by J. D. Robb
She paced, studying the data as she worked it through.
“He gets enough from the driver to turn the worry up to some serious concern. What does he do next? He needs somebody to tell him what to do. Does he contact Ricker? No, no, he’s a drone. He’s a peg. There’s a food chain. Drones don’t go straight to the top. He contacts his keeper. Whoever worked with him on Coltraine. That’s what he does.”
She angled her head. “Computer stop scroll. Look at this, how about that? Never takes the lead. Tenth in his graduating class, and there’s Alex in first. Cocaptains on the football team senior year, but look who gets MVP. Not our boy Rod, but Alex. And who has to take the VP spot to Alex’s class president? Yeah, old runner-up Rod Sandy again. Never grabs the ring, always second place. I bet he creamed his pants when Max Ricker offered him a chance to turn on his good pal Alex. I bet he wept tears of fucking joy.
“I bet there were women, too, women he wanted that never spared him a second glance because Alex got there first. I bet Coltraine was one of them. She probably knew it, too. Sure, she’s smart, she’s self-aware. She’d know he had a thing for her. Probably felt sorry for him. He’d have to hate her for that. Helping kill her would’ve been like a bonus.”
She turned to pace again, and saw Morris watching her. “Shit. I’m sorry. I didn’t—”
“Don’t be.” He came to her with coffee, held out the mug he’d poured for her. “I’ll get your murder board for you if you tell me where it is. I see her as she was,” he added.
“The panels over there open to a storage closet. Any time you need a break . . .”
“Don’t worry about me. It’s about her.”
“No private air transpo out of the city fitting the time frame,” Baxter announced. “Not with anyone using his ID, or anyone fitting his description. I’ll widen the circle.”
“Do that.” She went back to her desk to work out a time line, and looked up and over when Roarke came in.
“Groveling can wait,” he said before she could speak. “And I have specifics in mind there. But for now, what is it?”
“I’ve got Feeney and McNab on the way. I need a detailed and deep search on Sandy’s finances. I’ve got the hideaway accounts from Alex. The ones he knows of. I figure there’s at least one more. Sandy’s gone rabbit.”
“And any self-respecting rabbit needs funds. All right, I’ll see what I can find. But you’ll be losing your e-team at four.”
“But—”
“We’ll be leaving, Lieutenant, as arranged, for Vegas. Charles’s bachelor party.”
“You guys are going to Vegas?” Baxter piped up, looking both sad and hopeful. “I know Charles.”
Roarke smiled at him. “Would you like to go, Detective?”
Eve literally waved her hands in the air. “Hey, hey!”
“I’m already there. Can I bring my boy?”
“The more the merrier.” Roarke poked a finger at Eve while she sputtered. “You’ll be busy yourself. And what we can’t find in the next few hours isn’t to be found. But, in that unlikely event, I’ll program an autosearch.”
“I don’t see why we couldn’t just postpone the whole thing until—”
“Of course you don’t. But you’re out-voted.”
“Life has to be.” Morris stepped back from the board he’d set in the center of the room. “Or there’s no point.”
“Okay, wait. Wait.” She had to think. “Until four. But if we pinpoint Sandy’s location, or something equally relevant at three-fifty-freaking-nine—”
“We’ll cross that bridge,” Roarke finished. “Give me what you have.” He took the disc she gave him. “Feeney and McNab? We’ll use the computer lab then. Send them along when they get here.”
As impatience rubbed against guilt, Eve strode after him. “Listen, did I screw anything up—any important anything—by interrupting?”
“Oh, what’s a few million lost now and then in the grand scheme? I’ll try to win it back in Vegas.”
“Oh God. Oh my God.”
Laughing, he caught her horrified face in his hands. “I’m having you on, though I shouldn’t let you off that hook so easily. It’s fine. But annoying, so you’ll be scheduling in that groveling. Now go away. I have other things to see to, besides your e-work, before I leave.”
Sure. Fine. She went back to work.
“Nothing,” Baxter told her. “I checked on the All-Points. We got a couple of hits, but neither of them turned out to be Sandy. Morris did a recheck on his accounts and cards.”
“Still no activity. I can help Baxter with the search, the transportation.”
She nodded, went back to her time line. When she completed it, as she posted it on her board, her e-team walked in.
She stared at Feeney. “What are you wearing? Not you,” she said to McNab. “I never expect otherwise from you.”
“This is my lucky shirt.” Feeney jutted out his chin.
The lucky shirt was sea-sick green, and covered with maniacally grinning pink flamingos. On his explosion of hair he wore a black ball cap that had another flamingo leering from the bill.
“Jesus, Feeney, no man gets lucky dressed like that.”
“Not that kind of lucky.” He shot Baxter a steely glare when the detective hooted. “I got a wife, don’t I? This shirt has a history. So far, it’s won me eight hundred and a quarter.”
“It can’t be worth it. Never mind. Comp lab. Roarke’s already there. In brief,” she began, and gave them the bare bones.
“I think that shirt burned my corneas,” she muttered when they left her office.
“E-geeks. What can you do?”
She glanced over at Baxter’s comment, and saw Morris, stationed beside him, smile. “Run that auto for a minute. Take a look at the time line.” She gestured to the board. “Alex Ricker contacts Roarke at seven-thirty. Summerset tells Alex Roarke will get back to him. Roarke contacts Alex at just after eight, and they set up the meet. Transmission runs eight minutes. Meet at Coney Island at ten. Meet lasts round about thirty minutes. According to Alex, he made two stops before returning to the penthouse. The first, his antique store in Tribeca, which is where I bet the unregistered was taken before our search. He left there approximately thirteen-thirty, and kept a business lunch appointment—verified—in midtown. He didn’t return home until sixteen hundred. He states Sandy was in the penthouse at that time. They talked briefly, and during that conversation Alex mentioned that the driver was having the car washed and serviced.”
“Bet he started sweating,” Baxter said.
“He can’t get to the driver until after seventeen hundred. He returns to the penthouse according to the time stamp on the security disc, at seventeen-forty-three. And yeah, he looks a little sweaty. He may have tagged his contact then, but he for damn sure did when Roarke contacted the penthouse and informed Alex that I’d be around the next morning with some follow-up questions. That’s at nineteen-oh-five. It’s too much. Too many things leaning in. Still, he doesn’t leave for another hour. Time to get instructions, grab what he needs most.”
“You can’t know how much cash he might have had,” Morris pointed out. “His own, or what Alex might have had in the place.”
“It couldn’t be much, couldn’t be enough. Alex keeps funds in the penthouse, in a safe, but it’s still there. Sandy couldn’t open the safe without it signaling Alex. It’s programmed. Enough, we’ll say enough, for him to get out of the city. Maybe hole up until he can access more, make arrangements. It’s all rushed, and he’s methodical.”
Panic, panic, Eve thought again. What do I do, where do I go?
“Maybe he has a credit account Alex didn’t know about, and we haven’t found yet. Maybe. Charge the transpo,” she calculated, “and into the wind. But if so, we’ll find it, and we’ll track him. He can’t function without funds.”
“Reports have been coming in from the locals on some of the hot spots. No sign of him, no sign he’s come and gone.”
E
ve nodded at Baxter. “And I’m betting he’d leave one. He’s never had to run before, so he doesn’t know how. He’s lived a privileged life. He won’t last without the privilege.” She paused, frowned. “Where the hell is Trueheart?”
“Ah, he was en route, but you know, Vegas. He’s making a quick detour. I’ve got to have proper attire, don’t I?”
“You sent him to pack for you?”
“I don’t need much. Anyway, Morris has it covered.”
“Maybe you want to go to Vegas,” she snapped at Morris, then instantly winced. “Shit, I—”
“It’s almost tempting,” he said easily. “That’s how confident I am in you. But no, not this time.”
She sat at her desk again and began to pick her way through Sandy’s people. Parents, divorced, remarried—twice each. One sibling, one half sibling. According to Alex, Sandy wasn’t close to any of his family. Still, family was the usual well, wasn’t it, when you had to dip in for cash. She started the tedious process of contacting, questioning, intimidating, eliminating.
She barely glanced up when Trueheart came in, but noted Baxter’s fresh, young apprentice had obviously dressed for the upcoming festivities. Pressed pants, casual shirt, good skids.
She tried not to think just how Baxter might corrupt sweet and hunky Troy Trueheart in Vegas.
She worked her way through family, current women, and out the other side of exes. She scowled when Summerset wheeled in a large table.
“What?”
“Lunch.”
“Boy, I could eat.” Baxter sat back, skimmed his fingers through his hair. “Got nada, Dallas. And my eyes are starting to bleed.”
“I’ll be using your kitchen,” Summerset informed her, “to order up what I’ve prepared.”
She continued to scowl as Summerset walked by her desk, the cat hopefully at his heels.
“When you find nothing,” Morris said, “it means you’re eliminating what surrounds the something.”
“Is that a Zen thing?” Eve questioned.
“If not, it should be.”
Eve got to her feet as Roarke, Feeney, and McNab came in. From the opposite end of the room, Summerset pushed in a double-shelved cart she didn’t know she possessed.
“I’ll give you a hand.” McNab made a beeline.
“I have it, Detective. But there’s a second cart in the kitchen. If you wouldn’t mind.”
“Anything I can do that leads to food.” McNab all but danced his way on his knee-high purple airboots into the kitchen.
Feeney circled his head on his neck, rolled his shoulders. Eve heard the pops from across the room. “Getting creaky.”
“I’ve arranged for a pair of masseuses on board,” Roarke told him.
“You are the man.” Baxter slapped his hands together.
“Twins.”
“Oh, my aching heart.”
“Could use a rub. Strictly therapeutic,” Feeney added when he caught Eve’s beady eye. “We found the account. He buried it good. He’s no dope. Got himself twelve mil and change. Went traditional and used Zurich. Hasn’t touched it,” he said before Eve could ask. “But we did a little finagle or two. He checked on it—or somebody did—via ’link. The ’link trans came from New York, and the time of the check stamps at sixteen-fifty-five, EST.”
“Before he talked to the driver,” Eve said, and rose to update her time line. “Starting to cover his bases. Worried.”
“None of his accounts have been touched,” Roarke put in. “He has bank boxes in four locations.” He lifted his brows when Eve turned. “We finagled. He hasn’t signed in for any.”
“Friends,” Feeney offered. “Family.”
Eve shook her head “It’s not panning out.”
Feeney glanced over at Morris, puffed out his cheeks. “We may have something that does, on Detective Coltraine. The ’link used to check the Zurich account. We dug in there and ID’d it. It’s registered to Varied Interests.”
“Alex Ricker’s company.”
“Yeah, company ’link—and we nailed it, and dumped the transes. We got them going to another ’link. Toss-away, can’t trace it for ownership, but we got the ID and frequencies. There are transmissions between the ’links, from New York to New York, the day before the murder, the day of, the day after.”
“Can you pin it down any closer?”
“Cheap toss-away, that’s how it reads. No bells, no whistles. It’s damn near impossible to get a read at all on those bastards. It’s got a filter on it. Had to be an add-on.” Feeney scratched the back of his neck. “But we’ve got its print. Same as a fingerprint. Good as DNA.”
“And if Callendar gets that print, coming into Omega?”
“We can match it.”
“She’ll get it if it’s there.” McNab watched Summerset arrange trays of deli meats, bread, cheeses, fruit, vegetables, salads, with the same intense devotion as the cat. “She’s an arrow on that kind of thing. When she does, we may be able to put what she’s got and what we’ve got together and make more.”
“It’s all there is to get with what we have,” Roarke told her. “We’re running an auto. If any of his accounts are opened—even for a check—or any of his bank boxes are called for, we’ll know.”
“Okay. It’s good.”
“So we eat.” McNab made the first dive.
Cops, Eve thought, swarming like ants at a picnic. She started to go over to Morris, but saw Roarke move to him. It gave her heart a squeeze—a good one—to see him talking Morris over to the table.
She went back to her desk, and while the chaos reigned, ran a probability to see if the computer agreed with her instincts. Moments later, Roarke came up behind her, rubbed her shoulders.
“Morris okay?”
“Better, I think.” Over her head, Roarke watched the activity at the table. “I’d say this is helping. Not just the work, the feeling of doing, but being here, with the others. You brought the murder board back in.”
“I asked him first.”
“No, I mean you brought it in. And he can see she’s the center of it. Even when they’re over there devouring sandwiches as if they’re about to be outlawed, he can see she’s the center of this. It would help.”
“It won’t help if the comp and I are right.” She turned to face him.
“I have to figure it two ways. Sandy’s been off the scope for nearly seventeen hours. One, he’s holed up somewhere, squeezed in a corner and sucking his thumb. Or two, he’s already dead.”
“And you and the probability scan you just ran favor dead. So do I. He’s a liability alive. Ricker has no need to keep him breathing, and every reason to end him.”
“Someone he trusted, like Coltraine trusted. It’s gone back to the squad. It’s one of them.”
“You can’t do more than you’re doing. Let it sit, Eve, for just a while. Whoever it is feels safe, feels secure. He won’t run like Sandy.”
“No, he won’t run. And as long as he’s valuable to Ricker, he’ll stay alive.”
“Then let’s get something to eat before your cops chew up even the tablecloth. I still have some things to see to before we leave.”
“Yeah, you’re right. Twins?” she added as they headed toward what was left of lunch.
“It seemed just the thing.”
She built a sandwich, took the first bite. Through the thrum of guy talk and smacking lips, she caught the sound of female laughter.
Peabody and Nadine, both wearing girlie dresses, popped in the doorway.
“Mmmm, She-Body, look at you.”
Love, Eve supposed, could cause even McNab to forget his stomach for a few seconds.
He bounced over to her, spun her around, then dipped her while she giggled—actually giggled—before he planted one on her.
“No! No! This is still a cop room. There is no dipping and kissing in a cop room.”
Peabody simply sent her lieutenant a smile out of starry eyes. “Too late.” For good measure, she gave McNab’s ass a
squeeze as he spun her back up.
“Doesn’t this all look delicious?” Nadine fluttered her lashes. “And the food looks good, too.” She gave Eve’s cheek a pat as she passed, and brought a fiery blush to Trueheart’s as she sidled up to him. “Are you on duty, Officer?”
“Give it up, darling.” Roarke rubbed a hand over Eve’s back. “Shift’s over.”
