Big Jack (3 page)

“Well, since the book was published, I’ve gotten some communications. Mostly through my publisher. People who want to meet me, or who want me to help them get their book published, or want me to write their story. Some of them are pretty strange, I guess. Not threatening, though. And there’s some who want to tell me their theory about the diamonds.”

“What diamonds?”

“From the book. My book’s about a major diamond heist in the early part of the century. Here in New York. My grandparents were involved. They didn’t steal anything,” she said quickly. “My grandfather was the insurance investigator who took the case, and my grandmother—it’s complicated. But a quarter of the diamonds were never recovered.”

“Is that so.”

“Pretty frosty, really. Some of the people who’ve contacted me are just playing detective. It’s one of the reasons for the book’s success. Millions of dollars in diamonds—where are they? It’s been more than half a century, and as far as anyone knows, they’ve never surfaced.”

“You publish under your own name?”

“Yes. See, the diamonds are how my grandparents met. It’s part of Gannon family history. That’s the heart of the book, really. The diamonds are the punch, but the love story is the heart.”

Heart or no heart, Eve thought cynically, a few million in diamonds was a hell of a punch. And a hell of a motive.

“Okay. Have you or Andrea broken off any relationships recently?”

“Andrea didn’t have relationships—per se. She just liked men.” Her white skin turned flaming red. “That didn’t sound right. I mean she dated a lot. She liked to go out, she enjoyed going out with men. She didn’t have a serious monogamous relationship.”

“Any of the men she liked to go out with want something more serious?”

“She never mentioned it. And she would have. She’d have told me if some guy got pushy. She generally went out with men who wanted what she wanted. A good time, no strings.”

“How about you?”

“I’m not seeing anyone right now. Between the writing and the tour, juggling in the day-to-day, I haven’t had the time or inclination. I broke a relationship off about a month ago, but there weren’t any hard feelings.”

“His name?”

“But he’d never—Chad would
never
hurt anyone. He’s a little bit of an asshole—well, potentially a major asshole—but he’s not . . . ”

“It’s just routine. It helps to eliminate. Chad?”

“Oh Jesus. Chad Dix. He lives on East Seventy-first.”

“Does he have your codes and access to the house?”

“No. I mean, he did but I changed them after we broke up. I’m not stupid—and my grandfather was a cop before he went private. He’d have skinned me if I hadn’t taken basic security precautions.”

“He’d have been right to. Who else had the new codes?”

Samantha scrubbed her hands over her hair until it stood up in short, flaming spikes. “The only one who had them besides me is Andrea, and my cleaning service. They’re bonded. That’s Maid In New York. Oh, and my parents. They live in Maryland. I give them all my codes. Just in case.”

Her eyes widened. “The security cam. I have a security cam on the front door.”

“Yes. It’s been shut down, and your disks are missing.”

“Oh.” Her color was coming back, a kind of healthy-girl roses and cream. “That sounds very professional. Why would they be so professional, then trash the house?”

“That’s a good question. I’m going to need to talk to you again at some point, but for now, is there someone you’d like to call?”

“I just don’t think I could talk to anyone. I’m talked out. My parents are on vacation. They’re sailing the Med.” She bit her lip as if chewing on a thought. “I don’t want them to know about this. They’ve been planning this trip for nearly a year and only left a week ago. They’d head straight back.”

“Up to you.”

“My brother’s off-planet on business.” She tapped her fingers against her teeth as she thought it through. “He’ll be gone a few more days at least, and my sister’s in Europe. She’ll be hooking up with my parents in about ten days, so I can just keep them all out of this for now. Yeah, I can keep them out of it. I’ll have to contact my grandparents, but that can wait until tomorrow.”

Eve had been thinking more of Samantha contacting someone to stay with her, someone to lean on. But it seemed the woman’s initial self-estimate was on the mark. She wasn’t a weak woman.

“Do I have to stay here?” Samantha asked her. “As much as I hate the idea, I think I want to go to a hotel for the night—for a while, actually. I don’t want to stay here alone. I don’t want to be here tonight.”

“I’ll arrange for you to be taken anywhere you want to go. I’ll need to know how to reach you.”

“Okay.” She closed her eyes a moment, drew in a breath as Eve got to her feet. “Lieutenant, she’s dead, Andrea’s dead because she was here. She’s dead, isn’t she, because she was here while I was away.”

“She’s dead because someone killed her. Whoever did is the only one responsible for what happened. You’re not. She’s not. It’s my job to find whoever’s responsible.”

“You’re good at your job, aren’t you?”

“Yeah. I am. I’m going to have Officer Ricky take you to a hotel. If you think of anything else, you can contact me through Cop Central. Oh, these diamonds you wrote about. When were they stolen?”

“Two thousand and three. March 2003. Appraised at over twenty-eight million at that time. About three-quarters of them were recovered and returned.”

“That leaves a lot of loose rocks. Thanks for your cooperation, Ms. Gannon. I’m sorry about your friend.”

She stepped out, working various theories in her mind. One of the sweepers tapped her shoulder as she passed.

“Hey, Lieutenant? The fish? They didn’t make it.”

“Shit.” Eve jammed her hands in her pockets and headed out.

 

 

 

She was closer to home than to Central, and it was late enough to justify avoiding the trip downtown. Her equipment at home was superior to anything the cops could offer—outside of the lauded Electronic Detective Division.

The fact was, she had access to equipment superior than the Pentagon’s, in all likelihood. One of her marital side bennies, she thought. Marry one of the world’s wealthiest and most powerful men—one who loved his e-toys—and you got to play with them whenever you liked.

More to the point, Roarke would talk her into letting him help her use that equipment. Since Peabody wasn’t around to do any drone work, Eve was planning to let him, without too much of an argument.

She liked the diamond angle, and wanted to dig up some data on that. Who better to assist in gathering data regarding a heist than a former thief? Roarke’s murky past could be a definite plus on that end.

Marriage, for all its scary pockets and weird corners, was turning out to be a pretty good deal on the whole.

It would do him good to play research assistant. Take his mind off the revelations that had reared up out of that murky past and sucker punched him. When a grown man discovered his mother wasn’t the stone bitch who’d slapped him around through childhood then deserted him, but a young woman who’d loved him, who’d been murdered while he was still a baby—and by his own father—it sent him reeling. Even a man as firmly balanced as Roarke.

So having him help her would help him.

It would make up, a little, for having her plans for the evening ditched. She’d had something a little more personal, and a lot more energetic, in mind. Summerset, her personal bane and Roarke’s majordomo, was spending ten days at a recuperation spa off-planet—at Roarke’s insistence. His holiday after breaking his leg hadn’t put all the roses back in his cheeks. Like those sunken, pasty cheeks even
had
roses. But he was gone, that was the bottom line. Every minute counted. She and Roarke would be alone in the house, and there’d been no mention, that she remembered, of social or business engagements.

She’d hoped to spend the evening screwing her husband’s brains out, then letting him return the favor.

Still, working together had its points.

She drove through the big iron gates that guarded the world that Roarke built.

It was spectacular, with a roll of lawn as green as the grass she’d seen in Ireland, with huge leafy trees and lovely flowering shrubs. A sanctuary of elegance and peace in the heart of the city they’d both adopted as their own. The house itself was part fortress, part castle, and somehow had come to epitomize home to her. It rose and spread, jutted and spiked with its stones dignified against the deepening sky, and its countless windows flaming from the setting sun.

As she’d come to understand him, the desperation of his childhood and his single-minded determination never to go back, she’d come to understand, even appreciate, Roarke’s need to create a home base so sumptuous—so uniquely his own.

She’d needed her badge, and the home base of the law for exactly the same reasons.

She left her ugly police-issue vehicle in front of the dignified entrance, jogged up the stairs through the filthy summer heat and into the glorious cool of the foyer.

She was already itching to get to work, to put her field notes into some sort of order, to do her first runs, but she turned to the house scanner.

“Where is Roarke?”

 

Welcome home, darling Eve.

 

As usual the recorded voice using that particular endearment had slivers of embarrassment pricking at her spine.

“Yeah, yeah. Answer the question.”

“He’s right behind you.”

“Jesus!” She whirled, biting back another curse as she saw Roarke leaning casually in the archway to the parlor. “Why don’t you just pull a blaster and fire away?”

“That wasn’t the welcome home I’d planned. You’ve blood on your pants.”

She glanced down. “It’s not mine.” Rubbing at it absently, she studied him.

It wasn’t just his greeting that spiked her heart rate. That could happen, did happen, just by looking at him. It wasn’t the face. Or not just the face, with its blinding blue eyes, with that incredible mouth curved now in an easy smile, or the miracle of planes and angles that combined into a stunning specimen of male beauty framed by a mane of silky black hair. It wasn’t just that long, rangy build, one she knew was hard with muscle under the business elegance of the dark suit he wore.

It was all she knew of him, all she had yet to discover, that combined and blew love through her like a storm.

It was senseless and impossible. And the most true and genuine thing she knew.

“How did you plan to welcome me home?”

He held out a hand, linking his fingers with hers when she crossed the marble floor to take it. Then he leaned in, leaned down, watching her as he brushed his lips over hers, watching her still as he deepened the kiss.

“Something like that,” he murmured, with Ireland drifting through his voice. “To start.”

“Good start. What’s next?”

He laughed. “I thought a glass of wine in the parlor.”

“All by ourselves, you and me, drinking wine in the parlor.”

The glee in her voice had him lifting a brow. “Yes, I’m sure Summerset’s enjoying his holiday. How sweet of you to ask.”

“Blah blah.” She strolled into the parlor, dropped down on one of the antique sofas and deliberately planted her boots on a priceless coffee table. “See what I’m doing? Think he just felt a sharp pain in his ass?”

“That’s very childish, Lieutenant.”

“What’s your point?”

He had to laugh, and poured wine from a bottle he’d already opened. “Well then.” He gave her a glass, sat and propped his feet on the table as well. “How was your day?”

“Uh-uh, you first.”

“You want to hear about my various meetings, and the progress of plans for the acquisition of the Eton Group, the rehab of the residential complex in Frankfurt and the restructuring of the nanotech division in Chicago?”

“Okay, enough about you.” She lifted her arm to make room when Galahad, their enormous cat, landed on the cushion beside her with a thump.

“I thought so.” Roarke toyed with Eve’s hair as she stroked the cat. “How is our new detective?”

“She’s fine. She’s loaded down with paperwork yet. Clearing up old business so she can start on the new. I wanted to give her a few days as a desk jockey before she takes her shiny new detective’s badge out on the street.”

He glanced down at the bloodstain on Eve’s pants. “But you’ve caught a case.”

“Mmm.” She sipped the wine, let it smooth out the edges of the day. “I handled the on-scene solo.”

“Having a little trouble adjusting to having a partner rather than an aide, Lieutenant?”

“No. Maybe. I don’t know.” She gave an irritable shrug. “I couldn’t just cut her loose, could I?”

He flicked a finger down the shallow dent in her chin. “You didn’t want to cut her loose.”

“Why should I? We work well together. We’ve got a rhythm. I might as well keep her around. She’s a good cop. Anyway, I didn’t tag her for this because she had this whole big night planned, and she was already gone. You get enough plans fucked in this job without me pulling her in and botching her big celebration.”

He gave her a kiss on the cheek. “Very sweet of you.”

“It was not.” Her shoulders wanted to hunch. “It was easier than hearing her bitch and moan about losing reservations and wasting some fancy dress or something. I’ll fill her in tomorrow anyway.”

“Why don’t you fill me in tonight?”

“Planned on it.” She slid her gaze in his direction, smirked. “I think you could be useful.”

“And we know I love being useful.” His fingers skimmed up her thigh.

She set down her glass, then lifted the tonnage of Galahad, who’d sprawled his girth over her lap. “Come along with me then, pal. I got a use for you.”