Nora Roberts - Remember When

"I know him."

She looked around sharply. "You know this guy?"

"Mostly in that vague professional sense, though I've met his wife a number of times at various charity functions. His company has a solid rep, and so does he. Blue-collar him, meets blue-blood her. He does good work."

"Check the lists from the job sites you got earlier. Let's see if Whittier's got anything going in or around Alphabet City."

Roarke brought up the file, then leaned back in his chair. "I should learn not to question your instincts."

"Rehab on Avenue B. Five-story building, three sections." She pursed her lips, made a popping sound. "More than enough to take a closer look. See there, he's got a son. One son, Trevor, age twenty-nine. Let's get that image."

Roarke did the tech, and they studied Trevor Whittier's face together. "Not as close on the artist rendering as I'd like, but it's not a total bust. Let's see what else we can find out about Trevor."

"You can't do anything about him tonight. It's nearly one in the morning.

Unless you think you can build a case strong enough with this to go over and scoop him up and into a cage, you're going to bed. I'll set the computer to gather data while you get a few hours' sleep."

"I could go wake him up, hassle him." She considered. "But that would just be for fun. And it would give him a chance to whine for a lawyer. It can wait."

She pushed to her feet.

"Until morning. We'll check out this job site, see if we can nail it to the trace from Cobb's body. I need to approach Whittier and find his mother, interview her, too. They might be in on this. This Trevor feels the best to me. Smarter to wait to move on him until I have it all lined up."

"While it lines up, you lie down."

She'd have argued, but her eyes were starting to throb. "Nag, nag, nag. I'll just contact the team and tell them we're going to brief at seven hundred instead of eight."

"You can do that in the morning. It's easier, and more humane."

"Yeah, but it's more fun to do it now," she protested as he took her hand and pulled her out of the room. "This way I get to wake them up so they have to work at getting back to sleep. The other way, I just get them out of bed a little early."

"You're a mean one, Lieutenant."

"Yeah. So?"

Chapter 28

While she slept it all played in her head. Father to son, murder and greed, blood gleaming on sparkling stones. There were legacies you couldn't escape, no matter how fast or how far you ran.

She could see herself, a child, with no mother to panic or protect. No one to hide her or stand as a shield. She could see herself-she could always see herself-alone in a freezing room with the light washed red from the sign blinking, blinking, blinking from the building next door.

She could taste her fear when he came in, that bright, metallic flavor. As if there was already blood in her throat. Hot blood against the chill.

Children shouldn't fear their fathers. She knew that now, in some part of her restless brain, she knew that. But the child knew nothing but fear.

There had been no one to stop him, no one to fight for her when his hand had slashed out like a snake. No one to protect her when he'd torn at her, torn into her. There'd been no one to hear her scream, to beg him to stop.

Not again, not again. Please, please, not again.

She'd had no one to run to when the bone in her arm had snapped like a twig broken under a careless foot. She'd had only herself, and the knife.

She could feel the blood flooding over her hands, her face, and the way his body had jerked when she'd hacked that blade into his flesh. She could see herself smeared with it, coated with it, dripping with it, like an animal at the kill. And even in sleep, she knew the madness of that animal, the utter lack of humanity.

The sounds she made were vile. Even after he was dead, the sounds she made were vile.

She struggled, jabbing, jabbing, jabbing.

"Come back. Oh God, baby, come back."

Panic and protection. Someone to hear, to help. Through the madness of memory, she heard Roarke's voice, scented him and curled up tight in the arms he'd wrapped around her.

"Can't." Couldn't shake it off. There was so much blood.

"We're here. We're both right here. I've got you." He pressed his lips to her hair, her cheek. "Let it go, Eve. Let it go now."

"I'm cold. I'm so cold."

He rubbed his hands over her back, her arms, too afraid to leave her even for the time it would take to get up for a blanket. "Hold onto me."

He lifted her into his lap, rocking her as he would a child. And the shudders that racked her gradually eased. Her breathing steadied.

"I'm okay." She let her head fall limply on his shoulder. "Sorry." But when he didn't loosen his hold, when he continued to rock, she closed her eyes, tried to drift into the comfort he needed as much as she.

Still, she saw what she'd been, what she'd done. What she'd become in that horrible room in Dallas. Roarke could see it. He lived it with her through her nightmares.

Burrowing against him, she stared off into the dark again and wondered if she could bear the shame if anyone else caught a glimpse of how Eve Dallas had come to be.

***

Peabody loved briefings at Eve's home office. However serious the business, there was always an informal atmosphere when you added food. And a breakfast meeting not only meant real coffee, but real eggs, real meat and all manner of sticky, sugary pastries.

And she could justify the extra calories because it was work-related fuel.

There was, in her opinion, no downside to the current situation.

They were all loaded in-Feeney, McNab, Trueheart, Baxter, Dallas, even Roarke.

And boy, oh boy, a look at Roarke in the morning was as delicious a jolt to the system as the strong black coffee sweetened with honest-to-God sugar.

It was hardly a wonder the lieutenant was so slim. She had to burn up the calories just looking at him. Considering that, Peabody snatched a couple extra slices of bacon and calculated she might actually lose weight during the briefing.

It was a pretty good deal.

"Updates are in your packs," Eve began, and Peabody divided her attention between her plate and her partner.

Eve leaned on the corner of her desk, coffee in one hand, laser pointer in the other. "Feeney and our civilian made some progress last night, as did McNab.

McNab, give the team your data."

He had to swallow, fast and hard, a mouthful of Danish. "Sir. My area deals with the 'links and d and c's from both vics."

He ran through it, pinpointing transmission locations, with considerable comp-jock code. The jargon, and the questions and comments Feeney tossed him in the same idiom gave Eve time to finish her coffee and contemplate another cup.

"You'll scout those locations this morning," Eve put in when there was a short lull. "With these images. Screen One. This is Steven Whittier. Current data leads us to believe he is the son of Alex Crew. On Screen Two you see Trevor Whittier, son of Steven Whittier and likely the grandson of Crew. Given accumulated data and the profile, he fits. Steven Whittier is the founder and current owner of Whittier Construction."

"That's a nice little pop," Baxter commented.

"Bigger and louder one as we've determined Whittier Construction is the contractor on a major rehab job, building on Avenue B. The company is licensed for four gasoline storage facilities. None of the other potential matches have as many links as this. Steven Whittier's official data states his father is deceased. His mother..."

She split the screen and brought up the image of a woman known as Janine Strokes Whittier. "Currently residing at Leisure Gardens, a retirement and care facility on Long Island, where Whittier senior has a second home. She's in the right age group, has the right racial profile and matches the computer morphs."