Kindred In Death

She angled her head as she continued to study the board. “I wonder, I wonder… Does it piss you off that you’re good, but not brilliant? Not exceptional enough to bypass the security cams? Not exceptional enough to get past MacMasters’s-the enemy’s-security block. Does that get under your skin? I bet, yeah, I bet that’s a pisser for you. Because he’s rich enough, smart enough, careful enough to have the very best, and you can’t quite slither through the very best.”

She worked to try to fit some of the new pieces together, then sat, feet up, eyes closed to try to think them together.

Client’s the smartest way, the safest way, she thought. But the systems are high-dollar-extreme high. And require a private home for install.

But it doesn’t have to be your home. A friend’s, a relative’s, a client’s. She thought of fresh questions and sat up to nag Feeney again. Incoming signaled and presented her with the list of employees and clients, with a negative cross-reference already done-from Roarke.

She cross-checked both lists with the fresh data from Columbia, and hit another negative.

A

She circled, paced, sat, worked it a dozen different ways from a dozen different launch points.

And while she worked, Karlene Robins died.

In the loft, he checked and rechecked details. He’d logged her out of the building hours before, and had sent her fiancé a very sweet text so she wouldn’t be missed. He dressed, then placed his tools as well as her ’link, her PPC, and her memo book in his bag. Once again, he shut down the cameras, uploaded his virus.

He walked out of the building and headed home.

Cop work, Roarke thought, was bloody tedious. He had no doubt he’d be doing considerable more of it very shortly. But when he walked into the house, he was determined he’d be doing none of it until he’d had a decent meal and an hour to clear the buggering e-junk out of his head.

“This is a change,” Summerset commented. “You coming home late for di

“Then don’t tempt me to insult you as Eve does.”

“She’s in her office, and has been since she got home. Is there any progress?”

“Not nearly enough, considering.”

He continued up and found her where he’d thought he would, at her desk hunched over data and coffee.

She pushed to her feet when he came in, but he pointed a finger to stop her before she spoke. “We’re having a meal since all you’ve had is coffee and a candy bar.”

She blinked, then noted she’d neglected to dispose of the wrapper. “I need to know if-”

“I’ll tell you what there is to tell you, but I damn well want some food.”

“Okay.” It occurred to her that he’d had less sleep than she had, and was juggling his work with hers. “I’ll get it.”

His brows lifted. “Will you now?”

“Yeah. How about a steak? We can probably both use the boost.”

“I damn well could.” He reached out as she walked by, stroked her hair. “Thanks for that.”

While she went into the kitchen, he opened a bottle of wine. Deliberately, he turned his back on her murder board to keep it out of his head for a few minutes. A little clearing-out time, he thought as he sipped.

His brows rose again when she rolled out the di

“Let’s eat by the windows,” she said and nodded to the wine as she pushed the table toward them. “I could use a glass of that.”

He poured a second glass, then went to her, tapped the shallow dent in her chin, kissed her. “Hello, Lieutenant.”

“Hi, Civilian. Let’s take a breather.”

“I could use one nearly as much as I can use that red meat.”

“Okay.” She sat, stabbed her fork into one of the salads she’d programmed with him in mind. “I went by to see Louise at her new place.”

Now his brows winged up. “Aren’t you full of surprises?”

“I was almost there anyway, and… Okay, I figured she wouldn’t be there so I could just leave a note and get, you know, friend credit.”

Looking at her, listening to her, he laughed for the first time in hours. “Never change.”

“Well, it should’ve worked, but she was there. Planting flowers, which who would expect?”

“Astonishing.”

“I don’t have to eat sarcasm to recognize the flavor. Anyway, I had to go in and go through the place. Have to say it looks like them. Smooth and sophisticated and now. She’s whacked with happy, which kind of infects anyone within a ten-foot radius.” She stuffed salad in her mouth to get it over with. “Like an airborne virus.”

“God, you romantic fool. No wonder I adore you.”

She offered a smirk. “So, while I was infected, she’s talking about how she’s going to stay in a hotel the night before the wedding because she doesn’t want Charles to see her on the day of, and she’s got to get rubbed and polished and painted. I said she should stay here.”

“She should, of course.”

“And then I said how she’d probably want her women friends with her. I don’t know where that came from. It just came out of the whacky-happy infection. It wasn’t until I had some distance, and it was too damn late, that I realized one of those women will be Trina. Has to be. So now I’ve opened it all up to a bunch of women with wedding mania, one of whom will come at me-oh yes, she will-with gunk and goo.”

Her heart, Roarke thought, would always win out over her sense of self-preservation when it came to those who mattered to her.

“But think of the friend credit you’ll accumulate.”

“I don’t know if it’s worth it. Plus…”

“Murder,” he said when she trailed off. “You’ve already given me a breather, and red meat. You don’t have to stop yourself from talking about it.”

“You looked tired and irritable, and you almost never do. That’s my job.”

He thought of Summerset’s “a

“I’m better at it.”

He laughed again. “Got me there. I enjoy e-work as a rule, particularly when there’s a challenge involved. But this is like trying to unravel a ball of string one thread at a time.”

“Maybe we won’t need it. I have other threads, and I’m tying them together. Yancy’s working on his face. I’ve got various contact points, and when I pin him on one, there’ll be others. I think he may be in the e-business, or he can afford a lot of toys. Including the same security system involved. It’s your system. You update it regularly.”

“As technology emerges, refinements, options, yes. A customer would be given the option to add any or all of the new features or refinements.”

“Which MacMasters did, in March. The timing’s too damn good. A couple of weeks later, Deena meets her killer. I can’t co

“It’s not mine. We bid out service and maintenance to companies, and customers have the option of choosing from them, or at their risk, using an independent. Security Plus is a solid organization, and a service center for most top-of-the-line systems.”

“But you upgraded the system in March.”

“I can check.”

“While you’re at it, can you find out who bought the same system as MacMasters within the last six months? Year,” she corrected. “A year, and had the same upgrades done in March. He’s spent a lot of time on this project. He’d get the upgrades, too. He’d get every one of them.”

“I’ll warn you it sells very well to a certain level of clientele, and most will spring for the upgrades.”

“Something’s going to cross eventually. The system, his employment, his education, his face, his motive. It’s going to cross.” It damn well had to cross. “Then it’s going to cross again and again. Then we’re going to take that ball of string and shove it down his throat.”