Portrait In Death

"There could be a mistake." Lily Sulu, a tall, slender woman who'd passed her build onto her son, sat clasping her husband's hand. "Kenby hasn't come home, but there could be a mistake. He's only nineteen, you see. He's very smart, and very strong. There could be a mistake."

"I'm very sorry, Mrs. Sulu. There is no mistake. Your son was positively identified."

"But he's only nineteen."

"Lily." Chang Sulu's eyes were dark, as his son's had been dark. They glistened now as he stared at Eve, as tears slid down his cheeks. "How could this have happened to our son? Who would do this to our son? He harmed no one."

"I don't have the answers for you, but I will have. I need you to help me get those answers. When was the last time you saw Kenby?"

"Yesterday, in the morning. We had breakfast." Chang turned his head, and the look he sent his wife ripped at Eve's heart. "We had breakfast together, and you said: 'Finish your juice, Kenby. It's good for you.'"

Lily's face seemed to break apart. As tears flooded it, her body shook, and the sounds she made were more whimpers than wails.

"Is there someone I can call for you?" Eve asked.

"No. No." Chang held his wife and rocked, and now his gaze clung to Eve's face. "We had breakfast together," he repeated. "And he went to class. Early class. He is a dancer, like his mother. He left before seven. I left for work perhaps an hour later. I am an engineer with the Teckron firm. Lily is now a choreographer and is working on a play. She left home at the same time as myself."

"Where would Kenby go after his early class?"

"More classes. He had a full schedule at Juilliard. He would be there until five, then have some di

"I'd like to have the name and addresses of his friends, his teachers, the people he worked with."

"Yes, I'll give them to you."

"Was he bothered by anyone? Did he tell you about anyone or anything that disturbed him?"

"No. He was a happy boy."

"Mr. Sulu, was Kenby photographed, professionally, in the last year?"

"You need a photograph?" Sulu continued to stroke his wife's hair. "You said you'd identified him."

"No, I don't need a photograph. It would help me to know if he was photographed."

"At the school." Lily turned her head, her ravaged face, toward Eve. "A few months ago, there were photographs taken of his ballet class. And again, there were photographs taken of the cast of the spring ballet. They performedFirebird."

"Do you know who took the photographs?"

"No, but I have copies of several that were taken."

"Can I have them? I'll see they're returned to you."

"If it will help. Lieutenant, we need to see our son."

"I know. I'll arrange that for you."

When Eve stepped out of the house again, she breathed in deep to try to clear the taste of grief out of her throat. And turning over the photograph of the lithe, lively Kenby with his cast mates, she tapped the name: Portography.

"Have Hastings picked up," she told Peabody.

He hadn't slept, but Roarke didn't consider sleep a current priority. Though he didn't have his wife's aversion to chemicals, he didn't feel the need for a pill to boost his energy. He was ru

Siobhan Brody had been his mother. He didn't doubt it now. Couldn't doubt it now. Patrick Roarke had been a good hand at manipulating data, but his son was a hell of a lot better.

It had taken most of the night, but he'd dug down.

There was no marriage record, though from what he was begi

But he'd found his own birth record, something he'd never troubled himself to dig out before. It had been buried well and deep. He supposed the old man had done so to cover himself for one reason or another. But if you kept shoveling, if you had plenty of time and good reason, a man could find anything in the vast grave of data.

He was a full year younger than he'd believed. Wasn't that a fine kick in the head, he decided as he livened up the coffee with a shot of whiskey. Siobhan Margaret Mary Brody was clearly listed as mother, and Patrick Michael Roarke as father.

Sperm donor anyway, Roarke mused as he drank.

Most likely, she'd given whoever demanded such things that information. The old man wouldn't have been pleased to have his name listed on an official document. No, that wouldn't've set right with him.

Easy enough to bury it.

There was no employment record for her after his birth, but he'd uncovered both their medicals. Healthy as horses they'd been, for a bit.

Then it seemed young Siobhan had become accident prone. A broken arm here, a cracked rib there.

Fucking bastard.

He'd knocked her around, good and proper, for the next several months.

There were no police reports, but that wasn't unexpected either. None of the neighbors would have had the balls to call the cops just because a man was roughing up his wife. And if they had, Patrick Roarke would have known how to handle it. A few pounds slipped to the uniforms, and a solid beating for whoever had the bad ma

He lighted another cigarette, leaned back in his chair. Closed his eyes.

But he had found a police report, just one, on the disappearance of one Siobhan Brody, initiated by her family. After a bit of tedious cop-speak, statements from a handful of people, the conclusion was she'd taken herself off.

And that was the end of that.

So what was he supposed to do about it now? He couldn't change it, couldn't help her. He didn't know her.

She was a name, a picture in a frame. Nothing more.

Who knew better than he that you couldn't live your life joining hands with yesterday's ghosts?

He hadn't been Meg's. Meg Roarke with her wide face and hard eyes and beery breath. He hadn't come out of her after all. He'd come from that sweet-faced young girl, fresh off the farm. One who'd loved him enough to dress him in blue pajamas, and hold him close to her cheek for a picture.

He'd come from Siobhan Brody, who'd been young enough, foolish enough to go back into hell because she'd wanted to make a family. Give him a father.

God help them all.

Ill, tired, unbearably sad, Roarke sealed all the data he'd accumulated under his voice command and a password. Then he left the room, told himself he'd left the trouble of it-what else could be done-and went to prepare for the day.

He had work waiting, too much to shuffle around because he wasn't feeling quite himself. He'd built a fucking empire, a flaming universe, hadn't he, and it had to be run.

He'd have a shower, some food, make some excuse to Eve for his behavior the night before. There was no point in bringing her into it, no point in dragging out the whole sad and ugly business yet again.

But she wasn't there. The sheets were in tangles, which told him she'd spent as poor a night as he had. Guilt twisted inside him as he wondered if she'd been plagued by nightmares.

She never slept well without him. He knew that.

He saw the memo, picked it up.

"I caught a case. I don't know when I'll be back."

Feeling foolish, feeling raw, he played it back twice just to hear her voice. Then closing his fist around the little cube, he sat on the side of the bed.

Alone, he grieved for a woman he'd never known, and ached for the only one he'd ever loved.