by J. D. Robb
They walked in on that, finding Summerset himself standing in the large foyer, a stick man in black, with the pudge of a cat at his feet.
“So it was fine with him if you stole cars, money, picked pockets, but books were on the forbidden list of loot?”
“One must have one’s standards,” Summerset said. “I trust you’ve had a meal of some sort.”
“We have, thanks.” Roarke removed his coat, which Summerset took from him even as Eve tossed hers over the newel post. Galahad trotted forward to wind himself through three pair of legs.
“Standards? I’m betting most people would rather have the contents of their wallets than a book that ended up on the shelf.”
In that way he had, Summerset looked down his blade of a nose. “Books feed the mind and the spirit. We—”
“‘Don’t take bread from the hand of a hungry man,’” Roarke finished.
Summerset gave Roarke a nod of approval. “You learned well. But then, your mind and spirit both had a voracious appetite. If your body has an appetite, there’s pie. I had some time on my hands today and a nice basket of apples from New Zealand.”
She had a weakness for pie, enough of one to overshadow any sarcasm she might have leveled.
Besides, they were only a couple days away from Summerset’s winter vacation.
“There’s always an appetite for pie,” Roarke said as they started up the stairs. “Good night.”
“Why New Zealand?” Eve demanded as the cat jogged up beside them. “We have apples from here. We’re the Big Apple.”
“Because it’s February, and he’d prefer organic, naturally grown over agridomes or sims.”
“It’s February in New Zealand, right?”
“It is, but it’s in the Southern Hemisphere, which means it’s summer.”
“How can it be summer?” Frustration shimmered all around her. “It’s freaking February.”
Simply delighted with her, Roarke draped an arm over her shoulders and, knowing her, headed to her office. “As with the time zones that baffle and annoy you, it’s all about the planet, darling, its rotation and orbit. In the Northern Hemisphere freaking February equals winter. In the Southern Hemisphere, summer. You can’t change the basic laws of science to your own rather adorable logic.”
“Well, it’s stupid, and it’s no wonder people are perpetually fucked up, as nobody can depend on something as basic as February. Which is already screwed up because it insists on having less days, then adding one like a little prize every four years even though everybody wants February to get the hell over so we can move on.”
Adorable, he thought again, and really unassailable logic. “Who would argue with that?”
“And anyway—” She broke off.
It still gave her a little jolt to walk into her office, to see everything changed. For the better, she thought, for a whole hell of a lot better. But still, a jolt.
“Never mind,” she decided. “It all got me off track. I don’t get what books have to do with the house, the design.”
“Ah, yes, and I’ll explain. First, I know you want to set up your board, but I think we’ve earned some wine.”
He walked over, selected a bottle from the storage behind the wall while Eve drew out her board.
“Books, history, and Summerset saw to it that Irish history was included. So illustrations, descriptions, photographs of great houses, forts, castles, ruins, and so on. I’d think, I’ll have that one day, and build it just as I like. A great house in a great city with towers and treasure rooms, and every comfort I could devise.”
With a smile, he poured the wine. “Sometimes, in more fanciful moods, it might have run to moats and drawbridges as well.”
He brought her the wine, tapped his glass to hers. “But you asked is it Irish, this house. When I began to build it, I had—or thought I had—left Ireland behind me. So much of my life there had been brutal, even bloody. I felt no ties there—so I believed. And yet, this house I built springs from those books, those dreams, those needs and ambitions. It comes from Ireland, and so do I.
“Summerset was right. It matters who and what we come from.”
He felt her stiffen, saw her eyes go flat.
“It matters, Eve, that you came from monsters. Matters,” he continued, gripping her chin in his hand, “because, coming from them, you chose to make yourself into a woman who hunts the monsters. Not for vengeance, as would surely have been my choice, but for justice. I built a house. You built a hero.”
“I built a cop,” she corrected, relaxing again. “Had some help there, same as you. And you don’t give me hours of your time on an investigation for vengeance. If we don’t always toe the same line on justice, we do on truth. And you work with me for truth.”
His eyes stayed warm on hers as he skimmed his thumb over the shallow dent in her chin. “It wouldn’t have been my choice once, but then I met you, and loved you, and things changed. Like summer in February.”
Another truth, she knew, and it touched her, but she poked a finger in his belly. “Making it sound poetic doesn’t change how it’s screwed up.”
“And yet.” He kissed her. “We have pie.”
“That’s a bonus. But I need to get things set up before any pie.”
“And I need to check on some matters, as I left the work abruptly. Once I do, and you do as well, it’s my fondest wish—next to apple pie—to dip my fingers into the victim’s financials.”
“Always happy to grant those wishes.”
“I’ll come work on the auxiliary when I’m done with my own.”
On his way to his adjoining office, he ordered the fireplace on medium flame.
Another jolt. She had a fireplace in her office.
Mentally rubbing her hands together, she headed for the kickingest of kick-ass command centers.
Though she still had some trouble with the more advanced tech, she managed, generating what she needed from notes, her recording, official data, and carefully built her murder board, her murder book.
And completed the report she’d begun in the car.
She sent copies to her partner, her commander, and, after a moment’s thought, to Mira. As straightforward as this case seemed, it never hurt to have the department’s shrink and top profiler cued in.
When Roarke came back, she sat, boots up on her desk, still nursing the same glass of wine, watching the last moments of Mars’s life on the wall screen while the cat stretched out, full-length, on a curve of the command counter.
Roarke stood, slipped his hands in his pockets, studied as she did.
“Take another look,” she said to Roarke. “I’m looking for any sign the killer hung around. A lot of satisfaction to be gained by watching your target go down. I looked, and didn’t find a discarded weapon, but the sweepers’ report isn’t in yet. So I might have missed it.”
“Unlikely.”
“Unlikely’s not impossible. Computer, replay, half speed.”
Roarke saw several glasses shatter on the floor, the waiter Eve had interviewed wobbling as he tried to balance the tray and more glasses fell.
The image jerked—Eve leaping up, he thought.
He heard a laugh cut off in midstream, and the first screams. A man at a table shoved up, knocking his chair over. A woman standing at the bar glanced over, dropped her own glass, and lurched backward.
Larinda Mars, her right arm a sleeve of blood, continued her sleepwalker’s shuffle into the bar, her pupils so dilated her eyes read black. The image bobbled as Eve rushed toward the dying woman.
In the periphery, people froze. Some dropped to the ground, some started forward as if to try to assist, others moved away.
The screen began to fill with Mars as Eve rushed closer: the red blood flowing out against the bold pink, the mouth—yes, freshly dyed—slack, the eyes already sightless.
The sounds continued—panic, fear, confusion—as Eve’s hands and arms showed on screen, grabbing on as Mars collapsed.
“
Nobody sticks out,” she said.
“You do. The glasses hadn’t finished hitting the floor when you hit record,” he pointed out. “You reached her in under five seconds. That’s excellent reaction time, even for a cop, and I’d venture to say whoever killed her didn’t expect to have a cop in the bar, one who’d react so quickly, who’d engage her recorder.”
He ordered the recording to run again, studied the bystanders as he knew she had.
“No, nobody else stands out within recorder view. Still, it’s possible the killer might have strolled back up to the bar, ordered another drink to enjoy while someone discovered her body, or she managed to do what she did and come upstairs again. But if so, he or she didn’t show any reaction but the expected. Or weren’t visible on the recording.”
“Agreed. Computer, display exterior security feed, Du Vin, as previously cued.”
Acknowledged.
“This is where I lean,” Eve told him as they watched a group of five depart. “This is just two minutes and change before Mars bumped the waiter on her way back into the bar. Under three before TOD. I’ll get better numbers from Morris tomorrow, but the doctor who assisted, and DeWinter, say with a wound like that she could have lived for maybe four to twelve minutes without treatment. I’m thinking closer to the four from the amount of blood she lost on the way up. So, less than three minutes before TOD he walks out. Give the killer three minutes to slice, to react, to exit the bathroom, get upstairs, walk out.”
“I expect you timed that yourself.”
“At a couple speeds,” she confirmed. “Plenty of time. More than enough time. This group strikes me more than the others we have because it’s off-balance: three males, two females. The best way to get out without raising much notice on a search like this? A group.”
Roarke studied the recording again. “That may be, but people do socialize in uneven numbers, and it would count as a lucky break for a group to leave just as he—as I assume you’re thinking the third male—wanted that cover.”
“We’ll find out. I’m looking at this one, too. He’d have cut it closer. Eighteen seconds before I hit record. Left alone. Then there are two females who left seventy-three seconds before record. I want to talk to Morris, and we’ll definitely talk to all of these once we ID them through bar tabs, but look at the group again. The five.”
Roarke leaned a hip on her command center, watched again.
“Female far right,” Eve said. “Her head’s turned just a little toward male second right, and his toward hers. Female center, male far left, inside shoulders close. They’re holding hands. Center female’s leaning forward a bit, her body’s turned, again a bit, toward her right, like she’s engaged with what the two on her right are doing or saying, while the male on her left … there! His head goes back, his shoulders shake a little. Like he’s laughing at something.”
“All right, yes, I see that now. And also see the third man is just a step behind them and, from this rear view at least, doesn’t appear engaged with what the other four are saying.”
“Could be he’s just the odd man out, ready to call it a night, thinking of something else. Could be a lot of things, but he’s the only one of the males wearing a hat—ski cap pulled over his hair. His shoulders are hunched, he’s wearing gloves. Yeah, yeah, it’s cold, but you can’t get hair color, you can’t get skin color. And he tacks left with them, still a couple steps behind, until they’re out of cam range. They don’t glance back at him.”
She ordered a replay, froze it. “Still … could be a female,” she mused. “This reads male from the camera angle, from the build, the type of coat, but it could be a female.”
“Dark topcoat, dark ski cap, what looks like suit pants—dark again, and good dress shoes or half boots—more masculine in style.”
“Could be female,” Eve repeated. “Reads male, but that could be deliberate. I’m going to dig into the bar tabs. You can play with the vic’s financials.”
“Wishes come true. Let’s top that off with pie. You’re in my way,” Roarke said to the cat, who turned his head, blinked his bicolored eyes, and seemed disinclined to move.
To solve the issue, Roarke hefted him, carted him to the sleep chair. Galahad rolled over, stretched, then curled up to take a nap.
By the time Roarke had stripped off his tie and suit jacket, Eve had two slices of warm apple pie, topped with vanilla ice cream, on the counter.
“I love this thing.” She took mugs of black coffee out of her command center’s mini AutoChef. “Frigging love this thing. Computer, list receipts provided by Du Vin from eighteen hundred to eighteen-forty-three. Not going to pay the tab too long before the attack, can’t have paid it after she came in bleeding, but we’ll keep the window a bit wider.
“Oh God!”
Roarke glanced over quickly, saw her eyes closed in bliss even as she forked up more pie. “This is pie. Seriously, you need to get him to make another one before he goes on vacation. We absolutely need a backup on this. He’s got three days—well, no, two, because today’s over, essentially.”
She ate another bite, slowly now, reminding herself to savor it. “Two days, right?”
“Yes, they leave in three days, which leaves them two.”
“They? Who are they?”
“Summerset and Ivanna.”
“What? What? She’s going? They’re going on vacation together?”
“At least the Australian portion.” He sampled the pie and had to agree. There should be more.
“But … they’ll have sex.” She could actually feel the blood drain out of her head. “You know they’ll have sex. With each other. Why did you have to tell me? Why did you have to put that in my head when I’m having pie?”
“You asked about the timing, I confirmed. I didn’t say anything about sex.”
“You knew he was taking a woman he has a history with, and you didn’t think they’d have sex?”
She slapped fingers to her eye as it began to twitch.
For a moment, Roarke said nothing, then sighed. “I acknowledged the probability in some vague and distant corner of my intellect, but I didn’t actively visualize it until bloody well now, so thanks for that.”
He scowled down at his plate. “This is putting me off my pie.”
“Nothing could put me off this pie, not even Summerset sex. But, God.”
“Say no more about it. I’m deadly serious.” He pulled a leather strip out of his pocket, tied his hair back into a stub of a tail.
Letting pie and coffee soothe away the weird thoughts and images, Eve began to pick through the bar receipts.
In her designated time frame she found only one cash payment, and the itemized receipt management provided listed.
Two mineral waters, the first according to the time stamp ordered four minutes after Mars placed her drink order.
Just water, she thought. No caffeine to make you jumpy, no alcohol to slow your reaction times. Two waters, and a serving of spiced almonds. Just enough to hold a table for one without causing any interest.
She culled through, found what had to be the group of four. Eight drinks, two fancy appetizers—group size. She ran the name on the credit card.
Jonah R. Ongar
She ran him, sat back, drumming her fingers on the counter. After printing out ID shots, she rose, walked to her board to add them.
“You have something?” Roarke asked her.
“Two of the four—and it was a group of four. Four types of drinks times two orders of same. This one paid for the table, so we’ll have a talk. Ongar is thirty-two, single, no marriages on record, currently cohabbed with Cheyenne Case, thirty-one, mixed race—who I’m betting was one of the four at the table. She’s city government, works in procurement. He’s one of the legal team for the New York Times. No major criminal bumps on either. She’s been arrested a few times in protests, and he’s got a D and D that’s a decade old—and just happened to come down on his twenty-first birthday. They live downtown, about six bloc
ks from the bar.”
Eve sat, studied the new faces on her board. “I’ll talk to them tomorrow. And I’ve got this guy.” She ordered another printout. “The single walk out, according to the credit receipt. I also have a wit statement from the guy he was drinking with. Business associates, discussing a mutual project over drinks. The wit stayed back to take a ’link tag that came through just as they were about to leave. Associate had another meet—wit states this—so went on his way. Wit took the tag, a personal one from his sister, which we’ll confirm easily enough. They look clear to me, but we’ll check them.”
Still, she added them to the board.
“The two women who left together?”
“Mallie Baxter paid—they each had one drink and the straw things DeWinter likes. Mixed-race female, age twenty-six, one former cohab, no marriages. Assistant manager at some downtown boutique. No criminal. Again, looks clear, but we could have a partnership. One covers the bar area, one follows her down, does the job.”
“The third man in the group of five?”
“Paid cash—the only one who paid cash in the time period I set up. Two mineral waters and some fancy nuts. First water order minutes after Mars ordered her drink. I get a time stamp on his cash payment, six minutes, twelve seconds before I engaged my recorder. I need to know who served him the drinks, get a description.”
“Put up the receipt.”
Eve called it up on screen.
“He ordered and paid through the menu app—that’s the clever way to do this,” Roarke told her. “Minimal contact with waitstaff.”
“How can you tell?”
“There’s a code for it on the receipt. And for the section as well. Give me a minute.”
He did something on the computer, waited a beat. “I’ve got the section here and, according to the schedule, Cesca Garlini had it tonight.”
“She waited on us. He was in the same section.”
“On screen,” Roarke ordered, and the table layout for the bar flashed on. “Where were you?”