Seduction in Death (11 page)

"Keep it zipped, McNab," Eve warned. "Peabody, Roarke is generating some data. You'll assist in his office." Which should, she hoped, keep the peace for a while. She glanced at her wrist unit, thought of Mira. "I've got a meeting."

CHAPTER NINE

She set up in the library because it was quiet and in another section of the house. Mostly, unless it related to a case, she liked to remain as oblivious as possible to emotional vibrations. But there'd been so many of them winging around in her office, she'd been tempted to duck and cover.

Here, the air was smooth and placid. She settled down at one of the desks, input the fresh data into the file.

"Computer, factoring new data, run probability scan on subject Carlo as alias for suspect."

Working... probability subject Carlo as alias for suspect is ninety-six-point-two percent

"Yeah, that's what I think. Second run. Probability subject Carlo manufactures illegals he subsequently sells."

Working... insufficient data for scan. Request further input to complete.

"That's where you're wrong." She pushed away from the desk to pace on the faded roses on the antique rug. "He makes it, he bottles it, he sells it, he uses it. Control. It's all about control. Sixty thousand a year from one client for what, three ounces of that shit? Troll the 'net, hook a couple dozen rich marks, and you're rolling. But it's not about the money."

She stalked to one of the rows of tall, arched windows, flipped the drape, and stared out over the vast blooming estate. Even for Roarke, who'd been desperately poor, achingly hungry, it wasn't about the money so much as it was about the game of compiling it, having it, using it to make more of it.

And wielding the power of it.

But this was about neither greed nor need.

"Twenty k an ounce, and you slip a quarter of that into the first victim, after she's alone with you, helpless and naked in her apartment. After you've already poured more than two ounces of Whore into her. Computer, street value, illegal Whore."

Working... hormonibital-six, commonly known as Whore, street value sixty-five-thousand USD per fluid ounce. Known street use of this substance is negligible. Derivative, Exotica, is common. Street value Exotica, fifty USD per fluid ounce. Do you require listing of other common derivatives?

"Negative. Derivatives aren't good enough for this guy. No clones, no substitutes, no weak sisters. Date cost him about a hundred and fifty thousand. You could buy ten of the best LCs in New York for that and have a hell of a party. But it's not about money, and it's not about sex. They're only factors in the game."

"I wonder why you think you need me," Mira said from the doorway.

Eve turned. "Thinking out loud."

"So I heard."

"I appreciate you coming out here," Eve began. "I know you're busy."

"And so are you. I always love coming into this room." Mira glanced around at the walls of books that dominated the two-level room. "Civilized luxury," she commented. "You've hurt your face."

"Oh." Eve rubbed her knuckles along her jaw. "It's nothing."

Mira's face was, Eve always thought, perfect. Serene and lovely, framed by a smooth sweep of sable hair. She wore one of her quiet and elegant suits that looked like it had been formed out of cool, fresh limes. The long gold chain around her neck was as thick as Eve's pinky and enhanced with a single cream-colored pearl.

She smelled of apricots and her skin was baby smooth as she brushed her lips lightly over Eve's jaw.

"Habit," she said, and her blue eyes smiled easily at the line that formed between Eve's. "Kissing hurts to make them better. Shall we sit?"

"Yeah. Sure." She never quite knew how to handle Mira's maternal attitude toward her. Mothers were a mystery with too many of the pieces missing to attempt to form a picture. "You'll want tea."

"I'd love some."

Because she knew Mira's habits, she programmed for a cup of the fragrant herbal brew Mira favored. And because she was in her own space, Eve programmed the second cup for coffee.

"How are you, Eve?"

"I'm okay."

"Still not getting enough sleep," Mira commented when Eve brought her tea.

"I get by."

"On caffeine and nerves. How is Roarke?"

"He's -- " She started to pass it off. But this was Mira. "What happened with Mick Connelly's still weighing on him some. He's dealing with it, but it's, I don't know.... It's knocked him off stride some."

"Grief levels us. We go on, we do what's necessary, but there's a shadow on the heart. Knowing you're there for him lightens the shadow."

"He's horned in on the investigation, and I haven't given him as hard a time about it as I probably would have otherwise."

"You're a good team, in a number of areas." Mira sampled the tea, approved it. "I imagine he has some concerns about you standing as primary in this type of investigation."

"Sexual homicides. I've done them before, I'll do them again. I know how to handle it."

"I agree. And from your reports, from the thinking aloud I overheard, you've already formed your own profile." Mira slipped a disc out of her bag. "And now you have mine."

Eve turned the disc in her hand. "One profile?"

Mira sat back, watching Eve as she sipped her tea. "Two. There are two, whether individuals or personalities I can't tell you with absolute certainty. While multiple personality syndrome is rare, except in fiction, it does exist."

"I don't think this is MPS. I read up on it last night," she explained when Mira looked surprised. "The same basic method, the same basic motivation, the same staging. But two different styles, two different target types. He used a condom or spermicide, sealed his hands with the second victim, but left DNA and latents with the first. If it was MPS there'd be more distinction. One personality to hunt, another to kill. One to hunt and kill, the other to function normally. This is two guys, two, working together and taking turns at bat."

"I'm inclined to agree, but I can't rule out MPS." She crossed her legs, settling in comfortably to the talk of murder and madness. "The first murder appears to be accidental, or consciously unplanned. There is the possibility that the thrill and fear of the first triggered the more deliberate and more violent tone of the second. 'Turns at bat' is an accurate analogy. He, or they, are game players. There's a need here to dominate women, to debase them, but to do so with what is perceived as style and charm. Romance and seduction. The sexual act is wholly selfish, but would be rationalized as mutually satisfying as with the drug the victims would be eager and aggressive."

"More punch because as it happens she's looking at him as a sexual creature, a desire. Because, at the core of it, he's the focus."

"Precisely," Mira agreed. "It's not rape in the traditional sense, which uses force, violence, or intimidation. He doesn't look for fear, but for surrender. He's smart, patient. He spends time getting to know them -- their fantasies, their hopes, their weaknesses. Then plays on them and fashions himself into those fantasies. Pink roses. Not red for passion, not white for purity. Pink for romance."

"We're dealing with two very specific, very technical skills. Computer technology and chemistry. I have new data and have run a probability on it. It's very likely that a third alias is in use, for the purpose of selling sexual illegals. High-end illegals. One of these guys knows his drugs. How to get them, more, in my opinion, how to create them. Maybe he risks selling them because it's how he makes his living. But I think it's more. I think he feeds on risk."

"Agreed." Mira inclined her head. "He likes to take chances. Calculated ones."

"The computer technology is ace. When Roarke's impressed, you can be damn sure the skill's earned it. Is MPS going to give one guy two highly developed skills in different areas?"

"Again, not impossible." Noting the impatience that crossed Eve's face, Mira gestured. "You want a yes or no, and I can't oblige you. I could give you case studies, Eve, but they wouldn't hold up against your instincts. We'll say two, for the sake of argument. Two individuals. One is fanciful, lives in his head a great deal. His female ideal is sharp and sexy and sophisticated. He wants to enthrall her as much as he wants to dominate and conquer her. He's a man who can and does become caught up in the moment."

"He sent roses to Bankhead at work," Eve pointed out. "Grace Lutz received no roses."

"The second is more calculating, more deliberate, and potentially more violent. He doesn't delude himself to the same extent as the first that this is romance. He knows it's rape. Accepts that. He wants youth and innocence because he wants to possess then destroy them."

"The second would be the dominant partner."

"Yes, almost certainly. But they do have a symbiotic relationship. They need each other; not only for the details and the skills, but for the reinforcement of ego. Male to male approval, as when Arena Ball players slap each other on the ass, or catch each other in headlocks after a score."

"Teamwork. I pass, you kick, and we make the goal."

"Yes. This is a great game to them." Mira set her tea aside, toyed absently with the pearl on the end of her chain. "And they need the competition. They are defective and brilliant minds with young, spoiled boys' egos. Manipulators who didn't learn to be that way overnight. They come from money and privilege, are used to demanding or taking what they want as they want it, and with impunity. They deserve it."

"They'd have played games before," Eve put in. "Nothing to this level. They've worked up to this."

"Oh yes. One mind or two, they've known each other a very long time and shared a great deal. There's a lack of maturity that leads me to believe they may very well be in the same age bracket as their victims. Early twenties. Mid-twenties at best. They don't simply enjoy the finer things. They must have them."

"Outward appearances," Eve added. "The snazzy clothes, the status of the wine labels, the exclusive venues for the dates."

"Mmm. Status and exclusivity are vital. And what's more, I think, what they're accustomed to. To deny themselves or be denied is intolerable. Under the sheen of romance is a fear and a hatred for women. Look for a mother figure who was either dominant and abusive or weak and abused. Neglectful or overly protective. A man, particularly in his youth, most usually forms opinions and images of women based on his opinion and image of the woman who raised him."

She thought of Roarke and of herself. Motherless child. "What if he doesn't know her?"

"Then he forms them another way. But a man who seeks to exploit and hurt and abuse women will certainly have some female figure in his life who these represent to him."

"If I stop one, do I stop both?"

"If you stop one, the other will self-destruct. But he may very well kill on his way down."

She did what she did when there was too much data, too many threads, too many angles to all mix and match and tangle.

She went back to the victim.

When she used her master to uncode the police seal and unlock Bryna Bankhead's apartment, she blanked her mind of facts, and opened it to impressions.

The air was stuffy. There was no scent of candlewax or roses now, but the faint, dusty odor left behind by the sweepers.

No music. No softly glowing light.

She ordered the lights on full, checked that the privacy screen was in place, then wandered the room while an airbus rattled across the graying sky beyond the glass.

Strong colors, contemporary art, and still essentially female. The attractive nest of a single woman of very defined style and taste who enjoyed her life and her work.

A woman young enough that she had yet to form any serious or permanent sexual relationships. And confident enough to experiment. Adventurous enough to form a fanciful attachment with a faceless man over the 'net.

She'd lived alone, both tidily and fashionably, but was friendly with her neighbors.

Very eclectic music library, Eve mused as she flipped through the discs filed orderly in the entertainment unit. She came across Mavis: Live and Kicking, and despite the grim task felt the grin stretch over her face.

Her friend, Mavis Freestone, nearly always made her grin.

But it had been classical that night, Eve remembered. His choice or hers? His, she decided. It had all been his choice.

His fingerprints on the wine bottle. He'd brought it with him, opened it, poured. His fingerprints along with hers on one wineglass, only his on the second.

Handed her the wine. Perfect gentleman.

She walked into the bedroom. The sweepers had bagged the rose petals. The bed had been stripped down to bare mattress. Ignoring it, Eve opened the balcony doors, stepped out.

The wind lifted the choppy ends of her hair, streamed it back away from her face. It was starting to rain, soft, thin drops that fell soundlessly.

Her stomach pitched but she made herself step to the rail, made herself look down. A long drop, she thought. Long last step.

What had made him think of the balcony? There was no indication he'd been to the apartment before.

She replayed the security disc in her head and watched Bryna and her killer approach the front door of the building from the street. No, he hadn't looked up at the building, New Yorkers never did anyway. They'd been completely absorbed in each other.

Why had he thought of the balcony?

Why hadn't he just run in panic as he had in the cybercafe? Because part of his brain had stayed cool enough to click into survival mode both times. Had he thought the chemicals wouldn't show on a tox screen? Had he thought that far ahead?

Or just the first desperate step? He lives in the moment, Mira had said. And the moment had been shocking.

She's dead, and I'm in such trouble. What should I do ?

Self-termination ploy. Toss her away. Out of sight, out of mind. But why not clean up evidence and leave it as a potential self-overdose and buy more time to escape?

To cause confusion, she decided, as he had in the cafe. He could have uploaded a virus in the single unit, but programmed it to spread. And was knowledgeable enough about those who frequented such places to be sure a riot would result.

A woman splats on the sidewalk, witnesses are shocked, stunned, afraid. They might run to the body or away from it, but they don't rush into the building looking for a killer -- and the killer gains time to rush out and away.