Reunion in Death

*** CHAPTER 16 ***

Eve smelled coffee and baked goods the minute the elevator doors opened into her office. Both were being consumed with apparent enthusiasm by her team. Roarke seemed to be content with coffee.

«You've got a nine o'clock conference via 'link,» she reminded him.

«My admin's handling it.» He handed her his cup of coffee. «Updated schedule's on your desk. Have a muffin.» He chose one, bursting with blueberries, from a tray.

«Whatever your schedule, you should get to it. I have my own.»

«In which I have a vested interest. Push at me on this,» he added, lowering his voice, «and I'll push back. I doubt you're sufficiently recovered to be much of a challenge.»

«Don't make book on it. But if you want to waste your time sitting in on this briefing, I've got no problem with it.»

«That's lucky for both of us.» He strolled away to get himself another cup of coffee.

To stop herself from saying something nasty she might not be able to back up, she stuffed her mouth with the muffin, then sat on the edge of her desk. «I need to be brought up to speed on the guy who clocked me yesterday, and the airboard vid-kid.»

«I took those.» Feeney polished off a Danish then took out his memo book for reference. «Sidewalk sleeper's Emmett Farmer, licensed beggar. Trolls the sector around Central, hangs around intersections and does the windshield gag to pick up loose change. A lot of the uniforms know him, and reports are he's excitable but basically harmless.»

He glanced up at Eve, pursed his lips as he eyeballed her face. «Don't guess you'd agree with the harmless part under the circumstances. His statement is the blonde gave him five dollars and told him he was supposed to wait for your vehicle, do the windshield, and you'd give him another five. She told him he had to keep you by the vehicle or he wouldn't get paid. Farmer tends to be really insistent about being paid.»

«So she'd picked him specifically. Smear the windshield so my vehicle's blinded and I can't pursue that way. Pit me against Gibraltar so she buys enough time to get a good lead on me.»

Feeney nodded. «And if you get kicked around in the process, so much the better. Statement the airboard kid, Michael Yardley, gave you on-scene's what he's sticking to. Given his age, the fact he's never been in trouble, it holds. She claimed to be a vid producer, set the scene for him. Kid lapped it up. He's scared brainless he's going to go to jail for taking you down.»

«A lot of flaws in the plan.» Eve frowned as she drank her coffee. «Timing's off, just a little, either one of her stooges doesn't follow through, or doesn't follow through hard enough to immobilize me, she's the one eating pavement.»

And oh, she thought as she rolled her achy shoulder, what a glorious day that would have been.

«But she took the risk,» Eve continued. «That tells me the interview with Nadine got under her skin.»

«She wanted to hurt you.» Peabody could still see Farmer's slab of a hand flying out, striking, lifting Eve clear off her feet.

«Yeah, but more, she wanted to psych me out. Shake my confidence. It's personal.»

Idly she picked up the alabaster statue Phoebe had given her, turned it in her hand. «Everything's personal with Julianna. She set me up, and she did it fast. So, how did she know when I was leaving Central? She couldn't afford to keep the sleeper and the kid hanging around long. They get bored, she loses them. Couldn't afford to stand around Cop Central herself, or some uniform might make her.»

«Not that hard to find out your shift,» McNab put in.

«No, but how often do any of us come and go on shift schedule? I didn't yesterday. So, she was watching me. She's been watching me, so she can get a pattern. Getting patterns is one of her best things.»

She set the statue down again. «McNab, get me the buildings that face my office at Central. Get me a visual.»

«Do you think she's been staking you out?» Peabody asked as McNab hopped up to comply.

«She stakes out her victims, learns all she can about them. Their routines, their habits. Where they go, what they do. Who they are.» Eve glanced at Roarke. How much, she wondered, could Julianna Dunne find out about Roarke?

Only as much, she decided, as he allowed any of the public to know. And half of that was fiction.

«She'd see it as an advantage to keep my office under surveillance.» Eve turned to the screen as the grid of streets began to come up.

«Like a game?» Peabody asked.

«No, this isn't a game, not to her. First time around it was business. Now, it's war. And so far, she's taken all the important battles.» She picked up a laser pointer from her desk, ran its needle-point light over the screen. «These three buildings would give her the best access to my office window. We need a tenant list.»

She caught the look that passed between Feeney and Roarke, then shot Feeney one of her own as Roarke slipped into his own office.

«He'll get it faster.» Feeney lifted his coffee cup, but not quite in time to hide the grin.

She let it pass. «We'd be looking for a leased space, short-term. Month-by-month is probable. She wouldn't spend a lot of time there. She'd have surveillance equipment set up, feed it into another location where she could comfortably study and assess. But she was there yesterday, personally, because she'd decided to move on me.»

Eve saw herself, standing at her office window, looking out. She put herself back there, behind that narrow glass, and studied the buildings and windows across the street.

«This one gets my vote.» She ringed one of the buildings in light. «Or if there wasn't space available on one of these levels …» She ran a line through five stories. «This building. Those are her best angles. Hold on a minute.»

She walked into Roarke's office where he sat at his desk while his equipment hummed with efficiency. «I've got a priority location,» she told him. «I want you to list that one so I can run a probability.»

«I'm running probabilities, on all three. Though I think that's your location.»

She glanced at his screen where he had the same visual up, and the building she'd earmarked highlighted.

«Showoff.»

«Come sit on my lap and say that. You'd be looking for short-term leases, I imagine, and would want the run to move from the latest rentals back. How am I doing?»

«You bucking to make that expert consultant, civilian gig permanent?»

«Wouldn't that be fun?» He patted his knee, but she ignored him. «Ah, well, so much for fringe benefits. Your probabilities are coming up. I did these by line of sight. Easy enough to punch her data from your files into the mix and whittle this down considerably.»

«Just wait.» She scanned the list of names that he ordered on-screen. «Bam! Daily Enterprises. Justine Daily, proprietor. That's our girl.»

She wanted to move, fast and hard, but reined herself in. «We'll be sure first. Dump this data onto my unit, would you? Let's try to keep this investigation reasonably official.»

«Of course. Lieutenant? I'll be going with you on this bust. Wait,» he said as she opened her mouth. «However slim the chance you'll find her there, I'm going to be a part of it. She owes me.»

«You can't get whacked out every time I get banged up on the job.»

«Can't I?» The easy lilt had gone out of his voice, chilling it. «She's got a mind to come after us both, so I'm in this. I'll be there when you take her down. Whenever, wherever that might be.»

«Just remember who's taking her down.» She turned back into her office. «Feeney, we've got a Justine Daily in the primary building. Data's in my unit. Run a background on her, and her Daily Enterprises.»

«Likes sticking with her own initials.» He rose to take McNab's place at Eve's desk. «Those are the little foibles that screw bad guys to the wall.»

«I'm going to be the foible that screws her.» Eve went to her 'link and requested the search-and-seize warrant, and the manpower to enforce it.

In under an hour, she was moving down the corridor toward the offices of Daily Enterprises. The stairways were blocked, the elevators shut down. All exits were covered.

And she knew in her gut they wouldn't find Julianna Dunne.

Still, she would see it through, and motioned her team into place with hand signals. She drew her weapon, then flipped out her master and prepared to bypass the locks.

Pulled back.

«Wait. She'd have thought of this. She'd have counted on this.» She stared hard at the cheap door, the cheap locks, then crouched down for a closer study. «I need some microgoggles here. A boom scan.»

«You figure she booby-trapped the door?» Feeney pursed his lips, crouched down with her. «She never worked with explosives before.»

«You learn a lot of handy household hints in prison.»

Feeney nodded. «Yeah, that you do.»

«You see anything hinky?»

«Old locks. Feeble shit. Standard alarm from the looks of the panel. Want to call in the bomb sniffers?»

«Maybe. I'm trying to out-think her, but I don't want pieces of my team scattered all over this hallway.» She glanced up. Roarke was moving in behind her.

«Why don't you let me have a look?» He already was, hunkering down and dancing those nimble fingers over the panel, the frame of the door. He drew his PPC out of his pocket, programmed in a task code, then interfaced it to the panel by a hair-thin cable.

«It's hot,» he confirmed.

«Back. Pull back.» Eve gestured to her team as she yanked out her communicator. «Clear civilians off this floor, and the ones directly above and below.»

«That won't be necessary, Lieutenant, if you'll just give me a minute here.» Roarke already had the panel open by the time she turned back.

«Get the hell away from there.» She took two strides back to him, then stopped herself. She'd seen him defuse devices a great deal more destructive than a door blaster.

«There.» He spoke calmly to Feeney as he worked with tiny silver tools. «You see it?»

«Yep, I do now. Not my field, but I've seen a few homemades in my time.»

«Amateurish, but effective. She'd have done better to take more time, add in a couple of secondaries, or at least one failsafe. It's set to trip when the door's open. Very elementary. She'd have a bypass, of course, so she wouldn't ruin her manicure by blowing her fingers off.»

His hands were rock steady. He paused only once, to shake his hair back away from his face. When he did, Eve saw the cold gleam of concentration on it.

«Not particularly powerful this. Wouldn't have killed anyone who'd been five or six feet back. That'll do it.» He replaced his tools, stood again.

Eve didn't ask if he was sure. He was always sure. She gave the all-clear signal to her team, then indulged herself by leaving her master in her pocket. And kicking in the door.

She swept the door with her weapon, then gestured for Feeney to take the adjoining washroom.

There were a couple of ratty chairs, a dented desk. And a scent in the air that was both female and expensive. She'd left the communications center and a small, exotic arrangement of fresh flowers.

Eve stepped to the window, looked out, across, and into her own office. «She'd have needed equipment. You can't see enough from here with the naked eye. Good equipment she wasn't willing to leave behind. Start knocking on doors,» she ordered without turning around. «Talk to the other tenants, see who knows what. Find the building manager, get him up here. All building security discs. Feeney run the 'link and data center.»

«Sir.» Peabody cleared her throat. «This was in the flowers.»

She handed Eve a small envelope marked eve dallas. Inside was a handwritten card and a data disc. The card read:

With best wishes for your speedy recovery,

Julianna

«Bitch,» Eve grumbled, turning the disc over in her hand. «Feeney, disperse the men. We won't be finding her here today. Peabody, call in the sweepers.»

She turned the disc over again, then plugged it into the desk unit. «Run data,» she ordered.

Julianna's face swam on-screen a blue-eyed blonde now, and the closest to her own coloring and style than any of her looks since she'd started her latest murder spree.

«Good morning, Lieutenant.» She spoke in the lazy, somewhat breathy Texas drawl Eve remembered. «I'm assuming that salutation is correct. I doubt you'd have managed to get this far last night but I have such confidence in your abilities that I'm certain you'll be playing this before afternoon. Feeling better, I hope. And as you're playing this, you detected and defused my little welcome gift. It was really just an afterthought.»

She angled her head and continued to smile. But it was the eyes Eve studied. Eyes that were like ice over a deep, empty pit.

«I have to tell you how nice it's been to see you again. I thought about you a great deal during my … rehabilitation. I was so proud when I learned about your promotion to lieutenant. And Feeney's to captain, of course. But I never felt quite the same connection for him as I did for you. There was something there, wasn't there?»

She eased forward, face intent now. «Something deep and strange between us. A true bond. A recognition. If you believe in reincarnation, perhaps we were sisters in some other life. Or lovers. Do you ever wonder about such things? Probably not,» she said with a little wave of the hand. «You're such a practical-minded woman. It's appealing, in its way. Does your new husband find that part of you appealing? Oh, belated best wishes, by the way. It's been nearly a year, hasn't it, since the joyful event. Well… time passes.

«It passes slowly in a cage.» The drawl hardened like prairie dust under a baking sky. «I owe you for those years, Eve. You'd understand about payback. You never really understood what I did, why I did it, never respected that. But you understand about payback.»

«Yeah,» Eve said aloud, unconsciously brushing her fingers over her bruised cheek. «Damn right I do.»

«I've watched you, sitting in your office hard at work, standing at the window looking out as if the weight and worry of the entire city is on your shoulders. Pacing that horrible little space of yours. You'd think a lieutenant would be afforded a better work area. You drink far too much coffee, by the way.

«I had equipment set up in here. You know that now. I thought it best not to leave that behind. My own practical streak. I have several hours of you on disc. You dress better these days. Careless still, but with a style you once lacked. Roarke's influence, I'm sure. It's good to be rich, isn't it? So much better than … not being. Has it corrupted you, I wonder, in some secret part of yourself? Come on, Eve honey.» She laughed lightly. «You can tell me. After all, who'd understand better?»

Talking too much, Eve thought. Been lonely, hasn't it, Julianna, with nobody to talk to who you feel is on the same level?

«I'm sure he's excellent in bed, if you find such things important.» She settled back, made a movement that had Eve imagining her crossing her legs.

Getting cozy. A little girl-talk.

«I've always felt fucking's overrated and so demeaning to both parties. What is it, really, but a woman allowing herself to be plundered, penetrated. Invaded. And a man plunging away as if his life depended on it. And as we know, with the men I fuck, their lives do depend on it. For a short time, anyway. Killing is so much more exciting than sex. You've killed, so you know. Deep down, you know. I wish we had the time and opportunity to talk, really talk, but I don't think that's going to happen. You want to stop me, to put me back in a cage. Remember what you said to me? Remember what you said? You'd have left me there if it had been up to you. Left me to spend the rest of my life caged like an animal. Then you turned your back on me like I was nothing. You didn't get your way, did you? But I got mine. I always get mine. You'd better remember that. You'd better respect that. »

Her voice had risen, her breath had quickened. Now she drew in a long stream of air, fluffed a hand over her hair as if composing herself. «I thought of you when I killed Pettibone and Mouton. I've been thinking of you for a very, very long time. How does that make you feel, to know they died because of you? Does that upset you, Eve? Does that make you angry?»

Julianna tipped her head back and laughed. «Payback's a bitch, and I haven't even started. I want what I've always wanted. To do what pleases me and to live very, very well. You took eight years, seven months, and eight days from me, Eve. I'm going to balance the scales. I can and I will, tossing the bodies of silly old men at your feet. So you know how simple it is for me, here's a tip. The Mile High Hotel, Denver. Suite 4020. The man's name is Spencer Campbell. I'll see you again soon. Very soon.»

«Yeah, you will,» Eve retorted as the screen went blank. «Peabody, get me that hotel on the 'link. I want head of security.»

The suite had been reserved in the name of Juliet Darcy, who had checked in the night before, securing the room for two nights with cash.

«The victim is Spencer Campbell, of Campbell Investment Consultants. The top man.» In the conference room at Central, Eve brought his image on-screen. «Age sixty-one, divorced, currently separated from wife two. He had an appointment scheduled for a personal consult with Juliet Darcy in her hotel suite. Breakfast meeting, eight hundred Denver time. About the same time I was kicking in the door here in New York. She's very fucking cocky these days. Campbell had been dead less than thirty minutes when security broke in. Julianna didn't bother to check out, just grabbed her overnight bag, set the do not disturb light on the door, and waltzed out. Autopsy and lab reports will confirm that Campbell's coffee was poisoned.»

«She goes all the way to Denver to off this guy.» Feeney dragged a hand through his wiry hair. «What's the point?»

«To prove she can. He was nothing to her. Just an easily sacrificed pawn to show me she can keep racking them up, when and where she wants, while I scramble around trying to find her. She breaks pattern again, because she wants to show me she's unpredictable.»

And, Eve thought, she doesn't want me to sniff out that she's looking at Roarke. For victims she'd stick with what she'd called silly old men. Killing them as decoys to disguise her ultimate goal.

They died because of you.

Eve blocked out the voice, and the guilt. Most of the guilt.

«She had potential targets selected before she went down, and may have continued to select and research from inside.»

«Did some electronic surveillance and research on Pettibone and Mouton from the prison office units,» Feeney confirmed. «We dug out bits and pieces of it. Nothing on this guy or any others at this point. Nothing on personal business financials, real estate, travel inquiries.»

«She used her personal for that.» Supervisor Miller, she thought in disgust, would have a lot to answer for before she was done with him. «Most likely diddled on the office machines early on, but made sure she had a personal for data she couldn't risk having traced.»

She took a pass around the room. «She's got grease, and plenty of it. My personal grease expert states that it's most likely she stashes it in various numbered accounts in various locations. We've got no line to tug to the money. Loopy claims Julianna told her she had her own place here in New York. She's stuck to that during Interview with the Chicago cops, but can't or won't expand. My guess is she doesn't know the location. Julianna might have passed the time chatting with her, but wouldn't give her anything traceable.»

«We're running private residences through EDD.» Feeney dug out a handful of nuts. «But with no time frame of purchase or lease, no area, no name or names to feed in, we're mostly jerking off there.»

«She'll spend money on herself.» Eve thought how polished and fit Julianna had looked in person, in the vid. «But she'd be smart enough to use cash. We run high-end stores, salons, restaurants. But as this is goddamn New York, endless shopping nirvana, we're jammed there, too.»

She tried to clear her head. «We keep at that. Put some drones on the 'links to shops. Maybe we can hook that red skin suit she had on. We've got her height and weight from Dockport, translate that to size, push purchases of the suit in that size.»

«She may have purchased that in Chicago, or anywhere,» Peabody pointed out. «And red skin suits are legion.»

«Yeah, so it's a long shot. We keep blasting away, every detail, we're going to hit something eventually. Meanwhile, we'll check all the public and private transpos in and out of Denver. We'll find what she used, and by the time we do, she's in the wind again. But we have data.»

«She's taking more chances,» Peabody said. «Telling you about Campbell when she couldn't be sure of the timing. If she'd left it alone, it would've been hours before he was found.»

«Risk makes winning the war more satisfying. This is a grudge match, and it's no good unless the enemy bleeds. And she wants to shake me. She doesn't want to kill me, but she wants me to think that I'm a target. She wants me to live, with loss. She wants Roarke. And that's our advantage. She doesn't know I'm on that.»

In midtown, Roarke ended one meeting and prepared for another. The morning's activities had put him a bit behind schedule. He'd have to put in extra time that evening, but would find a way to do it from home. He intended to stay as close to Eve as their respective work schedules allowed.

«Caro.» He tagged his admin on his interoffice 'link. «Shift the Realto meeting to holographic, out of my home office. Seven-thirty, and we'll move the lunch with Finn and Bowler to the executive dining room here. See that Lieutenant Dallas is copied on these changes.»

«Yes, sir. There's a Dr. Mira here to see you. You have ten minutes before your next meeting if you'd like me to bring her back. Or I'll schedule an appointment.»

«No.» He frowned, shuffled time in his head. «I'll see her now. If the Brinkstone reps arrive before I'm done, have them wait.»

He clicked off, then rose to pace his office. Mira wasn't the type to drop in unannounced, nor to pay social calls in the middle of a work day. Which meant she had business she felt was important enough to add a burden to both their schedules.

Absently, he crossed to the AutoChef and programmed in the tea she preferred.

When Caro knocked, he opened the door himself, extended a hand to Mira. «It's nice to see you.»

«I'm sure it's not.» She squeezed his hand. «But thank you for making the time. I'm overwhelmed just from the walk from reception. Your glass breezeway is amazing.»

«Gives competitors a chance to think about a long plunge before they reach here. Thank you, Caro.» He drew Mira in as his admin closed the door quietly behind them.

«And this …» Mira glanced around the office with its lush furnishings, stunning art, sleek equipment. «It certainly suits you. It manages to be both sumptuous and efficient all at once. I know you're busy.»

«Not too busy for you. It's tea, isn't it? Jasmine, most usually?»

«Yes.» It didn't surprise her that he'd remember such a minor detail. He had a mind like a computer. She took the seat he offered on a deeply cushioned sofa, waited for him to sit beside her. «I don't want to waste your time with small talk.»

«I appreciate it. Did Eve send you?»

«No, but she knows I intended to talk with you. I haven't seen her yet today, though I intend to do that as well. I know she was injured last evening.»

«She's resilient. Not quite as much as she likes to think, but she springs back somehow or other. Bruised damn near top to toe. All but cracked her head open like an egg. Would have, if it wasn't made of rock.»

«Which is one of the reasons you love her.»

«True enough.»

«And still you worry. Being married to a cop is an enormous commitment of restraint. She understands that, which is one of the reasons she tried to resist, or deny what she felt for you. One of them.» Mira reached out to cover his hand. «And another reason was her father. She told me you've been to Dallas.»

«Good. It's good she can talk with you about it.»

«And you can't.» She could feel the tension gather in him like a bruise. «Roarke, you've spoken frankly with me before. There aren't many who know the circumstances of this. There aren't many you can speak with.»

«What do you want me to say? It isn't my nightmare, but hers.»

«Of course it's yours. You love her.»

«Yes, I love her, and I'll stand with her. I'll do whatever can be done which is bloody little. I know talking to you from time to time can settle her mind. I'm grateful for that.»

«She's concerned for you.»

«She's no need to be.» He could feel the anger rising into his throat, bit back on it. Felt it bleed. «Nor have you. But it was kind of you to take the time to come by.»

She saw the cool dismissal on his face, a thin veil of it over the heat. She set her tea aside, smoothed the skirt of her pale blue suit. «All right. I'm sorry to have interrupted your day. I won't keep you any longer.»

«Bloody hell!» He lunged to his feet. «What's the point in spilling my guts out here? What good will it do her?»

Mira sat where she was, picked up her tea again. «It might do you some.»

«How?» He spun back around, frustrated fury alive on his face. «It changes nothing. Do you want to hear how I stood there and watched her suffer, watched her remember it, and feel it as if it were happening still? She was helpless and terrified and lost, and watching her, so am I. I go after what comes for me, and I make a habit of going after it first. And this …»

«This can't be gone after, not the way you mean.» How difficult for him, she thought, this man who looks like, thinks like, a warrior to stand without a lance to protect what he values most.

«It can't be changed,» she added, «it can't be stopped because it's already done. So it preys on you, just as it does on her.»

«Sometimes she screams in the night.» He sighed. «Sometimes she only whimpers, like a small animal might when it's afraid, or in pain. And sometimes she sleeps easy. I can't go inside her dreams and kill him for her.»

Professional objectivity couldn't stand against the tidal wave of his emotion, or the flood of her own. Tears gathered in her throat as she spoke. «No, you can't, but you're there when she wakes. Do you understand what a difference you've made for her? How you've given her the courage to face her past? And the compassion to accept yours.»

«I know, realistically, we are what we are because of what we were, and what we've made of that. I believe in fate, in destiny, and also in giving fate a good twist of the arm when it's not going your way.» When she smiled at that, he felt his shoulders relax. «I know what's done is done, but it doesn't stop me from wishing I could go back and use these on him.» He balled his fists, then spread his fingers out again.

«I'd say that was a very healthy attitude.»

«Would you?»

«I hope so as I often feel the same myself. I love her, too.»

He looked at her, that serene face, those eyes so filled with quiet understanding. «Yes, I see you do.»

«And you.»

He blinked once, slowly, as if translating some foreign tongue. With a soft laugh, she got to her feet.

«The pair of you always seem so baffled and suspicious when offered free affection. You're a good man, Roarke,» she said and kissed his cheek.

«Not really.»

«Yes, really. I hope you'll be comfortable coming to me, speaking with me if you ever feel the need. I'll let you get back to your meetings. I'm already late for one of my own.»

He walked her to the door. «Does anyone manage to resist you?»

She winked. «Not for long.»