by J. D. Robb
It sickened, and somehow steadied. “If what I did was self-defense, what he did was in defense of the defenseless.”
“And can you let it go? I don’t mean legally. I mean inside you. Can you breathe out what you’ve surely been holding in since you came to know?”
“Patrick Roarke killed your mother because she was inconvenient. He nearly beat you to death. He threatened you and an innocent girl. I can’t say what Summerset did was right. But I can believe it was just.”
She walked back, sat. “I saw him in my dream, dead on the ground of an alley. With Richard Troy and Big Rod Keith.”
So now she told him all.
“I believe I know who killed Keith.”
More weight she carried, Roarke thought. “What will you do?”
“It’s not for me to judge, to decide. I believe I know who, I believe I know why. It’s possible I could prove it. But it isn’t my investigation, and unless it crosses clearly into mine, I’m not going to pursue it. That’s the gray, and I’m not altogether comfortable there, but I can live with it. I’m not sure I could live with destroying the lives of good people to walk the straight line.”
She picked up her coffee, stared into it. “If it does cross clearly, if that changes, I will pursue, and I will prove it. I can’t do otherwise. Mars is my dead, and has to get my best. Or I don’t deserve the badge.”
“You’re right, all the way down the line. Black or white or gray, you’re right.” Gently, he stroked a hand over her hair. “And I’m with you.”
As she had in the night, she shifted, pressed her face to his shoulder. He wrapped his arms around her.
“There now, we’re fine, aren’t we?”
She held on, then realized she’d done just what he’d asked. She’d breathed it out. “We’re okay.”
She lifted her face, met his lips with hers, lingered there.
When she eased back, he started to run a hand down her hair again, then his eyes narrowed.
“Oh, that’s well beyond the pale.”
At the snap in his voice she jerked a little, glanced back in time to see Galahad leap off the table, bound over to the bed, leap up, and sprawl out as though exhausted.
“What?”
“Well, he was trying to get under the warming domes, wasn’t he? Sneaking his paw under the edge.”
“For oatmeal? Seriously?”
Galahad merely rolled over, giving them his back. Switching his tail.
“There’s bacon as well.” Roarke lifted off the domes again. “So have at it.”
She thought it too bad the cat hadn’t been quicker, but doctored her oatmeal up enough that she could claim it wasn’t all that bad.
Plus, bacon.
“I’m heading out a little early,” Eve began. “I want to go by the lab, give DeWinter and team another push. I want that face. Who she was is going to be important. I need to do a quick check on your search, on the names and locations, see if we hit anything that rings.”
“We hit a few that might.”
“What? You already looked?”
“Well, since I didn’t buy Uruguay, I had a moment or two to spare.”
“Have you got a list? I need to run them. I need to—”
“Only three that hit the mark, and I transferred the results. You can look at them on screen here.”
“Why didn’t you say so before?”
“I had other things to say.”
She hissed out a breath, had to gnaw over his response. Was forced to see his point. “So we’re all fine and good, right? Let’s see what you got.”
“I’ll do just that. Eat your oatmeal.”
Eve rolled her eyes, but shoveled in more.
18
Roarke brought a half dozen names and ID shots on screen. Eve dismissed two instinctively.
“Take off the top left, bottom right.”
“Why?”
“She was vain, pretty seriously vain. I don’t see her using an ID that hits significantly older than she was. Both of those are.”
Though he wasn’t sure he agreed—clever concealment trumped vanity to his mind—he pulled the two off screen, enlarged the others.
Studying the four remaining, Eve ate her oatmeal without thinking about it. “Ditch top right.”
“Because?”
“Average looks.”
“That’s certainly scientific,” he said, but complied.
“That one, bottom right. Angela Terra. Terra’s not a planet, is it?”
“Earth.”
“A fancy name for Earth? Interesting.” She switched to bacon. “And possible. What about Juno? Carly Mae Juno.”
“Juno’s an asteroid between Mars and Jupiter.”
“Hmm. Connected to Mars, so you’d think maybe. But it’s not big enough. Important enough.”
“You could take another angle. She’s the wife of Zeus. A goddess.”
“Goddess ranks high on the scale.” Not bad, Eve thought, then reading the data, waved the bacon at the screen. “An assistant manager of a twenty-four/seven? No way Mars would settle. And that one, Brite Luna—seriously?—the proprietor of Moonstruck Life Embracing Therapy? It’s just embarrassing.”
“Which leaves you with Angela Terra. I’m not a cop,” Roarke began. “But I have some experience with alternate identification.”
“Really?” Eve’s voice was desert dry as she picked up her coffee.
“In some cases, it’s strategic to create something close to reality, and in others it’s advantageous to go in the other direction, particularly if that direction is average, quiet, something that goes unnoticed. A low-level job, an unremarkable face.”
She wondered how many he’d used—how many times he’d become someone else to slip through the fingers of authority, to outwit a competitor or enemy.
“Maybe, but I don’t figure she’s using this ID for anything but establishing another residence, maybe some financials. It’s not for traveling, for daily use,” Eve pointed out. “See there, Terra’s the president and CEO of Terra Consultants. Top dog, that’s the style. Age thirty-six, put on a red wig and fiddle with some facial enhancements, Mars could pull off that face if she had to use the ID. Height and weight are in line. And check the address? It’s just a couple blocks from Du Vin, a location she used routinely.”
“You make some points.”
“We’ll check all of them. It’s easy enough. We do runs, we knock on doors. But I start with Angela Terra.”
Eve rose, walked to her closet while Roarke brought the six images back to study them.
“Who’d be second on your list?”
“The goddess,” she called out. “Because she might have gone for, what’s it? Irony. Maybe she amused herself with the twenty-four/seven clerk. I’ll start the runs in the car on the way, have Peabody meet me at the first address.”
“You could simply contact each of these by ’link.”
“Face-to-face is better. If there’s a face to—ha—face. If we hit, one of those faces is in the morgue and unavailable for interview. Why are there so many clothes in here? It makes me clothes-blind.”
He got up, walked to where she stood in a pair of slate-gray trousers and a support tank and a look of baffled frustration. Tapping a drawer on one of the built-ins, he glanced at the contents, pulled out a sweater with a modest V-neck.
“Try this.”
She stared suspiciously. “I was working toward black.”
He tossed the aubergine cashmere to her. “Shock the world and go for a bit of color.”
“You should talk.”
“I might be wearing red boxers as we speak.”
“Yeah?” She dragged the sweater on. “Let’s see.”
Smiling, eyebrows arched, he reached for his belt buckle. “Well now, there’s plenty of room in here, isn’t there?”
“Never mind.” She stared at the line of jackets in the gray section, decided to just save time. Waved her hand at them.
Roarke stepped over,
plucked one out that had thin cuffs of leather that matched the sweater. She might have bitched, but she had that weakness for leather, and he knew it.
He strolled to the boots, lifted a pair the precise color of the sweater. Then laughed at her horrified expression.
“It was worth it. If you never wear them, it was worth having them made just for the look on your face.”
“They’re purple.”
“Aubergine,” he corrected.
“Auber my ass, those are fricking purple boots.”
“And would look very well on you, but…” He exchanged them for a pair in more acceptable murder-cop gray.
She snatched them, carried them and the jacket out to strap on her weapon harness, to fill pockets with her daily paraphernalia.
It wasn’t until she sat to pull on the boots that it struck her. “‘Made’? Made for me? You have the boots made?”
“Someone has to.”
“I mean, specifically?”
“Why wouldn’t I? My cop walks miles on any given day, and often runs after bad guys. As we already discussed, her feet are rather precious to me.”
“Precious feet,” she grumbled. “You’re a madman.” Standing, she rolled from heel to toe and back again. “I gotta go.” On impulse, she linked her arms around his neck, finished it off with a long, deep kiss. “Catch you later.”
He held her in place a moment. “Take care of my cop.”
“I’ve got the boots for it.”
She jogged downstairs, grabbed her outdoor gear, and stepped out into the sharp jaws of February.
They really needed to work on eliminating February from the calendar, she thought as she bulleted to her car—heater already running. There had to be a way; they must have the technology.
As she drove, she tagged Peabody, relayed the address. If they struck out there, they’d move to the next. It was a good angle to pursue. And she followed it up by starting a run on Angela Terra on the in-dash.
“Clean as a whistle,” she mused. “A clean, shiny whistle. Why are whistles so clean? What does that even mean?”
She didn’t realize she’d spoken out loud until the in-dash comp answered.
The phrase suggests the clean, pure sound a whistle makes. It indicates that to emit this clear sound, the tube must be clean and dry.
“Huh.” Eve pursed her lips, whistled. Let it go.
The clean-as-a-whistle Angela Terra had lived at the downtown address for seven years. The data stated she’d been born in Canton, Ohio, parents deceased, no siblings. No marriages or cohabs.
No connections, Eve thought, following the scent.
Graduated from an online university—interesting. Started the consulting business twelve years prior—with no other employment listed. Also interesting.
She pushed on to the consulting business, found absolutely zero. No data, no web page, no client list, no referrals. That wasn’t just interesting, she thought.
That was telling.
Angela Terra was bogus. The odds she wasn’t an alias for Larinda Mars were very, very slim.
“Sometimes you get lucky,” Eve noted aloud as she fought her way downtown.
She found the address—a quiet, dignified duplex. Since the residents of the neighborhood hogged all the curbside parking, she double-parked, ignoring the outraged horns. Flipping up her On Duty light, she stepped onto the sidewalk.
Sedate, she decided. The kind of sedate that took money to claim. The sort of neighborhood that ran to dog walkers and nannies, where the residents walked to their favorite restaurants and shops.
She approached the left-side entrance, walked up the short stairs to the door. Narrowed her eyes at it. Designed to look like old, rich wood, but a quick tap of the knuckles told her it was steel. A quick glance showed her high-level security. The cam, the palm plate, the double swipe, the trio of sturdy police locks.
No buzzer or bell, she noted, so knocked loud and long.
And received the expected response. None.
She walked down, and crossed to the neighboring door.
Standard door, she thought, good but standard security. And a buzzer.
She pressed it.
“Bonjour! Comment vous appelez-vous, s’il vous plaît?”
“Say what?” Eve buzzed again, holding her badge up to the scanner. “NYPSD.”
“Un moment, s’il vous plaît.”
“For Christ’s sake.” Eve leaned on the buzzer.
Finally she heard the locks thump. The door opened a couple inches with a woman in a red robe, her hair scooped up in a disordered chestnut mass on her head, peeking through the crack.
“Yes?”
Eve held her badge up again.
“Yes, the police. Is there some wrong? Something wrong?” she corrected.
English, Eve thought, heavily accented, but English.
“I have some questions about your neighbor, about Angela Terra.”
“I’m sorry. We don’t know the neighbors.”
“Could I have your name?” Eve glanced back as Peabody mounted the steps, her cheeks pink with cold. “My partner. Peabody show the woman your badge.”
“Sure. Morning,” Peabody said as she pulled out her badge.
Somewhere behind the woman a young male voice shouted out, “Maman, dépêche-toi!’
“Elles sont les officiers de police!”
That caused some rapid-fire responses Eve couldn’t interpret. “Ma’am, if we could come in for a minute. We have some questions about the individual who lives next door.”
“Yes, come in. It’s cold. We don’t know the next-door person.”
She let them in a narrow foyer where a coatrack with cubbies held various and colorful outdoor gear. The young male voice belonged to a gangly teenager with dark, fascinated eyes.
“You are police? Someone has been murdered!”
He said it with a kind of relish that had his mother—Eve assumed—giving him a look that translated in every language.
Shut up.
A girl a few years younger than the boy with flyaway blond hair and feet in pink bunny slippers ran in, with a man—a less gangly, taller version of the boy—following. Since he wore pajama pants, like the boy, and a New York City sweatshirt, Eve concluded the family hadn’t gotten a full start on their day.
“Is there a problem?” he asked in perfect English, with the charm of the accent.
“Lieutenant Dallas, Detective Peabody, NYPSD. We’re looking for information on the individual who lives next door. Angela Terra.”
“I’m sorry. We arrived only last week.”
“I like your coats very much,” the girl piped in. “I would like the long like you, but in the pink like you.”
The mother stepped back, stroked a hand over the girl’s head, and whispered something that had the kid shrugging.
“I don’t know how we can help,” the man said.
“Could we have your names?”
“Of course, excuse me. I’m Jean-Paul Laroche. My wife, Marie-Clare, our son, Julian, and our daughter, Claudette.”
“Would you like to sit?” Marie-Clare asked.
“If we could, for a minute.”
They trooped, the entire group, into a living area with colorful disorder—a couple of stuffed animals, a tossed sweater, some striped house skids—over what struck as bland furnishings.
They’d brightened them a bit with bowls and vases of flowers and some framed photos.
“We haven’t settled in.” Marie-Clare gestured to chairs. “May I offer you the coffee?”
“No, thanks. We won’t take much of your time.”
The entire family sat on the couch, looked expectantly at Eve.
“You’re moving to New York?”
“For three months,” Jean-Paul said. “I have business, and Marie-Clare has family.”
“My aunt and my cousins. It’s an opportunity to experience. The children will start school here on Monday.”
That got an eye roll from th
e boy, a wide grin from the girl.
“We have taken the house for the three months,” Jean-Paul continued. “And are having a short holiday before work and school begin.”
“Have you seen anyone next door since you arrived?”
“No.” He glanced at his family, got head shakes.
“It’s always dark,” Claudette added, “the windows.”
“Okay.” Dead end here, Eve thought. “So you found the property through your work?”
“I work for Travel Home. We are a global agency listing homes and flats for travelers who prefer this rather than a hotel, you see?”
“My cousin lives only one block,” Marie-Clare told Eve. “We can walk to see each other, and she has children close to the ages of ours. I worked with my husband’s assistant to find this house, this neighborhood. Through my husband’s business people can travel and stay in homes, a night, a year.”
“Handy,” Eve said, getting a polite, if puzzled, smile in return.
Wouldn’t it be really handy? she thought.
“The properties you—and clients—can rent belong to this Travel Home?”
“Listed with,” Jean-Paul corrected. “We take applications, you see, and screen the owners and the properties, visit them to be certain they are as they claim to be.”
“Got it. You’d probably know who owns this house.”
“I could not tell you from the top of my head, but it would be easy to find out.”
“I’d appreciate that.”
He rose. “Excuse me one moment.”
“Maybe somebody’s dead in the next door,” the boy said when his father walked out.
“I doubt it,” Eve said.
“Maybe.”
His mother sighed and patted his knee.
“I like also your boots very much,” Claudette told Peabody.
“Thanks.”
“Yours are very nice,” she added for Eve.
“They do the job.”
Jean-Paul came back in with a PPC. “The owner is Terra Consultants, and the address for the owner is next door. The property has our highest rating or I would not have brought my family into it. Is there a worry here?”
“No. No worry. We appreciate your time and your help. Enjoy your time in New York.”