Purity in Death

"In a nutshell," Eve agreed.

"The media gets ahold of this…" He shook his head, pushed to his feet. He paced to her window. "It's over for him, one way or the other. Even the talented Chang won't be able to spin him out of the toilet. The city's in enough of an uproar without this. We keep it quiet, for now."

"I need to interview him, Chief, as well as the other individuals on vid."

Tibble looked over his shoulder, studied her face. "You believe Peachtree is involved in Purity? The Mayor, setting a terrorist organization loose on his own city? He may have shown extremely poor judgment in a personal matter, but he's not stupid enough to piss in his own pool."

Why not? she thought. You use a sex broker to fulfill your dream-date fantasy, you're stupid enough for anything. "I can't make that determination until after he's interviewed."

"You want to drag him into a major homicide investigation because he wore a goddamn bra."

She felt her patience drying up, hulling out like a grape in the sun. "Sir, I don't care if he dresses up like a shepherdess and seduces his flock on his downtime. Unless doing so puts him into my case. It's my allegation, as primary in this matter, that Purity has people of power, authority, and influence among their members. My request for a warrant to open sealed juvenile files has been blocked, and continues to be blocked beyond all reasonable objections. Warrants to view files at Child Services have also been blocked or denied. These blocks impede the forward course of my investigation."

"You found a way around them with Dukes."

She took a deep breath. "Yes, sir, I did. And I'll continue to find ways around them. Seven people, including a police officer, are dead. I'll continue to find a way until I have the answers and justice is served. The Mayor of New York is now a suspect in this investigation whether it suits you or not."

"Chief Tibble." Whitney got to his feet, very nearly gave into the urge to step between them like a referee at a boxing match. "Lieutenant Dallas is right."

Tibble swung his searing gaze onto Whitney. "Do you think I don't know she's right? For Christ's sake, Jack, I've carried tin longer than she's been alive. I know she's right. I also know we'll be digging ourselves out of the fallout for months once this hits. Transvestite terrorist. Sweet Jesus, can you imagine what the media will do with it?"

"The media doesn't concern me."

Tibble turned to Eve. "If you want to climb up the ladder, it better. You'd be wearing bars now if you paid more attention to perception and image. You've made choices that have prevented you from being the youngest female captain in the NYPSD."

"Harry."

Tibble waved off Whitney's quiet objection, turned away again. "I'll apologize for that. This has blindsided me. I work with the man. I can't say we're friends, but we're certainly friendly. I know his family. I believed I knew him. I'd like some coffee. Black, no sugar. If you don't mind."

Eve said nothing, didn't trust herself to speak. Instead she walked into the kitchen, programmed the AutoChef while temper warred with training.

They could take their captain's bars and shove them.

She came back in. As Tibble was once again facing the window, she set his coffee on her desk, then handed Whitney a second cup.

"Am I ordered to ignore the evidence that has come into my hands and detour from the investigative route that leads to Mayor Steven Peachtree?"

"I have no doubt, Lieutenant," Tibble said with his back to the room, "that were I to issue that order you would disobey said command or throw your badge in my face. As I believe you're angry enough at the moment to choose the latter, I'll apologize once again."

"I had no right to personalize this, nor to take my frustrations out on you. I will say there are shades of right, Lieutenant Dallas, and the higher you climb, the more shades there are, and the deeper they get."

"I'm aware of the difficulty of the situation, and your position, Chief Tibble."

"But mostly you think it's bullshit." He spread his lips in the grin that had terrified both cop and criminal over the years. He walked over, picked up his coffee, and drank. "And mostly you're right. No, Lieutenant, you are not ordered to ignore the evidence that came into your hands."

Without thinking, he sat behind her desk. "I am asking you to delay that interview until I speak with the mayor. Any portion of the conversation that is salient to your investigation will be relayed to you. It's not just the man, but the office. The office requires some respect and protection. I hope you can trust me to separate man from office and conduct this preliminary questioning personally."

"I believe you're more than capable of handling such questioning, sir. How do you want me to handle the other individuals identified on the videos?"

"Discreetly. I need copies of those vids, your notes, and files."

"I have them available for you."

He took the evidence bag she offered. "Jack, it looks like we're going to start the day with some porn."

"I ended mine with it," Eve said and made Tibble roar with laughter.

"Job's never dull."

"How much am I cleared to tell my team?"

"Trust is a two-way street. I leave that to you." He rose. "If Peachtree's part of this, we'll take him down. You have my word on it." He held out a hand.

"We'll take them all down, sir. You've got mine on that."

After they'd left, Eve called Peabody into her office.

"Sit down," she ordered, then as Tibble had done, she took the position of command behind her desk. "New data has come to light that may have a direct bearing on this investigation. I'm not free to share all the details of this data with you at this time, but you'll be accompanying me today on what will be a number of sensitive interviews. Until I give you clearance, you're to say nothing of this to other team members."

"You're not bringing the team in?"

"Not at this time. This is Code Five. Any record I order you to make will be sealed."

Peabody choked back the dozen questions leaping to her tongue. "Yes, sir."

"Before we start on this new round of interviews, we'll do a followup with Dukes. He needs a push. And I figure to round off the day with Price and Dwier. Like, I don't know, bookends."

"Is what's between the bookends co

"It's all co

"Blackmail," Peabody said at the first stoplight on route. "Greene sure had his fingers in a lot of nasty pies."

"Lucrative pies. Raked in over three million a

"You think Purity infected him because of the blackmail?"

"Yeah, I do. Look at the others. Those were child predators. Greene, he dealt some in the adolescent arena, but the bulk of his clientele and employees were adults."

"You said you thought Purity would start expanding their criteria."

"And they will. Not this soon. There are plenty more in Fitzhugh's ilk to keep them busy. Greene teeters on the line. I think someone, maybe more than one, had personal reasons for wanting Greene dead. Eliminating another scumbag was a factor, but ditching a blackmail payment, and the threat of exposure, makes a real nice bonus. But it was stupid. A mistake. Killing the blackmailer before you destroy the evidence that ties you to him."

"Can you tell me if Dukes was on the blackmail list?"

"No. But he knows how it's done. He knows who's been infected or scheduled for infection. He's part of the foundation, so we shake him. Or his wife. She's a weak point."