J. Robb - Conspiracy in Death

Bargain hunters braved the frigid temperatures and shivered on people glides as they went about their business. It was a bad time for pickpockets and scam artists. No one stood still long enough to be robbed or conned.

Still, she spotted a three-card monte game and more than one sneak thief on airskates.

If you wanted something badly enough, she mused, a little inconvenience wouldn't stop you.

Routine, she thought. It was all a routine, the grifters and the muggers and the purse grabbers had theirs. And the public knew they were there and simply hoped they could avoid contact.

And the sidewalk sleepers had theirs. They would shiver and suffer through the winter and hope to evade the lick of death that came with subzero temperatures while it lapped at their cribs.

No one paid much attention if they were successful or not. Is that what he'd counted on? That no one would pay much attention? Neither of her victims had had close family to ask questions and make demands. No friends, no lovers.

She hadn't heard a single report on the recent killing on any of the news and information channels. It didn't make interesting copy, she supposed. It didn't bump ratings.

And she smiled to herself, wondering how Nadine Furst would feel about the offer of a one-on-one exclusive. Munching on a fry, she put a call through to the reporter.

"Furst. Make it fast and make it good. I'm on air in ten."

"Want a one-on-one, Nadine?"

"Dallas." Nadine's foxy face glowed with a smile. "What do I have to do for it?"

"Just your job. I've got a homicide – sidewalk sleeper – "

"Hold it. No good. We did a feature last month on sleepers. They freeze, they get sliced. We do our public interest bit twice a year. It's too soon for another."

"This one got sliced – sliced open, then his heart was removed and taken from the scene."

"Well that's a happy thought. If you're working a cult angle, we did a feature in that area in October for Halloween. My producer's not going to go for another. Not for a sleeper. Now, a feature on you and Roarke, on what it's like inside your marriage, that I could run with."

"Inside my marriage is my business, Nadine. I've got a retired LC who ran ponies. She was sliced open a couple of months back. Somebody took her kidneys."

The slight irritation in Nadine's eyes cleared, and they sharpened. "Connected?"

"Do your job," Eve suggested. "Then call my office and ask me that question again."

She disengaged and shifted the car back to manual.

"That was pretty slick, Dallas."

"She'll dig up more in an hour than six research droids could in a week. Then she'll call and ask me for an official statement and interview. Being a cooperative kind of woman, I'll give it to her."

"You ought to make her jump through a few hoops, just to keep up tradition."

"Yeah, but I'll keep the hoops wide and I'll keep them low. Put us back on log, Peabody. We're going to check out Spindler's place, and I want it on record. If anybody has any doubt the connection's been made, I want them to know it has. I want them to start to sweat."

The crime scene had been cleared weeks before, but Eve wasn't looking for physical evidence. She wanted impressions, the lay of the land, and hopefully, a conversation or two.

Spindler had lived in one of the quick-fix buildings that had been tossed up to replace those that had crumbled or been destroyed around the time of the Urban Wars.

The plan had been for fast, temporary housing to be replaced by more solid and aesthetically pleasing structures within the decade, but several decades later, several of the ugly, sheer-sided metal buildings remained in place.

A street artist had had a marvelous time spray painting naked couples in various stages of copulation over the dull gray surface. Eve decided his style and perspective were excellent, as was his sense of place. This particular building housed the majority of street LCs in that area.

There was no outside security camera, no palm plate. If there had ever been such niceties in place, they had long ago been looted or vandalized.

She walked into a cramped, windowless foyer that held a line of scarred mailboxes and a single elevator that was padlocked.

"She had 4C," Peabody said, anticipating Eve, then looked at the stained stairwell with its swaybacked treads. "I guess we walk up."

"You'll work off your lunch."

Someone had turned their choice of music entertainment up to a scream. The nasty sound of it echoed down the staircase and deafened the ears on the first-floor landing. Still, it was better than the sounds of huffing and puffing they heard through one of the thin doors on the second floor. Some lucky LC was earning her fee, Eve imagined as she headed up.

"I guess we can deduce that soundproofing isn't one of the amenities of this charming little unit," Peabody commented.

"I doubt the tenants give a damn." Eve stopped in front of 4C, knocked. Street hookers worked twenty-four / seven, but usually in shifts. She thought someone would be around, and unemployed.

"I'm not working till sundown," came the response. "So blow off."

In answer, Eve held her badge up to the security peep. "Police. I want to talk to you."

"My license is up to date. You can't hassle me."

"Open the door, or you'll see just how fast I can hassle you."

There was a mutter, curse, the rattle of locks. The door opened a slit and a single bloodshot brown eye peered out. "What? I'm not on for hours, and I'm trying to get some sleep here."

From the look in that single eye, she'd been getting that sleep with a little chemical aid. "How long have you lived in this apartment?"

"A few weeks. So the fuck what?"

"Before that?"

"Across the hall. Look, I got my license, my health checks. I'm solid."

"Were you one of Spindler's?"

"Yeah." The door opened another fraction. The other eye and a hard mouth appeared. "So the fuck what?"

"You got a name?"

"Mandy. So the – "

"Yeah, I got that part. Open up, Mandy, I need to ask you some questions about your former boss."

"She's dead. Been dead. Those're the only answers I got." But she opened the door. Her hair was short and spiked. Easier, Eve imagined, for her to don one of the many wigs street LCs liked to play with. She was probably no more than thirty, but looked ten years older if you went by the face.

Whatever profit Mandy made obviously went into her body, which was lush and curved, with huge, uptilted breasts that strained against the thin material of a dingy pink robe.

It was, Eve decided, the right investment for a woman in her field. Johns rarely looked at the face.

Eve stepped inside and noted that the living area had been converted so that it accommodated both ends of the business. A curtain was drawn down the center, cutting the room in two. In one half were two beds on casters with rates and services clearly posted on a board between them.

The other half held a computer, a tele-link system, and a single chair.

"Did you take over Spindler's business?"

"Four of us got together to do it. We figured, hell, somebody's got to run the stables, and if it's us, we can cut back on street time." She smiled a little. "Be like, executives. Trolling for Johns in the winter's murder."

"I just bet. Were you around the night Spindler was killed?"

"I figure I was around – in and out, you know, depending. I remember business was pretty good." She took the single chair, stretched out her legs. "Wasn't so freaking cold."

"You got your book handy?"

Mandy's eyes went sulky. "You got no need to poke into my books. I'm being straight."

"Then tell me what you know, where you were. You remember," Eve said before Mandy could deny it. "Even in this kind of flop, you don't get your boss carved open on a nightly basis."