by J. D. Robb
“Last night was the first time you’d actually seen Branson in person. He never came down to the workroom, never called you up to discuss the projects?”
“No, he never came down.”
Eve sat back. She was willing to bet Zeke had yet to meet B. Donald Branson in the flesh. “That’s all I need for now. Zeke, you’re going to have to stay here, in Central.”
“In a cell?”
“No. But you have to stay here.”
“Can I see Clarissa?”
“We’ll talk about that later.” Eve rose. “The uniform will take you up to the recreation area. There’s a sleeping bin off the side. I think you should tranq up and use it.”
“I don’t use tranqs.”
“Me, either.” She softened enough to smile at him. “Use the bin anyway. Get some rest.”
“Zeke.” There was so much Peabody wanted to say, wanted to do, but she held it in and looked at him soberly. “You can trust Dallas.”
“I’ll be up in a minute.” Mira patted his arm. “We’ll use meditation.” She waited until the uniform came to take him out. “My testing is complete enough for me to give you an evaluation.”
“I don’t need it.” Eve cut her off. “It’s for the record, not for me. He’s not going to be charged.”
Mira relaxed fractionally. In the last two hours, Zeke had slipped past her professional veneer. “He’s suffering. The idea that he took a life, however accidentally—”
“It wasn’t an accident,” Eve corrected. “It was a setup. If I’m on target, B. Donald Branson’s very much alive, and most likely with his wife. I can’t get into the details, I don’t have time,” she continued. “You looked at Clarissa’s statement, you viewed the recording.”
“Yes. It’s a classic case of abuse and shattered self-esteem.”
“Classic,” Eve agreed with a nod. “Like textbook. Like line for line out of a case study. She didn’t miss a trick, did she?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“No friends, no family support. Delicate, helpless woman dominated by an older, stronger man. He drinks, he beats her. He rapes her. She sticks. ‘Where will I go, what will I do?” ’
Mira folded her hands. “I realize you would find her inability to change her situation a sign of weakness, but it isn’t at all atypical.”
“No, it’s dead typical. And I’m saying that’s just how she played it. Played Zeke, played me, and would have played you. I think you’d have caught on, and she probably figured the same. That’s why she’s gone. And when we check Branson’s financials, I guarantee the money’s gone, too.”
“What possible reason would the Bransons have to fake his death?”
“The same reason they arranged his brother’s. Money. The same reason they timed it to pull part of the team away from the central theme. More money, with a little payback thrown in. We’ll tie them to Apollo. Sooner or later, something’ll click. Take care of Zeke. If I’m right, we’ll be able to tell him he didn’t kill anyone. Let’s move, Peabody.”
“I can’t keep up,” Peabody told her. “I can’t get it straight in my head.”
“You will, when we get the rest of the pieces. Check those financials.”
Peabody scrambled to keep pace as they worked their way down to the garage. “Jesus, Branson transferred fifty million—that’s most of the fluid cash in the business—to an off-planet, coded account. He did it last night, two hours before Zeke . . .”
“Check their personal accounts.”
Working one-handed, Peabody slid into the car. “Six personals, between twenty and forty apiece. He cleaned them out yesterday.”
“A nice little nest egg for Cassandra.” As she drove, Eve contacted Feeney on her communicator.
“Voiceprints match,” he told her. “Now how are we going to arrest a dead guy?”
“I’m working on it. Take a run by Branson T and T; take a look at the droids in development. Did we get the order for tapping Monica Rowan’s lines?”
“They’re tapped. Not a peep so far.”
“Keep me up.” She ended transmission. “Peabody, contact the locals up in Maine, get a black and white to do a runby. I want Monica under wraps.”
Lisbeth wasn’t pleased to see cops at her door. She stared through Eve and ignored Peabody. “I have nothing to say to you. My counsel has advised—”
“Save it.” Eve pushed her way in.
“This is harassment. One call to my lawyer, and I’ll have your badge.”
“How tight were the Branson boys, Lisbeth?”
“Excuse me?”
“J. C. must have talked to you about his brother. What did they think of each other?”
“They were brothers.” Lisbeth shrugged. “They ran a business together. They had their ups and downs.”
“Did they fight?”
“J. C. didn’t fight with anyone, really.” Something like grief flickered in her eyes and was quickly shut down. “They disagreed occasionally.”
“Who ran the show?”
“B. D. ran the show.” Lisbeth waved a hand. “J. Clarence was better with people, and creatively he enjoyed having input in new projects. It didn’t bother him that B. D. held the reins.”
“What was his relationship with Clarissa?”
“He liked her, of course. She’s a charming woman. I think she intimidated him somewhat. She’s very formal and aloof for all that air of fragility.”
“Really, but you were friends?”
“Friendly. After all, we were both involved with a Branson. We socialized, with and without them.”
“Did she ever tell you B. D. mistreated her?”
“Mistreated?” Lisbeth let out a short laugh. “The man fawned on her. All she had to do was bat her eyes and purr and he jumped.”
Eve glanced toward the wall screen, noted it was turned off. “Not watching the news these days?”
“No.” She turned her head and for a moment looked tired and strained. “I’m making arrangements to clean up some personal matters before I transfer to the rehabilitation center.”
“Then you wouldn’t have heard that B. Donald Branson was killed last night.”
“What?”
“He fell during a struggle when he was beating his wife.”
“That’s ridiculous. That’s absurd. He wouldn’t lay a hand on Clarissa. He worships her.”
“Clarissa claims he’s been abusing her physically for years.”
“Then she’s a liar,” Lisbeth snapped out. “He treated her like a princess, and if she says otherwise, she’s lying through her teeth.”
She stopped abruptly, went very pale.
“You didn’t find the photographs in your mail slot, did you, Lisbeth? You had them handed to you by someone you trusted—someone you thought cared about J. C.”
“I—I found them.”
“No point in lying to protect the Bransons. He’s dead, and she’s gone. Who gave you the photographs of J. C., Lisbeth? Who gave them to you and told you that he was cheating on you?”
“I saw the pictures. I saw them with my own eyes. He was with that blond bitch.”
“Who gave them to you?”
“Clarissa.” She blinked once, twice, and tears started to stream. “She brought them to me, and she was crying. She said how sorry she was, how sorry. She begged me not to tell anyone she’d given them to me.”
“How did she get them?”
“I never asked. I just looked at them, and I went crazy. She told me it had been going on for months, and she couldn’t pretend not to know any longer. She couldn’t stand to see me hurt and J. C. ruin his life over some cheap lay. She knew how jealous I was, she knew. When I got to his house, he denied it. He told me I was crazy, there wasn’t any blonde. But I’d seen! And the next thing I knew, I was picking up that drill. Oh my God, oh my God. J. C.”
She collapsed into the chair, wailing.
“Get her a tranq, Peabody.” Eve’s voice held no sympathy. “We
’ll have a car come by and pick her up. When she’s pulled it together, McNab can take a statement.”
“I know we’re pressed for time.” Peabody jumped in the car again. “But I feel like I’m three steps behind.”
“Branson’s connected to Cassandra. Clarissa’s connected to Branson, Zeke’s connected to Clarissa. We’re led to believe that both the Branson brothers meet with untimely and violent ends within a week of each other. Meanwhile, the accounts are stripped. Zeke’s brought in from clear across the country to work at the Branson house, and within a couple of days, he’s tangled with Branson over Clarissa and supposedly killed him. But Clarissa, out of her fear and concern for Zeke, loses the body.
“That’s the part that hung me up all along, but a guy tells you he kills another guy, you generally go with it. Still we’ve got no body, and there’s nothing on the droid playback to indicate he was instructed to weigh it down. The search team’s sensors don’t pick another up, it doesn’t bob up and float, but we know it got tossed in the river.”
“Droids don’t float, and the sensors are looking for flesh, blood, and bone.”
“See, you’re catching up. Now, we connect those dots. Zeke killed himself a droid. We have Lisbeth’s statement that there were never any beatings, no rapes, and odds are she’d have known if there were. Through J. C., if not on her own. We have the coincidence that Zeke just happened to be in the right place at the right time to hear beatings and rapes, then Clarissa turns to him for help. She’s already scoped him; she knows the kind of man he is, and very likely made the subtle kind of play for him he wouldn’t see as a come-on.”
“He doesn’t understand women,” Peabody murmured. “He’s practically still a kid.”
“He wouldn’t understand this one if he’d hit the century mark. She trolled for him and reeled him in. She and Branson got rid of the brother, which leads me to believe he wasn’t involved in Cassandra. He was weight, so they ditched him. I’m primary on the case, and they don’t want me looking too hard, having just the kind of talk with Lisbeth I just finished having, so they tag me on the bombings. Blowing up the city’s going to pull my attention away from a plea bargain I know I can’t change.”
“Whoever had pulled J. C. Branson’s homicide would have been tagged? They moved to you because of that?” Peabody considered. “That was their big mistake.”
“That was excellent sucking up, Peabody. Smooth, subtle.”
“I’ve been practicing.”
“The politics are more smoke—pull the attention away, waste our time. It’s the money they’re after and the sheer delight in destroying.”
“But they have money.”
“More’s better, especially if you grew up on the run, hiding out, maybe scraping for the good life. What do you want to bet Clarissa Branson spent her formative years in Apollo?”
“That’s a big leap, Lieutenant.”
“ ‘We are loyal,” ’ Eve quoted as she zipped through the security gate to the parking area under Roarke’s midtown offices.
Peabody gawked a little when they moved into the private elevator, but before she could comment, Eve’s ’link beeped.
“Lieutenant Dallas? Captain Sully, Boston PD. The patrols just reported in from the Rowan address. Monica Rowan has been the victim of what appears to be a bungled B and E. She’s dead.”
“Damn it. I’ll need a full report on that, priority level, Captain.”
“I’ll get you as much as I can as quick as I can. Sorry we can’t be of more help.”
“So am I,” Eve murmured as she ended the call. “Goddamn it, I should’ve put a wall around her.”
“How could you know?”
“I do know. Just a little too late.” She strode out of the elevator, moved past Roarke’s efficient assistant without stopping.
Efficiency prevailed, however. Roarke was opening the door for her himself when Eve got there.
“Lieutenant, I didn’t expect you personally.”
“I’m heading in. I’m pressed to the wall here.” She looked in his eyes, wished she could say . . . wanted to. “Things are coming together, and the clock’s running.”
“Then you’ll want your bait.” He looked into her eyes. “I assume several million in counterfeit bonds is bait—with you as hook.”
“We’re closing in. With any luck, this should finish it. I—Peabody, take a walk,” she said without looking back.
“Sir?”
“Step out, Peabody.”
“Stepping out, Lieutenant.”
“Look . . .” Eve began. “I’m really hitting the wire on this, so I can’t get into stuff. I’m sorry about before.”
“You’re sorry I’m irritated.”
“Okay, fine. I’m sorry you’re irritated, but I have to ask for a favor.”
“Personal or official?”
Oh, he was going to make it tough. She leveled her gaze, and a muscle in her cheek twitched. “Both. I need everything you can dig up on Clarissa Branson—everything—And I need it really fast. I can’t spare Feeney, and even if I could, you’ll be quicker and you won’t leave fingerprints.”
“Where do you want me to send the data?”
“I need you to call me with it, privacy mode, on my personal palm-link. I don’t want her to know I’m looking.”
“She won’t.” He turned and lifted a wide steel case. “Your bonds, Lieutenant.”
She tried a smile. “I won’t ask you how you managed this so fast.”
He didn’t smile back. “Best not.”
She nodded, hefted the case, and felt miserable. She couldn’t remember another time when they’d been together for five minutes and he hadn’t touched her in some way. She’d gotten so used to it, so dependent on it, that she felt the loss like a backhanded slap.
“Thanks. I’ll—The hell with it.” She took a fistful of his hair, and swallowing what for her was a great gulp of pride, pressed her mouth hard to his. “See you later,” she muttered and turned on her heel, stormed out.
Now he smiled, just a little, and walked to his desk to do the favor she’d asked of him.
“You okay, Dallas?”
“Yeah, shit. I’m dancing.” She was stripped down to her undershirt and jeans, a fact which mildly embarrassed both her and Feeney.
“I can call in a female to, ah, finish this.”
“Hell, I don’t want any ham-handed EDD chick pawing at me. Just do it.”
“All right, okay.” He cleared his throat, rolled his shoulders. “The tracker’s wireless. It’s going to go right over your heart. We figure they’ll scan you, but we’re going to coat it with this stuff—it’s like skin. They’re using it on droids. If they pick it up at all, it’ll look like a blemish or something.”
“So they’ll think I have a pimple on my tit. Fine.”
“You know, Peabody could do this.”
“Jesus, Feeney.” Somebody had to get going, so keeping her gaze trained over his shoulder, she yanked up her shirt. “Put the damn thing where it goes.”
The next five minutes were mortifying for both of them.
“You, ah, want to hold your shirt out for a couple of minutes, till the skin strip dries.”
“I’ve got it.”
“I’ll be on the tracker myself. We’ll be able to monitor your location through your heartbeat. We rigged this wrist unit.” Relieved the worst was over, he picked it up from the table. “The mike’s low frequency, so it shouldn’t pop on a scan, but its range is a joke, and you’re going to have to talk straight into it for us to pick you up. This is just backup.”
“I’ll take it.” Eve removed her own unit, replaced it. “Anything else I should know?”
“We’re positioning men all over Grand Central. You won’t be on your own. Nobody moves in until you give the go-ahead, but they’re there.”
“Good to know.”
“Dallas, any protective gear over your chest will jam the tracker.”
She stared at him. “No vest?
”
“Your choice. Gear or tracker.”
“Hell, they’re more likely to blast me in the head, anyway.”
“Goddamn it.”
“Joking.” But she rubbed a hand over her mouth. “Any line on the target?”
“Nothing so far.”
“You looked over the droids at Branson T and T?”
“Yeah, they’ve got a new Brainiac line.” He smiled a little now. “New shell covering, too. Next best to skin. But they’re toys,” he added. “I didn’t see anything full size.”
“Doesn’t mean they aren’t there. Those toys capable of acting out a scene like what happened at Branson’s?”
“If they were six foot instead of six inches, yeah. I’d say. Creepy little bastards, you ask me.”
“That’s my personal ’link,” she said when she heard the signal. “I have to take this. It’s private.”
“Okay, I’ll be outside. We’re ready to roll when you are.”
Alone, she took out her ’link, engaged the privacy mode by unfolding and slipping on her headphones. “Dallas.”
“I have your data, Lieutenant.” Roarke’s eyes narrowed. “Where’s your shirt?”
“Somewhere. Here.” She grabbed it up. “What have you got?”
“She checks out easily if you skim the first few levels. Born in Kansas thirty-six years ago, parents are teachers, pure middle class, one sister, married with son. She went through the local school system, worked for a short time as a department store clerk. She married Branson about ten years ago, moved to New York. I assume you have all that.”
“I want what’s under it.”
“So I thought. The names her records show as parents did indeed have a daughter named Clarissa born thirty-six years ago. However, she died at the age of eight. Scraping off the levels, we find this dead child with school and employment records and a marriage license.”
“Bogus.”
“Yes, indeed. A little dip into Clarissa Stanley’s medical files indicates she hasn’t seen the age of thirty-six for some time. She’s forty-six. Tracing the data input, it appears Clarissa was reborn twelve years ago. Whoever, whatever she was before, has been wiped. I might be able to jiggle some out, but it won’t be quick.”