by J. D. Robb
“It was.”
“I’ll have Crime Scene check it for tampering,” Peabody said.
“Bissel’s slot was empty,” Morris continued, and approached the wall of stainless steel refrigerator drawers. He opened one and it let out a whoosh of air and chilly white vapor. “Initially I was annoyed, assuming he’d been moved or misfiled, so I checked the last log-in, which verified he’d been stored properly. I called the AME, Marlie Drew, who was on the night shift. She was still here as she wouldn’t end shift until eight. She had no record of anyone entering this area, adding or removing anything.”
“I’ll need to speak with her.”
“She’s in her office, waiting. We ran a thorough search. His data is still here, his body is not.”
“How many bodies do you have in at this time?”
“Twenty-six. Four came in last night. There was a vehicular accident logged in at two-twenty.”
“You’ve checked all storage areas?”
Insult flashed over his face. “Dallas, this isn’t my first day on the job. When I tell you a body isn’t here, it isn’t here.”
“Okay. So you only had twenty-two before the new ones checked in at two-twenty?”
“No, we had twenty-three. Two were scheduled for disposal—city expense. Two sidewalk sleepers, unclaimed.”
“Disposal.”
Now, fresh irritation layered over the insult and made his voice an icy slash. “You know the damn drill. Unclaimed, indigent, the city cremates after forty-eight hours. We deal with them during the night shift, send them out to a crematorium.”
“Who goes with them?”
“Driver and orderly.” Because he saw where she was heading, he set his teeth. “They wouldn’t have taken Bissel by mistake, if that’s what you’re thinking. We don’t run a damn comedy hour around here. It’s serious and sensitive work to care for the dead.”
“I’m perfectly aware of that, Morris.” Her own temper was beginning to fray as she stepped up to and into his face. “But Bissel’s not here, so let’s go through the steps.”
“Fine. There’s a staging area. Bodies slated for transfer and disposal would be logged out from storage—and the records checked—by the AME on duty, and those records would be cross-checked to avoid any mistakes. The transfer team would take them to the staging area, log them out through another series of checks. This isn’t a matter of someone mistakenly slating Bissel for disposal and leaving one of the city jobs behind. I’ve got a damn body missing. The count’s wrong.”
“I’m not thinking it was a mistake. Contact the crematorium first. See how many they did for you last night. And I want the names of the ones who transported the bodies. Are they still on site?”
“Different shifts.” Looking more worried than angry now, Morris led the way out, resecured the door. “They’d have been off by six.” He walked quickly toward his office. He called up the previous night’s schedule even as he engaged his ’link.
“Powell and Sibresky. I know both these men. They’re big on jokes but they’re efficient. They’re careful. This is Chief Medical Examiner Morris,” he said into the ’link. “I need to verify a delivery for disposal, city contract, made early this morning.”
“One moment please, Dr. Morris, I’ll connect you with Receiving.”
“Does anybody but me think this is kind of sick?” Peabody wondered. “I mean, Receiving. Yuck.”
“Shut up, Peabody. Do a quick run on this Powell and Sibresky, get me pictures.”
“I gave you pictures,” Morris objected. “People around here don’t just fry up any loose body. There’s a very exacting system in place to . . . Yes, this is Morris,” he said when Receiving got on the line. “We delivered a John and a Jane Doe early this morning for disposal. Order numbers NYC-JD500251 and 252. Will you verify?”
“Of course, Dr. Morris. Just let me pull those up. I have those deliveries, and disposal was completed. Do you need the verification numbers?”
“No, thank you. That’s enough.”
“Do you need to verify the third delivery?”
Eve didn’t need to see his stomach to know it sank. It showed by the way he slowly lowered his body into his desk chair. “A third?”
“NYC-JD500253. All three were delivered and signed for by the Receiving supervisor, Clemment, at one-oh-six A.M.”
“Disposal is completed?”
“Oh yes, Doctor. Disposal was completed at . . . three-thirty-eight A.M. Is there something else I can help you with?”
“No. No. Thank you.” He broke transmission. “I don’t know how this could happen. It makes no sense. The order is here, right here.” He tapped his screen. “For two, not three. There’s no third disposal order, no third body cleared from Staging.”
“I need to talk to Powell and Sibresky.”
“I’m going with you. I need to follow this through, Dallas,” he said before she could object. “This is my house. The guests may be dead, but they’re still mine.”
“All right. Get Crime Scene in here, Peabody. And let’s get Feeney to pick us a hotshot from EDD to look at Morris’s unit. I want to know if any of the data’s been altered in the last twenty-four.”
They got a very irritated Sibresky out of bed. Though he mellowed a bit when he saw Morris, he still scratched his butt and bitched.
“What the hell? Me and the old lady work nights. You gotta sleep some time. You day people think everything runs on your clock.”
“Real sorry to disturb your sleep, Sibresky,” Eve began, “and I’m real sorry you didn’t use a mouthwash before this little conversation.”
“Hey.”
“But the fact is I’m conducting one of those pesky daytime investigations. You took a delivery to the crematorium early this morning.”
“Yeah, so what? That’s my fricking job, lady. Hey, Morris, what the fuck?”
“Sib, this is important. Did you—”
“Morris,” Eve interrupted, more gently than she might have with anyone else. “How many did you take in?”
“Just the one run from the city morgue. We do ’em in groups if it’s under five. Five or more, you gotta take it in two trips. More of that in the winter when the sleepers kick off from exposure and shit. Good weather like this, it’s pretty slow.”
“How many in the run?”
“Shit.” He poked out his bottom lip in an expression Eve gauged as concentration. “Three. Yeah, three. Two Johns, one Jane. Jesus, we went through the routine, the logs, the paperwork, the sign off, sign in, and shit. Not my fault if somebody decided to claim one of the bodies after the forty-eight.”
“Who authorized the transport for you and Powell?”
“Sal, I guess. You know, Morris, Sally Riser. She logs ’em out usually from Staging. It was already done when I clocked in, but it wasn’t Powell.”
“What wasn’t Powell?”
“Powell called in sick, so the new guy was working. Real hotdogger,” Sibresky said with a grimace. “Had all the paperwork done when I clocked on. Don’t matter a shit to me. I just drive ’em.”
“What was the new guy’s name?” Eve demanded.
“Shit, I gotta remember everything at ten in the fricking morning? Angelo, I think his name was. What the hell do I care, he was just filling in for Powell. Wanted to do all the paperwork himself, and that’s fine with me. Like I said, he was a real hotdogger.”
“I bet he was. Peabody.”
Understanding, Peabody pulled photos of Blair and Carter Bissel out of her file bag. “Mr. Sibresky, are either of these the man you know as Angelo?”
“Nah. Hotdogger had a big, stupid mustache, lots of eyebrows, hair all slicked back and hanging to his butt like some kinda fag-ass vid star. Scar on his face, too.” He tapped a finger on his left cheek. “Nasty one, went from the corner of his eye nearly to his mouth. Teeth bucked out, too. Guy was pretty damn ugly.”
“Sibresky, I’m going to ruin your day,” Eve told him. “You’ll need to get dressed,
and come down to Central. I need you to look at pictures and work with a police artist.”
“Ah, come on, lady.”
“That’s Lieutenant Lady. Go get your pants on.”
16 SHE WASN’T SURPRISED to find herself standing over Joseph Powell’s body, but she was furious. She had to control the fury, coat it thickly before it clouded judgment.
He’d lived alone, and that had been one of the many breaks for his killer. He’d been scrawny, with little meat on his bird bones and a crop of hair cut short around the ears and trained, somehow or other, to stand up straight from his head in a six-inch crown dyed lightning blue.
From the looks of his place, he’d liked music and cheese-flavored soy chips. He was still wearing his headphones, and an open bag of the chips was in bed with him.
There were no privacy screens on the single bedroom window, but a shade, blue as his hair, had been drawn. It blocked out the sun well enough, turned the room to gloom, and let all the traffic sounds—air and street—rumble against the glass like a storm rolling in.
He’d toked a little Zoner along with his chips. She could see the remnants of paper and ash in the dish shaped like a stupendously endowed naked woman on the table beside the bed.
Another break for the killer. He’d been zoned out, music pounding in his head, and couldn’t have weighed more than one-thirty. It was unlikely he’d even felt the jolt from the laser pressed to his carotid artery.
Small blessings.
Across from the bed, tacked up for the view she was sure, was a life-sized poster of Mavis Freestone, exploding into a midair leap, arms extended, grin wide and full of fun. She wore little more than the grin and strategically placed glitter.
MAVIS! TOTALLY JUICED!
The sight of it, hanging on the dingy beige wall, laughing down at the dead made Eve incredibly sad and sick.
Because Morris was there, and she knew he needed to take some control, she stayed back and let him handle the initial exam.
“One jolt,” he said. “Full contact. Burn marks from the weapon are clearly evident. No other visible trauma. No signs of struggle or defensive wounds. His neurological system would have been immediately compromised. Death instantaneous.”
“I need positive ID, Morris. If you want I can—”
He whipped around. “I know the drill. I know what the fuck has to be done here, and don’t need you . . .” He lifted both hands. His breath shuddered in, then out. “And that was so uncalled for. I’m sorry.”
“It’s all right. I know this is rough on you.”
“Close to home. This hits very, very close to home. Someone came into this room and killed this . . . boy as carelessly as you might swat a fly. He did that without knowing him, without having any feelings about him. Did this only to remove a small barrier so he could walk into my house. This really meant nothing more to him than putting on his shoes so he wouldn’t stub his toe.
“Victim is positively identified as Powell, Joseph. I’m going to take just a minute, Dallas, to pull myself together so I can do him, and you, some good.”
She waited until he left the room. “Peabody, I need you to work this. Do the on-scene, call the sweepers, start the knock-on-doors. I have to get to the Tower.”
“I need to be there.”
“They ordered me, not you.”
Peabody’s jaw tightened. “I’m your partner, and if your ass is getting fitted for a sling, mine is, too.”
“I appreciate the sentiment, however strange the visual, but I need my partner to pull the weight here. He needs you,” she said, looking down at Powell. “You have to start the process for him, and you need to help Morris. And if they’re fitting my ass for a sling, Peabody, I need you to keep pushing this investigation through, to keep the team solid. I’m not protecting you. I’m counting on you.”
“Okay. I’ll handle it.” She stepped up, stood with Eve over Joseph Powell. “I’ll take care of him.”
She nodded. “Do you see what happened here? Tell me.”
“He let himself in the door. He knows how to bypass security, and there’s not much here to bypass. No cams, no doorman. He picked Powell instead of Sibresky because Powell lived alone, and as orderly, probably handled more of the paperwork. It was business here, and he went straight for it. Powell’s in bed, zoned or asleep, probably both. He just leaned down, pressed the weapon to his throat, zapped him. Um . . .”
She took a quick scan of the room. “There’s no pass or ID sitting around. He might’ve taken it, altered it for his own use. We’ll check on that. Then he just walked out again. We’ll get time of death, but it was probably middle of the day yesterday.”
“Start with that. I’ll head back to the house as soon as I can. Morris may want to notify next of kin himself. If not—”
“I’ll take care of it. Don’t worry about this end, Dallas.”
“Then I won’t.”
She started out, paused in front of the poster of Mavis. “Don’t ever tell her,” she said, and left the scene.
Inside the lab, Reva worked side by side with Tokimoto. They rarely spoke, and when they did it was in an abbreviated computerese only the true data jock could translate. But for the most part, there were no words between them. One thought, the other anticipated.
But Reva couldn’t anticipate how badly he wanted to speak, how the part of his mind not focused on the work formed and re-formed the words and phrases.
She was in trouble, he reminded himself. She was just widowed, and widowed by a man she’d learned was using her. She was vulnerable, and emotionally fragile. It was . . . ghoulish—wasn’t it?—to even consider approaching her on any personal level at such a time.
But when she leaned back on a quiet sound of exhaustion, the words simply popped out.
“You’re pushing too hard. You need to take a break. Twenty minutes. A walk in the fresh air.”
“We’re close. I know it.”
“Then twenty minutes will make little difference. Your eyes are bloodshot.”
She worked up a twisted smile. “Thanks for pointing that out.”
“You have lovely eyes. You’re abusing them.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” She shut them on a sigh. “You don’t even know what color they are other than red.”
“They’re gray. Like smoke. Or fog on a moonless night.”
She opened one eye, peered at him. “Where’d that come from?”
“I have no idea.” Though he was flustered, he decided to push on. “Perhaps my brain is as bloodshot as your eyes. I think we should take a walk.”
“Why not?” She studied him as she got to her feet. “Sure. Why not?”
Across the room, Roarke watched them step out. “About damn time,” he muttered.
“You got something?” Feeney asked, and nearly pounced on him.
“No. Sorry. I was thinking of something else.”
“You’re a little off today, aren’t you, boy?”
“I’m on right enough.” He reached for his coffee mug, found it empty, and had to struggle against the urge to just heave it against the glass wall.
“Why don’t I fill that up for you.” Feeney nipped it handily out of Roarke’s hand. “I was about to do my own.”
“Appreciate it.”
When he’d done so, Feeney came back, swiveled his chair beside Roarke’s. “She can handle herself. You know that.”
“Who would know it better?” Roarke took a tool as thin as a dentist’s probe and scraped delicately at corrosion. Then because Feeney merely sat and sipped, he set the tool aside once more.
“I gave her a difficult time before she left. She deserved it, by God, didn’t she deserve it. But I regret the timing of it.”
“I’m not getting between a man and his wife. Those who do usually come out looking like they’ve been set on by wild dogs. I will say when the wife’s in a mood to cook my brains for breakfast, I can usually save myself with flowers. Pick ’em up from a street vendor, take them home to he
r—with a big sappy look on my face.” He sat, he sipped. “Flowers wouldn’t work on Dallas.”
“Not in a million years,” Roarke confirmed. “A sack of diamonds from the Blue Mines on Taurus I wouldn’t work on her, unless you knocked her in that block of wood she calls a head with them. Christ Jesus, that woman’s a frustration to me. Beginning, end, and all the middle.”
Feeney said nothing for five humming seconds. “See, you want me to agree with you. To say something like, ‘Oh yeah, that Dallas sure is a blockhead.’ If I did, you’d end up kicking my ass. So I’m just going to drink my coffee.”
“That’s a big help to me.”
“You’re a smart boy. You know what you have to do.”
“And what would that be?”
He patted Roarke on the shoulder. “Grovel,” he said, and scooted his chair out of harm’s way.
It wasn’t over. No, by God, it wasn’t over, and he was in the pilot’s seat now.
He paced and prowled his rooms—rooms he was so proud of, rooms he’d celebrated having completely to himself. No one knew about them.
Well, no one living.
They were a perfect place to strategize his moves. And to congratulate himself on yet another job well done.
The blue-haired freak had been child’s play. Absolute child’s play. He took a minute hit of Zeus to keep his energies up, keep his mind alert as he had business, very personal business, to conduct shortly.
He was protecting himself, step by stage by layer. And that, self-preservation, was paramount. The quick thrill of the kill, of outwitting those who would have erased him, was a nice benefit, but it wasn’t the point.
The point was to cover his ass, which he had done—and beautifully, if he did say so himself. The cops were up the creek now, without a body to work with.
The next was funding. And he couldn’t quite figure out, yet, how to get his hands on the money due him.
He paused to study his reflection in a mirror. He was going to have to change that face, and it pained him. He liked the face that looked back at him. Still, sacrifices would have to be made for the good of the whole.
Once he finished his work, tied up some more loose ends, he’d find a surgeon who wouldn’t ask too many questions. He had enough to pay for that, sure he did. And he’d find a way to get the rest, all the rest, when he could just think without all these complications springing up on him.