In Death [47] Leverage in Death

by J. D. Robb

  “How’d you pick the targets?”

  “What do you care?” He smirked. “Got blowed up, didn’t they?”

  “It took some doing, some work, some smarts. Why don’t you tell us how smart you are, Sergeant?”

  “Shit. Rogan was easy. That asswipe Banks fed Lucius some intel on the merger—rich bastards getting richer. We’re just sitting around one night, me and Lucius, drinking and bullshitting, and he says how we could make a windfall buying up some of the stocks. We started playing with it, then we could see how it could work.”

  “And how was that. Why Paul Rogan?”

  “Lucius wanted to pick a father. He’s got a hard-on for his own, right? He wanted to see, like an experiment, if a father would give his life for his kid. His brother gave his life for his men. It’s like the same, so we started working on it. Rogan fit the bill.”

  “I’m going to say Lucius worked up the jammers, the way through security.”

  Silverman jerked a shoulder. “He’s got a knack. Took him weeks, but he figured it out.”

  “You handled the parents, he handled the kids.”

  “No hurting the kids, that was his line.”

  “But the women were fair game.”

  “You gotta incentivize people. They don’t believe you’ll follow through, they don’t follow through.”

  “Lucius set up the fake accounts, buried them, bought up stocks,” Eve prodded.

  “He’s got good brains for that shit. He’s an asshole on tactics, but he knows his money shit.”

  “How much did you make?”

  “One-point-three.” When he grinned a little blood dribbled down his chin. He swiped it away. “More money than I’ve seen in my life, all at once.”

  “And still not enough. Did you always plan to steal the Richie from Banks?”

  “That jerk-off? Lucius said we’d consider that the jerk-off’s fee. We had some already, and we’d have more after we got the art guy to blow up the artist and a bunch of his faggy art shit.”

  “But Banks pushed his way into it. You had to kill him.”

  Silverman eased toward Eve. “If I could’ve gotten my hands on you just right?” He bared his teeth as he twisted his hands, made a crunching sound. “Stupid fuck walked right into it. Lucius was a little shaky after I did it, but he held up.”

  “The two of you dumped Banks’s body in the reservoir.”

  “It’s called teamwork.”

  “Lucius had already broken into Banks’s apartment for the Richie artwork.”

  “That was slick.” Admiration gleamed in those dark eyes. “Damn slick. He’s got skills, and we both figured we might as well have it.”

  “It’s a tight timeline, Rogan to Banks to Denby.”

  “Tighter than we figured, but we worked it. Gotta think on your feet in the field.”

  You’re not thinking so much now, Eve decided. Now you’re bragging. “Where was Lucius supposed to meet you, after I paid him a visit, got him all worked up?”

  “He’s not used to dealing with cops. We were supposed to meet at the garage. I figured it went south when he didn’t show.”

  “Did he know you planned to move on Chenowitz?”

  Silverman responded with another smirk. “He’d have known when we got there.”

  “Did he know you planned to kill the wife and kid this time?”

  “Look, I let him have his way before on that, and that’s why it went FUBAR. We left them alive. Dead don’t talk.”

  “You’d be surprised.”

  “Where were you going to go?” Trueheart wondered. “You knew your partner was compromised, you knew, had to know, we were coming for you.”

  “Private shuttle, dickwad. We got the scratch for it, and enough to buy some pilot’s silence. We get to Port Salute—no extradition, tropical, beaches? All the money we need. We get there, we’re home free. Fat fucking City.”

  “There won’t be any beaches for you, Silverman,” Eve said.

  He shot up his middle finger. “Do you think I care about doing time? I’m a goddamn soldier. Nothing you can throw at me I can’t handle. You won’t break me.”

  Eve stood. “I just did. Detective, have the prisoner taken back to his cell. You’re a disgrace to everything Captain Iler stood for, fought for, died for.”

  “You don’t know dick about squat.”

  “I know you. I’ve seen you before. I’ll see you again. You’re nothing special. Dallas, exiting interview.”

  She stopped outside the door, scrubbed her hands over her face. Coffee, she thought. One more hit, then she’d go back on Iler.

  Mira stepped out of Observation, laid a hand on Eve’s shoulder, rubbed gently. Eve sent a leery glance at the medical bag in her other hand.

  “You need another round with the healing wand and ice patches.”

  “I need coffee.”

  “You can drink it while we have that round. Save time,” Mira added. “Don’t argue with a doctor. You played him perfectly.” She steered Eve toward Eve’s office. “Tapped into his anger, resentment, manhood, ego. He may have emotional issues resulting from the attack, his injuries, and the loss of fellow soldiers.”

  “Screw that. He—”

  “Wait.” She nudged Eve onto her desk chair, opened her doctor’s bag. “His emotional issues don’t negate his actions. He showed no remorse. Look up. In fact,” she continued as she ran the healing want over Eve’s bruises. “He showed pride. He was, knowing he had no escape route, pleased to share details. To brag. In a very real way, he considers himself now a prisoner of war. He needs to be on suicide watch. He will try to self-terminate, whatever he claimed about not breaking.”

  “Yeah, I already planned for that. I need that coffee.”

  “One second.” Mira applied the ice patches, walked to the AutoChef. She handed Eve coffee. “I’m going to close the door and do the rest of you.”

  “It’s not that bad.”

  Mira simply walked to the door, locked it. “Strip off the jacket, weapon, shirt. I don’t want to recommend to your commander that you should be taken to a health center.”

  “Goddamn it.” Outgunned, she pushed up, started to jerk off her jacket. Everything twinged and pinged at once.

  “Here.” Mira slid the jacket off. “We’ll get this done, no fuss, then you’ll finish your job.” She helped Eve out of her harness, her shirt. Then sighed.

  “Not that bad? Really, Eve, damn it! Did the MTs say ribs are broken?”

  “Bruised. Just bruised.” She clamped her teeth down as the healing wand could sting on deeper injuries. “Maybe a hairline fracture. Maybe.”

  “Internal injuries?”

  “No. I swear. Roarke wouldn’t have let me skate out of there and straight here. I’ve got strains and sprains in places I didn’t know could get strains and sprains. The son of a bitch can fight.”

  “Obviously so can you.”

  She closed her eyes, ordered her body to relax, to accept the treatment. “Roarke’s Christmas present—dojo, training—holo and in the flesh with the master. I let it come. I was a goddamn crane, and a snake, a freaking dragon. Had the tiger coming, but he tried to take a header off the wall.”

  “I have to admit, I’d like to have seen that. You’re going to need another treatment in three hours.”

  “Okay.”

  Mira kissed Eve cheek. “I mean it.”

  “I know it. Or you’ll rat me out to Whitney.”

  “And Roarke.”

  “Figured.”

  She had to admit she felt better after Mira got done with her. With Baxter she walked back into Interview A with Iler. Singa remained counsel of record.

  “Record on, resuming interview. So here we are again. I have to tell you—full disclosure, because why the hell not—Silverman rolled on you like a pig rolls in shit.”

  “He wouldn’t do that.”

  “You think he gave a rat’s ass about you?” Baxter demanded with a laugh. “You were a vehicle, a piece
on the board.”

  “I think he liked Lucius here okay,” Eve added. “And he admired certain skills. Like building jammers, figuring out how to get through security systems. While he built the bombs. He knows he’s done.”

  She looked at Singa. “Just like your lawyer knows I’m not bullshitting. He gave us everything, like how this all started after Banks fed you some inside scoop on the merger. You and Silverman sitting around, drinking and shooting the shit, and you.” She pointed at Iler. “You come up with the idea.”

  “No, I—”

  “Lie, it’s done. Maybe you were just bullshitting, playing what if, but it started rolling from there. I don’t need anything from you.”

  “We have a deal on the table,” Singa said.

  “Yeah, I talked to APA Reo, and we agreed to go ahead with the deal. Save time and grief, just like I said before. One lie, deal’s void. Was that also made clear?”

  “It was,” Singa agreed. “Lucius, you need to cooperate.”

  “I said I would.”

  But he sat, silently.

  “Did you know he dragged the Chenowitz kid—August, six years old—up to the roof of the house, held a knife to his throat? Drew blood? He’d planned on killing the kid anyway, so no harm using him as a shield.”

  “He wouldn’t do that. Ollie wouldn’t do that.”

  Eve slapped both hands on the table. “You know he would. You know it. You could pretend otherwise as long as it all worked for you and you banked that profit. But you fucking knew what he was inside.”

  “I would never harm a child.”

  “Just terrify them.”

  “I did what I could to keep them calm,” Iler countered. “I’d never have allowed Ollie to physically hurt one of the children.”

  “How did you plan to stop him?”

  “He’d listen to me. We’re a team. The point is, and it’s important. I never killed anyone.”

  “Eighteen.”

  “No, you see, those men, those two men made a choice. They had a choice. They could have gone to the police instead.”

  “And had their families killed.”

  “No, no, no, that was a bluff. Just a bluff.”

  “‘A bluff.’” Eve opened the file, tossed out photos of both crime scenes. The charred bodies, the pieces of the dead. “A bluff.”

  “They had a choice,” Iler insisted. “They could have called the bluff. I admit we bear some responsibility, but—”

  “‘Some responsibility.’” She lunged up, lunged across the table. “You had him wired, had him wear a recorder so you could see—and so he could hear his wife and child screaming. You beat the women, threatened rape.”

  “I never touched them. I swear it. I swear it. I agree Ollie could go too far, but I held him back.”

  “Did you hold him back when he snapped Banks’s neck? Lie to me, you fuck. Please lie.”

  “I—he—Jordan was blackmailing me.”

  “You killed him for it.”

  “Ollie did. I could never—”

  “Did you help dump his body in the water? Lie to me,” she urged.

  “I didn’t know what else to do.” Tears started seeping down his face. “I didn’t know.”

  “Did you and Oliver Silverman break and enter into the residence of Paul Rogan, Cecily Greenspan, Melody Greenspan Rogan with the intent and purpose of imprisoning said family?”

  “I . . . yes.”

  “Did you or your partner physically assault both adults?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you or your partner batter Cecily Greenspan and threaten to sexually assault her?”

  His shoulders shook with sobs. “Yes, but—”

  “Did you, over the course of time from the early hours Saturday through Monday morning threaten, assault, and coerce Mr. Rogan, keeping his child separated, causing her to cry out for him, with the purpose of making him choose to carry an explosive device into the Quantum Air headquarters, to wear said device into a scheduled meeting, to detonate said device, killing himself and others in order to save his family?”

  “We were bluffing.”

  “Did you threaten, repeatedly, to kill Rogan’s wife and child if he did not carry out the bombing?”

  “Yes, yes, yes, but—”

  “I’m going to start considering your stupid buts an evasion and negate this deal. I would love to think about you living the rest of your worthless life off-planet. Deep space, no air unless they pump it in.”

  “Please.”

  “Did you and Silverman arrange to meet Jordan Banks at approximately three A.M. in Central Park, and did you stand as an accessory to his murder by Silverman?”

  Iler buried his face in his hands. “Yes. Please stop.”

  “When we’re done.”

  And when they were done, she called on Mira to give Iler a sedative.

  “I want to high five,” Baxter told Eve, “but I can’t work up to it. He was pathetic. Just goddamn pathetic.”

  “Go home, get some sleep instead. Good work.”

  “Yeah. Hey Trueheart,” he called as his partner came out of Observation. “Let’s you and me hit that diner you like, have ourselves a big, greasy breakfast. Get the taste of this out of our mouths.”

  “Works for me. Do you want to come, Lieutenant?”

  “No, thanks. Good work, Trueheart.”

  She started to turn toward Homicide when Anna Whitney came out, flanked by Roarke and the commander.

  “Jack’s annoyed with me,” she said briskly. “I’d agreed to stay only for the first few minutes of each interview. But I wouldn’t leave. I couldn’t. I’m going to see Rozilyn now. Thank you for finding justice for a good man.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Jack.”

  “All right, all right. Go home, Lieutenant.”

  “Yes, sir. I’m just going to write this up, connect with Reo, then—”

  “No. I’ll write it up.”

  “You? But—”

  His eyebrows lowered. “Do you doubt I can handle that duty, Lieutenant?”

  “No, sir.”

  “You’re dismissed. You’re on medical leave until the start of your shift on Monday morning. You’re off the roll. Understood?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good work, Dallas. Fine work. If I see you here five minutes from now, I’ll kick your ass.”

  He took his wife’s hand, walked away.

  “I’d say that was clear enough.” Roarke took Eve’s.

  “He probably hasn’t done this kind of paperwork in ten years. Twenty.”

  “Let’s get your coat.”

  “I should be able to tie up my own ends.”

  He kissed her hand before she could snatch it away. “Lieutenant, do you want your ass—which is surely already carrying bruises—kicked by your commander?”

  “No.” She let Roarke help her into her coat. “No,” she said again.

  “Let’s go get some sleep. Unless you’d like a big, greasy breakfast first.”

  “Sleep. Good work, Peabody.”

  “Thanks.”

  He got her down to the garage, into the car. Before he’d pulled out, she was getting a head start on that sleep.

  Epilogue

  She slept for twelve hours, woke starving and ate like a horse. Because it ached enough—and Roarke wouldn’t take no—she agreed to a soaking treatment, more wanding, the ice patches.

  She snuck into her home office long enough to read Whitney’s work. Had to admit he did the job well. Maybe she wanted to fiddle, just a little, but she had a feeling the commander would notice.

  And maybe kick her ass.

  Sprawled on the sofa with Roarke, she dropped off again while watching a vid, slept straight through—dreamless—until nearly noon.

  She swam, dozed, snuck in a quick check with Reo. Both prisoners would get their psych evals, their sentencing hearings—and the PA’s office expressed full confidence Iler would be remanded to an on-planet maximum security
prison, while Silverman would make Omega his new home.

  Eighteen consecutive life sentences.

  Satisfied with that, Eve took a walk around the grounds with Roarke. Then ate a huge bowl of spaghetti and meatballs.

  Submitted to more ice patches.

  Breathed a sigh of relief on Sunday when Roarke finally pronounced, “You’ll do.”

  She did well enough to indulge in a fairly energetic bout of sex.

  And felt in tune enough to bitch when he settled her down in front of the screen.

  “Why do we have to watch all this pregame stuff?”

  “Because I’m not going to miss watching our great good friends on the red carpet of the Oscars. You’ve got enough popcorn to give you solace.”

  Maybe.

  She didn’t see the point in strutting around in fancy duds, striking poses on some swatch of red while entertainment reporters in more fancy duds cooed and giggled and asked lame questions.

  “There’s our Peabody.”

  “What?” She looked up, focused on the screen.

  Peabody—Jesus—in some frothy pink (naturally) number that bared good, strong shoulders and sparkled in the sunlight.

  “How come it’s daytime? It’s nighttime.”

  “Rotation of the planet, darling Eve. It’s still about rotation.”

  “Right. She looks good.”

  Her hair all fluffy and curly.

  “Where the hell did she get those rocks she’s wearing?”

  “On loan—from you. McNab looks good as well.”

  Duded up, she noted, in a dark blue tux—made McNab-ish with a plaid vest, a screaming red bow tie.

  She spotted Mavis—how could you miss her—in a sweeping blaze of red and white. As she twirled for the cameras, the sweeps separated like blades of a fan. The heels of her red shoes towered with sparkling laces crisscrossing to the knee. Beside her Leonardo wore one of those long tux jackets that skimmed to his knees in some sort of metallic fabric that shifted from emerald to sapphire.

  He held Mavis’s hand as she bubbled for the reporter. “I can’t wait. It’s total dream come abso-true time. I’m nervous, but I’d be in the basket without my honey here, and our pals. Here’s Nadine. She’s wearing my honey, too. Nadine!” Mavis gestured. “You want to talk to Nadine, right? Nadine and Jake. He’s mega frost, isn’t he?”