Dead Of Night

Four

Eve grabbed the tox report the second it came through. Then she stared at the results. She engaged her interoffice ’link, said only, “ Peabody,” then went back to studying the lab’s findings.

“Yo,” Peabody said a moment later at Eve’s office doorway.

“Tox report. Take a look.” Eve passed her a printout while she continued to read her computer screen.

“Holy crap. It’s not what she took,” Peabody decided, “it’s more what didn’t she take.”

“Hallucinogens, date-rape drugs, sexual enhancers, paralytic, human blood, tranq, all mixed in wine. Hell of a cocktail.”

“I’ve never seen anything like this.” Peabody glanced over the printout. “You?”

“Not with so many variables and with this potency. It’s new to me, but let’s run it by Illegals and see if it’s new to them. According to the results, and the time line, she downed this herself, before she disengaged the alarm, or just after. Maybe she knew what was in it, maybe she didn’t. But she drank it down, on her own.”

“Hard to say, seeing she’s dead, but she pretty much wins the stupid prize.”

“All-time champ.” Eve paused as her machine signalled another incoming. “And we may have a ru

“Pretty damn careless of him,” Peabody commented.

“Yeah.” Eve frowned at the screen. “It is, isn’t it?”

“Another conclusion is he just didn’t care-being a vampire.” Peabody shrugged as Eve glanced back at her. “He doesn’t care if we match his DNA because he’ll just, I don’t know, turn into a bat and fly off, or poof into smoke. Whatever.”

“Right. A whole new scope on going into the wind.”

“I’m not saying it’s what I think, but maybe what he thinks.”

“We’ll be sure to ask him when we find him. Meanwhile, go ahead and run the cocktail by Illegals. I’ll do a standard search for the DNA match. Maybe he’s in the system.”

But she didn’t think so. He wasn’t careless, Eve thought. He was fucking arrogant. It didn’t surprise her when her search turned up negative.

“Lieutenant.”

She glanced over, experienced that quick heart punch when her eyes met Roarke’s. He was dressed in the dark suit he’d put on in their bedroom that morning, one of the countless he owned tailored to fit his long, rangy frame.

“Right on time,” she said.

“We aim to please.” He stepped in, eased a hip onto the corner of her desk. “How goes the vampire hunting?”

“I don’t think we’ll have to call in Van Helsing.” When he lifted his brows and gri

“And so armed, we’ll venture into the den of the children of the night. Never a dull moment,” he added and flicked his fingers at the choppy ends of her hair. “Your case is all over the media.”

“Yeah. Bound to be.”

“I noticed the primary hasn’t given a statement.”

“I’m not going to play the game on this one, or give this asshole the satisfaction. She drugged her own brains out prior-mix of Zeus, Erotica, Whore, Rabbit, Stu

“There’s an ugly recipe.”

“And my money says he provided the brew, pushed on her vanity and stupid buttons, got his rocks off, then drained her like a faulty motor.”

“For what purpose?” Roarke wondered.

“Best I can tell, he wound her up because he could. And he killed her because he could. He’ll want to do it again, real soon.”

“Foolish of him, don’t you think, to have chosen such a high-profile victim?”

She’d considered that, and had to appreciate being married to a man who could think like a cop. “Yeah, smarter, safer to bite a vagrant off the street. But this was more fun, more exciting. Why snack on street whores or sidewalk sleepers, the nobodies, when you can gorge yourself on the prime? Plus, it was profitable. A street level LC isn’t going to be sporting blue diamonds. He’s stoked, believe it, watching all the media coverage.”

“Unless he’s spent the day napping in his coffin.”

“Ha, ha.” She pushed up, instinctively brushed a hand over the weapon at her side. “Almost sundown. Let’s go clubbing.”

Peabody was lying in wait, along with her cohab, E-Division Detective McNab. He wasn’t just a fashion plate, but an entire place setting, and was decked out in pants of neon blue that appeared to be made up almost entirely of pockets. He’d matched it with a bright green jacket with streaks of yellow jagged across it and some sort of ski

“I thought we could use another pair of eyes,” Peabody began even as Eve’s eyes narrowed. “You know, strength in numbers.”

“I did a rotation in Illegals when I was still in uniform.” McNab gri

“You don’t want to miss a chance to cruise a vampire club.”

He smile turned winsome. “Who would?”

She could use him, Eve thought, but she gave him the hard-eye first, just for form. “This isn’t a damn double date.”

“No, sir.” So he waited until Eve turned her back to walk to the elevator before hooking pinkies with Peabody.

“Illegals hasn’t worked the combo,” Peabody began once they’d shoehorned into the elevator. “They don’t even have Bloodbath on their list of watch points. But they have worked a combination of Erotica, Bliss, Rabbit, with traces of blood-usually animal blood-in cases of vampire fetishism. They call it Vamp, and the use generally skews young. They haven’t had any homicides as a result of.”

“Our guy upped the stakes, considerably. Have to wonder why the club hasn’t made their list.”

“It’s new,” Peabody told her. “Way underground. Hadn’t hit their radar until I contacted them regarding our investigation.”

“Underground clubs pop up faster than weeds,” McNab put in. “Live or die on word of mouth. Since it’s more than urban legend that people tend to go down and not come back up, they don’t get heavy tourist traffic.”

“Tiara Kent found out about it somewhere.” Eve strode off the elevator and into the garage.

“Crowd she runs with.” Peabody jerked a shoulder. “New place with a jagged edge? It would be right up her alley.”

“And in less than two weeks from the first time she goes down, she’s guzzling a new, exciting illegals cocktail, and dies from a neck wound.” Eve slid behind the wheel of her vehicle. “That’s fast work, smooth work when you consider the security in her building never made him.” She glanced over at Roarke. “How much would a few pints of human blood net on the black market?”

“A few hundred.”

“What about famous human blood?”

“Ah.” He nodded as she drove out of the garage. “Yes, that might drive up the price to the right buyer. Are you thinking she was specifically targeted?”

“It’s an angle. She’s known, and she’s known to take risks, to slut around, to live wild. Her best friend hadn’t heard of the club before Kent clued her in. So maybe the idea or an invitation got passed straight onto the vic. In any case, she hooked up with her killer there, so someone saw them together. Someone knows him.”

“You know,” McNab speculated, “if you factor out the blood-sucking, soulless demon angle, this should be a slam dunk.”

“Good thing none of us believe in blood-sucking, soulless demons.” But Peabody ’s hand crept over and found McNab’s.

Eve caught the gesture in the rearview, just as she caught the way the fingers of Peabody ’s free hand snuck between the buttons of her shirt to close over something.

“ Peabody, are you wearing a cross?”

“What? Me?” The hand dropped like a stone into her lap. Her cheeks went pink as she cleared her throat. “It just happened that I know Mariella in Records, who just happened to have one, and I happened to borrow it. Just for backup.”