by J. D. Robb
“I can get with that. I think I’m going to have a slice of the Upper East Side since . . .” Eve trailed off, narrowed her eyes. And crouched again.
“Is something wrong?” Ariel began and gnawed her lip as she leaned over.
“No. This sector here? Are the streets, the buildings to scale—or close? Or did you just make what worked best?”
“Are you kidding?” Erik interrupted. “She used maps and holos, did freaking math. Ari was obsessed.”
“It’s different from a map. Different even from being there, being in it. This . . . it’s kind of like a God’s-eye view.”
She rose, circled, squatted down. “Boundaries change, depending on the people. Who comes in, who goes out. Back fifteen, twenty years ago, the Soldado turf ran from East 96th up to 120th. Solid fourteen blocks from the East River over to Fifth. And the Skulls held 122nd up to 128th, with some territory west of Fifth where they disputed borders with the Bloods. But this area right here, this eastern slice between 118th and 124th, that was the hot zone of the battleground, that was where each wanted more territory. That was where the bombings took place.”
“Bombings?” Ariel’s eyes widened as she edged closer to the cake to study it. “I didn’t hear about any bombings.”
“They happened seventeen years ago,” Roarke told her.
“Oh.”
“Here’s the church, and the rectory behind it,” Eve continued. “Deep in Soldado territory. The youth center—northwest of the church, but still in boundaries. Now, up here . . . What’s happened here, just a few blocks north of where the youth center was built? In that one-time hot zone.”
“What?” Ariel bent closer.
“Gentrification. Homes and properties, just hitting the edge of St. Cristóbal’s parish. A few were there before, the ones that held on during and after the Urbans. And in the last ten, twelve years, there’s more. Successful business owners and so on, settling here, cleaning it up, increasing its value. He’d see this every day. Somebody who lived here, crossed up and over to the center, visited parishioners—and bonded with the Ortiz family—would see this neighborhood, the houses, town homes, condos every day. He’d have seen them twenty years ago. He’d have seen that section every day. He wanted to keep it. He wanted more.”
“Seven Deadly Sins again,” Roarke commented.
“Huh?”
“Envy. In your face, day after day? You covet.”
“Yeah. Yeah. We’re hitting a lot of them. Got your lust, greed, pride, and now envy. Interesting.”
“I’m completely lost,” Ariel said, and brought Eve back to the moment.
“Sorry. Something just hit me, made me think about a case.” She straightened, but kept her gaze on the Upper East Side. “I think maybe we’ll take that slice out of the Lower West. SoHo looks good enough to eat.”
She ate cake, she drank champagne, and spent the better part of an hour doing her duty—and trying to keep at least part of her mind on the conversation. The minute their guests were out the door, Eve went back to the cake.
“Okay, so I need to hack this sector off and take it up to the office. It’s a good visual for—”
“Eve, for God’s sake, it’s cake. I can program you a holo-model of that sector in about twenty minutes. Probably less.”
Her brow furrowed. “You can? Oh. That would probably be better.”
“And involve less calories. But before I do . . .” He crooked his finger, then started toward the steps. “What’s the point?”
“I’m not sure, exactly. It was just looking down at it that way, different perspective. You can see, clearly, how the borders between gang turf ran, how they blended, putting certain areas in contention. And how the neighborhood’s changed. Where everything is. Church, rectory, youth center, the Ortiz home, the restaurant. Then there’s Lino’s former apartment building. And I’m thinking about what Lino said to his mother, to Penny. He’d come back with a big car, have a big house. You can get a car anywhere, but the house—”
“Would have to be in the neighborhood. He can’t show it off unless it’s in the neighborhood. But, if he had a big house in the neighborhood, why was he living in the rectory?”
“I don’t know if he actually had it, or if he was just coveting it. But he was waiting for something. Years of waiting, deliberately on his home turf. If he sticks that long, and under those circumstances, doesn’t it follow he may have planned to stick for good?”
“The big house, the wealth, the importance, and the girl.” With a nod, Roarke strode down the hall with her. “And the ground you’ve always considered yours.”
“When he got what he was waiting for—and it has to be money, or something that leads to money—why leave again? He wasn’t here for shits and smiles. He had a purpose. I haven’t looked for it here, because I was going on the assumption he came here to hide. Maybe so, probably so.”
She pushed at her hair as they turned into her office. “Maybe so. But there could have been something here he was waiting for. Something he got to see every day, and feel smug about. That kept him going, kept him playing the part that had to squeeze at him.”
She paced around the murder board, thinking it through, working it out. “How much do you own on Grafton Street?”
She threw him for a moment, then he nodded slowly. “A bit of this, a bit of that. Yes, I wanted to have what I could only envy as a boy.”
“Rosa knew him, but made it clear he left them be—mostly. He liked old Mr. Ortiz, respected him. Envied, maybe, if we go back to the Deadlies, maybe.” She hooked her thumbs in her pockets, circling it in her mind as she’d circled the board.
“The Ortiz group is a big, tight family. Like a gang? They look out for each other, hold their territory. He gets close to them as Flores, marries them, buries them, visits them in their nice homes. The big house. He wants what they have. How does he get it?”
“Are you thinking he killed Hector Ortiz?”
“No, no, natural causes. I checked that through and through. And he respected Hector Ortiz. He, in his way, admired him. But the Ortizes, they aren’t the only ones with nice houses, with a big house, with ties to the church. I need to run some of the properties, just see, just play this line out and see. I could use that holo.”
“Then I’d better get to work.” He held up the figure of Eve from the cake. “And this is my payment for the time and skill.”
Amused, she cocked her head. “You’re going to eat me?”
“Too many obvious and crude rejoinders on that one. But no, I’m going to keep you.”
He leaned down, kissed the woman. “What are you looking for with those properties?”
“I hope I know when I find it.”
19
IT WOULD TAKE A WHILE, EVE KNEW—LIKELY longer than Roarke and his magic hologram—to do the search and run on properties and owners thereof. She opted to start with a basic triangulation between church, youth center, and the Ortiz home.
Probably a waste of time, she told herself. Just some wild hair, wild goose, wild whatever.
But it had always been a con, hadn’t it? At the core, she thought as her computer worked the task, Lino Martinez had run a long con. A long con meant planning, dedication, research, and the goal of a fat payoff.
Considering, she went to her ’link, checked with a good friend who knew the grift.
Mavis Freestone, her hair currently a sunburst the color of spring leaves, filled the screen with cheer.
“Hey! Good catch. Baby’s down and Leonardo just split to go get some ice cream. I had a yen for Mondo-Mucho-Mocha, and we didn’t have it on tap.”
“Sounds good. I wanted . . . Yen?” Eve felt the blood drain out of her head. “You’re not pregnant again.”
“Pregs? That’s a negativo on being knocked up.” Mavis’s eyes twinkled, the same improbable green as her hair. “Just got the yums for the triple M.”
“Okay.” Whew. “Quick question. What’s the longest con you ever ran?”
“Ah, gee, trip in the way-back. I’m getting all nostalgic. Let’s see. There was this time I ran a Carlotta, named it after an old friend. I think she’s on Vegas II now. Anyway, to run a Carlotta you’ve got to—”
“No details. Just the length.”
“Oh.” Mavis pursed her lips. “Maybe four months. Carlottas take a lot of foundation and seeding.”
“Do you know anyone that ran one for years? Not months. Into the years.”
“I know plenty who ran the same game, into years. But different marks, you know. Same game, same mark?”
“Yeah, that’s the idea.”
“There was this guy, frigging genius. Slats. He ran a Crosstown Bob for three years. Then poofed. Just poofed for five more. Came back around, I heard. He’d moved to Paris, France, changed his name and all that shit. Buzz was Slats lived high on the take from the Crosstown Bob. Kept his hand in though, over there, ’cause you can’t help it.”
“Why did he come back?”
“Hey, once a New Yorker, you know?”
“Yeah. Yeah. That’s the deal. What about religious cons?”
“Those are the cheesecake. Sweet and creamy, go down smooth. There’s Hail Mary, Praise the Lord, Kosher, Redemption—”
“Okay. Ever hear of a grifter named Lino? Lino Martinez?”
“Doesn’t ring. But I’ve been out of the game awhile now. I’m a mommy.”
“Right.” And, Eve realized, she hadn’t asked about the baby. “So how’s Bella doing?”
“She’s the maggest of the mag, the ultest of the ults. In snoozeland now or I’d put her on. Nobody goos like my Bellarina goos.”
“Yeah. Well. Give her a goo back from me. Thanks for the info.”
“No prob. I’ll see you at the girl bash if not sooner. We’re revved topless over it.”
“Great. Wear a top anyway. Thanks, Mavis.”
She turned, and walked straight through a scale model of St. Cristóbal’s. And said, “Jesus.”
“I’ve heard he visits there often.”
“How did you do that? That wasn’t twenty minutes.”
“I’m often even better than I think I am.”
“Nobody’s better than you think you are.”
He’d scaled the holo down, but constructed it considerably larger than Ariel’s cake. The simple cross atop the church came to Eve’s knee. She stepped out of church and surveyed. “This is pretty much iced.”
“I can take it to the holo-room if you want larger scale.”
“No, this is good. Church, bodega, rectory,” she began, moving into the holo. “Youth center, Hector Ortiz’s house. Site of first bombing.” She moved south and east. “It’s still a school. Site of second. Now west and north. It was a sandwich shop-type hangout, now a 24/7.”
Roarke studied the holo himself. “I could, in about the same amount of time, program one from ’43, or any given year.”
“You just want to play,” she countered. “This is what he saw in the now, every day. Whatever was in the . . . way-back,” she decided, using Mavis’s term, “is in the now. Changed a little maybe. But something he wanted then he wanted now.”
“I actually understand that,” Roarke commented.
“Peabody and I are going to locate and interview survivors, family members. Five dead in the second bombing.” She frowned down at the bright red and yellow of the 24/7. “It’s not part of St. Cristóbal’s parish. It’s outside, and was clearly in disputed territory, but leaning toward Skulls, when it was hit. Close to the boundaries, of both. Lino liked to run, ran with the other priest, Freeman, when they could hook that up. Their typical route took them from the rectory, east, then turning north before heading west again, taking them through this part of Spanish Harlem—past these middle- and upper-middle-class properties, past Hector Ortiz, on, turning south, then hitting the youth center. He grew up here, but he bypassed the street where his old apartment is. Still is. Not interested in that, doesn’t need to see that. Likes to look at the snappier properties.”
Roarke started to speak, then decided to stand back and watch her work. While she did, he poured himself a brandy to add to his enjoyment.
“Habits get formed for a reason,” she muttered. “You do something, keep doing it, form a routine for a reason. Maybe this was his habitual route because it just worked out that way, and he fell into the habit. But he could’ve gotten the same time and distance in by mixing it up, and most people who run habitually like to mix it up. Stay fresher. He could’ve done that going west out the door, heading south, then doing the loop, but Freeman said he never varied. So what does he see when he does his route? And who sees him? Habitually.”
She crouched, ran her hand through buildings that wavered and shimmered at the contact. “All through here, all these homes, apartments. Part of the parish, and also part of the school district. Anybody living here then would have known Lino. Big bad dude. Sure, there’s been turnover. People move out, people move in, people die and get born. But there are plenty, like the Ortiz family, who’re rooted deep here. Every day, every day,” she murmured. “Hey, Father. Good morning, Father. How’s it going, Father. I bet he juiced on that. Father.
“It’s a patrol, isn’t it? A kind of daily patrol. His turf, his territory. Like a dog marking his territory.” She poked her finger at the Ortiz house. “How much is it worth, today’s market? A private home like this, this sector?”
“Depends. If you’re looking at it as a residential property—”
“Don’t nitty-gritty it. Just basic. Single-family home, pre-Urban construction. Well-maintained.”
“Square footage? Materials? It does depend,” he insisted when she curled her lip at him. “But if you want a very general ballpark . . .” He crouched as she did, studied the house, and named a figure that had her eyes bulging.
“You’re shitting me.”
“No indeed. That’s a bit of low-balling actually because I haven’t really studied the property. And that estimate will likely increase as the neighborhood gentrification continues to spread. Now if it’s a straight home-owner to home-owner sale you’re thinking, that would fluctuate somewhat due to the interior. Is the kitchen, are the baths, high-end, how much of the original materials remain, and all manner of things.”
“That’s a lot of tacos.”
“New York tacos, darling Eve. The same house in a different location. Let’s say . . . Baltimore or Albuquerque? About a third to a half of that market price.”
“Geography.” She shook her head. “Once a New Yorker,” she added, thinking of Mavis’s remark. “So he runs by this, and the rest every day. Patrols this area, every day. And whoever killed him knew him, whoever killed him goes to St. Cristóbal’s, whoever killed him lived in this sector when Lino lived here as Lino. Knows Penny Soto, because that bitch, she’s in this. She’s in all of it. Whoever killed him was smart enough to wait for a big ceremony like the Ortiz funeral, or got lucky enough to hit. I think smart. I just think smart.
“Cyanide. Doesn’t come cheap. We’re not pulling anything from black market sources, but hell, I didn’t expect to ring the bell there.”
“There are buttons I could push there.”
“Yeah, I bet there are. If it comes to it, maybe, but either way, it costs. Whoever killed him’s Catholic enough to be compelled to confess to his priest. I don’t know, I don’t know, that says older to me. That says it’s not some kid, but someone mature. Yeah, Mira said mature,” she said half to herself. “Mature enough to pull this off, mature enough to feel guilt over it. Not for gain, not for gain, that angle’s bullshit. If the killer was looking for gain, knife the bastard.”
She tapped her fingers on her knee as she ran it through, imagined it. “If it’s just gain, even the most simple kind of revenge or survival instinct, you’d work with Penny and lure him, hack him up like he and Penny hacked up her father. Make it look like a mugging—you’re smart enough to do that.”
“But you don’t,” Roarke pu
t in, “because it’s not simple.”
“It goes too deep for that. Penny, she’s in this for gain. That’s all she’s in it for. But you? It’s not about that. It’s about payment and penance. An eye for an eye. Who’d he kill or harm? One of yours. But you don’t confront him, you don’t report him, you don’t point the finger.”
She slowly straightened. “Because it didn’t work before. He got away before. No payment, no penance. It has to be done, and it has to be done in God’s house. You’ve held on to your faith all these years. You’ve been faithful, even though you lost something so vital. And here he is, back again, blaspheming, defiling the church, running free, every day. In your goddamn face. Doing it for five years, and you had no way of knowing. Not until Penny told you.”
She frowned down at the holo, could almost hear the conspiratory whispers. “Why, why, what’s the angle there? Gotta get back to that. Because that has to be it. Penny ratted him out to you, and you had to act. You had to balance the scales.”
She stepped back. “Damn it. There’s this, and this and that. And I can see it. I can see each point, but how do they come together?”
“Keep going. If it’s an eye for an eye, who did Martinez kill?”
“Soto. Nick Soto because of what he’d done and was doing to Penny. And thinking of her, of what it was like for her, he beat the crap out of Solas. But nobody gave a shit about Soto, nobody looked at a couple of kids, fourteen, fifteen years old to rip a man to pieces like that. Probably a lot of people had several small, private celebrations when he was offed. It may have been his first kill—Lino’s first kill. Made his mark with it. The timing’s about right, and the cop I talked to from back then remembers him as a troublemaker, as a badass, but they never hauled him in for questioning on murder—not for Soto, not before. After . . .”
She went back to check her notes. “Gang-related violence, questioned numerous times regarding the deaths or disappearances of several known members of rival gangs. No evidence, alibied.”
