Portrait In Death

Chapter 16

When you had connections, you used them. Doctors, as a breed, were one of Eve's least favorite species, yet somehow she'd managed to develop personal relationships with two of them.

For this line of the investigation, she'd tug on Louise Dimatto.

Knowing Louise's scattershot schedule, she tagged her by 'link first, pinned down her location, then wheedled an appointment.

The Canal Street Clinic was Louise's baby. She might have gone against her family's uptown grain to establish and run a free clinic on the verges of Sidewalk City where sidewalk sleepers made their beds in packing crates and unlicensed beggars trolled for marks, but she'd dug in with her manicured fingers.

She'd put her own time and money on the line, and then had launched a campaign to drag more time, more money from every source at her disposal. Louise, Eve knew, had a lot of sources.

She'd ended up being one herself. Or more accurately, Roarke had, she thought as she double-parked beside an ancient, rusted two-seater that had been stripped of its tires, seats, and one of its doors. It was his money, even if the sneaky bastard had dumped it into her account.

Whatever the sources, it was money well spent. The clinic was a steady beam of light in a very dark world.

The building was unimposing, unless you considered the fact it was the only one on the block with windows that were clean, and walls that were graffiti-free.

Across the street a funky-junkie wearing thick black sunshades sat with her muscles jerking to whatever tune she crooned. A couple of badasses stood hip-shot in a doorway looking for trouble that was never far away in this sector.

Behind their riot bars most of the upper-story windows were thrown open in the doomed hope that a lost breeze might stumble in on its way uptown. Out of them vomited the wail of babies, the burn of trash rock, and voices already raised in petty furies.

Gauging her ground, Eve flipped on her On Duty sign, then strolled over to the badasses. They straightened and fixed appropriate sneers on their tough guy faces.

"You know Dr. Dimatto?"

"Everybody knows the doc. Whatiz to you?"

"Anybody comes around here to hassle the doc," his companion warned, "they gonnaget hassled."

"Good to know, because the doc's a friend of mine. I'm going in to talk with her. See that police vehicle?"

One of them snorted. "Piece of shit cop car."

"My piece of shit cop car," Eve acknowledged. "I want it in the same shitty condition it is now when I come out. If it's not, well, the hassling will begin, starting with each of you fine gentlemen. Clear?"

"Ooh, Rico, I'm shaking." The first elbowed the second as he cracked up. "This skinny girl cop here, she's gonna slap my face if somebody pisses on her tires."

"I prefer the term 'bitch cop from hell.' Isn't that right, Peabody?"

"Yes, sir," Peabody called back from her stance by the vehicle. "It is absolutely correct."

With her eyes shifting from one badass face to the other, Eve asked, "And why is that, Peabody?"

"Because, sir, you're so damn mean. And rather than slap someone's face for relieving his bladder on your official tires, you are more likely to twist off said reliever's balls, then use them to strangle him."

"Yes. Yes, I am. And what would I do then, Peabody?"

"Then, sir? Then you would laugh."

"I haven't had a good laugh today, so keep that in mind." Satisfied her vehicle would remain untouched, Eve sauntered back across the street and into the clinic.

"The laugh was a good touch, Peabody."

"Thanks. I thought it added just the right tone. Boy." She scanned the waiting area. It was full, jammed with people in varying forms of distress. A good many of them made the badasses across the street look like boy scouts, but they sat, and they waited.

The room was clean. Fresh paint, spotless rug, thriving plants. A portion was sectioned off and held child-sized chairs and toys. In it she saw a boy of about four rhythmically bashing a boy of about two over the head with a foam mallet. He punctuated each bash with a cheerful: "Bang!"

"Shouldn't somebody make him stop doing that?" Eve wondered.

"Huh? Oh, no sir. He's just doing his job. Older siblings have to beat on younger ones. Zeke used to just about drill a hole in my ribs with his finger. I really miss him."

"Whatever." Baffled, Eve walked to the reception desk.

They were shown into Louise's office. However much the clinic had evolved, Louise's space was still small, still cramped. The clinic's benefactors needn't worry that the doctor was using their contributions to plump her own work nest.

Eve used the wait time to check on any voice or e-mail that had come into her unit at Central, stewing when she found one, very brief transmission from Roarke.

Louise dashed in, a pale green lab coat over jeans and a white T-shirt. Something that looked like curdled milk dribbled down the breast of the lab coat.

"Hi, gang. Coffee! I've got ten minutes. Spill it."

"You've already spilled it." Eve gestured to the dribble.

"Oh, I'm running peds today. Just a little baby puke."

"Oh. Bleck."

With a chuckle, Louise grabbed coffee from the Auto-Chef. "I imagine you come home some days with a lot more interesting bodily fluids on your clothes than a little harmless baby puke. So?" She sat on the edge of the desk, then sighed. "Ah, I'm off my feet. Feels almost better than sex. What can I do for you?"

"Are you up on the story about the two murdered college kids?"

"I've caught the media reports. Nadine's particularly." She blew on her coffee, drank. "Why?"

"I'm working on a theory that the individual who killed them may be sick, even dying. Some disease, some condition."

"Why?"

"It's a complicated theory."

"I've got ten minutes." She dug in her lab coat pocket and came up with a red lollipop to go with her coffee. "You'll have to simplify it."

"There's an old superstition about absorbing the soul through the camera. I think he may be taking it to another level. He talks about their light-pure light. And how they belong to him now. It could be reaching, but what if he thinks he needs their light to live?"

"Mmm." Louise sucked on the lollipop. "Interesting."

"If he does, then it may follow he got some bad news regarding his life expectancy at some point. Don't you guys call tumors and masses, the bad stuff, shadows?"

"A tumor, a mass, would show as a kind of shadow-a dark spot-on an X ray or ultrasound."

"Those are like images, right? Like pictures?"

"Yes, exactly. I see where you're going, but I'm not sure how I can help."

"You know doctors, and they know other doctors. You know hospitals and health centers. I need to know who's gotten bad news in the last twelve months. I can fine-tune that to male patients between the ages of twenty-five and sixty."

"Oh well then, piece of cake." Louise shook her head, and drained her coffee. "Dallas, even with cancer vaccines, early diagnosis, the success rates of treatments, there are quite a number of people who fall to incurable or inoperable conditions. Add to those, the ones who for whatever reason refuse treatment-religious reasons, fear factor, stubbornness, ignorance-and you've got hundreds just in Manhattan. Maybe thousands."

"I can cull through that."

"Maybe you can, but there's one big problem. It's called doctor-patient confidentiality. I can't give you names, and neither can any other reputable doctor or health care provider."

"He's a killer, Louise."

"Yes, but the others aren't, and are entitled to their privacy. I'll ask around, but no one's going to give me names and I couldn't, in good conscience, give them to you."

Irritated, Eve paced the limited confines of the office while Louise pulled another lollipop out of her pocket and offered it to Peabody.

"Lime. Thanks."

"Sugar-free."

"Bummer," Peabody replied, but ripped off the clear wrapping.

Eve huffed out a breath, settled herself. "Tell me this. What kind of shadow is most usually a death sentence?"

"You don't ask easy ones. Assuming the patient took the recommended vaccines, went in for routine annual exams so early detection was a factor, I'd go for the brain. Providing the mass hasn't spread, we can remove, kill, or shrink most bad cells, or if necessary, replace the involved organ. We can't replace the brain. And," she added, setting her empty cup aside, "this is ridiculously hypothetical."

"Gotta start somewhere. Maybe you can talk to your brain doctor pals. The individual remains highly functional, able to plan and execute complicated acts. He's articulate and he's mobile."

"I'll do what I can. It's going to be very little. Now I've got to get back to my own front lines. By the way, I'm thinking of having a little dinner party. Just friends. Both of you, Roarke and McNab, me and Charles."

"Um," Eve managed.

"Sounds great. Just let us know when. How's Charles?" Peabody added. "I haven't had a chance to talk to him in a while."

"He's great. Busy, but who isn't. I'll be in touch."

"Hey. Give me a damn sucker."

With a laugh, Louise tossed Eve one, then bolted out of the room.

Outside, Eve walked around her vehicle. Crouched as if to examine the tires. Then sent the two men still in the doorway a big, toothy smile before popping the lollipop into her mouth. She didn't speak until she and Peabody were pulling away.

"Okay, none of my business, but why aren't you weirded out by the idea of a cozy little dinner party with Louise and Charles?"

"Why should I be?"

"Oh, I don't know, let me think." As if contemplating, Eve rolled the round of candy in her mouth. Grape, she thought. Not bad. "Could it be that at one time you were dating Charles, and the fact that you were hanging around with our favorite licensed companion made your current bedmate swing so far out of orbit he knocked Charles on his undeniably adorable ass?"

"Kind of spices up the stew, doesn't it. Anyway, Charles, of the undeniably adorable ass, is a friend. He loves Louise. I like Louise. I wasn't sleeping with Charles, and even if I had been, it shouldn't matter."

Playing mattress tag always mattered, no matter what anyone said. But Eve kept that opinion to herself. "Okay. If it shouldn't matter, why haven't you told McNab that you and Charles never did the mattress mambo?"

Peabody hunched her shoulders. "He acted like such a moron."

"Peabody, McNabis a moron."

"Yeah, but he's my moron now. I guess I should tell him. I hate to give him the satisfaction though. It gives him the hand."

"What hand?"

"The upper hand. See, now I have the hand because he thinks I was sleeping with Charles and I stopped sleeping with Charles because of him. McNab. But if I tell him I never did the deed with Charles anyway, I lose the hand."

"Now my head hurts. I should never have asked."

She went back to the beginning. Rachel Howard.

Carpet fibers. They'd identified the make and models of the vehicles that came standard with the type found on both victims, and the list of registered owners. Diego Feliciano's uncle's work van didn't match, nor did Hastings's.

So far, this had been a dead end, but she'd push harder against the wall.

There was the tranq. A prescription opiate, not street buzz. If her theory about the killer held, odds are it was his prescription. Something recommended to help him sleep, calm his nerves, block whatever pain he might have due to his condition.

She'd cross-check the vehicle owners with local pharmacies. Cross-check both against imaging equipment purchases over the last twelve months.

A tedious proposition, and time consuming. More so as she had to wait for the authorization to do some of the searches.

Would she have cut through that if Roarke had been around? she wondered. Would she have used him, let him talk her into involving himself in the case, let him man his far superior equipment with his far superior skill, and his habit of bypassing the standard security and privacy codes?

Probably.

But he wasn't around, so it wasn't an option. Time was weighing on her. The killer had taken two lives within a week, and he wasn't finished.

He wouldn't wait much longer to seek out the next light.

Eve began her first level of cross-checks while she waited for the authorization to go deeper. And she worried about some faceless college kid already caught in the crosshairs of a camera lens.

And she worried about Roarke, trapped in the cage of his own past.

He hadn't traveled often to the west of the country where he'd been born. Most of his business was centered in Dublin, or south in Cork, north in Belfast.

He had some property in Galway, but he'd never stepped foot on it, and had spent only a handful of days in the castle hotel he'd bought in Kerry.

Though he didn't share his wife's ingrained suspicion of the countryside, he usually preferred the city. He doubted he'd know what do to with himself for long in this place of rolling green hills and flower-strewn yards.

The pace would be too slow to suit him for more than a short holiday, but there was a piece of him that was glad it had been left much as it had been, century by century.

Green, velvet green, and quiet.

His Ireland, the one he'd fled from, had been gray, dank, mean, and bitter. This curve of Clare wasn't simply another part of the country, but a world away from what he'd known.

Farmers still farmed here, men still walked with their dogs across a field, and ruins of what had been castles and forts and towers in another age stood gray and indomitable in those fields.

Tourists, he supposed, would take pictures of those ruins, and scramble around in them-then drive for miles on the twisting roads to find more. And the locals would glance at them now and again.

There, you see, they might say, they tried to beat us down. Vikings and Brits. But they never could. They never will.

He rarely thought of his heritage, and had never held the grand and weepy sentiment of Ireland so many did whose ancestors had left those green fields behind. But driving alone now, under a sky layered with clouds that turned the light into a gleaming pearl, seeing the shadows dance over the endless roll of green and the lush red blooms of wild fuchsia rise taller than a man to form hedgerows, he felt a tug.

For it was beautiful, and in a way he'd never known, it was his.

He'd flown from Dublin to Shannon to save time, and because the night's dip into whiskey had given him a miserable head. Conversely, he'd opted to drive through Clare, totake his time now.

What the hell was he going to say to them? Nothing that had run through his brain seemed right. He'd never be able to make it right, and could find no logical reason for trying.

He didn't know them, nor they him. Going to them now would do no more than open old wounds.

He had his family, and he had nothing in common with these strangers but a ghost.

But he could see that ghost in his mind's eye, see her walking across the fields, or standing in a yard amongst the flowers.

She hadn't left him, Roarke thought. How could he leave her?

So when the route map he'd programmed into the in-dash 'link told him to turn just before entering the village of Tulla, he turned.

The road wound through a forest, much of it new growth, no more than fifty years old. Then the trees gave way to the fields, to the hills where the sun was sliding through the clouds in a lovely, hazy way.

Cows and horses cropped, close to the fenceline. It made him smile. His cop wouldn't be pleased with the proximity of the animals, and she'd be baffled by the little old man, neatly dressed in cap and tie and white shirt, puttering toward him on a skinny tractor.

Why? she'd wonder in an aggrieved voice he could hear even now, does anyone want to do that? And when the old man lifted his hand in a wave as if they were old friends, she'd be only more puzzled.

He missed her the way he would miss one of his own limbs.

She'd have come if he'd asked her. So he hadn't asked. Couldn't. This was a part of his life that was apart from her, and needed to be. When he was done with it, he'd go back. Go home, and that would be that.

DESTINATION, the 'link informed him, ONE-HALF KILOMETER, ON LEFT.

"All right then," he said. "Let's do what needs to be done."

So, this was their land-his mother's land-these hills, these fields, and the cattle that grazed over them. The gray barn, the stone sheds and fences.

The stone house with its blossoming garden and white gate.

His heart tripped a little, and his mouth went dry. He wanted, more than he wanted anything, to simply drive straight by.

She'd have lived here. It was the family home, so she'd have lived here. Slept here. Eaten here. Laughed and cried here.

Oh Christ.

He forced himself to turn the car into the drive-what the locals would call the street-behind a small sedan and a well-worn truck. He could hear birdsong, and the distant bark of a dog, the vague sound of a puttering motor.

Country sounds, he noted. She'd have heard them every day of life here, until she didn't really hear them at all. Is that why she'd left? Because she'd needed to hear something new? The bright sounds of the city? The voices, the music, the traffic in the streets?

Did it matter why?

He stepped out of the car. He'd faced death more times than he could count. At times he'd fought his way around it until his hands ran with blood. He'd killed-in blood both hot and cold.

And there was nothing in his life he could remember fearing as much as he feared knocking on the bright blue door of that old stone house.

He went through the pretty white gate onto the narrow path between banks of cheerful flowers. And standing on a short stoop, he knocked on the blue door.

When it opened, the woman stared back at him. His mother's face. Older, some thirty years older than the image that was carved into his brain. But her hair was red, with just a hint of gold, her eyes green, her skin like milk tinted with rose petals.

She barely reached his shoulder, and for some reason, that nearly broke his heart.

She was neat, in her blue pants and white shirt, and white canvas shoes. Such little feet. He took it all in, down to the tiny gold hoops in her ears, and the scent of vanilla that wafted out the door.

She was lovely, with that soft and contented look some women carried. In her hand was a red-and-white dishcloth.

He said the only words he could think of. "My name is Roarke."

"I know who you are." Her voice held a strong west county accent. Running the cloth from one hand to the other, she studied him as he studied her. "I suppose you'd best be coming in."

"I'm sorry to disturb you."

"Do you plan on disturbing me?" She stepped back. "I'm in the kitchen. There's still tea from breakfast."

Before she closed the door, she took a look at his car, lifting her brows at the dark elegance of it. "So, the claims you've money coming out of your ears, among other places, are true then."

His blood chilled, but he nodded. If they wanted money from him, he'd give them money. "I'm well set."

"Well set's a variable term, isn't it? Depending on where you're standing."

She walked back toward the kitchen, past what he assumed was the company parlor, then the family living area. The rooms were crowded with furniture and whatnots, and fresh flowers. And all as neat as she.

The table in the big family kitchen could have fit twelve, and he imagined it had. There was a huge stove that appeared to be well-used, an enormous refrigerator, miles of butter yellow counters.

The windows over the sink looked out over garden and field and hill, and there were little pots he supposed were herbs sitting on the sill. It was a working room, and a cheerful one. He could still smell breakfast in the air.

"Have a seat then, Roarke. Will you have biscuits with your tea?"

"No, thank you. I'm fine."

"Well, I will. Don't get much of a reason to eat a biscuit in the middle of the day, might as well take advantage of it when I do."

She dealt with the homey chores, and had him wondering if she was giving them both time to settle. The tea was in a plain white pot, and the biscuits she put on a pretty blue plate.

"Yours is a face I never expected to see at my door." With the chores done, she sat, chose a biscuit. "So, why have you come?"

"I thought I… felt I… Ah, well." He sipped the tea. Apparently, she hadn't given him time enough to settle. "I didn't know about you-about Siobhan-until a few days ago."

Her eyebrow lifted. "Know what?"

"That you-she-existed. I'd been told, I believed, that my mother… the woman I thought was my mother, had left. Left me when I was a child."

"Did you?"

"Ma'am-"

"I'm Sinead. Sinead Lannigan."

"Mrs. Lannigan, until a few days ago, I'd never heard the name Siobhan Brody. I thought my mother's name was Meg, and I don't remember her particularly well except she had a hard hand and she walked out, leaving me with him."

"Your mother, your true mother, wouldn't have left you if there'd been breath in her body."

So she knows already, he thought. Knows her sister's long dead. "I know it now. He killed her. I don't know what to say to you."

She set her cup down, very carefully. "Tell me the story as you know it now. That's what I want to hear."

He told her, while she sat in silence, watching him. And when he'd told her all he knew, she rose, filled a kettle, put it on the stove.

"I've known it, all these years. We could never prove it, of course. The police, they didn't help, didn't seem to care. She was just one more girl gone astray."

"He had a few cops in his pocket back then. One or two is all it takes when you want something covered. You could never have proved it, however you tried."

Her shoulders trembled once on a long breath, then she turned. "We tried to find you, at first. For her sake. For Siobhan. My brother, Ned, nearly died trying. They beat him half to death, left him in a Dublin alley. He had a wife, and a babe of his own. Much as it pained us, we had to let you go. I'm sorry."

He only stared, and said, very slowly. "My father killed her."

"Yes." Tears swam into her eyes. "And I hope the murdering son of a whore's burning in hell. I won't ask God to forgive me for saying it, for hoping it." Carefully, she folded the red-and-white dishcloth, then sat back down while the kettle heated for more tea.

"I felt, when I learned all this, what had happened to her, I felt you-her family-deserved to be told. That it was only right that I tell you, face-to-face. I realize it's no easier hearing it from me, maybe harder at that, but it was the only way I knew."

Watching his face, she leaned back. "Come from America, did you, for this?"

"I did, yes."

"We heard of you-your exploits, young Roarke. His father's son, I thought. An operator, a dangerous man. Heartless man. I think you may be a dangerous man, but it's not a heartless one sitting in my kitchen waiting for me to slap him for something he had no part in."

"I didn't look for her, never thought of her. I did nothing to put it right."

"What are you doing now? Sitting here with me while your tea goes cold?"

"I don't know. Christ Jesus, I don't know. Because there's nothing Ican do."

"She loved you. We didn't hear from her much. I think he wouldn't let her, and she only managed to sneak a few calls or letters off now and then. But she loved you, heart and soul. It's right that you should grieve for her, but not that you should pay."

She rose when the kettle sputtered. "She was my twin."

"I know."

"I'd be your aunt. You have two uncles, grandparents, any number of cousins if you're interested."

"I… it's difficult to take it in."

"I imagine it is. Aye, I imagine it is. You have her eyes," she said quietly.

Baffled, he shook his head. "Hers were green. Her eyes were green, like yours. I saw her picture."

"Not the color, but the shape." She turned around. "The shape of your eyes is hers. And like mine, don't you see?" She stepped to him, laid a hand over his. "It seems to me that the shape of something is important, more important than the color."

When emotion stormed through him, Sinead did what came naturally. She drew his head to her breast, stroked his hair. "There now," she murmured, holding her sister's boy. "There now. She'd be glad you've come. She'd be happy you're here, at last."

Later, she took him out to where the edge of the yard met the first field. "We planted that for her." She gestured to a tall, many-branched tree. "We made no grave for her. I knew she was gone, but it didn't seem right to make a grave for her. So we planted a cherry tree. It blooms fine every spring. And when I see it bloom, it gives me some comfort."

"It's beautiful. It's a beautiful place."

"Your people are farmers, Roarke, generations back." She smiled when he looked at her. "We held on to the land, no matter what. We're stubborn, hotheaded, and we'll work till we drop. You come from that."

"I've spent years trying to shake off where I came from. Not looking back."

"You can look back on this with pride. He couldn't break you, could he? I bet he tried."

"Maybe if he hadn't tried so bloody hard I wouldn't have gotten away. I wouldn't have made myself. I'll… I'll plant a cherry tree back home for her."

"There's a good thought. You're a married man, aren't you, married to one of the New York guarda."

"She's my miracle," he told her. "My Eve."

His tone stirred her. "No children though."

"Not yet, no."

"Well, there's plenty of time for them yet. I've seen pictures of her, of course. I've kept tabs on you over the years. Couldn't help myself. She looks strong. I suppose she'd have to be."

"She is."

"Bring her with you next time you come. But for now, we should get you settled in."

"I'm sorry?"

"You don't expect to get away so easy, do you? You'll stay at least the night, meet the rest of your family. Give them a chance to meet you. It would mean a great deal to my parents, to my brothers," she added before he could speak.

"Mrs. Lannigan."

"That's Aunt Sinead to you."

He let out a half-laugh. "I'm out of my depth."

"Well then," she said cheerfully, and took his hand, "sink or swim, for you're about to be tossed into the deep end of the pool."