Promises in Death

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

EVE LISTENED TO THE RECORDING STRAIGHT through, let it stew in her mind, then replayed it. She sat back, considered—and noticed vaguely that Roarke was having a fine time weaving through uptown traffic like a snake through high grass.

“You believe him? You believe he’s telling it straight about his feelings and loyalty—or lack thereof—to his father?”

Roarke cut east, went vertical over a double-parked delivery truck, then waited sedately at the light. “I do, yes. I should have tried out the video element, then you’d have a better sense. It was in his eyes. I recognize that in-the-bone hate, as I have it myself for my own.”

“For the same reason,” Eve pointed out. “Maybe he knows. Maybe he played that card because he knows you’d relate.”

“It’s not impossible, but it would be smart work on his part as I only found out myself last year. Do you think he’s lying about his mother?”

“When I read the file, my first thought was Ricker did her. First thoughts aren’t always the right ones. But my second thought, and my third thought came back to that. No, I don’t think he’s lying about Ricker tossing his mother out the window. I’m working on whether it matters to him.”

“You’re trying out the mirror again, to see if it reflects. He and I—both with violent fathers—murderous bastards both. If mine didn’t beat the hell out of me by sundown, well now, that was a lost day for him. His, or so he claims, embraced him one moment and cuffed him the next. If true, he had the worst deal to my thinking. At least I always expected the boot.”

“He had a mother—he indicates—loved him for the first years of his life.”

“And I didn’t. I think he got the short end there as well. I never knew what I missed. He says he grew up trying to please his father. I never gave a damn about pleasing mine, except to avoid that boot. I hated him from my first memory, so it becomes just the way of it. I’d think coming to that hate later in life boils it hotter, so to speak.

“You’ll want to run it by Mira, I expect,” Roarke added as he cruised up Madison. “But he wasn’t lying.”

“Okay.” If she couldn’t take Roarke’s word on that, Eve thought, then whose? “Okay, it fits. One visit from him to Omega, then nothing. No contact. And if you angle it toward his relationship with Coltraine, the timing . . .”

“You take Max down, and some of that splashes on Alex. He spins, restructures, reevaluates. And his lady realizes he’s not going to take this chance to step away, to become fully legitimate. He’s never going to do that.”

“She makes her decision, breaks it off. He makes his. He gives her up rather than give up the shady. He’s not a mirror of you,” Eve stated.

Roarke glanced at her. “And he got the short end of the deal again, didn’t he? For here I am with my wife, about to shop for lingerie. And he has no one.”

“He came here hoping to change that. That’s the trigger. That’s why Ricker pushed the button. To give his son the boot.”

“I’m sure you’re right. That’s at least part of it.”

“So he knows what his son’s up to,” Eve calculated. “Which means someone in Alex’s organization is feeding Ricker. Someone close enough to know Alex intended to contact Coltraine, what he hoped. And when. I vote for—”

“Rod Sandy.”

“I was voting,” Eve complained. “Damn it.”

“There now.” Roarke patted her hand, shifted to her. “Alex’s PA, his friend—longtime friend. Certainly a confidant. He’d know, as you’ve concluded, that Coltraine was never on the take. That she wouldn’t turn that way. He’d have known when they met here in New York how it went between them.”

“And the next day, she’s dead. Sandy didn’t call her. She went armed, and that still says one of her squad to me. But he might have been on the stairs. If he managed to doctor the security, or find another way out—knowing Alex was out of the place, then—”

“An interesting theory. Hold that thought. Or rather, put it on hold and think lingerie.”

“Why would I—oh.” She focused on her surroundings and noted they were parked. How the man managed to find a street-level spot in midtown on a Friday evening baffled her. “Where is this place?”

“Just around the corner, on Madison.” He joined her on the sidewalk, took her hand. “We should take advantage of luck—with the parking and the evening, and polish off the shopping with dinner. There’s a nice place just across the street. We can sit outside, share a bottle of wine and a meal.”

“I really ought to—”

“Work, yes.” He brought her hand up to kiss her knuckles.

He’d sit and eat with her in her office while she did just that, she thought. Because it was the natural order for her.

She stopped at the corner, looked at him. “Maybe if it was a date.”

“Sorry?”

She angled her head, lifted her eyebrows. And watched his smile spread. “Ah. Darling, would you go out to dinner with me tonight?”

“She won’t, I will,” a woman said as she passed them. “I’ll even buy.”

“Yeah, I’ll go out to dinner with you tonight.” She kept her hand in his as they walked half a block.

In the place called Secrets, the window displayed human replicas lounging in silky robes, posing in fanciful bits of lace and satin, flirting in tit-enhancing corsets. Rose petals littered the floor. Eve studied the window, concluded that under normal circumstances she’d have to have a stunner pressed to her head to get her in the door.

She supposed friendship often amounted to the same.

“Is this yours?”

“The shop? I have a small interest. Twenty percent,” he added when she frowned at him.

“Why only twenty?”

“The couple who run it—and own the rest—used to work for me. They came to me with their idea, their concept, proposal, and business plan. I liked it. So I gave them the backing. About five years ago. There’s a second one downtown now, in the Village. But it’s a bit funkier. This one’s more Louise, I think.”

“Then I could’ve just ordered something, had it delivered. Not have to actually . . . shop.”

“Be brave, little soldier,” he said and opened the door.

He’d have gotten an elbow in the ribs for the crack, but he knew her well enough to evade.

The place smelled . . . sexy, she decided. Like smoldering candles and subtle whiffs of perfume. Select items spread like exotic butterflies over displays where others floated like suspended jewels. A woman sat in a gilt and velvet chair perusing a selection of minuscule bras and panties as if they were indeed jewels.

Another stood across the room, carefully wrapping something red and silky in tissue for a customer.

“It doesn’t even show,” Eve muttered. “What’s the big deal when you’re just going to cover it up with clothes?”

“Let me count the ways.”

“See?” She bumped his hip with hers. “That’s just fuckwear, like I said. I’m not sure I want to—”

She broke off when the tissue lady spotted Roarke and shot out a megawatt smile. “So good to see you again,” she said to the customer. “Enjoy.”

“Oh, I will. He will.” With a laugh, the customer started out, swinging her tiny, shiny silver bag.

“What a wonderful surprise.” The owner, Eve concluded, crossed over in her skinny pink heels to hold out both hands for Roarke’s.

“Adrian. You look lovely.”

“Oh.” She fluffed at the soft sunny waves of her hair. “It’s been a busy day. If you could just give me another moment?”

“Take your time.” As she went over to Bra-and-Panties, Roarke turned to Eve. “See anything you like?”

“Is this where my underwear comes from? The stuff, I mean, that appears like magic in my drawers? And the robes that mysteriously find their way to my closet or the hook in the bathroom?”

“Sometimes.” He wandered a couple of steps away to study a short gown as pale as water, and nearly as transparent. “Adrian and Liv have exquisite taste. Being women, they have a sense of what makes a woman feel sexy or romantic, confident, desirable. And being women who are attracted to women, they know what catches the eye and makes a woman sexy and so on to another.”

“So it’s a lesbian fuckwear shop?” She rolled her eyes when Roarke aimed his at her. “Just saying. And yeah, okay, it’s classy stuff in a classy atmosphere. Sex but no skank.”

“That should be their slogan.”

She grinned. “That’s what you get for taking me out of my element.”

He caught her face in his hands, surprised her with a cheerful kiss. “I wouldn’t have you any other way.”

“You go for skank as well as the next guy.”

“Darling Eve, only when the skank is you.”

She laughed, poked him in the chest. “Keep it that way, pal.”

“Sorry to keep you waiting.” Adrian hurried over to them as Bra-and-Panties left the shop—with a bag. “I let Wendy, our clerk, go about an hour ago. Hot date. Of course, when you’re on your own, that’s when you get three and four customers at once. Lieutenant Dallas.”

She took Eve’s hand, shook it enthusiastically. “It’s so good to finally meet you. Roarke says you’re not one for shopping.”

“No. Really not. But you’ve got a really nice place here.”

“We love it, thanks. My partner and I.”

“How is Liv?” Roarke asked her.

“She’s great. She’s pregnant,” Adrian told Eve. “Thirty-two weeks.”

“Congratulations.”

“We’re over the moon about it. She was just so tired today, so I made her go home at noon. She’ll hate knowing she missed you. Both of you. What can I help you with? Something special?”

“For me? No. No. I’m good. More than.”

“That one.” Roarke gestured to the waterlike gown. “But we’ll get to that after. Eve?”

“Oh, yeah. Well. I have this thing, and the word is this kind of stuff would work for it.”

Adrian narrowed her eyes—serenely blue—in thought. “A thing, but not for you. You need a gift.”

“Yes.” Thank God. “Yes, I need a gift.”

“The occasion?”

“Like pulling teeth, isn’t it?” Roarke commented.

“Shut up.” Eve blew out a breath. “Okay. It’s a shower thing. Bridal shower thing.”

“Oh, yes, we’ll find just the thing. What’s your relationship with the bride? I mean,” she added, correctly assuming Eve was about to panic again. “Is she a good friend, a relative, an acquaintance?”

“A friend.”

“Eve’s standing up for her at the wedding,” Roarke put in.

“A very good friend then. Tell me about her. What she looks like to start.”

“She’s blonde.”

Roarke sighed. “Describe the subject, Lieutenant.”

“Right.” That she could do. “Caucasian female, early thirties, blonde and gray. About five-five, approximately one-fifteen. Slim build, even features.”

“All right then.” Pleased, Adrian gave a decisive nod. “Would you say she’s traditional, edgy, artistic, flamboyant—”

“Classic.”

“Excellent. Now then.” Adrian tapped a finger to her lips as she strolled around the shop. “What does she do?”

“She’s a doctor.”

“Is this her first marriage?”

“Yes.”

“Is she madly in love?”

“I guess. Sure. Why else?”

“She may have bought something for her wedding night already. But . . . as her matron of honor, that’s where I’d advise you to aim. Classic. Romantic.” Adrian opened the door of a tall, narrow cupboard. “Like this.”

It was a long sheer robe open over a long shimmering gown. Not quite gray, Eve mused, not really silver. But the color of . . . moonlight, she decided. “That could work.”

“Silk, with satin accents at the bodice, the straps. And the back—” Adrian turned it to display the low back with its wisps of crisscrossing satin. “I love the back.”

“Yeah, that could work,” Eve repeated.

“I wish you had a picture of her. It’s an important gift. It should be perfect.”

“You want a picture?” Puzzled, but game, Eve pulled out her PPC. She ordered a standard run on Louise Dimatto, then turned the screen around to Adrian to display the photo ID. “That’s Louise.”

“Oh, that’s mag! Isn’t she pretty? Can you bring it over here? If I can just scan it—the photo?”

“Well—”

“You’ll like this,” Roarke said, and took Eve’s arm to lead her through the open doorway. As Adrian stationed herself at a computer, Roarke took Eve’s PPC, made some adjustment, and printed out Louise’s photo. “Use this.”

“Perfect. We’re the only intimate apparel shop in the city to have this system. Which we would never have been able to afford without Roarke’s backing. I scan her photo, and input the data you gave me on her height and weight. Now let’s add the Latecht boudoir ensemble—Moonlight Elegance. And have a look.”

The computer sent out a beam over the small table, and the beam sent out a swirl of light dots. The light dots shifted, connected.

“A miniholo,” Eve murmured.

“In a sense, yes. It takes the data and reconstructs. And . . . There. What do you think?”

Eve bent down for an eye-level study as the hologram of Louise circled inches off the table in the moonlight gown. “I’ve gotta say, that is seriously iced. It’s really close. Maybe she doesn’t have quite that much—” Eve wiggled her fingers in front of her own breasts.

“More delicate there?” Adrian made a slight adjustment.

“Okay, yeah. Very frosty. If I had one of these in my department . . . I’m not sure what I’d do with it, but I’d find a use. We can do holos, but not right off a comp station. They use them more in the lab, for forensics. Reconstructing a DB.”

“DB?”

“Dead body.”

“Oh.”

“Sorry.” Eve shook her head, straightened. “It’s bull’s-eye. Thanks.”

“I love when it works! The computer says size six, which is also my opinion from the data, but—”

“That’s my information,” Roarke assured her.

“Excellent. Still, if for any reason it doesn’t work for her, she can bring it back. I’ll box and wrap it for you. But in the meantime. Mini Waterfall, wasn’t it? We have your data on here already, so this will just take a moment.”

Eve barely blinked before Louise disappeared and she saw her own form wearing the short, nearly transparent gown. “Holy shit.”

Adrian laughed. “It looks delicious on you. You’re never wrong,” she said to Roarke.

“We’ll have that as well.”

Eve swallowed, ordered herself to look away from herself and couldn’t. “Would you turn that off? It’s strangely disturbing.”

“Of course.” Still beaming at Eve, Adrian ordered the image off. “Is there anything else while you’re here? Do you have enough tanks?”

“Enough what?”

“Support tanks. You prefer them to a bra for work.”

Eve opened her mouth, but couldn’t quite choke out a word.

“She could probably use a half dozen,” Roarke said.

“I’ll take care of it.”

“I know you will.” Roarke leaned over to kiss Adrian’s cheek. “We’re going out to dinner. Why don’t you wrap all that up, put it on the account, and have it sent?”

“My pleasure. Sincerely, Lieutenant.”

“Thanks.”

“Our best to Liv,” Roarke added as he led Eve out.

“She knows what I’m wearing under my clothes. She knows what I look like naked. Yes, this is very disturbing.”

“It’s her business to know,” Roarke pointed out. “And however attractive she may find you, she’s devoted to Liv.”

“That’s not the point. That is not the point. And people wonder why I hate shopping. I want that wine. A really big glass of it.”

“I can take care of that.” He put an arm around her shoulders, kissed the side of her head as they walked across Madison.

It was good and it was right, Eve thought later, to remember her actual life now and again. Yo step away from the work, even just for a few hours, and enjoy sitting at a sidewalk table on a balmy may evening in the city, drinking good wine and eating good food with the man she loved.

She leaned across the table toward him. “Consider this the wine talking.”

He leaned toward her so their foreheads nearly touched. “All right.”

“You’re never wrong, just like she said.”

“About the nightgown?”

“That’s for you, and we both know it. About dinner. Here. Us. It’s a good thing.”

“It is a good thing.”

“I don’t remember to give you the good things enough.”

“Eve.” He closed his hand over hers on the table. “I think you remember exactly the right amount.”

“That’s the wine talking.”

“Maybe. Or my calculating getting you in—and out—of that nightgown tonight.”

“Slick operator.” She sat back, took a long breath as she watched people, watched traffic. Hurry, hurry by. “It’s a good city,” she said quietly. “It’s not pure and it’s not perfect. It has some nasty edges, some hard lines. But it’s a good city. We both chose it.”

“I’ve never asked you why, exactly. Why you did choose it.”

“Escape.” Her brows lifted as she frowned into her wine. “Maybe it is the wine for that to be the first thought. I guess it was a part of the motivation. It was big enough to swallow me if I needed it to. It’s fast, and I wanted fast, and the crowds. The work. I needed the work more than I needed to breathe back then.”

“That hasn’t changed overmuch.”

“Maybe not, but I’m breathing now.” She lifted her wine, sipped.

“So you are.”

“When I came here, I knew. I can’t explain why, but I knew. This is my place. Then there was Feeney. He saw something in me, and he lifted me out. He made me more than I ever thought I could be. This was my place, but if he’d transferred to Bumfuck, Idaho, I’d have gone with him.”

Had she ever thought of that before? Eve wondered. Ever realized or admitted that? She wasn’t sure.

“Why did you choose it?” she asked Roarke.

“I dreamed of New York when I was a boy. It seemed like a shiny gold ring, and I wanted my fingers around it. I wanted a lot of places, and did what I did to get them. But here’s where I wanted my base. That shiny gold ring. I didn’t want to be swallowed; I wanted to own. To own here.”

He looked around, as Eve had, to the crowds, the traffic, the rush. “Well, that’s saying something, isn’t it? Then I fell for it, like a man might fall for a fascinating and dangerous woman. And it became more than the owning—the proving to myself, and I suppose, a dead man—and became more about being.”

“And you brought Summerset here.”

“I did.”

She sipped her wine. “Fathers make a difference, and they don’t have to be blood to do it. We both found fathers, or they found us, however it worked. It made a difference.”

“And you’re thinking Alex Ricker lost his, the day he learned his father murdered his mother. And that made a difference.”

“You read me pretty well.”

“I do indeed. Let’s go home, get to work.”

She waited while he paid the check, then rose with him. “Thanks for dinner.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Roarke?” On the sidewalk she stopped, studied his face, then shrugged. “What the hell, it’s New York.” And threw her arms around him, took his mouth in a long, shimmering kiss. “For reading me well,” she said when she released him.

“I’m buying a bloody case of that wine.”

She laughed all the way to the car.

At home, she peeled off her jacket, tossed it on the sleep chair. In shirt-sleeves, she circled her murder board.

“You said you were going to work from home, too. To Caro,” Eve reminded him.

“So I am. But not before you tell me what you plan to do.”

“I’m thinking about asking you to contact your new best friend before getting started on your own stuff.”

“And why would I be doing that?”

It had to be the wine, she thought, because sometimes when he talked—just the way that hint of Celtic music wove through the words—she wanted to drool. “Um.” She shook it off. “To tell him it’s important that both he and his PA stay in New York. And that I’d like to talk with each of them tomorrow.”

“On a Saturday. When you’re hosting a party.”

“I can do it in the morning. Peabody and Nadine are invading with God knows what stuff. I don’t have to do any of that. They said.”

“Easy, darling. And I’d be telling my new best friend this because?”

“Show of good faith. I’m inclined to believe him, blah, blah. I want to discuss some details tomorrow morning that may help me with a current line of investigation.”

“And put the heat on Sandy. Could work. I’ll do that. I’ll be a couple hours, I expect, after. You do remember I’m off to Vegas tomorrow?”

“I . . .” Now she did. “Yeah, yeah, male debauchery.”

“I could probably juggle things and go with you in the morning, as Peabody’s occupied.”

“No. No. You’ve juggled enough.” She could take it alone, but he’d get pissy about that. And he’d have a point, she admitted. “I’ll get Baxter.”

“All right then.”

Armed with coffee, Eve sat down to write up her notes. She ordered a secondary run on Rod Sandy, including his financials. The man had been in the Ricker stew since college, Eve thought. A long time.

He’d know how to tuck money away here and there. Maybe money paid by the father to betray the son.

She scanned the EDD reports on the data mined from the ’links and comps confiscated from the Ricker penthouse. Nothing to Omega, of course. It wouldn’t be that easy. Nothing to Coltraine but the single contact from Alex asking her over for a drink. Nothing to Coltraine’s precinct or any member of her squad.

But a smart guy like Sandy? He wouldn’t leave that clear a trace—one, in fact, his pal Alex might stumble on and question.

Second pocket ’link somewhere. Stashed, hidden, already ditched?

She checked her wrist unit. Hours, she thought, still hours before Callendar docked, much less started digging. Eve told herself to consider it time to refine her theory, to check for wrong turns.

She poured more coffee, had barely begun when Roarke stepped back in. “You reach Alex?”

“Yes, that’s done and he’s expecting you about nine. Eve, Morris was at the gate. I had Summerset let him through.”

“Morris?”

“On foot.”

“Oh, shit.” She pushed away from her desk, and started downstairs. “What condition is he in? Is he—”

“I didn’t ask. I thought it best to get him here. Summerset sent a cart down to him.”

“A cart?”

“God, how long have you lived here? One of the autocarts. It’ll bring him straight here.”

“How am I supposed to know we have autocarts? Do I ever use an autocart? What’s your take?” she demanded of Summerset as she came down the last flight of stairs. “His condition?”

“Lost. Not geographically. Sober. In pain.”

Eve stood, dragging her hands through her hair. “Do some coffee thing,” she told Summerset. “Or . . . maybe we should let him get drunk. I don’t know. What should we do here? I don’t know what to do for him.”

“Then figure it out.” Summerset moved to the door. Then he paused, turned back to her. “A drunk only clouds the pain for a time, so it comes back sharper. Coffee’s best when you listen to him as that’s what he’ll need. Someone who cares who’ll listen to him.”

He opened the door. “Go on, go on. He’ll do better if you go to him.”

“Don’t kick at me,” she muttered, but went out.

The cart was nearly silent as he cruised sedately down the drive, made a graceful turn. It stopped at the base of the steps.

“I’m sorry.” Morris rubbed his hands over his face like a man coming out of sleep. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know why I came. I shouldn’t have.” He got off the cart as she went down the stairs. “I wasn’t thinking. I’m sorry.”

She held out a hand. “Come inside, Li.”

He shuddered, as if fighting a terrible pain, and only shook his head. She knew pain, and the fight against it, so moved to him, and took his weight, some of the grief when his arms came around her.

“There,” Summerset murmured. “She’s figured it out, hasn’t she?”

Roarke put a hand on Summerset’s shoulder. “Coffee would be good, I think. And something . . . I doubt he’s eaten.”

“I’ll see to it.”

“Come inside,” Eve repeated.

“I didn’t know where to go, what to do. I couldn’t go home after . . . Her brother took her. I went and I watched them . . . They loaded her on the transpo. In a box. She’s not there. Who knows that better? But I couldn’t stand it. I couldn’t go home. I don’t even know how I got here.”

“It doesn’t matter. Come on.” She kept an arm around him, walked him up the stairs where Roarke waited.