by J. D. Robb
“I’ll go along with your recommendation, Dallas. The other lab reports should be in shortly. We’ll hope the results will clear everything up. You understand they may further incriminate Mavis Freestone.”
“Yes, sir, I understand that.”
“You have a long-standing friendship with her. It would be no blot on your record to withdraw as primary on this case. It would, in fact, be better for you, and certainly more rational if you were to do so.”
“No, sir, I will not withdraw as primary. If you pull me, I will take leave and pursue the case on personal time. If necessary, I will resign.”
For a moment, he rubbed his joined hands against his brow. “Your resignation would not be accepted. Sit down, Lieutenant. Damn it, Dallas,” he erupted when she remained standing. “Sit. I’ll make it a fucking order.”
“Yes, Commander.”
He sighed, reined in his temper. “I hurt you not long ago with a personal attack that was neither appropriate nor deserved. Because of that, I damaged something between us. I understand that you no longer feel comfortable under my command.”
“You are the best commander I’ve ever served under. I have no problem with you as my superior.”
“But no longer friends—not even remotely.” He nodded, accepting her silence. “However, because of my behavior during your investigation of a case that was very personal to me, you should be aware that I fully understand what you’re going through on this one. I know what it is to be torn between loyalties, Dallas. While you may be unable to discuss your feelings in this case with me, I strongly suggest that you do so with someone you can trust. My mistake in the other investigation was in not sharing the burden. Don’t make the same one with this.”
“Mavis didn’t kill anyone. No amount of evidence will convince me otherwise. I’ll do my job, Commander. And in doing it, I’ll find the real killer.”
“I have no doubt you’ll do your job, Lieutenant, or that you’ll suffer for it. You have my support, whether you choose to use it or not.”
“Thank you, sir. I have a request to make on another case.”
“Which is?”
“The Johannsen matter.”
This time he sighed, long and deep. “You’re like a damn terrier, Dallas. You never let go.”
She couldn’t argue the point. “You have my report on what was found at Boomer’s flop. The illegal substance has not been fully identified. I’ve done some research of my own on the formula we discovered.” She took a disc out of her bag. “It’s a new blend, highly potent, its effects would probably be fairly long term as compared to what’s found on the street. Four to six hours for an average dose. Too much more at one time would be, in eighty-eight percent, fatal.”
Lips pursed, Whitney turned the disc over in his hands. “Personal research, Dallas?”
“I had a connection, I used it. The lab is still working, but they have identified several of the ingredients, and their ratios. My point is, this substance would be enormously profitable, as it takes only a small amount to produce results. It’s highly addictive, and produces feelings of strength, delusions of power, and a kind of euphoria—not tranquillity, but a sense of control over self and others. It also contains some sort of cell regenerator. I’ve calculated the results of long-term addiction. Daily use for a period of five years will, in ninety-six point eight percent, result in a complete and sudden shutdown of the nervous system. And death.”
“Christ Jesus. It’s poison?”
“Ultimately, yes. The manufacturers certainly know this, which makes them guilty not only of distributing illegals, but of premeditated murder.”
She let him chew over that a moment, knew the headache it would cause if and when the media dug its claws into the data. “Boomer may or may not have known about this aspect, but he knew enough to be killed for it. I want to pursue the case and, as I’m aware, I’m distracted by other matters, so I request that Officer Peabody be assigned as my aide until the matter is resolved.”
“Peabody has little experience in illegals or homicide, Lieutenant.”
“She makes up for it with brains and sweat. I’d like her to assist in my coordinating with Lieutenant Casto of Illegals, who also used Boomer as a weasel.”
“I’ll see to it. As to the Pandora homicide, use Feeney.” He lifted a brow. “You already are, I see. Let’s pretend I’ve just ordered it, and make it official. You’ll have to deal with the media.”
“I’m getting used to it. Nadine Furst is back from leave. I’ll feed her what seems best. She and Channel 75 owe me a few.” She rose. “I have some people to talk to. I’ll contact Feeney and take him along.”
“Let’s see if we can get things cleared up before your honeymoon.” Her face was such a study of contradictions, embarrassment, pleasure, and fear, he roared out a laugh. “You’ll live through it, Dallas. I can guarantee it.”
“Sure, when the guy who’s designing my wedding dress is in holding,” she muttered. “Thank you, Commander.”
He watched her walk out. She might not have been aware that she’d dropped the barrier between them, but he was.
“The wife’s going to love this.” More than content to let Dallas handle the driving, Feeney leaned back in the passenger seat. Street traffic was light as they headed toward Park Avenue South. Feeney, a native New Yorker, had long since tuned out the bellows and echoes of the tourist blimps and sky buses that crowded overhead.
“They told me they were going to fix it. Those fuckers. Hear that, Feeney? Do you hear that goddamn buzzing?”
Obligingly, he focused on the sound coming from her control panel. “Sounds like a swarm of those killer bees.”
“Three days,” she fumed, “three days in repair, and listen to it. It’s worse than it was.”
“Dallas.” He laid a hand on her arm. “You may have to face it, finally, learn to deal with the simple fact that your vehicle is a piece of garbage. Requisition a new one.”
“I don’t want a new one.” Using the heel of her hand, she rapped the control panel. “I want this one, without the sound effects.” She got caught at a light, tapped her fingers on the wheel. The way the controls sounded, she wouldn’t be able to trust automatic. “Where the hell is 582 Central Park South?” Her controls continued to buzz, so she slapped them again. “I said, where the hell is 582 Central Park South?”
“Just ask nice,” Feeney suggested. “Computer, please display map and locate 582 Central Park South.”
When the display screen popped up, the holographic map highlighting the route, Eve only snarled.
“I don’t baby my tools.”
“Which may be why they’re always breaking down on you. As I was saying,” he continued before Eve could snap at him, “the wife’s going to love this. Justin Young. He used to play this stud on Night Falls.”
“Isn’t that a soap?” She shot him a glance. “What are you doing watching soaps?”
“Hey, I tune in the Soap Channel for a little relaxation like everybody. Anyway, the wife was nuts about him. He does the movie thing now. She hardly goes a week without programming one of his movies on screen. Guy’s good, too. Then there’s Jerry Fitzgerald.” Feeney smiled dreamily.
“Keep your little fantasies to yourself, pal.”
“I tell you that girl’s built. Not like some of the models who have their bodies honed down to bone.” He made a sound like a man anticipating a large bowl of ice cream. “You know one of the best things about working with you recently, Dallas?”
“My charming ways and rapier wit?”
“Oh sure.” He rolled his eyes. “It’s being able to go home and tell the wife who I interrogated today. A billionaire, a senator, Italian aristocrats, film stars. I tell you, it’s done wonders for my prestige.”
“Glad I could help.” She squeezed her battered police issue between a mini Rolls and a vintage Mercedes. “Just try to control your awe while we do the third degree on the actor.”
“I’m a professional.
” But he was grinning as he climbed out. “Just look at this place. How’d you like to own a place in here?” Then he chuckled and shifted his eyes away from the glossy faux marble facade of the lofty building. “Oh, I was forgetting. This is slumming for you now.”
“Kiss ass, Feeney.”
“Come on, kid, loosen up.” He slung an arm around her shoulder as they headed toward the doors. “Falling for the richest man in the known world isn’t something to be ashamed of.”
“I’m not ashamed of it. I just don’t like to dwell on it.”
The building was choice enough to have a live doorman as well as electronic security. Both Eve and Feeney flashed their badges and were admitted into a marble and gilt lobby accented with leafy ferns and exotic flowers in huge china pots.
“Ostentatious,” Eve muttered.
“See how jaded you’re getting?” Feeney moved out of range and approached the inner security screen. “Lieutenant Dallas and Captain Feeney, for Justin Young.”
“One moment, please.” The creamy computer voice paused while their identification was verified. “Thank you for waiting. Mr. Young is expecting you. Please proceed to elevator three, request your party. Enjoy your day.”
chapter six
“So, how do you want to play it?” Feeney pursed his lips, studied the tiny camera in the corner of the elevator on the way up. “The standard good cop/bad cop?”
“Funny how it always works.”
“Civilians are easy marks.”
“Let’s start with the sorry to bother you, appreciate your cooperation sort of thing. If we get a sense he’s playing games, we can shift gears.”
“If we do, I want to be the bad cop.”
“You’re a lousy bad cop, Feeney. Face it.”
He gave her a mournful look. “I outrank you, Dallas.”
“I’m primary, and I’m better at bad cop. Live with it.”
“I always have to be the good cop,” he muttered as they stepped into a well-lighted hallway with more marble, more gilt.
Justin Young opened the opposing door with perfect timing. And, Eve thought, he’d dressed for the part of the well-to-do yet cooperative witness in casual, expensive, buff linen slacks and a drapey silk shirt of the same tone. On his feet were trendy sandals with thick soles and intricate beading over the instep.
“Lieutenant Dallas, Captain Feeney.” His beautifully sculpted face was in serious lines, the killer black eyes sober and a dramatic contrast to a wavy mane of hair the same color as the gilt in the hallway. He offered a hand adorned with a wide ring studded with onyx. “Please come in.”
“Thank you for agreeing to see us so quickly, Mr. Young.” Perhaps her eye had become jaded, but Eve’s initial scan of the room left her thinking, Overdone, overwrought, and overexpensive.
“It’s such a tragedy, such a horror.” He gestured them in toward a huge L-shaped sofa jammed with pillows in wild colors and slick fabrics. Across the room, a meditation screen was programmed to a tropical beach at sunset. “It’s almost impossible to believe she could be dead, much less that she died in such a sudden and violent way.”
“We’re sorry to intrude,” Feeney began, prepping for his good cop role while he struggled not to gape at all the tassels and stained glass. “This must be a difficult time for you.”
“It is. Pandora and I were friends. Can I offer you something?” He sat, elegant and slim, in a wing chair that could have swallowed a small child.
“No, thank you.” Eve tried to wiggle her way back among the mountain of cushions.
“I will, if you don’t mind. I’ve been living on little more than nerves since I heard the news.” Leaning forward, he pressed a small button on the table between them. “Coffee, please. One.” Settling back, he smiled a little. “You’ll want to know where I was when she died. I’ve done a number of police vehicles in my career. Played the cop, the suspect, even the victim in my early days. With my image, I’ve always been innocent.”
He flicked a glance up as a domestic droid, dressed, Eve noted with horrified amusement, in the classic French maid’s uniform, carried in a glass tray topped with a single cup and saucer. Justin took the cup from it, used both hands to bring it to his lips.
“The media hasn’t stated exactly when Pandora was killed, but I believe I can give you my movements for the entire evening. I was with her, at a small party at her home until about midnight. Jerry and I—Jerry Fitzgerald—left together, and went to have a drink at a nearby private club. Ennui. It’s very in right now, and it pays for both of us to be seen. I imagine it was one or so when we left. We considered doing a bit of club hopping, but I confess, we’d both had enough to drink, and enough socializing. We came here, stayed here together until about ten the next morning. Jerry had an assignment. It wasn’t until she’d left and I was having my first cup of coffee that I turned on the news and heard about Pandora.”
“That certainly covers the evening,” Eve said. He’d recited it all, she thought, as though it was a well-staged play. “We’ll need to speak to Ms. Fitzgerald to verify.”
“Certainly. Would you like to do so now? She’s in the relaxation room. Pandora’s death has left her a bit rattled.”
“Let’s let her relax a bit longer,” Eve suggested. “You said you and Pandora were friends. Were you lovers?”
“Now and again, nothing serious. It was more that we ran in the same circles. And to be brutally honest at such a time, Pandora preferred men who were easily dominated, intimidated.” He flashed a smile as if to show he was neither. “She preferred affairs with those who were striving rather than those who had attained success. She rarely enjoyed sharing the spotlight.”
Feeney picked up the rhythm. “Who was she involved with, romantically, at the time of her death?”
“There were a few, I believe. Someone I think she’d met on Starlight Station—an entrepreneur, she called him, but with a sarcastic tone. This up-and-coming designer Jerry tells me is brilliant. Michelangelo, Puccini, Leonardo. Something of the kind. Paul Redford, the video producer who joined us that night.”
He took a sip of his coffee, then blinked. “Leonardo. Yes, it was Leonardo. There was some sort of tiff there. A woman came by the house while we were there. They fought over him. An old-fashioned catfight. It would have been amusing if it hadn’t been so embarrassing for everyone involved.”
He spread his elegant fingers, looked mildly amused despite his statement. Well done, Eve thought. Well rehearsed, good timing, lines professionally punched.
“It took Paul and I both to separate them.”
“The woman came to Pandora’s home and attacked her, physically?” Eve asked in carefully neutral tones.
“Oh no, not at all. The poor thing was devastated, pleading. Pandora called her a few vile names and hit her.” Justin demonstrated by making a fist, jerking it. “Really socked her. The woman was small, but she was game. Scrambled right up and plowed in. After that it was wrestling and hair pulling, scratching. The woman was bleeding some when she left. Pandora had lethal nails.”
“Pandora scratched the woman’s face?”
“No. Though I’m sure she was going to have quite a bruise. It was her neck as I recall. Four long, nasty scratches on the side of the neck where Pandora raked her. The woman, I’m afraid I don’t know her name. Pandora just called her bitch, and varieties of the same. She was trying not to cry when she left, and told Pandora, quite dramatically, that Pandora would be sorry for what she’d done. Then I’m afraid she ruined her exit by sniffling and claiming that love conquers all.”
It sounded just like Mavis, Eve thought. “And after she left, how did Pandora behave?”
“She was furious, overexcitable. That’s why Jerry and I left early.”
“And Paul Redford?”
“He stayed; I can’t say how long.” With a sigh that signaled regret, Justin set his coffee aside. “It’s unfair to say anything negative about Pandora when she can’t defend herself, but she was hard, ver
y often abrasive. Cross her, and you paid.”
“And did you ever cross her, Mr. Young?”
“I was careful not to.” He smiled charmingly. “I enjoy my career and my looks, Lieutenant. Pandora was no threat to the first, but I’d seen and heard of her doing some damage to faces when annoyed. Believe me, she didn’t wear her manicure like knives just for fashion.”
“She had enemies.”
“Plenty of them, most of whom were terrified of her. I can’t imagine who might have finally snapped and struck back at her. And from the news reports I’ve heard, I can’t believe even Pandora deserved to die so brutally.”
“We appreciate your candor, Mr. Young. If it’s convenient, we’d like to speak with Ms. Fitzgerald now. Alone.”
He lifted a slim, elegant brow. “Yes, of course. No coordinating stories.”
Eve only smiled. “You’ve had plenty of time to do that already. But we’d like to speak to her alone.”
She had the pleasure of seeing his smooth facade shaken a bit by her statement. Still, he rose and walked toward a connecting corridor.
“What do you think?” Feeney muttered.
“I think it was a hell of a performance.”
“We’re on wavelength there. Still, if he and Fitzgerald were ripping up the sheets all night, it keeps him in the clear.”
“They alibi each other, it keeps them both in the clear. We’ll get the security discs from building management, check what time they came in. See if they went out again.”
“I never trust those, not since the DeBlass case.”
“If they diddled with the discs, you’ll see it.” She glanced up at the sound of Feeney sucking in his breath. His hangdog face had gone terrier bright. His eyes were glazed. After a glimpse at Jerry Fitzgerald’s entrance, Eve wondered why Feeney’s tongue wasn’t hanging out.
She was built, all right, Eve mused. Her lush breasts were barely covered with ivory silk that dipped nipple low, clung, then halted briefly a few millimeters below crotch level. One long, shapely leg was decorated beside the knee with a red rose in full bloom.