Conspiracy in Death

He ran a hand over her hair. He'd give her the night to grieve, to escape.

But when he left her alone, she opened her eyes, stared at nothing. And didn't sleep.

Getting out of bed in the morning seemed like wasted effort.

She shifted, looked up through the glass overhead. The snow was gone and the sky was the dull gray of depression. She tried to think of some reason to get up, get dressed, but could think of nothing, could feel nothing but a low, dragging fatigue.

She turned her head, and there was Roarke in the sitting area, sipping coffee and watching her.

"You've slept long enough, Eve. You can't go on hiding in here."

"It seems like a good idea right now."

"The longer it does, the more you'll lose. Get up."

She sat up, but drew her knees into her chest and rested her head on them. "I don't have anything to do, nowhere to go."

"We can go anywhere you like. I've cleared my schedule for a couple of weeks."

"You didn't have to do that." Anger struggled to surface but turned pale and listless and faded. "I don't want to go anywhere."

"Then we'll stay home. But you're not lying in bed with the covers over your head."

A bubble of resentment worked its way free. "I didn't have the covers over my head," she muttered. And what did he know? she thought. How could he know how she felt? But there was enough pride left to have her getting up, dragging on a robe.

Pleased with the small victory, he poured her coffee, topped off his own. "I've eaten," he said casually, "but I don't believe Mavis has."

"Mavis?"

"Yes, she stayed last night." He reached over, pressed a button in the interhouse 'link. "She'll keep you company."

"No, I don't want – "

But it was too late as Mavis's face swam on-screen. "Roarke, is she awake yet – Dallas!" Her smile broke out, a little wobbly, but there, as she spotted Eve. "I'll be right there."

"I don't want to talk to anyone," Eve said furiously when the screen went blank. "Can't you understand that?"

"I understand very well." He rose, laid his hands on her shoulders. It broke his heart as he felt them droop. "You and I went through a large part of our lives without having anyone who mattered or who we mattered to. So I understand very well what it is to have someone." He leaned forward to press his lips to her brow. "To need someone. Talk to Mavis."

"I've got nothing to say." Her eyes filled again and burned.

"Then listen." He squeezed her shoulders once, then turned as the door burst open and Mavis flew in. "I'll leave you two alone," he said, but he doubted either of them heard him as Mavis was already wrapping herself around Eve and babbling.

"Those suck-faced pissheads," he heard her sob out, and he nearly smiled as he closed the door.

"Okay," Eve murmured and buried her face in Mavis's blue hair. "Okay."

"I wanted to go find Whitney and call him a suck-faced pisshead in person, but Leonardo said it was better to come straight here. I'm sorry, so sorry, so sorry." She reared back so abruptly Eve nearly went down. "What the hell's wrong with them!" Mavis demanded, throwing her arms out and sending the diaphanous pink sleeves of what might have been a nighty flapping.

"It's procedure," Eve managed.

"Well, screw that in the ass sideways. No way they're going to get away with this. I bet Roarke's already hired a platoon of hot-shit lawyers to sue their suck-faces off. You'll own the goddamn city of New York when this is over."

"I just want my badge." And because it was Mavis, Eve dropped onto the sofa and buried her face in her hands. "I've got nothing without it, Mavis."

"You'll get it back." Shaken, Mavis sat, draped an arm around Eve's shoulders. "You always make the right thing happen, Dallas."

"I'm locked out." Weary, Eve sat back, closed her eyes. "You can't make things happen when they're happening to you."

"You made them happen for me. When you collared me all those years ago, it changed my life."

It was an effort, but Eve worked up a ghost of a smile. "Which time?"

"The first time – the other couple were just like, you know, slips. You made me wonder if I could be more than a grifter scamming marks, then you made me see I could. And last year when things were bad for me, when it looked like they were going to put me in a cage, you were there for me. You made the right things happen."

"I had the badge, I had control." Her eyes went bleak again. "I had the job."

"Well, now you've got me and you've got the iciest guy on or off planet. And that's not all. You know how many people called here last night? Roarke wanted to stay up here with you so I asked Summerset if I could, like, take the calls and stuff. They just kept coming in."

"How many from reporters wanting a story?"

Mavis sniffed, then got up to call up the menu on the AutoChef. Roarke had given her orders to see that Eve ate, and she intended to follow them. "I know how to ditch the media dogs. Let's have ice cream.".

"I'm not hungry."

"You don't need to be hungry for ice cream and – oh yeah there's a God – chocolate chip cookies. Mag squared."

"Mavis – "

"You took care of me when I needed you," Mavis said quietly. "Don't make me feel like you don't need me."

Nothing could have worked more completely. Though she sent one longing look toward the bed, to the oblivion she might find there, Eve sighed. "What kind of ice cream?"

Eve drifted through the day, like someone wandering in and out of sweeps of fog. She avoided her office and Roarke's, used a headache as an excuse to crawl away for a few hours. She took no calls, refused to discuss the situation with Roarke, and finally closed herself in the library on the pretense of choosing reading material.

She turned on the search screen so anyone monitoring would think she was browsing through, then ordered curtains closed, lights off, and curled on the couch to escape into sleep.

She dreamed of coiled snakes slithering up a gold staff that dripped with blood. And the blood slipped and slid and beaded over paper flowers tucked into a brown glass bottle.

Someone called for help in a voice thin with age.

She stepped into the dream, into a landscape blinding white with snow, wind that stung the eyes and carried the voice away. She ran through it, her boots skidding, her breath puffing out in visible waves, but there was nothing but that wall of cold white.

"Cunt cop." A hiss in the ear.

"What are you up to, little girl?" Terror in the heart.

"Why'd somebody wa

Then she saw them, the doomed and the damned, frozen in the snow, their bodies twisted, their faces caught in that shocked insult of death. Their eyes staring at her, asking the question still unanswered.

Behind her, behind that white curtain, came the crack and snick of ice breaking. Of something breaking free with sneaky, whispering sounds that were like quiet laughter.

The walls of white became the walls of a hospital corridor, stretched out like a tu

"What are you up to, little girl?"

The sob ripped at her throat, the fear swallowing her whole. So she ran, stumbling down the tu

The tu