J D Robb - Dallas 19 - Divided In Death Read online

  Eve was willing to bet she'd paid plenty for the face.

  She'd been covering herself with the transmission. Don't call me tonight, I've got a hot one. It just happens to be your husband, but what you don't know won't hurt me.

  Or so she'd believed when she'd placed the bubbling call.

  And there was a look in those eyes, a kind of live-wire excitement that told Eve Blair Bissel had likely been with her already, just out of range of the 'link.

  And when he'd called home, at seventeen-twenty, Eve noted, he'd been very careful to have nothing but his own face on screen. His eyes, cat green, were heavy. The smile, curve of that handsome mouth, was weary, like his voice.

  She could see why Reva had fallen for him, more so on the transmission than in the ID still Eve had studied. You added that lazy animation to the face, that slow, sexy voice, and you got a powerful punch.

  Hey, baby. I was hoping you'd be home by now. Should've called your pocket 'link. Pretty fuzzy with the travel and time change. I'm going to shut down, so you won't be able to reach me. I've just got to catch some serious zee's. I'll try you again as soon as I surface.

  Miss me, baby. You know I'm missing you.

  Covered his ass, too, and gave himself a clear night to play with his bed pal.

  Still, it was careless. Reckless. At least it would've been if she'd trusted him less. What if she'd tracked the transmission as Eve would do. What if she'd gotten a wild hare and decided to transport herself to where he'd said he'd be?

  What if... a dozen things that often happened to blow up the secret affair and leave the cheating spouse with his or her ass in the sling.

  Instead he'd ended up dead. Because someone else had been tracking, someone else had been watching and waiting for the right time and place.

  But why?

  "Matching set of cooking tools," Peabody reported as she walked in. "Missing the bread knife."

  "Would that be a bread knife in our evidence bag?"

  "Yes, sir, it would. I also checked the log on the AutoChef. It looks like Reva Ewing had a single serving of chicken piccata and a garden salad at nineteen-thirty last night. Prior to that, there was a double serving of wheat waffles and a pot of coffee at seven-thirty yesterday morning."

  "So they had breakfast together before he left on his fake business trip and she went to work."

  "Security logs also show Reva Ewing entering, alone, at eighteen-twelve. And the gate bell sounding, as per her statement just after twenty-three hundred. Her leaving to retrieve the package and returning with it to the house after a scan also checks."

  "You've been busy,"

  Peabody grinned. "We detectives do what we can."

  "You're not going to be able to milk that much longer."

  "I figure I've got at least a month to mention my detective status at least three times a day. After that, I'm weaning myself."

  "So noted. I want to take the security discs and the 'links to EDD. If Reva's being set up, whoever's doing it knows as much about security as she does."

  "You said if. Do you have doubts?"

  "There's always room for doubts."

  "Okay, so I was thinking-and it doesn't really gel for me, but since there's room... What if she set it up to look like a setup? It'd be cold, and it'd be risky. But it'd be smart, too."

  "Yeah, it would." Eve began to go through the desk drawers methodically.

  "You already thought of it."

  "Peabody, we lieutenants are always thinking."

  "But you don't buy it."

  "Look at it this way. If she did it, it's a dunk. The case fell whole into our laps. Nothing to do but file the reports and wait for it to come to trial. But if she's telling the truth, we've got a real, live mystery on our hands. I just fucking love a mystery."

  She took all the discs into evidence for viewing at Central, added memo cubes, a PPC and what appeared to be a broken address book.

  "Pick a dresser," Eve invited.

  They searched the bedroom, moving from the contents of the dressers to the contents of the closet. They turned up nothing of interest but for what Peabody referred to as monkey sex underwear.

  They split up on the home offices, with Eve taking Blair's.

  He had, she noted, the better end of the deal there. His was twice the size of hers, and with a view of the stone garden-the garden she assumed he'd wanted. There was also a long leather couch, the color of light coffee, with a mirrored wall behind it, and an entertainment center loaded with the latest toys.

  It was, she thought, more a man-as-boy playroom than workspace. And when she called up his data unit, she found it wasn't working at all.

  She gave it a quick slap with the heel of her hand, which was her usual way of dealing with recalcitrant machines. "I said, 'Computer, on,'" she repeated and once again read in her name, rank, and badge number for override of standard passcodes.

  The screen stayed blank, the unit silent.

  Interesting, she thought as she circled around it as she might a sleeping animal. What did he have in there he didn't want his wife to see?

  Still watching the unit, she pulled out her communicator and tagged Feeney at EDD.

  His hound dog face had been sun-kissed by his recent vacation in Bimini. He'd only been back a couple of days, and Eve was hoping it would fade soon. It was... disconcerting to see Feeney with a tan.

  She wanted his hair to grow back, too. He'd shorn his wiry ginger-and-gray mop painfully short while he'd been gone. It looked like he was wearing a snug, fuzzy helmet.

  When you added the post-holiday sparkle to his droopy brown eyes, it was a study in mixed signals, and made her head hurt.

  "Hey, kid."

  "Hey. Did you get my request?"

  "First thing. Already cleared the time and manpower for you."

  "I got more. Dead guy's home unit. He must have it seriously pass-coded. I can't get it on."

  "Dallas, there are times you can't get your AutoChef on."

  "That's a dirty lie." She poked the data unit with a finger. "I need a pickup for this, and for a houseful of 'links and data centers. A boatload of security discs I need studied and analyzed."

  "I'll send out a team for pickup."

  She waited a beat. "Just like that? I don't even get a token bitch?"

  "I'm in too good a mood to bitch. The wife made me pancakes this morning. Can't do enough for me. I'm a fricking hero with my whole family. You flipped me that Bimini deal, Dallas, and I figure I'm going to reap the rewards for the next six months. I owe you."

  "Feeney, you look sort of scary when you smile like that. So cut it out."

  His grin only widened. "Can't help it. I'm a happy man."

  "I've got enough EDD work on this one to keep you and a full team buried for days."

  "Sounds good." He almost sang it. "I'm ready for a real challenge. Guy gets soft sitting on the beach sucking coconut juice all day."

  This had to stop, was all she could think. And now. "Case is a slam," she said and showed her teeth. "And I've already booked the suspect on two counts in the first. I'm using departmental time and money to pick the case apart from the inside out."

  "Sounds like fun," he said with a lilt in his voice. "Glad you called me in."

  "I could learn to hate you like this, Feeney." She rattled off the address, and cut transmission as he began to hum.

  "Do a favor for a friend," she muttered, "and it bites you on the ass. Peabody!" She shouted it. "Tag all electronics for EDD pickup. Arrange for two droids to guard the premises and seal it after EDD has come and gone. And move it. We need to go check Bissel's gallery and studio."

  "If we're partners now, how come I have to do all the tagging?" Peabody shouted back. "And are we ever going to eat? We've already been on the clock six hours, and my blood sugar's dropping. I can feel it."

  "Just move your ass," Eve shot back, but she smiled. At least she still worked with somebody who knew how to bitch.

  ***

  Becau
se she appreciated it, and she remembered she hadn't eaten since the night before herself, she double-parked in front of a 24/7 and let Peabody make the dash in for some to-go food.

  They were both going to need to go off the clock for a couple of hours, get some sleep. But she wanted to get a look at Blair's workspace and get all the electronics and security discs in evidence first.

  Because the only why she could think of equaled security. The only why made Reva the real target. The killings took her out, deliberately. Unless there was a personal reason to target her, and she'd explore that angle, it was professional.

  Any professional motive against Reva brushed a little too close for comfort to Roarke. So she intended to move fast, and get as much locked into Central as she could before moving on to the next stage.

  Peabody hurried out again, carrying an enormous take-out bag.

  "Got hoagies." With a grunt, she dropped back in the seat.

  "What, for the whole squad?"

  "And other provisions."

  "Because we're going on safari?"

  With some dignity, Peabody pulled out a tidily wrapped hoagie and passed it to Eve. "Drinks, and a bag of soy chips, and a bag of dried apricots-"

  "Dried apricots, in case the rumor of the coming Armageddon is true."

  "And some damn cookies." Peabody's face closed in on a scowl that was edging toward pout. "I'm hungry, and when you're on a roll like this I might not see food again until I'm a withered sack of bones. You don't have to eat, you know." She made a fuss out of unwrapping her own sandwich. "Nobody's holding a blaster to your head."

  Eve peeked inside her sandwich and saw something that was pretending to have come from a pig. It was good enough. "In the event of Armageddon, I hope those cookies have some form of chocolate in them."

  "Maybe." Slightly mollified when Eve drove one-handed and bit into her sandwich, Peabody opened a tube of Pepsi and stuck it in the drink slot.

  By the time Eve got to the Flatiron Building, Peabody had mowed her way through the hoagie and a good portion of chips. As a result, both her mood and her energy were up again.

  "This is my favorite New York building," she said. "When I first moved here, I took a day and went around taking pictures of the places I used to read about. This was one of the top on my list. It's so yesterday, you know. But here it is, still standing. The oldest remaining skyscraper in the city."

  Eve hadn't known that. Then again she didn't collect that sort of trivia. She supposed she'd admired its unique triangular style now and then, in an absent sort of way.

  But for her, buildings simply were. People lived or worked in them, and they took up space, gave the city shape.

  She decided against trying Broadway for parking, as this section always had a party going on. Instead she turned onto Twenty-third and crammed her unit into a loading zone.

  The next drop-off or pickup was going to bitch, but she flipped up her ON DUTY sign, and climbed out.

  "Bissel rented space on the top floor."

  "Jesus, that's got to be prime."

  Eve nodded as they walked toward an entrance door. "I glanced through his financials, and he could afford it. Apparently that metal crap he built went for big bucks. And he had his own gallery, bought and sold art."

  "His connection to Felicity Kade?"

  "Apparently. She was a client, according to Reva. So she bought from both Blair and Reva, and she's the one who persuaded Reva to come to the art showing where Reva met Blair."

  "Cozy."

  With appreciation, Eve glanced at Peabody as they crossed the lobby. "That's right. Too cozy for my liking, too. So why do you figure Felicity puts her lover and her friend together?"

  "Maybe they weren't lovers yet. Or maybe she didn't know they'd get serious about each other."

  "Maybe." Eve bypassed the security desk and used the code Reva had given her to access the elevator to the top floor. Instead of the doors opening, the computer gave a warning buzz.

  You are not cleared for this elevator. Please return to the security and/or information desk for instructions on how to access the public entrance of Bissel Gallery. This elevator is for private use only.

  "Maybe she gave you the wrong code," Peabody suggested.

  "I don't think so."

  Eve walked to the main security station. "Who used that elevator last?"

  The young, prim woman in black curled her lip. "I beg your pardon?"

  "Don't bother," Eve told her and slapped down her badge. "Just answer the question."

  "I'll need to verify your identification." With her nose still in the air, she scanned Eve's badge, then slid over a palm plate. When Eve's ID was verified, she tucked the palm plate away again. "Is this about what happened to Mr. Bissel?"

  Eve merely smiled. "I beg your pardon?"

  The woman sniffed, then turned to her log book. "Mr. Bissel himself was the last to use that elevator. It goes directly to his studio. His employees and clients use the one to the right. That will go to the gallery."

  "You have the code for the studio elevator."

  "Of course. It's required that all tenants file their security and passcodes with us."

  "What is it?"

  "I'm not permitted to give out that data, not without proper authorization."

  Eve wondered if stuffing her badge up the woman's snooty nose would qualify as proper authorization. Instead, she shoved her own memo book onto the desk, tapped the screen. "Is this it?"

  Once again, the woman turned to her data unit, keyed in a complex series of numbers. She glanced at her screen, then Eve's. "If you have it, why are you bothering to ask me?"

  "It doesn't work."

  "Of course it works. You just didn't do it properly."

  "Why don't you show me how to do it properly?"

  Heaving a sigh, the woman gestured to a coworker. "Watch the station," she snapped, then clipped her way over to the elevators on hair-thin heels.

  She coded in, and when she got the same result as Eve, coded in again. "I don't understand it. This is the proper code. It's registered. Building security checks all passcodes twice a week."

  "When was the last check?"

  "Two days ago."

  "How long will it take maintenance to bypass?"

  "I have no idea."

  "Is there access from the gallery to the studio?"

  Obviously aggrieved, she marched back to her station, called up the diagram for the top level. "There is. There's a security door between them. I have the passcode for that."

  "Which, I imagine, is about as much good as the one you have for the elevator. Give it to me anyway."

  Eve pulled out her pocket 'link as she walked to the gallery elevator. "I need you at the Flatiron Building," she said the minute Roarke answered. "Bissel Gallery, top floor. The security codes for the direct elevator to his studio has been changed, so I can't access it. I'm going to try to get through the door between the gallery and the studio, but I'm figuring I'll find the same block."

  "Leave it be. If someone tampered with it, using the original code could add another block. I'm on my way."

  "What could Bissel have in his studio he didn't want his wife to see?" Peabody wondered.

  "Doesn't make sense." Eve shook her head. "Nothing in his file to indicate he's that security savvy. It takes savvy to alter a code without building security sniffing it out. And a guy who risks an affair with his wife's friend, all but under her nose? Why'd he do that? For the sex, sure, but also for the thrill. Look what I can get away with. Why does a man who goes for the thrill take such extensive precautions with his home office unit, his art studio. What does one have to do with the other?"

  She stepped off the elevator, into a space filled with sculpture, paintings, both static and animated. In the midst of the softly lighted room, a woman sat on the floor, sobbing her heart out.

  "Man," Eve said under her breath. "I hate when this happens. You take her."

  Pleased to have a concrete assignment, Peabody
approached the woman, crouched in front of her. "Miss."

  "We're closed." She wailed into her own hands. "Due to a de-de-death. "

  "I'm Detective Peabody." Under the circumstances, she tried not to display too much glee in being able to say just that. "This is my partner, Lieutenant Dallas. We're investigating the deaths of Blair Bissel and Felicity Kade."