by J. D. Robb
‘Don’t tell me what I am,’ Eve said evenly. ‘And don’t tell me how to run this investigation. I’m primary, Casto, so back the hell off.’
He measured her. ‘You don’t want me to go over your head with this decision.’
‘Threats?’ She angled her body up on the balls of her feet, like a boxer ready to dance. ‘You go ahead and do what you have to do. My recommendation stands. She gets treatment, though Christ knows how much good that’s going to do her in the short term, then we reinterview. Until I’m satisfied she’s coherent and capable of judgment, she won’t be charged.’
Eve could see he was making an effort to pull himself back. And she could see it was costing him. She didn’t give a damn.
‘Eve, you’ve got motive, you’ve got opportunity, you’ve got the personality capacity tests. She’s capable of the crimes in question. She was, at her own admission, under the influence and predisposed to hate Pandora’s guts. What the fuck do you want?’
‘I want her to look me in the eye, clear in the eye, and tell me she did them. I want her to tell me how she did them. Until then, we wait. Because I’ll tell you something, hotshot. No way she acted alone. No fucking way she did all of them with her own pretty hands.’
‘Why? Because she’s a woman?’
‘No, because money isn’t her big pull. Passion is, love is, envy is. So maybe she did Pandora in a fit of jealous rage, but I don’t buy her doing the others. Not without help. Not without a push. So we wait, we reinterview, and we get her to finger Young and/or Redford. Then, we have it all.’
‘I think you’re wrong.’
‘So noted,’ she said briskly. ‘Now, go file your interdepartmental complaint, take a walk, or blow it out your ass, but get out of my face.’
His eyes flickered, the temper in them ripe and ready. But he stepped back. ‘I’m going to go cool off.’
He stormed off, with barely a glance at the silent Peabody.
‘Your pal’s running a little low on charm this evening,’ Eve commented.
Peabody could have said the same went for her commanding officer, but she held her tongue. ‘We’re all under a lot of pressure, Dallas. This bust means a lot to him.’
‘You know what, Peabody? Justice means a little more to me than a pretty gold star on my record or some fucking captain’s bars. And if you want to go run after lover boy and stroke his ego, no one’s stopping you.’
Peabody’s jaw twitched, but her voice was even. ‘I’m not going anywhere, Lieutenant.’
‘Fine, just stand here and look martyred because I—’ In midtirade, Eve stopped, sucked in her breath. ‘I’m sorry. You’re a goddamn handy target at the moment, Peabody.’
‘Is that part of my job description? Sir.’
‘You always have a fine comeback. I could learn to hate you for that.’ Calmer, Eve laid a hand on her aide’s shoulder. ‘I am sorry, and I’m sorry to put you in a tight spot. Duty and personal emotions never mix well.’
‘I can handle it. He was wrong to come at you that way, Dallas. I can understand how he feels, but it doesn’t make him right.’
‘Maybe not.’ Eve leaned against the wall and closed her eyes. ‘But he was right about one thing, and it’s eating at me. I didn’t have the stomach for what I did to Fitzgerald in interview. I didn’t have the stomach while I was doing it, while I was hearing myself hammer at her, twist her up when she was suffering. But I did it, because that’s my job, and going for the jugular when the prey’s wounded is exactly what I’m supposed to do.’
Eve opened her eyes and stared hard at the door behind which Jerry Fitzgerald was mildly sedated. ‘And sometimes, Peabody, the job just fucking sucks.’
‘Yes, sir.’ For the first time, Peabody reached out and touched a hand to Eve’s arm. ‘That’s why you’re so good at it.’
Eve opened her mouth, surprised when a laugh popped out. ‘Goddamn, Peabody, I really like you.’
‘I like you, too.’ She waited a beat. ‘What’s wrong with us?’
Cheered a little, she slung an arm around Peabody’s sturdy shoulders. ‘Let’s go get something to eat. Fitzgerald’s not going anywhere tonight.’
On that, Eve’s instincts proved to be wrong.
The call woke her at a little before four A.M., out of a deep and thankfully dreamless sleep. Her eyes were gritty, her tongue thick from the wine she’d indulged in to be marginally sociable with Mavis and Leonardo. She managed a croak as she answered the ’link.
‘Dallas. Christ, doesn’t anyone ever sleep in this town?’
‘I often ask myself the same question.’ The face and voice on the ’link were vaguely familiar. Eve struggled to focus, to roll through her memory discs.
‘Doctor . . . hell, Ambrose?’ It slid back, layer by layer. Ambrose, spindly female, mixed race, head of chemical rehab at the Midtown Rehabilitation Center for Substance Addiction. ‘You still there? Is Fitzgerald coming around?’
‘Not exactly. Lieutenant, we have a problem here. Patient Fitzgerald is dead.’
‘Dead? What do you mean dead?’
‘As in deceased,’ Ambrose said with a bland smile. ‘As a homicide lieutenant, I imagine you’re familiar with the term.’
‘How, damn it? Did her nervous system give out, did she jump out a fucking window?’
‘As near as we can determine, she overdosed herself. She managed to get her hands on the sample of Immortality we were using to determine the proper treatment for her. She took all of it, in combination with a few of the other goodies we have stashed here. I’m sorry, Lieutenant, she’s gone. We can’t bring her back. I’ll fill you in on the details when you and your team arrive.’
‘Damn right you will,’ Eve snapped and broke transmission.
Eve viewed the body first, as if to ensure herself there hadn’t been a horrible mistake. Jerry had been laid on the bed, her color-coded hospital gown draped to midthigh. Sky blue for addict, first stage treatment.
She was never going to get to stage two.
Her beauty was back, oddly eerie, in the bone-white face. The shadows were gone from under her eyes, the strain from around the mouth. Death was the ultimate calmer, after all. There were faint burn marks on her chest where the resuscitating team had worked on her, a light bruising on the back of her hand where the IV had pinched. Under the doctor’s wary eye, Eve examined the body thoroughly, but found no signs of violence.
She’d died, Eve supposed, as happy as she would ever be.
‘How?’ Eve demanded shortly.
‘The combination of Immortality and, as far as we can determine by what’s missing, doses of morphine and synthetic Zeus. Autopsy will confirm.’
‘You keep Zeus here, in a rehab?’ The idea had Eve scrubbing her hands over her face.‘Jesus.’
‘For research and rehabilitation,’ Ambrose said tightly. ‘Subjects addicted need a slow, supervised withdrawal period.’
‘So where the hell was the supervision, Doctor?’
‘Ms. Fitzgerald was sedated. She was not expected to regain full consciousness until eight A.M. My hypothesis would be that, as we don’t fully understand the properties of Immortality as yet, what was left in her system counteracted the sedative.’
‘So she got up, marched herself down to your drug hold, and helped herself.’
‘Something of the kind.’ Eve could all but hear Ambrose’s teeth grinding.
‘What about security, the nursing staff? Did she turn herself invisible and walk right by them?’
‘You can check with your own officer on duty about security, Lieutenant Dallas.’
‘Be sure I will, Dr. Ambrose.’
Ambrose gnashed her teeth again, then sighed. ‘Listen, I don’t want to hang the mess on your uniform, Lieutenant. We had a disruption here a few hours ago. One of our violent tendencies attacked his ward nurse, got out of his restraints. We had our hands full for a few minutes, and the uniform pitched in. If she hadn’t, the ward nurse would very likely be standing at the P
early Gates with Ms. Fitzgerald right now instead of dealing with a broken tibia and some cracked ribs.’
‘You’ve had a busy night, Doctor.’
‘Not one I want to repeat any time soon.’ She dragged her fingers through curly, rust-colored hair. ‘Listen, Lieutenant, this center has an excellent reputation. We help people. Losing one, this way, makes me feel every bit as shitty as you. She should have been asleep, damn it. And that uniform wasn’t away from her post for more than fifteen minutes.’
‘Timing again.’ Eve looked back at Jerry and tried to shrug off the weight of guilt. ‘What about your security cameras?’
‘We don’t have any. Lieutenant, can you imagine how many media leaks we’d have if we had recordings of patients, some of whom are prominent citizens? We’re bound by privacy laws here.’
‘Great, no security discs. Nobody sees her take her last walk. Where’s the drug hold where she OD’d?’
‘This wing, one level down.’
‘How the hell did she know that?’
‘That, Lieutenant, I can’t tell you. Any more than I can explain how she unkeyed the lock, not only on the door, but on the holds themselves. But she did. The night watch found her on his sweep. The door was open.’
‘Unlocked or open?’
‘Open,’ Ambrose confirmed. ‘As were two holds. She was on the floor, dead as Caesar. We tried the usual resuscitations, of course, but it was more for form than from hope.’
‘I’ll need to talk to everyone in this wing - patients as well as staff.’
‘Lieutenant—’
‘Fuck privacy laws, Doctor. I’m overriding them. I want your night watch as well.’ Pity jangled Eve’s nerves as she recovered the body. ‘Did anyone come in, try to see her? Did anyone call to check her condition?’
‘Her ward nurse will have that information.’
‘Then let’s start with her ward nurse. You round up the rest of them. Is there a room I can use for interview?’
‘You can use my office, such as it is.’ Ambrose looked back at the body, hissed between her teeth. ‘Beautiful woman. Young, with fame and fortune at her fingertips. Drugs heal, Lieutenant. They extend life and the quality of it. They eradicate pain, soothe a troubled mind. I work hard to remember that when I see what else they can do. If you ask me, and you’re not, she was headed here the first time she sipped that pretty blue juice.’
‘Yeah, but she got here a lot faster than she was supposed to.’
Eve strode out of the room, spotted Peabody in the corridor. ‘Casto?’
‘I contacted him. He’s on his way.’
‘It’s a goddamn mess, Peabody. Let’s do what we can to mop it up. See that this room - Hey, you.’ She saw the officer she’d left on guard at the end of the hallway. Her finger pointed like an arrow. She could see that it hit its mark by the way the uniform winced before she blanked her face and started toward her commanding officer.
Eve blew off some steam giving the uniform a dressing down. She didn’t have to know Eve would recommend no disciplinary action be taken. Let her sweat.
In the end, when she was sweating and pale, Eve studied the nasty bruising scrape on the officer’s collarbone. ‘The VT give you that?’
‘Sir, before I restrained him.’
‘Have it seen to, for Christ’s sake. You’re in a health center. And I want this door secured. You got that this time? Nobody in, nobody out.’
‘Yes, sir.’ She snapped to attention, looking, Eve thought, pathetically like a whipped puppy. Barely old enough to buy a beer at a street stall, Eve mused with a shake of her head.
‘Stand your watch, Officer, until I order your relief.’
She spun away, gesturing for Peabody to follow.
‘You ever get that pissed off at me,’ Peabody said in her mild voice, ‘I’d prefer a bare-knuckled punch in the face to a tongue lashing.’
‘So noted. Casto, glad you decided to join us.’
His shirt was rumpled, as if he’d tossed on the first thing that had come to hand. Eve knew the routine. Her own shirt looked as if it had been balled in someone’s pocket for a week. ‘What the hell happened here?’
‘That’s what we’re going to find out. We’re setting up in Dr. Ambrose’s office. We’ll question the relevant staff one at a time. For the patients we’re likely going to be required to do a room to room. Everything on record, Peabody, starting now.’
In silence, Peabody took out her recorder, clipped it to her lapel. ‘On record, sir.’
Eve nodded to Ambrose, then followed her through reinforced glass doors, down a short hallway, and into a small, cluttered office.
‘Dallas, Lieutenant Eve. Questioning of possible witnesses in the death of Fitzgerald, Jerry.’ She checked her watch for time and date and recorded them. ‘Also present are Casto, Lieutenant Jake T., Illegals Division, and Peabody, Officer Delia, temporary attache to Dallas. Questioning to take place in the office of Dr. Ambrose, Midtown Rehabilitation Center for Substance Addictions. Dr. Ambrose, please send in the ward nurse. And stand by, Doctor.’
‘How the hell did she die?’ Casto demanded. ‘Her system just give out? What?’
‘In a manner of speaking. I’ll fill you in as we go.’
He started to speak, then controlled himself. ‘Can we get some coffee in here, Eve? I haven’t had my fix.’
‘Try that.’ She jerked her thumb at a battered AutoChef, then took her place behind the desk.
It didn’t get much better. By midday, Eve had personally questioned every staff member on duty in the wing, with nearly the same results each time. The VT in room 6027 had gotten out of his restraints, attacked his ward nurse, and all hell had broken loose. From what she could gather, people had poured down the hallway like a river, leaving Jerry’s room unattended for anywhere from twelve to eighteen minutes.
More than enough time, Eve supposed, for a desperate woman to flee. But how did she know where to find the drug she craved, and how did she gain access to it?
‘Maybe some of the staff were talking about it in her room.’ Casto shoveled in veggie pasta on their midday break in the center’s eatery. ‘A new blend always creates a big buzz. It’s not much of a stretch to figure that the ward nurse or a couple of orderlies were gossiping about it. Fitzgerald obviously wasn’t as sedated as anyone thought. She hears them, and when she sees her chance, goes for it.’
Eve chewed over the theory and a forkful of grilled chicken hash. ‘I can buy that. She had to hear it somewhere. And she was desperate, and smart. I can buy that she’d figure a way to get down to it undetected. But how the hell did she get past the locks? Where’d she get the code?’
He fumbled there and scowled down at his meal. A man wanted meat, damn it. Good red meat. And these pussy health centers treated it like poison.
‘Could she have gotten a master code somewhere?’ Peabody speculated. She was sticking to green leaf salad, undressed, with the idea of shaving off a couple of pounds. ‘Or a code breaker.’
‘Then where is it?’ Eve shot back. ‘She was stone dead when they found her. The sweepers didn’t find any master code in the room.’
‘Maybe the frigging door was open when she got there.’ Disgusted, Casto shoved his plate aside. ‘That’s the kind of luck we’ve been having.’
‘That’s a little too serendipitous for me. Okay, she hears a discussion about Immortality, how it’s being kept in the drug hold for research. She’s in acute withdrawal, with whatever they’ve plugged into her smoothing out the worst of the raw edges. But she needs it. Then, like a gift from God, there’s a commotion outside. I don’t like gifts from God,’ Eve muttered. ‘But we’ll run with it for now. She gets up, the guard’s gone, and she’s out of there. She gets down to the drug hold, though I can’t see a couple of orderlies discussing directions to it. Still, she got there, we’ve established that. But getting in . . .’
‘What are you thinking, Eve?’
She lifted her gaze to Casto’s. ‘That sh
e had help. That somebody wanted her to get to it.’
‘You think one of the staff led her down there so she could help herself?’
‘It’s a possibility.’ Eve shrugged off the doubt in Casto’s voice. ‘A bribe, a promise, a fan. And when we go through everyone’s records, we might hit on something that indicates a weak link. In the meantime—’ She broke off as her communicator sounded. ‘Dallas.’
‘Lobar, sweeper. We found something interesting in the disposal hold down here, Lieutenant. It’s a master code, and its got Fitzgerald’s prints all over it.’
‘Bag it, Lobar. I’ll be down shortly.’
‘That explains a lot,’ Casto began. The transmission perked up his appetite enough for him to dig into the pasta again. ‘Somebody helped her, like you said. Or she copped it from one of the nurses’ stations during the confusion.’
‘Clever girl,’ Eve murmured. ‘Very clever girl. Times it all like clockwork, goes down, unkeys what she wants, then takes the additional time to ditch the master. She sure was thinking clearly, wasn’t she?’
Peabody drummed her fingers on the table. ‘If she took a hit of the Immortality first - and it seems likely she would, it probably jolted her back on full. She probably realized she could be caught there, with the master. If she ditched it, she could claim she’d wandered off, that she was confused.’
‘Yeah.’ Casto flashed her a smile. ‘That works for me.’
‘Then why stay?’ Eve demanded. ‘She’d had her fix. Why didn’t she make a run for it?’
‘Eve.’ Casto’s voice was quiet, sober, as were his eyes. ‘There’s a possibility we haven’t touched on here. Maybe she wanted to die.’
‘A deliberate OD?’ She had thought of it, didn’t like what it did to her stomach muscles. Guilt descended like a clammy mist. ‘Why?’
Understanding her reaction, he laid a hand briefly over hers. ‘She was trapped. You had her. She had to know she was going to spend the rest of her life in a cage - in a cage,’ he added, ‘with no access to the drug. She’d have gotten old, lost her looks, lost everything that mattered most to her. It was a way out, a way to die young and beautiful.’
