Betrayal in Death

"Why shouldn't I? I'm pretty pleased with you, too."

He leaned down just enough to touch his lips to the dent in her chin. "Thank you."

"You don't have to thank me for sex. We're married."

"Not for the sex, though that was worthy of a few cheers. For understanding me. For, let's say, tending to me."

"I've had a lot of practice on the other side of it." She reached up, brushed the hair from his brow. "Feeling better?"

"Yes." He shifted, and as he sat up drew her with him. "Let me just hold this for a minute," he murmured, nuzzling her in his lap.

"Keep that up, we'll end up horizontal and sweaty again."

"Mmm. And it's tempting." The rage was still inside him, but chilled now. Calculated. "But there's work. Do I have to argue with you, Lieutenant, about letting me work with you on this, and spoil the nice place we're in?"

She said nothing a moment. "I don't want you to. No, don't start. Let me finish." She turned her face into the curve of his throat. "The part that doesn't want you to is personal. That part's afraid for you, and worried about you. The professional part knows the more involved you are, the more help you can be, the quicker we close this thing. The personal side doesn't have a chance against the cop and you pushing together."

"Would it help if I tell you I'll handle all this better if I'm involved in the work? It won't eat at me in the same way."

"Yeah." She held on another moment, then drew back. "Yeah, I guess I know that, too. Let's get a shower, some fuel, then I'll lay out the ground rules."

"I've never liked that phrase," he said as she rose. "Ground rules."

She let out a short laugh. "There's something else I know."

When they were dressed and sharing a meal of seafood pasta, she set out her stipulations.

"With Whitney's approval, you'll come onboard this investigation officially, as an expert consultant, civilian. With this appointment there are privileges and limitations, and a moderate fee."

"How moderate?"

She speared a scallop with her fork. "Less," she said as she popped it in her mouth, "then I imagine you paid for any one pair of your six hundred shoes. You will be issued ID – "

"A badge?"

She spared him a withering look. "Don't be ridiculous. Standard photo and print ID. You will not be issued a weapon."

"That's all right. I've plenty of my own."

"Shut up. You will be privy to data relating to this investigation at the discretion of the primary. That happens to be me."

"Handy."

"You will be expected to obey orders, or this appointment can and will be terminated. Again, at the discretion of the primary. We run this by the book."

"I've always wondered. How many pages are in that book of yours?"

"And smart mouthing to the primary can result in disciplinary action."

"Darling. You know how that excites me."

She sneered, even though she wanted to celebrate that he was himself again. "During the course of the investigation, the primary and investigative team will require access to some of your files."

"That's understood."

"Okay." She scooped up one last forkful of pasta. "Let's go to work."

"That's it, for ground rules?"

"We'll hit them as we go. My office. I want to bring you up to date."

The advantage of working with Roarke was that he understood cop. The fact that this had more to do, she suspected, with him spending most of his life outwitting them than it did with being married to one was irrelevant.

She didn't have to spell things out for him, and that saved time.

"You didn't give the FBI everything you've put together, but they'll know that."

"Right. And they'll live with it."

"They'll also suspect, or at least wonder, if you've put more salient data together on Yost in less than a week than they have in years. That won't sit well."

"Yeah, and that just breaks my heart."

"Your competitive streak's showing, Lieutenant."

"Maybe. When it comes down to it, the Feebs can have the glory. Yost will know who brought him down. That does the job for me. They didn't pay enough attention to the wire, the exactness of it. Their profile gives a strong indication of pattern, his obsessiveness with detail, and still they missed subtleties."

"Don't they, you think, as a Bureau, tend to concentrate more on the overview, and depend too heavily on pure data, rather than instinct and possibilities?" He smiled easily when she frowned at him. "Not that I've had any personal dealing with them that I'd want to take up your time discussing just now."

"Is that so? Well, we'll have to make time later."

"Mmm. But my point is, while you're one to use your data, to see the overview and quite clearly, you trust your gut and you never forget possibilities."

"Maybe. Then again, most Feebs aren't hooked to a guy who can buy a case of fancy shampoo at five thousand a pop, so they don't look at that angle. At the rich, self-indulgent guy angle."

"I never buy shampoo by the case for personal use, and you'd have looked there in any event. You don't miss details. Still, I know more about high-end products than you, which is why I'm an expert consultant."

"Civilian," she added. "And you're not, until tomorrow after Whitney's approval."

"In anticipation of that, I need to see the security disc run from Jonah's murder."

"No."

"I need to see what Yost was wearing, how he wore it. I've reviewed the hotel disc. In that he prefers British designers."

"How the hell do you recognize a designer from looking at somebody's suit jacket on a disc run?"

"Darling Eve." With a faint smile he skimmed a ringer over the shoulder of her ancient and faded NYPSD T-shirt. "Fashion is more a priority for some of us than it is for others."

"You think that's a dig, but it doesn't hit the mark with me, ace. Anyway, I should've figured one clothes snob would recognize another." She pulled the disc out of her file bag. "You get a good look at him as he's coming to the door. That should do it for you."

And that, she thought as she loaded it into her desk unit, was as much as she intended to show Roarke. "Computer, run current disc file, point mark zero to point mark fifteen. On wall screen."

Working… Begin segment run.

They both looked on-screen, both watched Yost stroll casually up the steps to Jonah Talbot's door. And there the image froze.

"Definitely British," Roarke confirmed. "As are the shoes. I need a closer look at the briefcase."

"Okay. Computer, enhance segment twelve through twenty-two, ten power."

working…

The image shifted with the hand and the briefcase it held separating and magnifying.

"So he sticks with the Brits. That's a Whitford bag, made exclusively in London. I own the bloody factory."

"This is good. We concentrate on sales in London. British designers."

"The conservative ones," Roarke added.

Her forehead knitted. "I thought it was more the arty type of look."

"He's added the wig and scarf for that, but under it, it's straight arrow. The suit looks like a Marley, but Smythe and Wexville make that same sharply angular style. The shoes are Canterbury's, almost certainly."

She frowned at them. They looked like shoes to her, simple black slip-onto-the-feet shoes. "Okay, we'll follow it up. Eject disc."

"Computer, disregard. I'll see the rest."

"No. There's no point in it."

"I'll see the rest," he said. "Would you prefer I access it and view at another time and place?"

"I'm telling you there's no point in putting yourself through that."

"I spoke to his mother. I listened to her weep. Computer, continue run."