by J. D. Robb
“No. It seems she didn’t earn as much as a blip on their radar. They weren’t paying much mind to him that long ago, and she didn’t matter to them, wasn’t useful or interesting, which is all to the good. But Patrick Roarke became of more interest, and they spent time tracking his moves now and again. Mostly, it appears, on the chance he’d give them something to use against Ricker.”
“I’d say he didn’t, as Ricker stayed in operation until last year.”
“He didn’t give them enough. It’s a long, convoluted file, a great many cross-references, a lot of man-hours that didn’t amount to anything that would stick.”
“Well, he’s away now. Ricker. What does that have to do with this?”
“They had my father under surveillance, believing he was working as a bagman for Ricker, and they tracked him to Dallas, in May. The year you were eight.”
She nodded, slowly, but had to swallow. “We knew he’d been in Dallas about that time, helping to set up for the Atlanta job, the sting where Skinner’s operation went to hell. It’s not important. Look, since I’m up, I’m going to get a shower.”
“Eve.” He clamped his hands on hers, felt hers jerk as she tried to escape. “He was met at the airport by a man named Richard Troy.”
Her eyes were huge now, with fear—the kind he saw when she woke from nightmares. “This has nothing to do with the case. The case is priority. I need to—”
“I’ve never looked into your past, because I knew you didn’t want it.” Her hands had gone cold in his, but he held them. He wished he could warm them. “I didn’t intend to look now, but only to assure myself that my family wasn’t being watched. The connection . . .” He brought her rigid hands to his lips. “Darling Eve, the connection between your father and mine is there. We can’t pretend otherwise. I don’t want to hurt you. I can’t stand to hurt you.”
“You have to let me go.”
“I can’t. I’m sorry. I tried to talk myself out of telling you. ‘She doesn’t need to know, doesn’t want to know.’ But I can’t hold this back from you. It would hurt you more, wouldn’t it, and insult you on top of that if I treated you like you couldn’t take it.”
“That’s tricky.” Her voice was scratchy and her eyes burned. “That’s pretty fucking tricky.”
“Maybe, but no less true for all that. I have to tell you what I’ve found, and you’ll decide how much of it you want to hear.”
“I need to think!” She yanked her hands free from his. “I need to think. Just leave me alone and let me think.” She sprang off the bed, rushed into the bathroom. Slammed the door.
He nearly went after her, but when he asked himself if doing so would be for her sake or his own, he wasn’t at all sure. So instead, he waited for her.
She took a shower, blistering hot. Halfway through her heart rate was nearly normal again. She stayed in the drying tube too long, and felt a little light-headed afterward. She just needed coffee, that was all. Just a few hits of coffee—and she needed to put this crap out of her mind.
She had a job to do. It didn’t matter, it didn’t fucking matter about Patrick Roarke or her father, or Dallas. It didn’t apply. She couldn’t afford to crowd her head with that kind of bullshit when she had work to do.
And she looked at her face in the mirror over the sink, her pale, terrified face. She wanted to smash her fist through it. Nearly did.
But she turned away, yanked on her robe, and walked back into the bedroom.
He’d gotten up, put on a robe of his own. He said nothing as he walked over and handed her a cup of coffee.
“I don’t want to know about this. Can you understand? I don’t want to know.”
“All right, then.” He touched her cheek. “We’ll put it away.”
He wouldn’t call her a coward, she realized. He wouldn’t even think it. He would just love her.
“I don’t want to know about this,” she repeated. “But you have to tell me.” She walked to the sitting area and lowered to a chair because she was afraid her knees would shake. “His name was Troy?”
He sat across from her, keeping the low table between them because he sensed she wanted the distance. “He had a number of aliases, but that was his legal name, so it seems. Richard Troy. There’s a file on him. I didn’t read the whole of it, but just the . . . just the business in Dallas. But copied it for you in case you wanted to.”
She didn’t know what she wanted. “They met in Dallas.”
“They did. Yours picked mine up at the airport, brought him to the hotel where you . . . where you were. He registered. They went out later that night and got piss-faced. There’s a transcript of their conversation, such as it was, and the same over the three days they were there together. A lot of posturing and bragging, and some speculation on the operation in Atlanta.”
“Ricker’s gun-running operation.”
“Yes. My father was to go on to Atlanta, which he did the following day. There is speculation that he took payoff money from the cops who were using him as an inside man in Ricker’s organization. He took that, and Ricker’s money, and—double-crossing both sides—went back to Dublin.”
“That confirms what we theorized when we dealt with Skinner. Sloppy job by the spooks if they didn’t cop to what your father had in mind, and warn the locals. Puts HSO on the trigger for the thirteen cops who died in that botched raid as much as Ricker, as much as anyone.”
“I’d say HSO didn’t give a damn about the cops.”
“Okay.” She could focus on that, pinpoint some of the rage on that. “They’d consider Ricker the prime directive. The Atlanta operation was major, but it wasn’t the whole ball. Maybe they were too focused on bringing down Ricker, crushing his network and doing the victory dance that they didn’t figure a small cog like Patrick Roarke was going to screw all sides. But it’s unconscionable they’d let cops die that way.”
“They knew about you.”
“What?”
“They knew there was a child in that bloody room with him. Female, minor child. The bastards knew.”
When her eyes went glassy, he cursed. Shoving the table away, he pushed her head between her knees. “Take it slow, breathe slow. Christ, Christ, I’m sorry.”
His voice was a buzz in her ears. His beautiful voice, murmuring in Gaelic now as his control wavered. She could hear it wavering, feel it in the quiver of his hand on the back of her head. He was kneeling beside her, she realized. Suffering as much, if not more, than she was herself.
Wasn’t that strange? Wasn’t that miraculous?
“I’m okay.”
“Just give it a minute more. You’re trembling yet. I want them dead. Those who knew you were trapped with him and did nothing. I want their blood in my throat.”
She shifted enough to rest her cheek on her knee and look at him. At the moment, he looked every bit like a man who could rip out another’s throat. “I’m okay,” she said again. “It’s not going to matter, Roarke. It’s not, because I survived, and he didn’t. I need to read the file.”
He nodded, then just laid his head on hers.
“If you’d blocked this from me”—her voice was thick but she didn’t try to clear it—“it would’ve set me back. It would’ve set us back. I know this isn’t easy for you either, but telling me . . . Trusting us to get through it, that’s going to make it better. I need to look at some of this data.”
“I’ll get it for you.”
“No, I’ll go with you. We’ll look at it together.”
They went back in his private room, and read what he brought up on screen together.
She didn’t sit. She wasn’t going to let her legs go weak on her again. Not even when she read the field operative’s report.
Sexual and physical abuse involving minor female purported to be subject’s daughter. No recorded data on minor, no birth mother or surrogate registered. Intervention is not recommended at this time. If subject becomes aware he is being observed, or if any social or law enforcement age
ncy is informed of the situation with minor female, subject’s value would be compromised.
Recommend nonaction re minor female.
“They let it go.” Roarke spoke softly, too softly. “I hate fucking cops. Saving your presence,” he added after a moment.
“They’re not cops. They don’t give a rat’s ass about the law, much less about justice. They sure as hell don’t give a damn about an individual. It’s all big picture to them, always was, from the moment they formed at the dawn of the Urban Wars, it was big picture and fuck the people in it.”
She packed away her rage, her horror, and continued to read. It wasn’t until she came to the end that she had to reach out, lay her hand on the console for balance.
“They knew what happened. They knew I killed him. My God, they knew, and they cleaned up after me.”
“For security, my ass. To cover their own culpability.”
“It says . . . it says the listening devices planted were defective and shut down that night. What are the chances?” she drew a deep breath and read the section again.
Surveillance returned at seven hundred and sixteen hours. No sound or movement recorded on premises for six hours. Assumption that subject had moved on during dark period caused field agent to risk a personal check of room. Upon entering, agent observed subject DOS. Cause of death determined to be multiple stab wounds inflicted with small kitchen knife. Female minor child could not be located on premises.
No data on premises pertaining to Ricker or Roarke. On orders from Home, area was cleaned. Body disposal team notified.
Minor child, female, believed to be subject’s daughter, located under medical observation. Severe physical and emotional trauma. Local authorities investigating. Minor has no identification and will be assigned a social caseworker.
Subsequently local authorities unable to identify minor child, female. Minor subject unable to remember and/or relate name or circumstances. No connection to Troy or this agency can be made. Minor subject has been absorbed by the National Agency for Minors and has been given the name Dallas, Eve.
Case file Troy is closed.
“Is there a file on me?”
“Yes.”
“Did they make the connection?”
“I didn’t read it.”
“Aren’t you just full of willpower?” When he didn’t speak, she turned away from the screen, and took a step toward him.
He took one back. “Someone will pay for this. Nothing will stop me. I can’t kill him, though God, I’ve dreamed of it. But someone will pay for standing by, standing back, and letting this happen to you.”
“It won’t change anything.”
“Aye, by God it will.” Some part of the fury he’d held inside him since reading the reports lashed out. “There are balances, Eve. You know it. Checks and balances, that’s what makes your precious justice. I’ll have my own on this.”
She was cold, already so cold, but his words, the look of him now all but numbed her. “It’s not going to help me to think about you going off and hunting up some spook assigned to this over twenty years ago.”
“You don’t have to think about it.”
A little bubble of panic rose in her throat. “I need you focused on the work—do what you promised to do.”
He stepped around the console, up to her. His eyes were blue ice as he took her chin in his hand. “Do you think I can or will let this go?”
“No. Do you think I can stand back and let you hunt someone down and mete out your personal sense of justice?”
“No. So we have a problem. In the meantime, I’ll give you whatever you need from me on this case. I won’t fight with you over this, Eve,” he said before she could speak. “And I won’t ask or expect you to change your moral ground. I only ask you do the same when it comes to me.”
“I want you to remember something.” Her voice wanted to shake. Her soul wanted to tremble. “I want you to think about this before you do something you can’t take back.”
“I’ll do what I have to do,” he said flatly. “And so will you.”
“Roarke.” She gripped his arms, and was afraid she could already feel him slipping away from her. “Whatever happened to me back in Dallas, I came out of it. I’m standing here because of it. Maybe I have everything that matters to me, including you, because of it. If that’s true, I’d go through it all again. I’d go through every minute of the hell to have you, to have my badge, to have this life. That’s enough balance for me. I need you to think about that.”
“Then I will.”
“I need to get ready for the morning briefing.” To think about something else—anything else. “So do you. This has to be put away for now. If you can’t put it away, you’re no good for me, or your friend.”
“Eve.” He said it gently, as he’d loved her gently, and he brushed the tear she hadn’t been aware of shedding from her cheek.
She broke when his arms came around her. And because they did, she burrowed into him and let herself weep.
8 SHE WAS BACK in form by the time her team arrived for the briefing. Thoughts of what she’d survived in Dallas were locked away to be taken out later when she was alone, when she could stand them. When she could, she would figure out what could and couldn’t be done.
He’d kill them. She had no illusions. Left to himself, Roarke would hunt down those responsible for the nonaction directive in Dallas, and . . . eliminate them.
Checks and balances.
He would do this, unless she found the key to his rage, his sense of justice, his need to punish. His need to stand for her and to spill blood for blood for the sake of a desperate and brutalized child.
So she had to find that key, somehow. And while she was looking for it, she was going up against one of the most powerful and self-contained organizations on or off planet.
Her prior plans of expanding the team, of including a strong showing of hand-selected EDD men, had to be put on hold. She had an intricate little bomb on her hands. Too much shifting and passing and it would blow up in her face.
She would keep her team as small and tight as possible.
Feeney. She couldn’t do without Feeney. He was currently chowing down on one of his favored danishes while he argued with McNab about some Arena Ball player named Snooks.
EDD ace Ian McNab didn’t look like somebody who’d get riled up about Arena Ball. Then again, he didn’t look like a cop either. He was wearing purple leather-look pants, pegged tight as tourniquets at the ankles to show off his low-rider purple gel-sneaks. His shirt was purple stripes and snug enough to show off his narrow torso and bony shoulders. He’d pulled his blond hair back in a relatively simple braid that hung between his angel-wing shoulder blades, but had made up for the simplicity with a jungle of silver hoops that curved along his left ear.
Though he had a pretty face, narrow and smooth and set off by clever green eyes, he didn’t look like the type the sturdy and steady Peabody would go for. But she did, and in a big way.
You could see what was between them in the casual way his hand brushed Peabody’s knee, the way she jabbed him with her elbow when he tried to take her pastry.
And the proof that love was in bloom when Peabody broke the pastry in half and gave it to him.
She needed them, the three of them, and the man—her man—who sipped his coffee and waited for her to start the show.
And once she did, she put them all at risk.
“If everyone’s finished their little coffee break, there’s a little matter of a double homicide to discuss.”
“Got your EDD report there.” Feeney nodded toward the disc packet he’d put on her desk. “Every one of the units—house, gallery, studio—was fried. Total corruption. I got some ideas on how to regenerate and access data, but it’s not going to be easy, and it’s not going to be quick. Easier and quicker with the use of some of the equipment our civilian consultant has at his disposal.”
“Then it’s at yours,” Roarke said and had Feeney beam
ing in anticipation.
“I can have a retrieval team here in an hour, with the units. We’ll set up a network and—”
“That’s not going to be possible,” Eve interrupted. “I need to ask you to personally transport a sampling of the units here. Those that remain at Central will require top-level security. They have to be moved from the pen, Feeney. ASAP.”
“Dallas, electronics isn’t your area, but even you should be able to figure out how long it’s going to take me to work this magic on more’n a dozen units. I can’t be hauling them over here a couple at a time, and without a retrieval team, six-man minimum, we’re looking at days, if not weeks before we pull out anything readable.”
“It can’t be helped. The nature of the investigation has changed. Information has come into my hands that confirms involvement and possible participation in these murders by the Homeland Security Organization.”
There was a moment of absolute silence, then McNab’s excited response. “Spooks? Oh baby, ultimately iced.”
“This isn’t a vid, Detective, or some comp game where you play secret agent. Two people are dead.”
“With all respect, Lieutenant, they’re dead anyway.”
Since she couldn’t think of an argument for that, she ignored it. “I can’t reveal how this information came to me.” But she saw Feeney’s glance at Roarke, the speculation and the pride in it. “If it comes down to a court order demanding my source—as it very well may—I’ll lie. You need to know that up front. I’ll perjure myself without hesitation, not only to protect the source, but to maintain the integrity of this investigation, and to protect Reva Ewing, who I’m convinced is innocent.”
“I like the anonymous tip myself,” Feeney said easily. “Untraceable transmission of data. There’s a couple of ways to set that up on your unit right here so it’ll look like you got one. Should hold up against most tests.”
“That’s illegal,” Eve pointed out, and he smiled.
“Just talking out loud.”
“When each of you took this case, it was on the belief it was a standard homicide investigation. It’s not. You have a choice of stepping out of the investigation before I reveal the data in my possession. Once I relay it, you’re stuck. And it could get pretty fucking sticky. We can’t bring anyone else into this. It can’t be discussed outside of secured locations. Each of us will have to be swept daily for possible bugs and that includes home, workplace, vehicles, and person. You’ll be at risk, and certainly under observation.”