Strangers In Death

“Damn it, now I’m nervous.” And because of it, Eve rose and paced in front of the screen as she watched.

Handling it, handling it. Pursuing all leads, blah, blah, blah. Unable to comment on specifics, yada, yada. Peabody confirmed there had been no sign of forced entry-that was okay-and better, dropped in there were indications the security system had been compromised.

They circled around each other on the sexual nature of the murder. It was Nadine’s job to dig for details and Peabody’s duty to avoid giving them. Standing in front of the screen, Eve felt a quick little twist of pride. They both did nice work.

Enough got in, just enough to confirm the murder had sexual elements. But the tone, the message, transmitted clearly that Thomas A. Anders was the victim. A life had been taken.

Wrapping it up now, Eve realized. Thank Christ.

“Detective,” Nadine began, “Thomas Anders was a wealthy man, a strong, visible presence in social and business circles. His prominence must bring a certain pressure onto the investigation. How does that influence your work?”

“I…I guess I’d say murder equalizes. When a life’s taken, when one individual takes the life of another, there’s no class system, no prominence. Wealth, social standing, business, those might all go to motive. But they don’t change what was done, or what we as investigators do about it. We work the case the same way for Thomas Anders as we do for John Doe.”

“Still, some departmental pressure would be expected when the victim has prominence.”

“Actually, it’s the media that plays that kind of thing up. I don’t get it from my superiors. I wasn’t raised to judge a person’s worth by what he owns. And I was trained as a cop, as a detective, that our job is to stand for the dead-whoever they were in life.”

Eve nodded, dipped her hands into her pockets as Nadine cut away to end the segment and preview the next.

“Okay, Peabody, you can live.”

Ordering the screen off, Eve sat at her desk and got back to work.

There she was. Roarke stood in the office doorway, took a few enjoyable minutes to just watch her. She had such a sense of purpose, such a sense of focus on that purpose. It had appealed to him from the first instant he’d seen her, across a sea of people at a memorial for the dead. He found it compelling, the way those whiskey-colored eyes could go flat and cold as they were now. Cop’s eyes. His cop’s eyes.

She’d taken off her jacket, tossed it over a chair, and still wore her weapon harness. Which meant she’d come in the door and straight up. Armed and dangerous, he thought. It was a look, a fact of her, that continually aroused him. And her tireless and unwavering dedication to the dead-to the truth, to what was right-had, and always would, amaze him.

She’d set up her murder board, he noted, filling it with grisly photos, with reports, notes, names. And somewhere along the line in her day, she’d earned herself a black eye.

He’d long since resigned himself to finding the woman he loved bruised and bloody at any given time. Since she didn’t look exhausted or ill, a shiner was a relatively minor event.

She sensed him. He saw the moment she did, that slight change of body language. And when her eyes shifted from her comp screen to his, the cold focus became an easy, even casual warmth.

That, he thought, just that was worth coming home for.

“Lieutenant.” He crossed over, lifted her chin with his hand to study the bruising under her eye. “And so, who’d you piss off today then?”

“More like who pissed me off. He’s got more than one bruise.”

“Naturally. Who might that be?”

“Some mope named Clipper. I busted a snatch, switch, and drop.”

“Ah.” He cocked his head. “Why?”

“Good question. This kid named Tiko dragged me into it.”

“This sounds like a story. Do you want some wine to go with it?”

“Maybe.”

“Before you tell me the story, did you catch Peabody’s appearance?”

“Yeah. Did you?”

Across the room he contemplated the wine selection, made his choice for both of them. “I wouldn’t have missed it. I thought she did brilliantly.”

“She didn’t screw up.”

He laughed, opened the bottle. “High praise, Lieutenant. It’s you who trained her. The last thing she said. It’s you who trained her to stand for the dead, no matter who they were in life.”

“I trained her to work a case. She was already a cop.”

“As you were, when Feeney trained you. So it trickles down.” He walked back to hand her a glass of wine. “It’s a kind of inheritance, isn’t it?” With his own wine, he sat on the corner of her desk. “Now, about that eye.”

He listened, by turns amused and fascinated. “How old is this Tiko?”

“I don’t know. Seven, maybe eight. Short.”

“He must be very persuasive as well as short and seven.”

“He digs in, that’s for sure. It wasn’t much of a detour anyway.” She shrugged. “And you had to admire his logic, pretty much down the line. They’re stealing from potential customers, which cuts into his business. I’m a cop.”

“Top bitch cop.”

“Bet your ass. So as such I’m supposed to fix it.”

“As you did.” He brushed a finger over her cheek. “With minimal damage, I suppose.”

“Guy had ski

“Of course you did.”

“Neither’s been in any trouble. The same can’t be said of Tiko’s mother. Illegals busts, solicitation without a license, shoplifting that upped to petty theft that upped to grand larceny. Last couple busts were down in Florida. The gra

“The father?”

“Unknown. She was afraid I was going to call Child Services. Afraid I was going to call them in, and she could lose the kid.”

“Another cop might have.”

“Then another cop would’ve been wrong. Kid’s got a decent roof over his head, warm clothes on his back, food in his belly, and somebody who loves him. It’s…”

“More than we had,” Roarke finished.

“Yeah. I thought about that. There’s no fear in this kid, and that’s about all that was in me at his age. No mea

“From what you’ve said, he sounds like the kind who’ll make the most of that chance.”

“That’s my take. And I thought about Anders. He wasn’t afraid, and from everything I find, he wasn’t big on the mean. But his chance at life was taken. Because someone cared enough to end him.”

“Cared enough. Interesting choice of words.”

“Yeah.” She looked over at her murder board, looked at Ava Anders’s ID photo. “I think it fits. Listen, I couldn’t get by the lab to browbeat Dickhead into ru

“It probably wouldn’t.” He considered it over a sip of wine. “I might do that for you, if you fixed my supper.”

It seemed a fair trade. And if she went for one of her own personal faves-spaghetti and meatballs-he hadn’t specified a choice. She continued her run on Ava Anders first, left another message on Dirk Bronson’s-the first husband’s-voice mail. Then she wandered into the kitchen to program the meal.

She’d only set the plates on her desk when Roarke came back in. She wondered why she even bothered with the lab.

“Good news is, it didn’t take long. Bad news, from your standpoint anyway, they’re a match.”

“Shit. Could the St. Lucia transmission have been by remote?”