Nora Roberts - Remember When

She was barely five feet in height, with a chunky build and a face of wide planes. Her skin was the color of roasted chestnuts, and her one good feature-in Eve's opinion-was her hands. They looked as though they could play a mean piano, and were, in fact, greatly skilled at carving cadavers.

Eve jerked her chin at the draped form on an exam table. "That one mine?"

"If you mean is that the remains of the victim of your current investigation, yes, it is."

Duluc's voice always sounded to Eve's ear as if she had a bubble of thick liquid stuck in her throat. As she spoke she washed her hands in a sink. "I told you I'd send through my findings as soon as possible. I don't like being hounded, Lieutenant."

"You get the tox screen?"

Duluc stared at her. "Do you have a particular problem understanding me?"

"No, I understand you just fine. You're stringing me because you're pissed I jumped on you this morning. You're going to have to get over it because she doesn't care we're irritated with each other." She moved toward Andrea. "She just wants us to deal, so we're going to deal."

"Your on-scene was accurate, as far as cause of death. The single throat wound. A keen, smooth-edged blade. Stiletto perhaps. There are no defensive wounds, no other indications of violence. There was no sexual assault or recent sexual activity. Her blood-alcohol was a bit high. I'd estimate she had four vodka martinis with olives. No illegals on the tox. Her last meal was a salad, leafy greens with a lemon dressing, consumed approximately five hours premortem."

"Do you concur that the attacker was behind the victim?"

"From the angle of the wound, yes. Given her height, I'd say he or she is about six feet tall. Average enough for a man, tall for a woman. All of which will be in my official report, delivered to you in the proper fashion. This is not a priority case, Lieutenant, and we are extremely busy."

"They're all priorities. You've got a Jane Doe. Crispy critter, brought in from Alphabet City."

Duluc sighed heavily. "I have no burn victim on my schedule."

"It's on someone's. I need to see the body, and the data."

"Then give your case number to one of the attendants. I have other things to do."

"It's not my case."

"Then you have no need to see the body or the data."

She started to walk by, but Eve grabbed her arm. "Maybe you don't know how this works, Duluc, but I'm a lieutenant in Homicide and can damn well see any body that strikes my fancy. As it happens, Detective Baxter, who's primary, is meeting me here as I believe our respective cases may converge. Just keep pissing on me and I promise you, you'll end up drowning in it."

"I don't like your attitude."

"Wow. Media alert. I need the Jane Doe."

Duluc wrenched away and stalked over to a workstation. She keyed in, brought up data. "The unidentified female burn victim is in Section C, room three, assigned to Foster. She hasn't been examined yet. Backlog."

"You going to clear me?"

"I've done so. Now if you'll excuse me?"

"No problem." She swung back out the doors. How do all these people walk around with sticks up their asses? Eve wondered.

She turned into Section C, gave the door of room three a push and found it secured. "Shit!" She whirled, pointed to an attendant who was sitting in one of the plastic chairs in the corridor, dozing. "You. I'm cleared for this room. Why's it locked?"

"Duluc. She locks every damn thing. Surprised the vendings aren't wired with explosives." He yawned and stretched. "Dallas, right?"

"That's right."

"Getcha in. I was just catching a break. Pulling a double today. Who you coming to see?"

"Jane Doe."

"Little Jane. She's mine."

"You Foster?"

"Yeah. I just finished an unattended. Natural causes. Guy was a hundred and six, and his second ticker conked on him in his sleep. Good way to go if you gotta."

He unlocked the door, led them in. "This is not a good way," he added, gesturing to the charred bones on a table. "I thought this was Bax's case."

"It is. We may have a connected. He's on his way in."

"Okay by me. I haven't gotten to her yet."

He brought up the file, scanned it as he pulled out his protective gear.

"Didn't come in until Sunday, and I had the day off-fond, fond memory. You guys get Sundays off?"

"Now and again."

"Something about sleeping in on a Sunday morning, or sleeping off Saturday night until Sunday afternoon. But Monday always comes." He snapped on his cap.

"Been backed up since I clocked in Monday morning. Got no flag on here from Bax saying she matches a missing persons. Still little Jane Doe," he said and glanced back toward the body on the table. "No way to print her, obviously.

We'll send the dental off for a search."

"What do we know?"

He called up more data on the screen. "Female between twenty-three and twenty-five. Five feet three inches tall, a hundred and twenty pounds. That's approximate from the virtual reconstruct, which is as far as we've got. That's just prelim check-in data."

"You got time to take a look at her now?"

"Sure. Let me set up."

"Want some coffee?"

He looked at her with love. "Oh, Mommy."

Appreciating him, she waved Peabody back and went out to Vending herself.

She ordered three, black.

"Love of my life, we can't keep meeting like this."

She didn't even turn. "Bite me, Baxter."

"I do, nightly, in my dreams. I'll take one of those."

Reminding herself he'd come in at her request, she programmed for a fourth, then glanced back. "Trueheart?"

"I'll have a lemon fizz if it's all the same to you, Lieutenant. Thank you."

He looked like the lemon-fizz type with his clean-cut, boyish face. Adorable, Peabody had called him, and it wasn't possible to deny it. An all-American boy, cute as a button-whatever the hell that meant-in his summer blues.

Beside him, Baxter was slick and smooth and cagey. Good-looking, but with an edge to him. He had a fondness for a well-cut suit and a well-endowed female.

They were good cops, both of them, Eve thought. And tucking the earnest Trueheart in as the smart-ass Baxter's aide had been one of her better ideas.

"To the dead," Baxter said, and tapped his coffee cup lightly to Eve's. "What do you want with our Jane?"

"She might connect to one of mine. Foster's doing her workup right now."

"Let me help you with those, Lieutenant." Trueheart took his fizz and one of the coffees.

Eve briefed them on the way back to the exam room.

"Whether she's your maid or not, somebody wanted her dead real bad," Baxter commented. "Skull cracked, broken bones. Had to be dead, or at least blessedly unconscious, when he lit her up. He didn't kill her where he lit her. It was dump and fry. We coordinated with Missing Persons on the prelim data and came up goose egg. Been canvassing the area all day. Nobody saw anything, heard anything, knew anything. Guy who made the nine-one-one saw the fire from his window but not the source. Statement goes it was too hot to sleep, and he was going to go sit out on the fire escape. Saw the flames, called it in. Call came through at oh-three-sixteen. Fire department responded, arrived on scene at oh-three-twenty-gotta give those guys points for speed. She was still burning."

"Couldn't've lit her up too much earlier."

Foster glanced up as they came in. "Thanks, Lieutenant, just set it down over there. Hey, Bax, hanging low?"

"Low and long, baby, low and long."

Foster continued to run the scanner over the body. "Broken right index finger.

That's an old break. Early childhood. Between five and seven. Scanned the teeth already. Running them in the national bank for a match. This one? The skull injury?"

Eve nodded, stepped closer.

"You got severe trauma here. Ubiquitous blunt instrument, most likely. Bat maybe, or a pipe. Skull's fractured. She's got three broken ribs, a fractured tibia, jawbone. Somebody wailed on this girl. She was dead before he poured the gas on her. That's a blessing."