Imitation in Death

“Dallas.”Peabody kept her voice low, laid a hand onEve ’s shoulder as her lieutenant had gone pale and clammy.

Eveshrugged, carefully took a step back. She knew everythingLoisGregg had felt. But it wouldn’t take her down, not now, into the memory, into the nightmare. The blood and the cold and the pain.

Her voice was level and cool when she continued. “When he’s done raping her, he takes the sash from her robe. She’s incoherent now, from the pain and the shock. He gets on the bed, straddles her, looks into her eyes when he strangles her, listens to her fight to breathe, feels her body convulsing under his in that sick parody of sex. That’s when he comes, when her body bucks under his and her eyes bulge. That’s when he gets his release.

“When he comes back to himself, he ties the sash into a bow, wedges the note between her toes. He takes the ring off her finger, amused by it. Such a female thing, to wear the symbol when there’s no man to go with it. He slips the ring in his pocket, or puts it in his toolbox, then checks how it all looks, and he’s pleased. Just as it’s supposed to. An excellent imitation.”

“Of what?”

“Of who,”Eve corrected. “AlbertDeSalvo. TheBoston Strangler.”

– -«»--«»--«»--

She stepped out into the hallway, where cops were milling around, doing what they could to keep people from the neighboring apartments inside.

And there was Roarke, she thought. There was a man with more money than God sitting cross-legged on the hallway floor, his back supported by the wall as he worked with his PPC.

And would probably be content to do so, for reasons she could never understand, for hours.

She moved to him, squatted down so their eyes were level. “I’m going to be here a while. You ought to go on home. I can catch a ride into Central.”

“Bad, is it?”

“Very. I’ve got to talk to the son, and he’s…” She let out a long breath. “They tell me the MT gave him something, but he’s still pretty messed up.”

“One is, when their mother’s murdered.”

Despite the presence of other cops, she laid a hand over his. “Roarke-”

“Demons don’t die,Eve, we just learn to live with them. We’ve both known that all along. I’ll deal with mine, in my way.”

She started to speak again, then looked up when McNab came off the elevator.

“Lieutenant, no disc run since eight this morning. Nothing from the outside unit, elevator, or the hall on this floor. Best I can tell, he jammed it by remote from outside before entering the building. I could verify, but I don’t have any tools on me.”

He held out his hands, a half-ass smile on his face, to indicate his baggy red shorts, blue cinch vest, and toeless airsneaks.

“Then go get some,” she began.

“I happen to have a few things in the car that might help with that,” Roarke interrupted. “Why don’t I give you a hand,Ian?”

“That would be mag. It’s pretty decent security, so I figure if he went remote, it had to be police-issue level or above. Can’t tell unless I can get into the panel and check the board.”

Evestraightened, then held out a hand. Roarke grasped her forearm, and she his, to help him to his feet. “Go ahead. Get me best guess on what he used.”

Oh eight hundred for entry, she thought. With the time of death she’d established, he’d spent no more than an hour onLoisGregg. More time than Wooton, more time to play, but still fast.

She went back in, walked to the kitchen.

JeffreyGreggwasn’t weeping now, but the tears already shed had wrecked his face. It was red and swollen, much like his mother’s.

He sat at a small laminated table, his hands cupped around a glass of water. His brown hair stood up in tufts from where she imagined he’d pulled at it, raked his fingers through it, in his grief.

She judged him to be somewhere in his early thirties, and dressed in brown shorts and a white T-shirt for a casual summer Sunday.

She sat across from him, waited until those damaged eyes lifted to hers.

“Mr.Gregg, I’mLieutenantDallas. I need to talk to you.”

“They said I couldn’t go in and see her. I should go in. When I-when I found her, I didn’t go in. I just ran out again, and called the police. I should’ve gone in-something. Covered her up?”

“No. You did exactly the right thing. You helped her more by doing just exactly what you did. I’m sorry,Mr.Gregg. I’m very sorry for your loss.”

Useless words, she knew. Goddamn useless words. She hated saying them. Hated not being able to count the number of times they’d forced themselves out of her mouth.

“She never hurt anybody.” He managed to lift the glass to his lips. “I think you should know that. She never hurt anybody in her life. I don’t understand how somebody could do this to her.”

“What time did you come here today?” She knew already, but would take him through the details, the repetition.

“I, ah, came over about three, I think. Maybe closer to four. No, nearer to three. I’m so mixed up. We were supposed to have this afternoon cookout at my sister’s inRidgewood. My mother was supposed to come by our place. We’re over on39^th. We were all going to take the train over toNew Jersey. She was supposed to be at our place by one.”

He gulped some water. “She runs late a lot. We tease her about it, but when it got to be like two, I started calling to move her along. She didn’t answer, so I figured she was on her way. But she didn’t show. I called her pocket number, but that didn’t answer either. My wife and kid were getting restless and a

Remembering that, he began to cry again. “I was really steamed that I had to come over here and get her. I wasn’t worried so much, not really. I never thought anything had happened to her, and all the time she was…”

“When you got here,”Eve prompted, “you let yourself in. You have a key?”

“Yeah, I got access to the outside door and her apartment. I was thinking, something wrong with her ‘links, that’s all. She forgets to bump them sometimes and they go out. Something’s wrong with her ‘links and she’s lost track of time. That’s what I was thinking when I let myself in. I called out to her, like: ‘Mom! Damn it, Mom, we were supposed to leave for Mizzy’s two hours ago.’ And when she didn’t answer, I thought, Oh crap, she’s on her way to my place and I’m over here, and this is so irritating. But I walked to the bedroom door anyway. I don’t even know why. And she was… God. God. Mom.”

He broke down again, andEve shook her head at the MT before he could move in with a tranq. “Mr.Gregg.Jeff, you have to hold it together. You have to help me. Did you see anyone near the apartment, anyone outside?”

“I don’t know.” He mopped at his streaming face. “I was irritated and in a hurry. I didn’t see anything special.”

“Did your mother mention being uneasy about anything, noticing something, someone who worried her?”

“No. She’s lived here for a dozen years. It’s a nice building. Secure.” He took deep breaths to steady his voice. “She knows her neighbors. Leah and me, we’re only ten blocks away. We see each other every week. She’d’ve told me if something was wrong.”

“How about your father?”

“They split, God, twenty-five years ago. He lives out inBoulder. They don’t see each other much, but they get along okay.Jesus,Jesus, my father wouldn’t have done this.” The hitch came back in his voice, and he began to rock himself. “You’d have to be crazy to do this to somebody.”

“It’s just routine. Was she involved with anyone?”

“Nobody special now. She hadSam. They were together for about ten years. He was killed in a tram wreck about six years ago. He was the one for her, I guess. There hasn’t been anybody else special since.”

“Did she wear a ring?”

“A ring?” He looked atEve blankly, as if the question had been posed in some strange foreign language. “Yeah.Sam gave her a ring when they moved in together. She always wore it.”