by J. D. Robb
“The other Hudson Yards case. Yeah, I heard some of it.”
Absently, he fiddled with his tie. Eve’s eyeballs vibrated.
“Not going to be Bardov. Not a pregnant woman. The bastard has a code, like you said. And he loves kids. Doesn’t put a fucking halo on him, but he loves kids.”
“He’s got four.” Eve reached back to the backgrounds she’d run. “Two of each, and no criminal on any of them—or their kids. No connections I found to his organization.”
“Wouldn’t be any. The story goes he fell for this Russian girl—like a friend of a cousin—and fell hard. He was already taking over—who the hell was it?—Smirnoff—like the vodka—Smirnoff’s territory. Had a rep, wasn’t afraid of doing his own wet work. This is before my time. I ain’t that old.”
“He’s been married close to sixty years,” Eve pointed out. “That puts you in the diapers.”
He smirked. “Yeah, well. Story is, she laid down conditions to marry him. He kept the business outside the home, and when they had kids none of them would be part of it. She wouldn’t interfere in his business, but she didn’t want it in the home, didn’t want it passed to their kids. So that’s how it is.”
“Not her kids,” Eve noted, “but her nephew. This is good to know, Jenkinson.”
“He may not like putting a target on women, but you being a cop changes that. Cop’s first.”
“He’s got no reason to put a target on me. Yet.”
She walked over to Peabody’s desk. “When you’re finished, have the files picked up. Then go home. Or wherever.”
“We had a good day, Dallas. Are you heading out?”
“Just about.”
One more thing, Eve thought as she went to her office, sat down at her desk. One more.
She contacted the police department in Moses, Oklahoma.
“Moses Police Department, how can I assist you?”
“This is Lieutenant Dallas, New York Police and Security Department. I need to speak with Chief Wicker.”
“All the way from New York?” The man on-screen looked more like a cowboy than a cop to Eve’s eye. Ruddy face, faded blue eyes, crooked smile, and sun-bleached hair. “Can I tell the chief what this is about?”
“I’ll tell him.”
“All righty then. Hold on a sec.”
The screen went to waiting blue; the audio to some drippy music.
It didn’t take long.
“This is Chief Wicker. What can I do for you, Lieutenant?”
No cowboy this one, Eve noted. He had a square face with a hard jawline that was tanned rather than ruddy. With skin that looked pampered to her. He wore his dark brown hair in a buzz cut, adding a military tone.
She could all but feel the starch in the collar of his tan uniform shirt.
“Chief Wicker, I have some difficult news regarding your ex-wife.”
“Genna?”
“No, sorry, I should have been more specific. Your first ex-wife. Alva Elliot.”
His brown eyes widened. “Alva. She took off for who knows where years ago. She’s in New York?”
“She was. I’m sorry to tell you she was killed, two nights ago.”
“I’ll be damned.”
No grief, no regret. Just what Eve saw as mild interest.
“I’ve got to tell you, Lieutenant, I figured she’d been dead years now. That Alva, she had a flighty nature. I’m real sorry to hear she’s passed on, but I don’t know why you’re notifying me. I wouldn’t be her next of kin.”
“I’ve notified her siblings, Chief. I want to say she didn’t simply pass on. She was murdered. I’m Homicide.”
That got his attention. Narrowed those eyes, stiffened those shoulders.
“How the hell’d she get herself murdered? If you’re doing some fishing here, looking at me—who hasn’t seen or heard from her since she took off—”
“The individual responsible for her murder is in custody. She was a witness to his illegal activity. As her former husband, as a police officer, I’m sure you’re satisfied justice is done.”
“Of course.”
“Of course,” she repeated. “I felt obliged to contact you, Chief, as during the course of our investigation we recovered a number of notebooks—handwritten notebooks.”
“She picked that up again?” Like a man pitying a wayward child, Wicker shook his head. “She had a strange habit of keeping those books—rule books—before we got married.”
“We recovered a considerable collection. I haven’t been able to read them all. Fortunately, the case broke quickly, so I’ve had no need. But as your name was mentioned in one I skimmed, I felt I should let you know.”
“I’m in there?”
“Some of them are dated during the period you were married. As I said, the case broke and the investigation ran in other, more immediate avenues, so there was no reason to read the older notebooks. While we’ll turn over the victim’s effects to her next of kin, I felt you might want to have those that applied to the years you and the victim were married.
“Just as a courtesy,” she added. “Cop to cop.”
“I appreciate that.” He pumped a little warmth into his voice. “She was young and foolish back in those days. But I loved her. She broke my heart when she took off that way. I’ve carried that a long time, to be honest about it. I’d like to have them, have that memory of her.”
“I understand. As a fellow police officer, you know this is a little irregular. Now that the case is closed, I expect the next of kin to make arrangements to transport the body and retrieve her personal effects. Still, I’m sure they’d agree to turn over the ones written during her marriage to you.”
She watched annoyance, then calculation come into his eyes.
“You’re talking about her siblings, I expect.”
“That’s right, Chief. Her brother and sister.”
“I’m not sure they would agree, to be honest. The fact is, a lot of blame got tossed around when Alva ran off and that caused some hard feelings on all sides. I’ve made peace with that, but … I’d like to have that part of Alva, those memories of her, to help put the rest of my heart at rest. If you could send them to me, I’d be grateful.”
“It’s one thing to hand them off to you, Chief. I can justify that. But to ship them out, well, I’d need to have a record of that, paperwork. My boss is a stickler.”
“How about I come to you then?”
“I know it’s a long way to travel.”
“She was my wife once. This is all I’ll have left of her. I can fly out there first thing in the morning, pick them up, then head right on back.”
“I’ll have them for you. We will have some paperwork, but I can slide that through.”
“I’m grateful to you.”
“I’m at Cop Central. Lieutenant Dallas. Morning’s best, as I had another case fall in my lap, and I have to get on it.”
“Big-city busy.” He flashed a smile. “I’ll be there by nine.”
“That works. I’ll see you then. And I’m sorry for your loss.”
Big-city busy, Eve thought when she sat back. You have no idea.
Driving home, she let the noise of the city wash over her. She didn’t bother to separate the blasting horns from the rumbling maxibuses, the rumbling from the overhyped shouts of sales and more sales from the overhead ad blimps.
She didn’t bother to fight the traffic, to dodge and weave, but simply adjusted to its fits and starts, its snarls and stops.
And let her mind empty.
She wanted home. Wanted the cool, the clean, the quiet, but just didn’t have the energy left to push for it.
It would be there, she told herself. Beyond the endless river of pedestrians, the smoking glide-carts, the yellow flood of Rapid Cabs.
It would be there.
And when she drove through the gates, the world shut itself on the other side.
Before Roarke, she’d never had that, that demarcation, that line between everything else an
d home. Even when she brought the work, the blood, the death, the despair through the gates, she still had home.
And now, when her head ached from the blood, the death, the despair, with work yet to do, she thanked God for home.
Summerset waited, and the cat pranced away from his side to ribbon between her legs.
“Did you lose your topper?”
It took her a minute to understand what he meant. And to realize she’d forgotten to grab it when she left her office. “I left it at work. It didn’t rain.”
“Thunderstorms likely tomorrow afternoon. You’ll want it then.”
She didn’t want to think about tomorrow afternoon. She didn’t want to think about tomorrow morning, so she walked up the stairs.
Summerset watched her go, then took out his ’link, sent a text.
Boy, the lieutenant has exhausted herself.
The reply came quickly.
Leaving for home shortly. I’ll see to her.
Because she was exhausted, more in mind than body, Eve went straight to the bedroom. Without bothering with her weapon harness, her boots, she flopped facedown on the bed.
When Roarke came in some thirty minutes later, she lay where she’d dropped, with the cat stretched over her butt.
“Worn herself out, has she now?” he murmured to Galahad. “Well then, we’ll tend to her as best we can.”
He gave the cat a light scratch between the ears before he tugged off his tie.
He was ready, more than, to shed the day himself.
He loved his work, as his cop loved hers, but Christ, there were times it left you knackered.
His thoughts ran right alongside where Eve’s had as he changed out of his suit. Home. He’d had the building, and the beauty, the space and the quiet of it. But he hadn’t had home, not the full of it, before Eve.
He left her sleeping to see to some details. When he came back, he stretched out beside her and let himself fall away.
Still, when she surfaced, stirred, opened her eyes, his looked back into them.
“Hi,” she said.
“Hi to you.” He laid a hand on her cheek. “You rested well.”
“I needed to get out of my head. I guess I did. The cat weighs a ton.”
“He’s been on guard.”
“Damn good cat. Did you actually nap?”
“For a bit. I wanted out of my head as well. What do you say to a walk on this fine spring evening?”
“I could take a walk. Do you have work?”
“Nothing urgent. Do you?”
“We closed it.” She put her hand over his, squeezed. “Alva and Delgato. I’m sorry there’s not much movement on—”
“Stop.” He brought her hand to his lips. “The Russian, was it? As you thought.”
“Tovinski, yeah.”
“You’ll tell me about it, if you like, while we take that walk.” He sat up, picked up the cat, stroked him. “I don’t think you’ll need your weapon.”
“Right. It was a good day,” she said as she pushed up, released the harness. “We did the job.”
“And still you’re unsettled.”
“Some, I guess. Yeah. It’s not time to walk away.”
He rose, reached for her hand. Satisfied he’d done his job, Galahad stretched across the bed to take his own nap.
They went out the front door and walked the lush grounds through the long tunnel of roses. They bloomed elegantly and scented the air while little diamonds of sunlight sparkled through.
Another world, she thought. A separate world from blood and death and petty cruelties.
“He was sloppy,” Eve began, “just like you said. Reo got a warrant because I had enough—the correct way,” she added. “And the forensic accountant found what you found pretty quick. Not Roarke quick, but quick.”
“Well, after all, the accountant would have to do it the correct way.”
“Reo and I came up with a plan—and an alternate if that didn’t fly. Peabody and I worked out strategy … Over lunch. Over lunch on the floor of my office, because she decided to be you.”
He shot her a bemused look. “I don’t recall ever having lunch with you on the floor of your office.”
“She cornered me into eating, which is you.”
He took a long, winding, meandering way as she filled him in.
“Not to disparage your considerable skills—or Reo’s, or Peabody’s—the man broke quickly for a veteran gangster.”
“Fear for his life.” They walked through the orchard, where tiny green peaches replaced the fragrant blossoms of May. “He could take lives without a second thought, but the idea of his own death terrified him. Bardov terrified him. Living in a cage is still living.”
“A kind of living, I suppose. And you don’t know where he’ll do that kind of living?”
“No. They’re not going to read us into that. I figure the PA knows, Tibble and Whitney, whoever coordinated with the Marshals Service. I’m going to bet the warden wherever they stick him doesn’t know. It’s smart, and I’m good with it. He’ll never get out, never wear a twenty-thousand-dollar suit again, bang another woman. It closed the book on Delgato, and most of it on Alva.”
“The ex-husband.”
“Yeah, but first I should tell you about Bardov. He came to see me.”
Roarke turned his head toward her. His eyes went ice-floe cold. “He came to you?”
“Came to, not at, so stand down, pal. Very polite—old-school—and … it’s natty, right? Why do people say natty for somebody who wears bow ties and linen suits and shiny shoes?”
“I expect because it fits.”
“But what does it mean? Gnats are annoying little bugs. Spelled different, but still … Doesn’t matter. He comes in—nattily—with his bodyguard. Tried the concerned uncle routine, hoping to get a chance to talk to Tovinski. And put the fear of God into him.”
“Which you’d already done.”
“Yeah. I used a conference room.”
She told him, straight through, pausing only when she saw the pond, the bench. And the wine bottle and glasses on it.
“The pond fairies left wine.”
“So they did. Well now, it wouldn’t do to insult them, would it? Let’s go sit and have a glass while you tell me the rest.”
“Not much more, really. He didn’t like it, then you could see him starting to consider the advantages. Kill him, it’s just over. Life in prison, afraid, never quite sure the shiv’s not going to slide between your ribs? It’s a lot more.”
“And he’s getting soft,” Roarke added as they sat.
“So I keep hearing.”
“His name once struck fear in just the saying of it—I know from before I came to New York and in the circles, we’ll say, I ran. Now, though he’s not one I’d easily turn my back on, he’s considered more of…” He thought it through as he took out the wine stopper, poured two glasses. “An elder statesman in his milieu.”
“Milieu.” She rolled her eyes, took the wine. “He didn’t kill the pregnant woman, or order it. He says, and he means it, a pregnant woman’s sacred.”
“Hmm. I can believe that. I don’t know a great deal of him, not in the last decade, we’ll say, as he’s been moving toward that elder statesman for some time. But it’s definitely well-known he’s a family man—not just the mob family. His family.”
“I won’t have any trouble with him, and he won’t have any from me unless he crosses my line.”
“No need for the jet-copter then.”
“I still need to talk to the Singers—the father, the mother, the grandmother. They may know something. Hell, they may have shot the woman, built the wall, poured the concrete.”
Roarke smiled, tapped his glass to hers. “Good luck there.”
“Garrett Wicker comes first. He’s coming to New York, meeting me at Central at nine sharp. He thinks, to pick up Alva’s books from when they were married. One cop doing another cop a little favor.”
“Is that how you playe
d him?”
“Didn’t have time to read the books, case broke fast, blah blah. Feels like he should have those. Siblings are entitled to her personal effects, but and so on.”
She took a long drink. “He was easy to play because it’s all about him. Just him. He never asked how she was killed. He’s a cop, the ex, but he never asked how she died. Never asked what she was doing in New York, nothing. Not a single question about her.”
She drank again, looked at the fat white flowers floating on the water. “I’ll close Alva’s book tomorrow. Then I’m going to hound DeWinter until she gives me something on Jane Doe.”
“Oh, I’m sure that’ll make her work faster.”
“Shut up.” She elbowed him, then leaned her head on his shoulder. “I met her kid today—DeWinter’s.”
“Did you?”
“She’s a little scary. I mean, most kids are, as I see it, but this one bumps it up a few levels. She’s beautiful—I mean like wow, is-that-a-real-kid beautiful. And she’s full of questions. She read the Icove book. She’s just a kid.”
“As I remember her from the few times we met—some time ago—some of that scary comes from brains. She’s terrifyingly smart and, with the work her mother does, I imagine understands much of the world already. The Icove story would likely fascinate her.”
“Tell me about it.” She sipped more wine. “This is nice. It’s nice to just be here.”
He joined their free hands. “Let’s just be here awhile longer.”
After a while longer, they took the wine with them as they walked back to the house.
And Eve thought of the Marriage Rules.
“You should tell me about your day and stuff.”
“No, I really shouldn’t.”
“Why?”
“Because it consisted of meetings, negotiations, progress reports, a small, easily fixable manufacturing glitch out of Cincinnati, a less easily but still fixable data drop in Tokyo, considerable revisions to the Sea and Space Museum on the Olympus Resort, a preview of the presentation for the rollout of the remodeled and redesigned Typhoon All-Terrain and other ’62 vehicles, some key staff adjustment issues in Detroit—and on Vegas II—and so on.”
He paused a moment. “Which is why I didn’t find the time to buy Lithuania.”
“Well. There’s always tomorrow. Where is Lithuania anyway?”
