by J. D. Robb
“Nothing that applies to this.”
“Everything applies to this.”
Anger flashed across his face. “Understand I’m under no obligation to answer you, or to cooperate in this matter. But I’ll tell you that I made it clear to my father I wouldn’t be back, wouldn’t communicate with him in any way. That I’d come to see him only because I wanted to look at him—this last time—and know he was exactly where I wanted him to be.”
“And his response?”
“He didn’t need me, or want me. He promised to bring me down, and when he was done with me I’d have nothing. As nothing was what I deserved. That was the gist.”
Alex closed his eyes, fought for control. “What could he have offered Rod to have him do this? What could he have promised him he couldn’t have asked me for?”
“You’re going to tell me everything you know about Sandy, everything not on his official data. And you’re going to get me those financials. While you do, Detective Baxter’s going to turn his room inside out. Record on,” she ordered. “Mr. Ricker, do we have your permission to search the quarters of Rod Sandy on this premises, at this time?”
“Yes, you do. You have my permission to search his room, my permission to hunt him down like a dog. My permission to do whatever it takes to take him down. Is that enough?”
“It’s a good start. Baxter.”
“I’m on it.”
Eve sat. “Tell me about Rod Sandy.”
16
EVE PUSHED, SHOVED, AND BULLIED HER WAY through Saturday morning traffic. Beside her, Baxter worked furiously on the in-dash auxiliary computer.
“We need an e-man if we want to get into some of these accounts,” he told her. “I can pull up the standard ones. No major activity over the last ten days. But the others are trickier. It’s going to take me some time.”
“I’ve got an e-man. Recheck the transportation.”
“He didn’t get on any public transpo out of the city, not using his legit ID. Private’s going to take longer. And private’s the way he’d go. He could’ve taken a cab or a car service out of New York and picked up a private any damn where with the lead he’s got on us.”
“He’s got to tap one of his accounts.” There was always a trail, Eve thought, and money was the biggest breadcrumb. “And he’ll contact Ricker on Omega. He does what he’s told. He’s a drone, just a goddamn drone. He’ll follow instructions, if not direct from Ricker, then from whoever Ricker’s got working him.”
“He panicked, left with the clothes on his back, whatever cash he had, probably some files. But the panic’s working for him.”
“Not for long. He may get out, get away, but he’s already a dead man. Jesus, Baxter,” she said when he turned to her. “Ricker’s not going to let him run loose. His value just bottomed out. He’s worthless. We find him first or Ricker’s going to shut him down.”
Too impatient to wait for the gates, Eve hit vertical and soared over them. Baxter said, “Yee-haw.”
“We find which account he tapped.” Eve tore down the drive. “When he tapped it, and backtrack to where he was when he tapped it. We search on private transpo, starting in the city, working out. And we call in the locals on all of Sandy’s and all of Alex Ricker’s residences. He’ll want a place to catch his breath, to pick up more of his things. If he’s got any brains, and he does, he’ll be quick about that and he’s already gone. But we find out where he was, and we’ll start tracking where he goes from there.”
She swung out of the car, strode up the steps.
“You.” She jabbed a finger at the lurking Summerset. “Be useful. Contact Feeney and McNab, tell them I need them here. Now. Baxter, call in your boy,” she added as she headed upstairs.
“You recall,” Summerset called after her, “you’re hostessing a bridal shower in approximately six hours.”
The sound Eve made was perilously close to a scream.
“Bridal shower?” Baxter repeated.
“Shut up. Shut up. Never speak of it.” She rounded toward her office and nearly ran into Morris.
Baxter pulled up short. “Ah, hey, Morris.”
“You’ve got something,” Morris said.
“Got someone, lost him, now we’re going to find him.” She pushed past him, then let out an oath when she saw the connecting door between her office and Roarke’s was closed. The red light over it indicated he was working.
She’d owe him, she told herself. Big-time.
She knocked.
When he opened the door, irritation sparked in his eyes. “Eve. Closed door. Red light.”
“I’m sorry, I’ll grovel later if you want it.” Beyond him she could see several suited figures. Holo-meeting, she realized, and figured the groveling would be major. “I need your help, and I’ve got a ticking clock.”
“Ten minutes,” he said and shut the door in her face.
“Man, am I going to pay for that. Baxter, use the auxiliary to keep on the transpo. We need to start pushing through Sandy’s friends, relatives, contacts, acquaintances, girlfriends, boyfriends, his fucking tailor. This guy’s not a loner. He’s tagged someone, somewhere.”
“I can help.” Morris stood in the center of the room. “Let me help.”
She gave him a quick study. He looked rested, and that was a plus. Summerset must have dug up a shirt and pants for him—somewhere. “Morris, I’m going to have to bring my murder board back in here. Can you handle that? Don’t say it if you don’t mean it.”
“Yes.”
“I’ll have to fill you in as we go. For now, go in there.” She gestured toward the kitchen. “Program a whole buncha coffee. It’s not just scut work. It’s necessary.”
“I don’t mind scut work.”
She went to her desk as he walked to the kitchen. “Computer, all known data on Rod Sandy, on screen one. Priority run authorized, Dallas, Lieutenant Eve.”
Acknowledged. Working . . .
“He gets worried,” she began as the data began to scroll. “It sets off a little tingle when Alex tells him he’s going to meet with Roarke. He’s supportive, sure, that’s his job. But he worries about it. He chews on it. Pumps the driver because he’s not sure—not a hundred percent—that something in that conversation didn’t set off a bell that rings too close to him. Can’t pry too deep with Alex, and have that bell ringing any louder. The driver’s not too bright. Loyal, but not too bright, and hey, it’s Mr. Sandy and he’s got some prime brew.”
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.
“T
he 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.”
Eve 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.”
