. Would you like me to get you in?”
She would. Oh boy, would she. “I didn’t get clearance for that.”
“Stickler—which is much the same as tight-ass.” He waited, watching her fight her internal battle.
“No. If I need to toss her ride, I’ll do the new one. With a warrant or at command directive. Let’s go.”
“That was fun.” Roarke got back behind the wheel, made the turn to curve up to the exit. “But vaguely unsatisfying.”
“What did you do to it?”
“Identified, copied, then countermanded the mainframe system code with an incompatible command issued by a diagnostic clone issuing feed directly into ...” He trailed off, smiling at her. “I do love it when you get glassy-eyed over tech. It’s not altogether dissimilar from when you come.”
“Oh, please.” Deliberately she darkened the look with a scowl.
“I’m the one privileged to look in those eyes of yours at such moments. Basically, I fried a number of chips, which will disable the starter. I issued a second command so when she get in, tries to start it, the action will set off a further reaction, and essentially completely bollocks the engine.”
“Okay. That’s good. Will it pass diagnostics?”
He sighed, long, deep, exaggerated. “I wonder why I tolerate such abuse and cynicism? Ah yes, it’s those glassy eyes. It’ll read like a starter defect, which, in turn, compromised the engine.”
“That’s perfect. Thanks.”
“My pleasure. On to our favorite grifter?”
“Yeah. They’re expecting us.”
Lieutenant Renee Oberman clipped into the squad room in a very bad mood.
“LT,” Detective Strong began, and received a furious shut-the-fuckup glare.
“Officer Heizer, contact Requisitions and tell them I want the damn paperwork on my vehicle asap.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And I don’t want to see that piece of crap they hauled out of my garage this morning again. If they replace it with a similar piece of crap, I’ll make their lives a living hell.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he repeated even as she stormed into her office. Renee pulled up short when she saw Eve in one of her visitor’s chairs.
“Lieutenant. Nice hours you have here in Illegals.”
“Don’t start on me.” Renee strode around to her desk, opened a bottom drawer, tossed her purse inside. “My vehicle rolled over and died this morning.”
“Sympathies,” Eve said with no sincerity whatsoever. “They are crap.”
“Now I’m dealing with those idiots in Requisitions and the Vehicle Pool.”
“Pain in the ass,” Eve agreed. “I’m here to give you a bigger one.”
“Look, Dallas, you put me in a corner regarding sensitive data and files generated with the use of my CI.”
“Your dead CI.”
“Dead or alive, that data remains sensitive. Several of those cases are either in trial or yet to come to trial. If the information’s compromised, those trials could be compromised.”
Eve’s face went stony. “Are you insinuating, Lieutenant, that I might apprise a defendant or said defendant’s legal rep of that data?”
“I’m not insinuating anything, I’m stating a fact. I don’t know how you run your division, who might now have access to that data. But you left me no choice. Now you’ve got it, and as far as I’m concerned, that’s the end of it.”
“You’d be wrong. To start, Keener’s COD was an overdose of FYU, sweetened with barely pushed Zeus. I’m wondering how a low-level chemi-head who dealt primarily in zoner managed that one.”
“I told you.” Renee spoke deliberately, as if to a child. “He used whatever he could get.”
“Yeah, and I’m wondering how he managed to get the high grade. I need to know who in your squad worked on anything involving FYU, who they busted on it, and so on. I’ll need those files.”
“That’s bullshit! Are you standing there, in my office, implying one of my people passed my weasel high-grade illegals?”
Perfect, Eve thought. Simply perfect. “I wasn’t implying that. Should I be? In fact, given my next order of business with you, that’s a very interesting angle.”
Renee slapped her hands on her desk. “Now you listen to me—”
“’Scuze.” A tiny woman with sho
e-black hair in hooking pigtails poked her head in. She snapped bright pink gum and gave the two lieutenants a bored look out of chocolate brown eyes. “Either of you LT Renee Oberman?” Brooklyn drenched her voice.
Renee gave the woman a quick sweep, from the pigtails, over the cheap white polo shirt, the baggy pants, the dull gray skids. “I’m Lieutenant Oberman.”
“Candy, Requisitions.” Candy’s ID badge bounced between enormous breasts as she walked to the desk.
“It’s about time.”
“Yeah, well, we get backed up, you know. Cops’re hard on their rides. Gotcha a spank-new Torrent. That’s an upgrade, as requested. Got your codes and whatnot here.”
Renee held out a hand. “Well?”
“Jeez, can’t hand ’em over till you sign. Whatcha think? We just pass out rides? Sign, date, initial both pages—that’s in dupe.” Candy laid the forms on the desk, tapped them with a bright—and chipped—pink fingernail. “Said you were in a big-ass hurry, so they sent me up. Nice office.”
“Just give me the codes,” Renee snapped as she dashed her signature on the forms.
“Don’t have to get huffy about it.” Candy passed her a sealed card. “You want to change the codes, you gotta notify—in trip—so’s we got it on record.”
“Fine. That’ll be all.”
“Nope. You gotta sign my screen here, verifying acceptance of the new vehicle and codes. You don’t verify, somebody could say I boosted the ride, turned it on the street.”
Renee snatched the little screen, scrawled her name on it with the attached stylus. “Get out.”
“Jeez.” Candy gathered the forms, sniffed. “You’re fucking welcome.”
“It’s hardly a wonder they’re so disorganized over there,” Renee said when Candy strolled out. “Hiring people like that.”
“You got your new ride, Oberman. Now if you’re all set, why don’t we continue this fascinating discussion with you telling me why two of your detectives were in my victim’s flop yesterday?”
“Excuse me?”
“No, I won’t excuse you. What I will do is file a formal complaint against you, your detectives, and this squad for interfering with and potentially compromising a homicide investigation.”