The In Death Collection 06-10 (23 page)

“You don’t want to see it now,” Peabody commented and managed to suppress the shudder. “They hauled it in to vehicle analysis. I shot through the automatic requisition for a new unit.”

“They’ll probably stick a couple of bolts in it and expect me to make do.” However foolish and sentimental it was, she almost hoped they did. “Idiot bureaucrats are always . . . wait, wait, what’s this?”

Turbo-van, the computer told her helpfully. Model Jet-stream, manufactured 2056—

“Stop, freeze image. Look at this.” Eve gestured Peabody closer. “The windows are privacy tinted. Surveillance vans aren’t allowed to have that tint on the driver’s area. And those plates, see the plates? That’s not a van ID. It’s a cab plate, for God’s sake. Our boy’s in there, Peabody.”

“Good catch, Dallas.” Impressed, McNab tapped some keys and had the frozen image printing out in hard copy. “I’ll run the plates for you.”

“Let’s see what he does,” Eve murmured. “Continue, computer.” They watched the van circle the first level, climb slowly to the next. And stop directly behind Eve’s car. “We’ve got him. I knew he’d get sloppy.”

The van door opened. The man who stepped out was concealed in a long coat, and his hat was pulled low. “Police issue. That’s a beat cop’s overcoat. It’s a uniform’s hat. . . . But he got the shoes wrong. He’s wearing air treads. Damn it, you can’t see his face. He’s wearing sunshades.”

Then he turned, looked directly into the camera. Eve got a glimpse of white, white skin, just a hint of the curve of a cheek. Then he lifted a slim wand, pointed it, and the picture swam with color.

“Fucking hell, he jammed it. What the hell was that he had in his hand? Play back.”

“I’ve never seen a jammer like it.” McNab shook his head both in bafflement and admiration as the image
replayed and froze. “It’s no more than six inches long, barely thicker than a ski pole. You ought to have Roarke look at it.”

“Later.” Eve waved that away. “We’ve got coloring, we’ve got height and build. And we’ve got the make of a van. Let’s see what we can do with it.”

She continued to stare at the screen as if she could somehow see through the concealing shades and hat to his face. To his eyes. “Peabody, run the make and model of the van. I want a list of everyone who owns one. McNab, find out when that cabbie lost his tag. And figure this: He’s driving into the garage at six twenty-three—that’s less than one hour after Nadine’s broadcast. Maybe he already had the boomer made up, but he had to have time to rig it for transport, to decide on a plan, to find my location. And you bet your ass he needed time to have a temper fit. How much time did he spend in transpo?”

She sat back again and smiled. “I’m betting he’s located downtown, within a ten-block radius of Cop Central. So we’re going to start working our own backyard.”

Smiling, she ordered her computer to continue. She wanted to see just how long it took the son of a bitch to rig her car.

Eve wasn’t in the mood for another marital bout, but she thought it best to get it over with. She needed Roarke’s eye, his contacts—and, since she was going to follow her commander’s request and travel to Ireland, his expertise in a foreign country.

Since Peabody and McNab had begun sniping at each other like longtime cohabitants, she’d separated them, shooing them off to different assignments in different locales. With their current competitive level, she hoped to have her answers from both of them by midday.

She paused outside Roarke’s office door, sucked in a bracing breath, and gave what she hoped was a brisk and somewhat wifely knock.

When she entered, he held up a finger, signaling her to wait while he continued to address two hologram images. “. . . Until I’m free to travel to the resort personally, I’ll trust you’ll handle these relatively minor details. I expect Olympus to be fully operational by the target date. Understood?”

When there was no response other than respectful nods, he leaned back. “End transmission.”

“Problem?” Eve asked when the holograms faded.

“A handful of minor ones.”

“Sorry to interrupt, but have you got a minute?”

Deliberately, he glanced at his wrist unit. “Or two. What can I do for you, Lieutenant?”

“I really hate when you use that tone.”

“Do you? Pity.” He leaned back, steepled his fingers. “Would you like to know what I hate?”

“Oh, I figure you’ll tell me, but right now I’m pressed. I’ve got McNab and Peabody in the field chasing leads. I’m locked in here because I planted a story through Nadine that I’m busted up and recuperating at home.”

“You’re getting good at that. Planting stories.”

She jammed her hands in her pockets. “Okay, we’ll run through it and clear the air. I made the statement, crossed the official line, to insult and challenge the killer to make a move on me. I’m supposed to serve and protect and I had to figure if he swung his aim in my direction, I’d buy time for whoever he’d targeted next. It worked, and as I’d calculated, he was pissed off enough to be sloppy, so we’ve got some leads we didn’t have twenty-four hours ago.”

Roarke let her finish. To give himself time he rose, walked to the window. Absently he adjusted the tint of the glass to let in more light. “When did you decide I was gullible, or simply stupid, or that I would be pleased to know that you had used yourself to shield me?”

So much for the cautious route, she decided. “Gullible and stupid are the last things I believe you are. And I wasn’t considering whether or not you’d be pleased that I deflected his attention from you to me. Having you alive’s enough—even pissed off and alive is fine by me.”

“You had no right. No right to stand in front of me.” He turned back now, his eyes vividly blue with temper that had gone from frigid to blaze. “No fucking right to risk yourself on my behalf.”

“Oh really. Is that so?” She stalked forward until they were toe to toe. “Okay, you tell me. You keep looking me
dead in the eye and you tell me you wouldn’t have done the same if it was me in jeopardy.”

“That’s entirely different.”

“Why?” Her chin came up and her finger jabbed hard into his chest. “Because you have a penis?”

He opened his mouth, a dozen vile and furious words searing his tongue. It was the cool, utterly confident gleam in her eyes that stopped him. He turned away and braced both fists on the desk. “I don’t care for the fact that you have a point.”

“In that case I’ll just finish it out so you can swallow it all in one lump. I love you, and I need you every bit as much as you love and need me. Maybe I don’t say it as often or show it as smoothly, but that doesn’t make it any less true. If it pricks your ego to know that I’d protect you, that’s just too bad.”

He lifted his hands, dragged them up through his hair before he turned to her. “That’s a hell of a way to diffuse an argument.”

“Did I?”

“Since any argument I could attempt would make me sound like a fool, it would seem you have.”

“Good thinking.” She risked a grin at him. “So, if you’re finished being mad at me, can I run a few things by you?”

“I didn’t say I was finished being mad, I said I was finished arguing with you.” He sat on the corner of his desk. “But yes, feel free to run a few things by me.”

Satisfied with that, she handed him a disc. “Put that in. I’ve got a still on it you can project on screen. Enhance it to full.”

He did as she requested, then studied the image. He could see the fingers of a gloved hand wrapped around a wand-shaped device. The hilt was blocked from view but
the pattern of notches and buttons on the stem were clear. A light at the tip glowed green.

“It’s a jammer,” he said. “More sophisticated and certainly more compact than anything I’ve seen on the market.” He stepped closer to the screen. “The manufacturer’s ID—if there is one—is likely on the hilt and hidden by his hand, so that’s no help. One of my R and D departments has been working on a smaller, more powerful jammer. I’ll have to check the status.”

That caught her off guard. “You’re manufacturing this kind of thing?”

He caught the tone, smiled a little. “Roarke Industries handles a number of contracts for the government—for a number of governments, as it happens. The Defense and Security Department is always looking for new toys such as this. And they pay well.”

“So a device like this might be in the works in one of your departments? Brennen was in communications. One of his research arms could have been working on one.”

“It’s easy enough to find out. I’ll check which one of my particular arms has something along these lines on the boards, and have one of my moles check Brennen’s organization.”

“You have spies?”

“Data gatherers, darling. They object to being called spies. Have you got the rest of your man on here?”

“Click one back.”

“Computer, display previous image on screen.”

Roarke frowned at the picture and, using the vehicles for points of reference, speculated. “About five-ten, probably about one-sixty by the way that coat hangs on him. He’s very pale from the looks of that swatch of skin you can see. I wouldn’t say he spends a lot of time outdoors, so his profession, if he has one, is likely white collar.”

Roarke tilted his head and continued. “No way to tell
age, except he . . . holds himself youthfully. You can see part of his mouth. He’s smiling. Smug bastard. His taste in outerwear is miserably inferior.”

“It’s a beat cop’s topcoat,” Eve said dryly. “But I’m inclined away from thinking he’s got a connection with the department. Cops don’t wear air treads, and no beat cop’s going to have access to the kind of knowledge or equipment this guy has or EDD would have snatched him up. You can pick up one of those coats at a couple dozen outlets in New York alone.” She waited a beat. “But we’ll run it anyway.”

“The van?”

“We’re checking. If he didn’t boost it, and it’s registered in the state of New York, we’ll narrow the field considerably.”

“Considerably’s optimistic, Eve. I probably have twenty of these vans registered in New York to various outlets. Delivery vans, maintenance units, interstaff transpos.”

“It’s more than we started with.”

“Yes. Computer, disengage.” He turned to her. “Peabody and McNab can handle a great deal of the legwork on this for the next day or two?”

“Sure. Then Feeney’s back pretty soon and I’m grabbing him.”

“They’re finished with Jennie’s body. It’s being released this afternoon.”

“Oh.”

“I need you to come with me, Eve, to Ireland. I realize the timing might not be convenient for you, but I’m asking you for two days.”

“Well, I—”

“I can’t go without you.” The impatience surfaced, glowed in his eyes. “I won’t go without you. I can’t take the chance of being three thousand miles away if this bastard tries to get to you again. I need you with me. I’ve
already made the arrangements. We can leave in an hour.”

She thought it best to walk to the window so that he couldn’t see she was fighting to hold back a grin. It was dishonest, she supposed, not to tell him she’d intended to ask him to go to Dublin with her that afternoon. But it was too sweet an opportunity to miss.

“It’s important to you?”

“Yes, very.”

She turned back to smile at him with what she believed was admirable restraint. “Then I’ll go pack.”

“I want the data as it comes in.” Eve paced the cabin of Roarke’s private plane and stared at Peabody’s sober face in her palm ’link. “Send everything to the hotel in Dublin, and send it coded.”

“I’m working on the van. There are over two hundred of that make and model with privacy tint registered in New York.”

“Run them down. Every one.” She skimmed a hand through her hair, determined not to let a single detail slip by. “The shoes looked new. The computer should be able to estimate the size. Run the shoes, Peabody.”

“You want me to run the shoes?”

“That’s what I said. Sales of that brand of air tread for the last two—no, make it three months. We could get lucky.”

“It’s comforting to believe in miracles, Lieutenant.”

“Details, Peabody. You’d better believe in the details. Cross-check with sales of the beat cop’s coat, cross-check that with sales of the statue. Is McNab working on the jammer?”

“He said so.” Peabody’s voice chilled. “I haven’t heard from him in over two hours. He’s supposed to be talking to the contact Roarke gave him in Electronic Future’s research and development.”

“Same orders for him, all data, coded, as it’s accessed.”

“Yes, sir. Mavis has called a couple times. Summerset told her that you were resting comfortably and under doctor’s orders couldn’t receive visitors. Dr. Mira also called, and sent flowers.”

“Yeah?” Surprised and disconcerted by the idea, Eve paused. “Maybe you should thank her or something. Damn, how sick am I supposed to be?”

“Pretty sick, Dallas.”

“I hate that. The bastard’s probably celebrating. Let’s make sure he doesn’t party for long. Get me the data, Peabody. I’ll be back inside of forty-eight hours, and I want to nail him.”

“Swinging the hammer as we speak, sir.”

“Don’t bash your thumb,” Eve warned and ended transmission. She slipped the ’link back into her pocket and looked at Roarke. He’d been lost in his own thoughts throughout the flight, saying little. Eve wondered if it was time to tell him she’d already contacted the Dublin police and had an appointment with an Inspector Farrell.

She sat across from him, bounced her fingers on her knee. “So . . . are you going to take me on a tour of the favored locales from your misspent youth?”

He didn’t smile as she’d hoped, but he did shift his gaze from the window to her face. “They wouldn’t be particularly picturesque.”

“They may not be among the tourist hot spots, but it would be helpful to brush up with some of your former friends and companions.”

“Three of my former friends and companions are dead.”

“Roarke—”

“No.” Annoyed with himself, he held up a hand. “Brooding doesn’t help. I’ll take you to the Penny Pig.”

“The Penny Pig?” She straightened quickly. “Brennen’s wife said he used to go there. A bar, right?”

“A pub.” Now he did smile. “The social and cultural center of a race who goes from mother’s milk straight to stout. And you should see Grafton Street. I used to pluck pockets there. Then there are the narrow alleyways of South Dublin where I ran games of chance until I moved my portable casino into the back room of Jimmy O’Neal’s butcher shop.”

“Link sausage and loaded dice.”

“And more. Then there was the smuggling. An adventurous enterprise and the financial foundation for Roarke Industries.” He leaned forward, hooked her safety strap himself. “And even with all that experience, I had my heart stolen by a cop and had to mend my ways.”

“Some of them.”

He laughed and glancing out the window watched Dublin City rise toward them. “Some of them. There’s the River Liffey, and the bridges shine in the sun. A lovely place is Dublin Town of an evening.”

He was right, Eve decided when less than an hour later they were in the back of a limo and streaming along with traffic. She supposed she’d expected it to be more like New York, crowded and noisy and impatient. It certainly bustled, but there was a cheer beneath the pace.

Colorful doors brightened the buildings, arched bridges added charm. And though it was mid-November, flowers bloomed in abundance.

The hotel was a grand stone structure with arched windows and a castlelike air. She had only a glimpse of the lobby with its towering ceiling, regal furnishings, rich dark walls before they were whisked up to their suite.

Men like Roarke weren’t expected to fuss with such pesky details as check-in. All was ready for their arrival. Huge urns of fresh flowers, massive bowls of fruit, and a generous decanter of fine Irish whiskey awaited them.

And the tall windows gleamed with the last red lights of the setting sun.

“I thought you’d prefer facing the street, so you could watch the city go by.”