Conspiracy in Death

"How the hell do we find it?"

"I believe I can help you there. But, unless you have a specific target, it will take some time to go through this entire list of suspects."

"I'm not going to ask how you'll do it," Feeney decided. "But start with Tia Wo and Hans Vanderhaven. Wo was supposed to meet me today with her gold pin, and she never showed. Vanderhaven's taken an unscheduled leave. All we can get at this point is he's in Europe. Peabody and I were about to track both of them down when you called, Dallas."

"If the pin found on-scene belongs to either of them, they'll try to replace it."

"Got that covered," McNab assured her. "I'm linked into all the sources in the city for that particular piece. Already doing a search on other sources in Europe if that's where the other doc flew. We'll have a record of every sale made."

"Good coverage."

"We'd better get started." Feeney rose, looked at Eve. "What're you going to be doing while we're busting our butts?"

"Taking a quick trip. I'll be back tomorrow. Baxter's setting up a truth testing and evaluation with Mira."

"You could put that off. We get a break, you could be clear without it in a few days."

The faint smile she'd worked up faded. "I'll never be clear without it."

"You stick with level one. They can't make you go higher."

She kept her eyes on his. "I'll never be clear unless I go the route. You know that, Feeney."

"Goddamn it."

"I can handle it." Aware that Roarke had gotten to his feet, she sent Feeney a warning look. "It's just routine, and Mira's the best handler there is."

"Yeah." But there was a sick feeling in his gut as he turned to grab up his coat. "Let's ride, people. We'll be in touch, Dallas. You can tag any of us, any time, on our personals."

"As soon as I know something."

"Sir." Peabody stopped in front of Eve, shifted her feet. "Hell," she muttered and grabbed Eve into a fierce hug.

"Peabody, this isn't the time to get sloppy. You're embarrassing yourself."

"If Rosswell's co

In a quick jerk, Eve hugged back and released. "That's the spirit. Get the hell out of here. I've got places to go."

"Nobody gave me a hug," McNab complained as they headed out and made Eve snort out a laugh.

"Well." Fighting to steady her emotions, she turned back to Roarke. "Looks like we've got a plan."

His eyes fixed on her face, he came toward her. "I didn't realize there were levels of this testing process."

"Sure. It's no big deal."

"Feeney seemed to think otherwise."

"Feeney's a worrier," she said with a shrug, but when she started to turn away, Roarke took her arm.

"How bad is it?"

"It's not a cruise on airskates, okay? And I can handle it. I can't think about it now, Roarke, it'll mess up my head. Just how quick can that spiffy transpo of yours get us to Chicago?"

Tomorrow, he decided, they would damn well deal with it. But for now, he gave her the smile he knew she needed. "Just how quick can you pack?"

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The sun was already dipping down in the western sky, sending shadows to droop over Chicago's jagged skyline. She saw the last glints of it shimmer and bounce off the lake.

Should she remember the lake? she wondered.

Had she been born there, or had she just passed through to spend a few nights in that cold room with the broken window? If she could stand in that same room now, how would she feel? What images would dance through her head? Would she have the courage to turn and face them?

"You're not a child now." Roarke slipped a hand over hers as the transport began its gentle descent into the Chicago Air and Space Complex. "You're not alone now, and you're not helpless now."

She continued to concentrate on breathing evenly, in and out. "It's not always comfortable to realize you can see what goes on in my head."

"It's not always easy to read your head, or your heart. And I don't care for it when they're troubled and you try to hide it from me."

"I'm not trying to hide it. I'm trying to deal with it." Because the descent always made her stomach jitter, she turned away from the view port. "I didn't come here on some personal odyssey, Roarke. I came here to gather data on a case. That's priority."

"It doesn't stop you from wondering."

"No." She looked down at their joined hands. There was so much that should have separated them, she thought. How was it nothing did? Nothing could. "When you went back to Ireland last fall, you had issues, personal issues to deal with, to face or resolve. You didn't let them get in the way of what had to be done."

"I remember my yesterdays all too clearly. Ghosts are easier to fight when you know their shape." Linking their fingers, he brought hers to his lips in a gesture that never failed to stir her. "You never asked me where I went the day I went off alone."

"No, because I saw when you came back you'd stopped grieving so much."

His lips curved against her knuckles. "So, you read my head and heart fairly well, yourself. I went back to where I lived as a boy, back to the alley where they found my father dead, and some thought I'd put the knife in him. I lived with the regret that it hadn't been my hand that ended him."

"It's not a thing to regret," she said quietly as the transport touched down with barely a whisper.

"There we part ways, Lieutenant." His voice, so beautiful with that Irish lilt, was cold and final. "But I stood there, in that stinking alley, smelling the smells of my youth, feeling that same burn in the blood, the fire in the belly. And I realized, standing there, that some of what I'd been was still inside me and always will be. But there was more." Now his voice warmed again, like whiskey in candlelight. "I'd made myself different. Other, you could say. I'd made myself other, and it was you who's made me more."

He smiled again as blank surprise filled her eyes. "What I have with you, darling Eve, I never thought to have with anyone. Never thought to want it or need it. So I realized as I stood there in an alley where he must have beaten me black a dozen times or more, where he'd laid drunk and finally dead, that what mattered about what had come before was that it had led me to where I was. That he hadn't won, after all. He'd never won a bloody thing from me."

He flipped the catch on her safety harness, then his own, while she said nothing. "When I walked away through the rain, I knew you'd be there. You have to know that whenever you decide to look into your own, whatever you find, when you walk away from it, I'll be there."

Emotions swirled inside her, filling her to bursting. "I don't know how I managed to get through a day before you."

It was his turn to look surprised. He drew her to her feet. "Ah, every once in a while you manage to say the perfect thing. Steady now?"

"Yeah, and I'm staying that way."

Because power clears paths and money waxes them smooth, they were through the jammed shuttle terminal in minutes and out to the private valet area where he had a car waiting.

She took one look at the sleek silver torpedo shape with its elaborate and streamlined two-seater cockpit and scowled. "Couldn't you have booked something a little less conspicuous?"

"I don't see why we should be inconvenienced. Besides," he added as they climbed in, "this thing drives like a fucking rocket." So saying, he engaged the engine, hit the accelerator, and blasted out of the lot.

"Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, slow down! You maniac." She struggled into her harness as he laughed. "The airport cops will tag your ass before we clear the first gate."

"Have to catch me first," he said cheerfully. He punched a control, sent them into a screaming vertical lift that had her mixing curses and prayers. "You can open your eyes now, darling, we're clear of airport traffic."