J. Robb - Kindred In Death

“Which may have been part of her appeal to him,” Eve said. “She’d make a challenge. He knew enough about her at the setup meeting. He’d already done or at least started research on her. He knew her father was a cop when he staged the meet-cute. Knew her tastes. Shy boy, awkward boy, gentle boy.”

“Specifically her then.” Peabody frowned. “So why was it a good question?”

“Because we can’t rule out the other option. I’m going to drop you off at the next pal’s, leave that one to you. I think Jo was being straight when she said nobody else knew about this guy-but we’ll cross the Ts. When you finish interviewing the friends, head down to Central. I’ll book a conference room. I want EDD to come in with a prelim report asap.

“They went for walks,” Eve murmured, thinking of what Jo had said. “You can bet he didn’t walk with her in her own neighborhood. Nowhere they’d be likely to run into someone who knew her. To vids, where it’s dark. Keep it all a secret. It’s more romantic, and I’m ashamed of my minor transgression. I’m shy. A few weeks, Jo said. A long time to play out the string. Patient bastard.”

“Young, if he’s really nineteen.”

“Maybe he is, or maybe he knows how to look nineteen.” She swung to the curb. “We’ll run like crimes. I’ll start on that after I go by the morgue.”

“Tell Morris… well, just tell him welcome back.” Peabody climbed out.

Hell of a welcome, Eve thought, but bulled her way back into traffic. The barricades, the swarms of pedestrians trooping toward Fifth for the parade, the seas of entrepreneurs with carts and wheeled cases loaded with souvenirs jammed the streets and sidewalks.

Within blocks her bulling slowed to inching. She narrowed her eyes at the throng of tourists and locals forming impenetrable walls-and thought if she saw one more person sporting a peace sign or waving a flower flag, she might just pull her weapon and give them one good zap.

I’ve got your peace right here, she thought.

She glanced at the time, blew out a breath, then used her dash ’link to contact Roarke.

“Lieutenant. I take it this isn’t to let me know you’re on your way home.”

“No. I’m fighting through freaking Peace Day mayhem. If these people want peace, why the hell don’t they stay home?”

“Because they want to share goodwill with their fellow man?”

“Bullshit. Because they want to get drunk and cop feels in the crowd.”

“There is that. Where are you heading?”

“The morgue. It’s a bad one.”

“I’m sorry. Can you tell me?”

“Sixteen-year-old daughter of a decorated cop, one who recently earned his captain’s bars. Rape-murder, in her home. Her parents found the body this morning when they returned from a weekend holiday.”

“I’m very sorry.” Those intense blue eyes searched her face looking, she knew, for cracks.

“I’m fine.”

“All right. Is there anything I can do?”

You just did it, she thought, by asking. “I’m trying to fit the pieces together. One of them is Jamie.”

“Jamie? How?”

“They were friends.”

“Surely you don’t think-”

“No, I don’t think. I’ll check out his alibi simply because I don’t want to leave any blanks, but he’s not a suspect. She had a secret boyfriend-one it’s looking like targeted her, laid all the groundwork. I’m on my way to the morgue to see if some of the pieces in my head fit the evidence. After that, I’m hitting the lab.”

She saw a minute break in traffic, gunned it, flipped her vertical, soared over-she loved this new ride-and swung west.

“I asked Whitney to order Morris in today. Then I’m convening a briefing at Central. We need to run like crimes, go through the electronics, start a sweep on her areas of interest, so-”

“I believe I’ll come down and watch you work.”

“Look-”

“I can stay out of the way if that’s what you want. But you won’t keep Jamie out. I may be some help there. You’ve said her parents-one a police captain-returned home to find her dead. But you don’t mention security discs or the system. One assumes a veteran cop would take all necessary means, including strong security, to protect his family. There’s some e-work here.”

“That’s Feeney’s aegis.”

“I’ll be contacting him then.”

Knew you would. “Wouldn’t you like a nice quiet Sunday at home?”

“I would, if I had my wife here. But she’s having a different sort of day.”

“Suit yourself. Question. Why didn’t you tell me you were supplementing Jamie’s scholarship?”

“Busted.” He looked mildly disconcerted.

“It’s not a crime.”

“Well now I’m not altogether sure, as you’d see it as a bribe, wouldn’t you, to lure him into one of my companies?”

“Isn’t it?”

“Damn right, and a fine one, too. But the boy’s determined to be a cop. If he’s still of that mind when he’s finished at university, your gain is my loss. He’s bloody brilliant.”

“As good as you?”

Those wild blue eyes sparkled. “No, but a good deal more honest. I’ll see you at Central.”

“Don’t take Fifth. Jesus! I wish you could see this. There’s some asshole dressed like a peace sign. He’s a big yellow circle, with naked limbs. People are so damn weird. I’ll see you later.”

She’d known he’d come, just as she’d come to know how useful it was to have a thief-former-help analyze the bypassing of locks and codes.

Deena might have given her killer the passcode for the control room, if she’d had it. But if he’d shut down the cameras, wiped the hard drive, accessed the discs, he’d needed more than the code. He’d needed excellent e-skills.

And there her thief-former-was unsurpassed.

“Bloody brilliant,” she muttered, using Roarke’s own term.

A skeletal holiday shift manned the morgue, and those who remained behind to deal with the dead wore colorful shorts under lab coats. Music danced jauntily out of offices and cutting rooms.

She doubted the residents cared overmuch one way or the other.

She paused long enough to scowl at Vending. She wanted a tube of Pepsi, and didn’t want any bullshit from the damn machine.

“You!” She jabbed a finger at a passing tech, and the gesture had his face going as white as his bony legs. “Two tubes of Pepsi.” She pushed credits at him.

“Sure, okay.” Dutifully, he plugged them in, made her request. Even as the tubes plopped into the slot, and the machine began the soft drink’s current jingle, Eve snatched them out.

“Thanks.” She strode away.

The first sip was shockingly cold, and exactly what she was after. She continued down the white tunnel, chased by the echo of her own boots and the sticky hints of death that clung to the air under the blasts of citrus and disinfectant wafting out of the vents.

She paused outside the double doors of the autopsy suite not to brace herself to face that death, but the man who studied it.

She drew a breath, pushed through the doors.

There he was, looking the same.

He wore a clear protective coat over a suit of moonless night black. He’d paired it with a shirt of rich gold, and a needle-thin tie where both colors wove together. She frowned at the silver peace sign pinned to his lapel, but had to admit on Morris it worked.

His ink-black hair drew back from his exotic face in a single, gleaming braid.

He stood over the dead girl he’d already opened with his precise, almost artistic Y cut.

When his dark eyes lifted to Eve’s, she felt her belly tighten.

He looked the same, but was he?

“I guess this is a crappy welcome back.” She crossed over, offered the second tube. “Sorry I had to pull you in early, and on a holiday.”