by J. D. Robb
“It wasn’t like that! It wasn’t like that at all! I was going to tell you, Tash, I was just about to tell you, but then they came in. It was just one time. Well, two times, but on the same day. And it was weeks ago. Weeks and weeks.”
“I don’t think you should say any more.” Natasha put a restraining hand on her sister’s arm. “I don’t think my sister should say any more without legal representation.”
“That’s her choice. We’ll need you to come with us, Mrs. Schubert, into Central for further questioning. You’re free to call in your lawyer or legal representative.”
“But I don’t want to go with you.” Her voice cracked and her big blue eyes pleaded. “I don’t want that. Lance would find out. Tash, it was just that one time. Lance and I had that big fight. You remember. And he just left on that business trip even when I was so upset. Listen. Just listen.”
She took her sister’s drink, tossed back the contents.
“I told Trey all about it, about the fight, about how Lance just left while we were mad at each other. And he could see I was really upset. He said he’d come over to the house, give me a massage, help me relax and detox. So he did.”
“And sex was part of the service?” Eve asked.
“No! I never— It wasn’t supposed to be. I was upset and he was sympathetic, and caring. He even made me tea, started with some Reiki just to help me find my center, then he started the body massage and . . . it just sort of happened.”
“Twice?” Natasha said crisply.
“Yes. It was just . . . I was so relaxed, just drifting. I never felt so loose, and it was all so warm, and smelled so good with the incense.”
“Incense,” Eve murmured.
“And the tea was so nice.”
“What kind of tea?” Eve asked.
“Herbal tea. A special blend.”
“I bet. Mrs. Schubert. Martella. Look at me. Did you intend to sleep with Trey? Was it your intention or did you consider having sex with him before that incident?”
“No. No. I mean, he’s really great-looking, and that body is amazing. But no, I swear. I never even thought about it. I love my husband, I really, really do. It’s just I was so tense and upset, and he—Trey—didn’t have any openings for a massage or detox during working hours. He was doing me a favor by coming over, making a personal visit.”
“For how much?”
“Two thousand, but it was an in-home, personal treatment. Afterward, I got upset again. I’d cheated on my husband, but Trey said it wasn’t like that. It was just finding my balance, opening up and letting out the negative feelings, embracing the positive. Being all clear again, I could understand how much I loved Lance. And he was right. But Lance, he wouldn’t understand.”
“How much did you give him to be . . . discreet.”
“I added a thousand dollars as a personal thank-you, and we agreed we’d never think about it or speak about it. And I really didn’t, speak about it.”
“Did he ever offer you the tea again? Before or after that incident?”
“No. I don’t get massages from him anymore. It didn’t seem right. I didn’t want to—I just didn’t want him to touch me again, remind me. I get massages from Trudy at the club now. And I . . .” She flicked away a tear. “I was going to switch to Gwen for training. I just hadn’t figured out how to do it without making everyone upset.”
“Who initiated the sex?” Eve asked.
“God. I did. I’m so ashamed. It was my fault. All my fault.”
“You initiated—after you drank the tea? After you were on the table, and he’d lit the incense?”
“Yes. I just felt so drifty, and so . . . needy. It’s terrible.”
“What are you implying. Do you think he gave her something?” Natasha gripped her sister’s hand. “Do you think he gave Tella some sort of drug?”
“He’d never do that. He was only trying to help me. He did help me. Please.” She held out both hands to Eve. “Please, I don’t want Lance to know. He wouldn’t understand.”
“What you tell your husband’s up to you,” Eve said. “Where were you between five and seven last night?”
“I was with Tilly. We were at the salon. We were at Ultra You. We had the works done. Hair, nails, facials, body treatments. All for Tash’s and JJ’s big party last night. I was at the salon with Tilly from one until seven. We had the full-bliss package.”
Six hours in a salon sounded like the full-torture package to Eve. “I need your friend’s full name and contact, and the name of your technicians.”
The streetlights had flickered on while they’d been inside the Quigley brownstone. She’d started the day in the dark, Eve thought, and would end it the same way.
“You think he slipped her something.” As she opened the car door, Peabody glanced back toward the house. “So do I.”
“I’m leaning that way, and leaning toward whatever it was he’d packed in the suitcase. Tea.” Eve got in the car, drummed her fingers on the wheel. “Something in the tea, and he decides to take a supply with him to the seminar. Either he had a target there, or he’d pick one that struck his fucking fancy.”
“And he targeted Martella Schubert because she was rich, attractive, vulnerable. And she trusted him,” Peabody added. “She felt safe with him.”
“Easier to roofie the trusting. She just blurted it all out,” Eve added. “If it went the way she says, he went to her home a couple weeks ago. The odds of us finding that out were slim, but she blurted it out.”
“I’d say she’s lousy at keeping secrets, but she kept this one from her husband.”
Eve edged out into the street. “Maybe she did, or maybe he found out, went over to Trey’s, and bashed him in the head with a trophy. If she kept it zipped, it’s because she convinced herself it was some Zen thing instead of cheating. I need to get a better sense of who she is, but my initial take is not so much dumb as gullible. She’s led a privileged lifestyle—the Quigleys come from money—and she married money. She took her husband’s name. That’s a bit old-fashioned, so I’m gauging her a romantic. Again, if it went as she said, Ziegler opened her up. He played the sympathetic ear, offered her a service—not sex. A service. And he comes with tea and incense.”
“It changes things—adds additional motive, and maybe suspects. With some luck the lab can analyze the hair strands you talked her into giving us.”
“If her timing’s true, and it’s only been a couple weeks, they can find Rohypnol or one of the compounds in the hair. Either way, we’ll know more when we get the results of the stuff in the baggie, the stuff in the locker. I should’ve put a rush on that.”
“It looked like tea in the baggie and it looks like incense cones in the locker. Fussy, but not especially weird for somebody to take their own tea on a trip. Not weird to find incense cones in a locker at a fitness club with massage services.”
“Maybe not.” Still she regretted tagging them low priority.
“But why would he do it?” Peabody wondered. “He had a girlfriend, another one ready to jump, and from what we’re hearing plenty of action from clients anyway. Why dose one to get some? She’d’ve paid him the money for the straight massage and sympathy.”
“Conquest. Ego. Practice—bigger pay when you add the ‘please be discreet’ money. Who the hell knows what goes on in the head of somebody so in love with his own dick? I’m betting he figured he was doing her a favor.”
Considering, Eve took a corner. “I’ll drop you home.”
“You will?”
“It’s on the way, basically.” And, she remembered, Peabody began and ended her day in the dark, too. “Check the alibi. It’s going to hold, but check it through.”
“It’s Trina’s salon. I can tag her, get the full skinny.”
“Yeah, you do that.”
“It’s a wonder he didn’t tap the si
ster. She’s just his type, right? Just into her forties, plenty of money, really attractive.”
“Who says he didn’t?”
“Well, she did.” But now Peabody’s eyebrows drew together. “But yeah, she strikes as a better liar than little sister.”
“We’ll see. And we’ll run through the rest of the client list tomorrow. Martella Schubert’s not going to be the only one he dosed, if he dosed her. We can start working that angle.”
“He’s our dead guy,” Peabody said, “but I really hate when they’re fuckheads.”
“Being a fuckhead’s a good reason to punch somebody in the face, not to cave in their skull.”
“Still, I wish he’d been a nice guy. On the other hand, then he’d be a dead nice guy, and you’d have to feel bad. So maybe being a fuckhead’s better.”
“Just check the alibi, Peabody.” Eve pulled over to the curb.
“On it. Thanks for the lift. Hey, look at that hoodie!”
She pointed to a sidewalk stall and the virulent orange hooded sweatshirt with an animated hula dancer plastered over the front.
“That’s just perfect for McNab. A little from-Santa present.”
“Does he know Santa doesn’t exist?”
“Santa exists in the hearts of all true believers.” Face aglow, Peabody patted her own. “Can I borrow fifty bucks?”
“What?”
“I’m short until payday.”
“You’re short every day.”
“Ho, ho, ho. Financially, in this case. Please? He’d really love that hoodie.”
“Christ. Santa Claus and hula dancers,” Eve muttered as she dug into her pockets.
“Oh, there’s one with a gyrating Elvis in a Santa hat! How much fun is that!”
“Elvis has been dead a hundred years. How is it fun to have a dead man gyrating on your chest?”
“Elvis never dies, just like Santa. No, it’s the hula girl. Except—”
Eve shoved money at Peabody. “Go, buy McNab a ridiculous hoodie. Get out of my car.”
“Fun! Shopping! Bye!”
Eve pulled out, flicked a glance in the rearview. And saw Peabody doing a happy little bounce in front of dancing, gyrating hoodies.
Merry Christmas.
But it got her thinking, made her curse and check the time. If she only had two days, and today was practically over, when the hell was she supposed to buy stuff for people the rules somehow dictated she had to buy stuff for?
She headed uptown, took a detour. It was a little late in the day, but there was a chance she’d find a source who could wrap it all up for her—or at least some of it—quick and easy.
She drove by first, spotted the kid on his corner, manning his stall, then dealt with the insanity of parking.
She had to hoof it two blocks, through the raging sea of tourists, of shoppers, of semi-sane New Yorkers just trying to get the hell home after the workday.
She studied the stall as she approached. Scarves, capes, socks, gloves, mittens, caps, hats—the kid had expanded since their last encounter.
She watched him make change, fold three scarves into a clear bag. “Have a good one.”
Then his dark eyes shifted over, met hers. His grin spread. “Yo, Dallas. What you say?”
“Yo, Tiko. Business is good.”
“Business is tight.”
He was a squirt of a thing, a kid who probably should’ve been home playing video games or sweating over math homework. But at heart, Tiko was a businessman.
“You catch any bad guys?”
“Not today, but the day’s not over. Late for you out here, isn’t it?”
“Holiday business. I got till seven-thirty. My granny’s good with that. Deke! Help that lady there. One of my employees,” Tiko told her, nodded toward a skinny kid wearing fingerless gloves and an earflap cap. “I got two.”
“Employees now?”
His eyes did an amused dance under the bright stripes of the watch cap he wore pulled low. “For the Christmas rush, sure. Got some nice scarves here. Got cotton, got wool, got cashmere, got silk blends. You can match ’em up with gloves and a cap, make a gift set.”
“Yeah. Yeah.” She stuffed her hands in her pockets. “I’ve got some girl types I need to get stuff for.”
“What kind of girl types? Friends, relations, coworkers?”
Eve huffed out a breath. “Friends, I guess. Friends.”
“Good ones? Or the kind you just gotta come up with shit for?”
She had to laugh. He knew the score.
“Good ones.”
“I’m gonna take you to my associate.”
“Your associate?”
“Yeah. Deke, Manny! You mind the store now, and don’t screw around. You come on with me.” He took Eve’s hand, marched her to the corner. “You remember that shop you busted last time? I told you about how they were bad guys, and you came and took them down?”
“Yeah. Street thieves, identify theft racket.”
“Got a new business in that shop now. Mom-and-pop deal. They’re good people. They’re going to fix you right up.”
“Are they?” Willing to try if it finished this shopping crap once and for all, she crossed the street with him.
“True. Give you a good deal, too, since you’re with me.”
He zigged, he zagged his way through the crowds, then zipped into the long, narrow store.
“Hey, Pop!”
The man, probably no more than thirty-five, used a long hook to reach the strap of one of what looked like a half million bags. He snagged it off the wall, lowered it, offered it to the waiting customer.
Then smiled at Tiko. “Hey, Tiko!”
“Hey, Mom.”
The woman, back at the counter, folded and fluffed tissue into a shopping bag. “Tiko!”
Young for the mom-and-pop label, Eve thought. They looked entirely too relaxed and happy to be New York City merchants. And neither wore black.
“Happy holidays,” the woman said as she gave her customer the shopping bag. “You come back and see us.”
Tiko dragged Eve straight back. “This is Dallas. She’s the cop who cleared this place out so you could rent it.”
“Oh, Lieutenant Dallas. Tiko’s told us all about you. I’m Astrid.” She offered a hand. “It’s great to finally meet you.”
“Dallas, she needs presents for some girlfriends. How many friends you got?”
“Crap. I need something for . . . I guess there’s five I need to take care of.”
“Let me just . . . Ben, this is Tiko’s Lieutenant Dallas.”
“No kidding? Great to meet you. If you’ll excuse me a minute, I’ll be right with you.”
“Do you see anything you like?” Astrid asked Eve.
“I don’t know.” There were bags, with straps, without straps, satchels and cases, tiny little purses that would be absolutely useless, enormous ones that could hold a room of furniture. “I don’t get this stuff.”
“Ladies like bags. Don’t you got bags?” Tiko demanded.
“I have pockets. I have a field kit. I’ve got a file bag when I need it.” And she had the dozens of girlie bags that found their way into her closet along with the dozens of shoes, the forest of clothes.
Her husband definitely got that stuff.
“Why don’t you pick one of the five,” Astrid suggested. “Tell me a little about her.”
“Ah. Okay, elegant, classy, not rigid or stuffy, but classy. Mostly goes for soft colors, but can surprise you. Everything always goes together like she worked it out on a program first. Professional, smart. Kind.”
“I like her already. I’ve got something in the back that just came in. I think it might work.”
“Told you they’d take care of you,” Tiko said when Astrid hurried off.
&n
bsp; “The stuff in the back isn’t hot, is it?”
Insult covered his face. “What you think? These are good guys.”
“Okay, okay. Shopping makes me twitchy. Why is there so much of everything?”
“So not everybody has the same.”
Astrid came back with a box, slipped out the long, narrow bag. “I only ordered a few of these, just to see how we did. They’re hand-painted. Really special, I thought.”
“Ah.” Eve studied it. Smooth, a little silky, with a pastel garden of flowers and a jeweled butterfly as a clasp.
“Since they’re hand-painted, they’re one of a kind.”
“I guess she is, too,” Eve said, thinking of Mira. “I think she’d go for it.”
“I got a nice silk scarf that color pink.” Tiko tapped one of the flowers. “You fluff it up inside the purse, and you got class, like you want.”
Eve eyed him. “Sold. Moving on. Now I’ve got one who’s out there. Nothing’s too much, too wild, too anything. Color, bright, changeable, bouncy. Oh, and she’s got a kid. A girl kid, not quite a year old.”
“Oh, I’ve got it.” Astrid clapped her hands together. “We have these great mother-daughter bags. Just so much fun. Practical, too, as they’ll convert from shoulder bags to handbags to backpacks.”
Astrid pointed up.
Eve spotted an explosion of bright colors, big bag, small bag, hooked together. And a pair with a sparkly unicorn dancing over each.
“Oh yeah, that’s Mavis and Bella. The unicorn set.”
“Let me get the hook.”
While Astrid did just that, Eve looked down at Tiko. “I bet you’ve got a scarf that’ll go with it.”
“I got a scarf for the mama be perfect, and I got a baby girl cap, a pink one shaped like that horse with the horn.”
“Jesus, Tiko, you’re killing me. Sold.”
Forty minutes after she’d parked, Eve loaded shopping bags in her car, then got behind the wheel.
Then just sat there until her head stopped spinning.
God, she wanted a drink. Two drinks.
Telling herself to be grateful Christmas only hit once a year, she pulled back into traffic and fought the holiday rage of it all the way to the gates of home.