Born In Death

She might have been carrying an extra twenty pounds, but Mavis could still bounce. She all but boinged into the room on pink airboots that slicked up to her knees. Her blue and white skirt fluttered like flower petals beneath the basketball bulge of her belly. The sleeves of her dress displayed a geometric pattern of color that came to points over the backs of her hands.

Her hair – a soft, pale blonde today – was scooped back in a long, twisty tail as bouncy as she was.

She stopped short, slapped both hands over her mouth. And burst into tears.

“Oh shit. Oh shit” was all Eve could manage.

“No, no, no.” Still sobbing, even as Leonardo rushed in behind her, Mavis waved one of her hands. “I’m so knocked-up. I’m a total victim of the hormones. It’s so pretty! Oh, oh, it’s all rainbows and flowers. It’s so mag. It’s so mag, Dallas.”

She sobbed her way across the room and threw herself into Eve’s arms – bulging belly first.

“Okay, good then. Glad you like it.”

“I absolove it. Peabody!” Mavis flung out a hand, pulling Peabody into a three-way embrace. “Thank you. Thank you.”

“Maybe you should sit down.”

“No, I’m okay. I just flood off and on. Isn’t that right, honey-pie?” she said to Leonardo.

“We had baby carrots last night.” He was already passing her tissues. “She cried for ten minutes.”

Obviously the memory made her laugh, as she gri

“That’s your spot,” Eve confirmed.

“Can I give you a hand, your majesty?” Roarke offered his.

“This is TTF. Too Totally Frosty. You’re going to run away for the day with my sweetie, aren’t you?”

“As soon as humanly possible,” he told her, and helped her into the chair.

“Well, okay. I give you leave.”

“Give her the stuff,” Peabody whispered.

“She might start crying again.”

“I get stuff? Already?” Since she was sitting, the best Mavis could do was bounce on her butt. “What? Where? Oh, God, I love stuff.”

Uneasy about the results, Eve went to a cabinet, took out the scepter and tiara.

“Oh, boy! Uptown squared.”

Relieved because this time Mavis’s eyes glittered with laughter instead of tears, Eve passed the tiara to Leonardo.

“You probably know how to get it on right.”

“Crown me, moonpie,” Mavis told him. “And let the games begin.”

Within the hour, the room was so full of estrogen Eve thought she could bottle it and sell it on the black market. Women nibbled, sipped, cooed over other women’s protruding bellies and chatted about the things she understood they chatted about when they got together as a species.

Hair. That’s a great look for you, and what a mag color! Where do you go?

Clothes. Absolutely fabulous shoes. Are they comfortable?

Men. He just doesn’t listen to what I need to say.

And due to the nature of the event, they talked of babies, babies, and more babies.

The new fact she discovered was that women who’d already had children felt compelled to share their childbirth experiences with those about to head to the labor mines.

Sixteen hours, and two and a half of that pushing. But it was worth it.

Titania popped out as soon as my water broke. If I’d been ten minutes later getting to the birthing center, she’d have been born in the cab!

I had to have a C. Wiley just wouldn’t turn.

They were also full of advice.

You have to get Magdelina’s Symphony For Giving Life! I’d have been lost without it. So empowering.

Water births are the only way to go. I had both of mine in a birthing lagoon. It’s a religious experience.

Take the drugs.

And that one, Eve thought, was the most sensible statement of the day.

With a frosty bellini in her hand, Nadine Furst – ace reporter and soon-to-be host of her own crime-beat show – wandered over. “You give a good party, Dallas. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Mavis look happier. She’s literally radiating.”

“Wait, she could start bawling any minute.”

“Hormones.” Nadine shrugged. She was wearing her streaky blonde hair sleek these days around her sharp face. “Wanted to talk to you.”

“Hair looks great, fantastic shoes, and I’m sure whatever man you’re currently banging is handsome and wise. Does that cover it?”

“No, but you got three out of three. We’re fine-tuning the format for my show, and the producers and I thought it would just top it off if we had a monthly segment with you. An intense hour every four weeks that not only focuses on whatever case you’re working, but gives a roundup of what you’ve handled through the month.”

Nadine lifted her glass in a kind of toast before she sipped. “Adds a nice punch to the format, and it’s good exposure, good PR for the NYPSD.”

“A monthly deal? Let me think about it a minute. No.”

Nadine merely sipped her drink, cocked a brow. “Which is exactly what I told my team you’d say. So I have this alternative, which I think would suit us both. A monthly segment with Homicide. Someone in your division comes on every four weeks. All you have to do is assign the detective, give me the heads-up so I can prep. It’s good screen, Dallas. And it gives the viewing public a face.”

“Maybe.” The reality was there had to be some give and take with the media, and the plus was Eve knew she could trust Nadine to give a balanced view. “Something like that I’d have to run by the brass.”

“You’re still first up.” She tapped Eve’s shoulder. “The one you’re working now would have a kick. Two lovers – young, attractive, and seemingly ordinary – bound, tortured, and killed. How’s it going?”

“That’s what I like about you, Nadine. You know how to make party conversation.”

“Would you rather talk about childbirth and breast-feeding?”

“I’d rather be stabbed in the eye with a burning stick. It’s going. You got any dish on a Walter Cavendish? Rich lawyer.”

“No, but I can poke around.”

“How about the Bullock Foundation?”

“Huge. Donates mucho moolah, funds programs, gives grants. London-based with a worldwide reach and some off-planet interests. Headed now by Bullock’s widow and second wife, who enjoys the limelight, and her son, who’s rarely far from her side. Just what does the respected and generous Bullock Foundation have to do with two dead accountants?”

“That’s the question.”

Because she saw Peabody rushing over and knew she was about to be tossed back into Babyland, Eve grabbed a bellini for herself.

“We have to do the games.” Peabody had a gleam in her eye that might have come from the bellinis, or the overdose of estrogen.

“Go ahead,” Eve told her.

“Nuh-uh! You have to run them. If I do it, I can’t play. I wa

“Don’t look at me,” Nadine said when Eve turned to her.

“Oh, hell. Fine, great. I’m on it.”

She’d run ops, she ran a squad of detectives. She could handle a hundred women over a bunch of stupid games.

They were insane, Eve discovered within the first fifteen minutes. The room was packed with women who were psychotic and certifiable. Screaming, shouting, laughing like mental patients over the race to decipher each rubric she held up.

She wasn’t entirely sure she wouldn’t be forced to subdue a brunette who looked big enough to be carrying triplets.

“Cradle Robber!” The woman screeched out.

“Okay, good. You got it. Settle down.” Eve pressed a finger to her eyes, breathed, and prayed she’d make it through the next two rounds without becoming a gibbering idiot.

At last she got a break as the victor insisted on being hauled to her feet to waddle over to inspect the prizes and select her spoils.