Portrait In Death

Chapter 10

The beeping of the bedside 'link shot her out of a nightmare. From dark to dark. Shivering, groping through the panic, she dragged at the tangled sheets.

"Block video. Oh Jesus, lights, ten percent Damn it, goddamn it."

Eve scrubbed the heels of her hands over her damp cheeks, sucked at air while her heart continued to thunder, and answered the call.

" Dallas."

DISPATCH, DALLAS, LIEUTENANT EVE.

She dragged at her hair. "Acknowledged."

REPORT IMMEDIATELY, LINCOLN CENTER, ENTRANCE TO METROPOLITAN OPERA HOUSE. POSSIBLE HOMICIDE.

"Is the scene secure?"

AFFIRMATIVE.

"Notify Peabody, Officer Delia. My ETA, twenty minutes."

ACKNOWLEDGED. DISPATCH OUT.

She rolled out of bed, the empty bed. It was nearly four in the morning, but he hadn't come to bed. Her skin was clammy from the nightmare, so she gave herself two minutes in the shower, another minute in the swirling heat of the drying tube, and felt almost steady again.

She dressed quickly in the dim light, strapped on her weapon, pocketed her badge, her field restraints, clipped on her recorder. And was halfway out the bedroom door when she cursed, stalked back, and dug a memo cube out of the drawer of the night stand.

"I caught a case," she said into it. "I don't know when I'll be back."

She thought of a dozen things she wanted to say, but they all seemed pointless. So she left it at that, tossed the memo on the bed, and went to work.

The police sensors were up, flashing red and yellow. At the curb a couple of black-and-whites nosed together, with their cones circling in cold blue, hot red.

The great fountain that graced the wide terrace was quiet, and the elegant building behind it dressed in shadows. She'd lived a decade in New York without ever having come to this cathedral of the arts. Until Roarke had taken her inside to the theater, to concerts, even the opera.

When you were hooked up with a man like Roarke, she thought, your horizons broadened whether you wanted them to or not.

What the hell was wrong with him?

"Lieutenant."

She nodded to the uniform who greeted her and pulled herself back. A cop didn't have a personal life, or personal worries on a crime scene.

"What have we got?" She skimmed his tag. "Officer Feeno."

"Male, Asian mix, about twenty, DOS. Couple of half-stewed partyers found him in the fountain. Guy pulled the kid out, woman called it in. My partner and I were first to respond and arrived about two minutes after the call. My partner's got the witnesses stashed over there."

He gestured to the steps leading up to the entrance.

"Keep them wrapped for now. Send my aide through when she arrives."

"Yes, sir. Looks like he might've fallen in and drowned. Not a mark on him, and the way he's dressed, he could be an usher for the Met or one of the other theaters in the Center. Thing is," he continued as he fell into step beside Eve, "he's about the same age as the recycle bin case. She didn't have any marks on her either."

"We'll see what we see."

There were still little rivulets and pools of wet where the body had been pulled out of the fountain. The air was already warm, but heavy enough with humidity that she imagined the water would take some time to evaporate.

She set down her field kit, engaged her recorder, and stood over the body.

Young, she thought on the first quick stir of pity. Twenty at best. Pretty face for a boy. Death had leeched his color, but she imagined his skin had been a smooth and dusky gold to go with the ink black hair and brows. Sharp facial bones, long, elegant fingers, a long trim body, mostly leg.

He was dressed in black-short jacket with a notched collar, straight pants, soft leather shoes. When she crouched, peered close, she could see the faint marks where a name tag had been removed.

Carefully removed, she thought.

"Victim is male, Asian, eighteen to twenty. No visible signs of violence. He is fully dressed in what appears to be a uniform."

She sealed up, then went through his pockets for ID. She found a wallet that held two debit cards, a student ID, and an employee card from the Lincoln Center.

"Victim is identified as Sulu, Kenby, age nineteen, Upper East Side residence, currently a registered student at Juilliard and employed by Lincoln Center."

She sealed the wallet in evidence, then examined his hands.

The skin was smooth, the nails short and well-kept. "Come from money, don't you?" she murmured. "Took care of yourself. Juilliard." She looked toward the Center. "So it was theater for you. You were working tonight. Part-time job, right? To keep close to the theater, maybe help pay your way."

She turned his right hand over, saw the faint red mark from a pressure syringe. "I'm going to find out how he got you, Kenby."

She dug into her field kit, barely glancing up when she heard the huffing breaths and rapid clap of cop shoes on pavement.

"Record on, Peabody. The body's been moved. Lifted out of the fountain, civilian found him." As she spoke, she fixed on microgoggles and examined the palm of the right hand more closely.

"Faint discoloration as is typical from pressure syringe."

"Like Howard."

"Yeah, like Howard." She unbuttoned the jacket. "He was carrying an ID, and two debit cards, got a trendy wrist unit."

"Not robbery."

"No, not robbery." She parted the jacket.

The wound was small and neat. A tidy round hole through smooth flesh, toned muscle, and into the heart. With the goggles on she could see the bits of NuSkin adhesive left around the wound. "And he didn't drown either. Primary's assessment, cause of death, heart wound induced by thin blade. Tox report will likely show opiates in bloodstream."

She sat back on her heels. "Contact Morris. I want him on this one. Run the victim's prints, Peabody, to verify ID. Get time of death, finish the scene exam. Get the names and addresses of next of kin. Then have him bagged, tagged. Homicide. I'm going to question the civilians."

She heard Peabody take a breath to steady herself as she walked away.

The couple sat close on the steps. Hip to hip in their fancy evening clothes. The woman was wearing a black-and-white speckled dress that wound around her body like the snake it mimicked. Her hair had probably started out the evening in a golden tower, but the tower had crumbled considerably, sending poofs and curls and straggles in and around her face.

The man had fared little better. His jacket was bundled in a wet ball beside him, and his snow-white ruffled shirt was transparent from his dip in the fountain. He was barefoot, with his soggy silver shoes on the steps. His pants were still dripping and clung to skinny legs.

She put them both just shy of thirty.

She motioned to the uniform to step aside, then tapped her badge. "I'm Lieutenant Dallas. Tell me what happened."

"He was in the water. I pulled him out. He was dead. I feel sick."

"I know this is difficult." She imagined he did feel sick, not only from the experience but from the crash from whatever party favors they'd been imbibing earlier in the evening. "How did you find him?"

"We went to the ballet-Giselle-then to a party. Friend's house on Riverside Drive."

"That's not exactly next door. What were you doing back here at four in the morning?"

"It's not against the law to walk around at four in the morning." The woman spoke up, a whiny baby-doll voice that instantly put Eve's nerves on edge.

"Nope, but sucking up illegals at a party half the night is. We can get through this quick and easy, or we can make it tough and I can take you into custody, run a tox screen."

"We were just trying to help," the man protested.

"That's why I'm not going to run the tox. Let's start again." She pulled out a notebook. "I need your names."

"I'm Maxville Drury. Look, I'm an executive at Fines and Cox, the ad agency. I don't want any trouble."

"You guys do the blimps, right, and the holoboards along the FDR?"

"Among other things."

"Do you have any idea how irritating they are?"

He managed a smile. "Yeah."

"Just wondered. Miss?"

"Loo Macabe. I'm a shoe designer."

"You design those?"

"Yes, I did."

"Interesting. Now that we're pals, why don't you tell me exactly what happened? You were here for the ballet, you went to a party. Then?"

"Okay." Maxville drew a deep breath. "We left the party. I didn't notice the time, honest to God. We were feeling good, up, you know? It's a hot night, and we were just sort of joking around about what it would be like to cool off in the fountain. One thing led to another, and we ended up back here. We were thinking we could not only cool off in the fountain, but heat up. You know?"

Eve glanced at Loo's face, caught the foolish little smile. "Must've been some party."

"I told Max how I have this contest going with some friends on who can make it at the most New York landmarks. And we thought, what the hell, let's chalk up a couple points."

"So you came back here, and…?"

"I just sort of jumped in," Max continued. "Jesus, I almost landed on him. I hauled him up, dragged him out. Loo called for an ambulance. I tried to give him mouth-to-mouth, CPR. I tried. I don't know if I did it right, everything got all jumbled up. I don't know if I did it right."

Because he was looking up at her for some kind of reassurance, Eve sat beside him. "He was gone, Max. He was gone before you got here. There was nothing you could have done. But you tried, and you called for help. So you did it right."

She watched dawn come up, a hazy light in a milky sky. Street and security lights faded out, and the grand fountain spurted into life, spewing its towers of water into the heavy air.

The sounds of morning were the clank and bang of recycle bins being emptied, of maxibuses belching. Of the air-trams and buses beginning their early run across the sick white sky.

The dog walkers came out with their braces of canines, and the joggers who preferred the sidewalks to the parks or the health clubs.

Glide-carts opened for business, and pumped out their greasy steam.

She watched the dead wagon pull away with its burden of a young man with long, graceful limbs and a minute hole in his heart.

And she watched the Channel 75 van pull up.

"I've got the next of kin, Lieutenant." Peabody stepped up beside her, and with Eve watched Nadine step out of the van. "And when I checked I learned that the victim's parents have already reported him missing."

And she would have to tell them he'd been found.

"Let me deal with this," she said and crossed to Nadine.

"I'd have contacted you," Nadine began, "but the station got the report of the body, and that cops were on scene. I had to figure one of those cops was you."

"Because?"

"Because I got another note, and more pictures. It came through my station unit at sixa.m. He's a young man, Asian mix. Very slim, very attractive. Another student, I'd have to say, as the candid shot puts him at Juilliard. I recognized it. Who the hell is killing these kids, Dallas?"

Eve shook her head. "I'll give you a stand-up, here and now, Nadine. Then I'm going to ask you to send the crew away, give me the transmission, then come into Central. I have a stop to make, but I'll be in as soon as I can. I'm going to ask you not to talk to anyone about what you received this morning. I'll give you everything I can."

"Let's set it up." She signalled her crew. " Dallas, I'll do anything I can to help you stop him. But that doesn't mean I don't want the entire story, exclusive, once you have."

"I'll give you what I can when I can." A headache was waking up behind her eyes. "Let's get this done," she added with a glance at the time. "I'm on the clock."

Eve sat in the Sulu living area of their gracious uptown home at twenty after seven on a sticky summer morning, and watched two people dissolve under the shock of losing their only child.

"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 dinner before he went to work. He worked three nights a week at the Metropolitan Opera House, as an usher. We expected him home by midnight, perhaps twelve-thirty. We didn't worry. He's responsible. We went to bed. But Lily woke in the night, and the light we leave on for him was still lit. She checked, and when she saw he hadn't come home, woke me. We called his friends first, then we called the police."

"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 running on caffeine and nerves.

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 beginning to know about Siobhan, he imagined she'd believed they'd been morally wed.

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 manners to call them.

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.

Eve walked into her office, saw that Nadine was already inside. There was no point in tearing her hair out over the fact that Nadine ran tame in Central. For once, having her in the office rather than one of the waiting rooms suited her. It saved time.

"I need to put a tracer on your unit at 75."

Nadine crossed her legs, examined her toes in their strappy, heeled sandals. "Oh sure. Why should it be a problem to have a reporter's work unit tapped into by the cops? Why, everybody will be thrilled to pass me information that's going straight to Cop Central at the same time. I'll be deluged with tips."

"He's using you as a conduit. If he has anything more to say, he'll go through you. You authorize the tracer, or I impound the unit-and I can impound you, too, Nadine."

She waited a beat while Nadine's head snapped up. "Material witness, police protection, and so forth. I'm tempted to do it because I like you. I like you breathing."

"He's not coming after me."

"Maybe not. But psychopaths sometimes become annoyed with their tools. I'm banking on you taking care of yourself. I've got a call in to Mira. If she indicates there's a chance he'll turn on you, I'll have you wrapped up and packed away before you can freshen your lip dye for a one-on-one."

"Try it."

"Oh, I'll do it." Seated, Eve stretched out her legs. "I didn't ask you to be my friend, you know. Just worked out that way. Now you have to live with it."

"Shit." With her foxy face sulky, she drummed her fingers on the arm of the chair. Then the corner of her mouth twitched. "I like you, too, for some insane reason."

"Good, now we're all cozy. You get your picture taken lately? Professionally?"

Nadine glanced down at the photos Eve had set on the desk. "We get them taken every year at the station. Publicity shots for viewers, and for posters they have framed in the Green Room."

"Who takes them?"

"I'll find out. What's the connection between Howard and Sulu, other than the photographs?"

"I'll find out." Eve jerked a thumb at her doorway. "McNab's waiting to go to 75 with you, install the trace."

"Damn sure of yourself."

"That's right." She studied her boots as Nadine rose to leave, then she swiveled in her chair. "You're banging that suit?"

"Generally, I make him take off the suit before we bang, as you so romantically put it."

"Whatever. What I mean is, you know about men."

One perfect eyebrow lifted as Nadine turned. "Enough to be baffled, fascinated, and annoyed by the species. Why? Trouble in paradise?"

Eve opened her mouth, then firmly closed it again. "No. It's nothing." She waved Nadine away, then swiveled back to write her report. She'd let Hastings stew for a while before heading into interview. And make sure she had her own head clear before she questioned him.

She spent several minutes scrolling through the names of customers who'd registered purchases of high-end cameras over the last twelve months.

Could go back beyond that, she thought. And the killer might not have registered the equipment. Might not have worried about the whole warranty deal.

Still, she cross-referenced, looking for a link to the names on her victim and suspect list.

But her mind wouldn't stick to the point.

She hissed out a breath, kicked out with her foot, and slapped her door closed. She shut down the temptation to contact Roarke. She'd left him a memo, hadn't she? She didn't have all the rules of the marriage game aligned, but she was damned sure it was his turn to make the call.

Instead, she called someone she felt had a good handle on the rules of the road.

"Mavis."

Her friend's pixie face was slack, and naked as a child's. The hair was still streaked and decorated with bells. They jingled softly as Mavis snuggled into the pillow.

"Huh? Timezit?"

"Uh… I don't know. Morning."

"Ugh. Morning. Whassamatter?"

"Nothing. Sorry. Go back to sleep."

"'Sokay." Mavis opened one eye, blue as a berry. "Summerset?"

"No, no, he's coming along." At least she figured he was. She hadn't checked. Was it her turn to check? How was she supposed to keep up, for God's sake? "Maybe you're going by there today?"

"Gonna. Poor thing. Trina and I are going by, maybe give him a face and hair treatment. Whatcha think?"

The grin spread. Maybe it was a little evil, but the image of Summerset caught in Trina's enhancement web was so beautiful. It almost brought a tear to Eve's eye. "Great. Great idea. Just what he needs."

"You okay? Something's up. I can tell."

"It's nothing."

"I'm awake." On a huge yawn, Mavis shifted, and the 'link screen showed the mountain that was Leonardo snoring softly beside her. "Tell me."

"I don't know. It's probably stupid. I'm probably stupid. Something wrong with Roarke. He won't talk about it. He shut me out, Mavis. Blasted at me out of the clear blue, then shut me out. Big-time. He didn't come to bed, and when he talked to me, he… Shit."

Hurt and confused all over again, she dragged a hand through her hair. "Maybe, when people are together awhile they're not all jazzed up when they see each other. That's okay, I guess. But…"

Screw the buts, she thought as her anger spiked again. "Damn it, usually he can't keep his hands off me, usually there's this look in his eye when I come home. It wasn't there, not even close, and he couldn't wait to get rid of me."

"You were fighting about something? You didn't do anything to piss him off?"

Aggrieved, she kicked at her desk. "How come it has to be me?"

"Doesn't." Naked, and easy with it, Mavis sat up. "I'm just eliminating possibilities. You know, marriage is a kind of mystery, just like cop stuff. So you gotta eliminate possibilities and look for clues."

"Then it oughta come with a goddamn field kit," Eve muttered.

"He's worried about Summerset."

"Yeah, but it wasn't that. I know it wasn't."

"Okay, you'd know." Mavis ticked her head back and forth, little hair bells ringing as she considered. "Maybe it's a work thing squeezing him."

"It could be, but he usually feeds on that crap. He put up this wall. It was personal."

"Okay." Mavis nodded decisively. "Then you tear it down. You don't take no for an answer. You nag and you pick and you stick until it pops out of him. Whatever it is. Girls are good at this, Dallas."

"I'm not good at being a girl."

"Sure you are. You're your own kind of girl. Think of it as kicking his ass until he cracks. At drilling him in Interview until he confesses. Dig it out of him, then, depending on what it is, you either make him suffer or comfort him. Or fuck his brains out. You'll know which."

"That doesn't sound that hard."

"It's not. Trust me. Let me know how it turns out. Since I'm awake, I think I'm going to get Leonardo revving." She blew Eve a kiss, and signed off.

"Okay, things to do: file report, interview suspect, harass ME and lab. Arrest homicidal maniac. Close case. Kick Roarke's ass. Piece of cake."