Thankless in Death (14 page)

“Okay.” She walked to the table where plates already sat under silver warmers, got a cup of her own and came back to pour coffee from the pot on the low table in front of Roarke.

“Why aren’t you over there making the deal?”

“Because EuroCom is the one under the gun, and I had them come to me here.”

“Your turf, their hand out.”

“Close enough. Much of it’s been negotiated through ’link and holo-conferences, and my liaison there. As it happens, I just signed off about ten minutes ago while having my coffee—or what had been my coffee. The announcement should hit shortly.”

Eve wagged her thumb at the screen. “Blondie thinks it’s a big deal.”

“Blondie’s quite right.” He held up his cup so Eve could fill it. “After the transition, which on my terms will be swift and clean and final, there’ll be some restructuring.”

“Heads rolling.”

“Asses booted more like. And some retooling. Within the next quarter we’ll generate about a half million new jobs.”

He changed lives, she thought, sitting there in his slick suit, coolly drinking coffee. With an eye toward profit, sure, and expansion absolutely, but his go-ahead changed the life of someone sitting in a pub or café across the Atlantic worrying about paying the rent.

The screen flashed like a sunspot before the banner hyping BREAKING NEWS! swept over it. Even with the sound low, Eve heard the excitement in the blonde’s voice as she announced the EuroCom/Roarke Industries deal was confirmed.

“Well then.” Roarke got to his feet, gave Eve a light good-morning kiss. “Let’s have breakfast. They do a fine full Irish here.”

Just like that, she thought.

She sat with him, uncovered the plate to reveal the abundance of food. Jesus, what starving Irishman had first come up with the concept of the full deal?

“How much of it goes to Ireland?” she asked him. “The EuroCom thing.”

He shot her an amused smile. “Want the figures, do you? Should I have a report sent over?”

She picked up her fork. “Definitely not. I’m just curious if any of this plays in with your family.”

“Most of my people are farmers, as you know, but there are some who don’t work the land, and they may find their way onto the payroll. You don’t look as rested as I’d hoped.”

“Weird dream. Dream,” she repeated so he understood there’d been no nightmare. “The latest vic and I had this conversation in her apartment. She’s pretty bummed out about being dead.”

“It’s difficult to fault her for that.”

“Yeah. She … she doesn’t want her parents to see her looking the way Reinhold left her. In the dream, I mean. Projecting,” Eve said as she began to eat. “And I shouldn’t be.”

“Why not? You feel for her.”

“It’s not my job to feel for her. It’s my job to find and stop Reinhold.”

“You do both, and that’s what makes you you.”

“My subconscious is putting words in her mouth.”

Watching her, Roarke cut into meaty, Irish-style bacon. “Your subconscious, driven by your innate observation skills and your unique sensitivity. I wouldn’t discount it.”

“None of that tells me where he is now, or what he’s planning next.”

“You’ve generated considerable data in a short amount of time.”

She had—they had, she knew, but … “Time’s the problem. He’s like … like a kid with a brand-new toy and nobody to tell him to put it down. Or an addict who’s just discovered a new drug, and thinks there’s an unlimited supply. He’s not going to pace himself.”

“I’d agree with that, exactly. And I’d also say that’s his mistake, or one of them. It’ll be the rush, the gorging on it, that trips him.”

“Gorging, yeah. He’s spent his whole life accumulating and hoarding grudges, and now he’s figured out what to do with them. Stabbing, bludgeoning, strangulation.” She scooped up eggs as she spoke, fueling up. “It’s all so much fun he can’t decide what to try next. And there’s so many ways to kill. And better, so many ways to cause pain and torment first.”

Fighting frustration, she stabbed at potatoes. “He’s got a target already, and I can’t know who.”

“If you can’t narrow down his next victim, you might narrow down his potential space. As you’ve said, he has to land somewhere.”

“Yeah, he needs a place of his own—and money to get it, to furnish it in the fashion he deserves.”

A narcissist, Mira said. So he’d believe he deserved the best.

“Maybe he’ll blow a big chunk of what he’s got on his headquarters. From the time line, he didn’t have much time to scout out places yesterday. He may have done some via ’link or Web, but he’d need to
see
, to walk around in the space, to imagine himself there. Maybe that’s today’s agenda. But he has to change his looks first, has to alter them enough. He has to know we have his face, and he’s not stupid. That’s something else Nuccio said.”

“You had quite a conversation.”

“Well, we both felt pretty crappy.”

“Won’t most of his potential victims have holiday plans?” At her blank look, he shook his head. “Thanksgiving, Eve. Two days from now.”

“Shit. That’s right. Family groups, people leaving town or coming in. That’s something to look at.” It struck her. “Yours. Yours are coming in tomorrow.”

“They are, yes, and will perfectly understand if you’re busy on an investigation and don’t have much time for them.”

But the house would be full of people, noise, conversations, questions. She liked them, really she did. But …

“Life happens, darling,” he reminded her. “However ill the timing.”

“I guess it does. Maybe luck will turn our way and away from him, and I’ll have him in a cage before the turkey’s stuffed.”

“Let’s hope for that.”

“It’s going to take more than hope.” She pushed away from the table. “I’d better start working on turning that luck because the little bastard’s somewhere right now, thinking about his next kill.”

H
e felt
great
! A good night’s sleep, a long, hot shower, and a hearty breakfast prepared and served by Asshole, his new droid. He ordered the droid to clean up, to ignore any ’link communications or anyone who might come to the door during the process, then shut down.

The idea of anyone trying to contact Farnsworth made him consider she might have appointments. Armed with her passcodes, he checked both her calendar and her e-mail history on her bedroom ’link.

The fat, ugly blob had a salon appointment at two. As if anyone would look at her twice anyway. He found the salon contact, send a quick text canceling.

And she was booked to have Thanksgiving dinner with some losers named Shell and Myra, who were probably as ugly and worthless as she was. He considered that, decided to leave it alone for now. If he still needed her and the house on Thursday, he’d make up some excuse at the last minute.

It amazed him to see just how many dates and appointments ran through her calendar. Lunches, dinners, more salons, groomers for the little rat-dog, currently half dead in the hallway.

Maybe he should finish him off, but then again …

Helping himself to a post-breakfast cappuccino, Reinhold walked upstairs.

He wrinkled his nose at the smell as he walked into the office
and found Ms. Farnsworth slumped in the chair, urine dripping down her legs, blood staining the tape around her wrists and ankles.

“Jesus, you
pissed
yourself. You stink.” He held his nose with one hand, waved the other in front of his face, his eyes gleaming bright as her head rolled up.

“Now I have to get Asshole—I renamed the droid—I have to get Asshole in here to clean this up. Oh, by the way, I canceled your salon appointment. Saved you money, because no amount of it could make you less ugly, fat, and disgusting.”

He walked back out, called downstairs. “Hey, Asshole! Ms. Farnsworth pissed all over the place, get up here and clean this mess up.”

Stepping back in he did what he thought of as a manly pose, one arm cocked up, the other across his body. “So, what do you think of the new look? Frosty, huh?”

He’d spent considerable time with the hair product, lightening his color by degrees, using the tools supplied to streak it through so he now sported a sun-washed, streaky blond. He’d trimmed it, though he thought he needed some pro help there. But it lay slick over his head. He’d mated that with layers of bronzing product. He thought he looked as though he’d spent a month at some fancy tropical resort.

The eyes had been trickier, and he’d go pro there next time, too. But now they were electric blue. Using some of the hair he’d trimmed off, he’d added a soul patch to the center of his chin. and though it had hurt like fucking hell, he’d used the kit he’d bought to pierce his left ear, which now sported a small gold hoop.

“I look successful, right? Young, rocking, rich? I’ve got an appointment
with a realtor to look at a couple apartments today. Gotta look good.”

He barely glanced over when the droid came in with cleaning tools.

“He’s mine now.” He gave the formerly named Richard, dignified in his dark uniform and silver-templed hair, a pat on the back. “Just like everything else that was yours. So don’t even think about giving him orders. Oh that’s right. Still can’t talk. I’ll fix that as soon as Asshole’s done here. Be right back.”

When he strolled out, Ms. Farnsworth rolled her eyes toward the droid. She screamed:
Help me!
but all that sounded was a weak moan. It went about its business efficiently, as she’d programmed its domestic duties herself. She tried rocking and bucking in the chair, but her limbs were numb, the only sensation was the burning where she’d rubbed her flesh raw in her attempts to get free.

She’d loosened the tape a little in places, or maybe that was just desperate hope. But she thought if she could regain a little strength, she could loosen it more. If she just had a few sips of water for her burning throat, anything, anything to ease the pain.

Even the humiliation barely touched her now, though when she’d no longer been able to control her bladder, she’d wept.

It didn’t matter, didn’t matter, didn’t matter. Just pee. Just a normal human function. If she peed, she lived. And as long as she lived she had a chance to survive and pay the bastard back.

She’d kill him if she could. She’d never harmed another human being in her life, but she would cheerfully end his by any means possible.

She tried to speak again, slowly, clearly. If she could only get the droid to understand a few words. But the garbled mumbles meant
nothing, and he continued his task, then gathered up the cleaning supplies.

Reinhold walked in as the droid walked out, as if he’d been waiting.

“You still stink, but it’s a little better, and sometimes we have to work under unpleasant conditions.”

He’d brought the nippers with him, waved them at her as he crossed to her. “Scream, lose a finger.”

He ripped the tape away. She let out a gasp as much in shock as grabbing air.

“You—” Her voice croaked out, barely audible. “You have the money.”

“I sure do, but we’re going to hide it, really, really good. You know how, and you’re going to show me. And I need a few other things.”

“I need water. Please.”

“You’ll just piss yourself again.”

“I’m dehydrated.”

Bitch and complain, he thought, his jaw tightening. Just like his mother. Just like Bald Lori.

“Too fucking bad. Now, what we’re going to do this morning is make me a nice new ID, and get the data up. I’ve worked out everything I want. Your job is to walk me through making it happen. Got that?”

“No.”

He pressed the nippers against her cheek. “Need me to repeat it?”

“Go ahead, use them.” She coughed as the words scored her throat like hot needles. “I’m done helping you.”

“Helping me? Is that what you think you’re doing?
Helping
me?” He swung back, bashed the back of his fist in her face. “You’re following
orders, bitch. I don’t need your fucking help. You do what you’re told.”

She made herself look him in the eye, even as she felt blood slide out of her nose. And shook her head.

He turned around, walked out.

She gathered herself, digging for breath, digging for strength. She’d scream, however much it hurt, however much he hurt her for it. She’d scream and someone would hear.

Please, God.

Before she could, he came back, holding her little dog. Snuffy whimpered when he saw her, and she could see from his eyes he was hurt. And still he wagged his tail.

Fear came back, raw as the skin on her wrists. “Don’t hurt him. He’s just a little dog.”

“Too late for that. He’s already hurt. Probably needs the vet. Maybe I’ll take him to a vet if you do what you’re told.”

“You won’t.”

He shrugged. “Maybe yes, maybe no. But if you don’t.” He turned the nippers, pushed Snuffy’s paw out. “I’ll just start snipping away.”

Tears stung her eyes, ached in her burning throat. “Don’t. Please, Jerry.”

“Wouldn’t take many snips with a rat-dog like this.” To motivate her—and because it was fun—he pinched the dog, hard, so it yelped. “But I’d start small. This paw, that paw, maybe his tongue so he can’t yap.”

“I’ll do it. Don’t hurt him, and I’ll do it.”

Smiling, he closed the snips a little more. “Maybe I’ll snip just one paw because you said no first.”

“Please. Please.” The tears rolled now. She couldn’t stop them. He was a sweet old dog, he was
family
. He was defenseless. “I’m sorry. I’ll make the ID for you, and upload all the data you want. I’ll make it perfect. I’ll hide the money. I’ll bury it so nobody can trace it.”

“Damn right you will. And one mistake? Just one? He loses a paw, you lose a finger.”

He dumped the dog in her lap where Snuffy whimpered at her.

Reinhold sat at the desk, cracked his knuckles. “Let’s get started!”

EVE WENT STRAIGHT TO THE MORGUE. NO
need that she could see to pull Peabody in, not for this. The investigation was better served with her partner checking out the shops they knew Reinhold had visited, and at her desk, tracking down pawnbrokers who might be slow—or reluctant—to report the purchase of items sold by a murderer.

She traveled the white tunnel as she had the day before, and thought, yeah, it was past time for luck to turn.

She found Morris with Lori Nuccio. As he often did, he’d chosen music to suit either his mood or the victim. This was light, kind of breezy, with a high, clear female voice singing hopefully about what lay behind the bend in the road.

He looked up from his work when Eve entered, ordered the music to low volume. “I’d hoped not to see you again quite so soon.”

“Same here,” she said as she joined him.

“Young. Very pretty.”

“Hard to tell now, after he messed her up.”

Morris shook his head. “No, not really. Her bone structure, coloring. There’s an ugliness to what he did here, but she shows through it.”

“She’d like to know that.” Eve lifted her shoulders, let them fall at Morris’s arched brows. “You know how it is. They get in your head, and you feel like you know.”

“Yes.”

“She mattered to him, in his own twisted way. He hated her for that. He didn’t rape her.”

“No,” Morris confirmed. “There was no sexual activity, consensual or forced.”

“He might go there with another, if he gets the chance. He orgasmed during the kill, so now he has a sexual connection—a bonus round.”

“This one’s difficult for you.”

“I don’t know why this one, especially, except we kept missing her. It’s like everything was weighted on his side. We’re trying to contact her, her neighbor’s looking out for her, and still, he gets in, does this, walks away.”

Studying the body as he did, Eve hooked her thumbs in her front pockets. “She was living cheap, you know? Padded crates, stringed beads for curtains in this little box apartment. But she kept it nice, kept herself nice, worked hard, had friends, had family. He took it all because she wouldn’t let him sponge off her anymore, do nothing anymore. Her parents are wrecked.”

She paused, pinched the bridge of her nose as if to release tension. “They told me her older sister and her spouse, their baby were all in from Ohio for Thanksgiving. They were having a big family dinner,
and this one here was getting some fancy dish from the restaurant where she works.

“I don’t know why they told me all that. Sometimes they tell you things because they don’t have anything else.”

“Death’s cruel. Crueler yet at times when family traditionally gathers.”

“Yeah. And about that. They’re going to want to come in, see her. I don’t know how much you can do, considering, but they shouldn’t see her like this.”

“Don’t worry.” He touched a hand briefly to Eve’s arm. “We’ll take care of her, and them.”

“Okay. Good. So.” She had to put it away, out of her head, and do her job. “The way it pieces together, he had keys, or he’d made copies. He went in when the neighbor went out. We have him sitting in a café across the street where he had a good view of the building. It was the vic’s regular day off, and from statements she usually went out, ran errands, shopped, hooked up with a friend. When he saw the chance he went in. He’d been shopping. We’ve got him coming and going on his hotel security cams. He bought the tape, the cord. And I’m thinking another baseball bat.”

“I’d agree with that. The head injury’s consistent with a bat. It would have knocked her unconscious, but it wasn’t a killing blow.”

“Or meant to be,” Eve added.

“He used good quality cord. Strong and pliable. As you see from the ligature marks, he tied it as tightly as possible, much more than necessary to restrain her. She struggled, but it didn’t help her. The tape, also good quality. She left teeth marks and blood inside. Some of that would be from the lip, opened from a blow. He struck her with his fist.”

Morris balled his own. “In the face, in the abdomen, in the right
side. There’s slight bruising around her nose, and a deeper bruising on the nipple. From pinching.”

“I missed the nose.”

“Very slight. You’d need the microgoggles. This slight cut here, thin, sharp blade with a serrated edge. I can’t tell you what sort. It’s just a nick.”

“A warning. Just showing what he could do.”

“Most likely, yes.” As if to comfort, he laid a hand on Lori’s shoulder. “But the lab may be able to identify the type of knife from the shorn hair.”

“I’ve got Harpo on the hair.”

“You couldn’t do better. He cut it before killing her.”

“Yeah, part of the torture.”

Shifting, Morris turned his attention, and Eve’s, to the throat wounds. “Considerable force was used in the strangulation. He put his back into that. You can see how deeply the cord cut into her. From the angles, and the crime scene record, he would’ve straddled her, looped it around her neck, twisting the lines in front.” He pulled his fisted hands apart sharply to demonstrate. “Leaving this pattern of bruising here where the lines of cord crossed.”

She could see it perfectly, the positioning, the movements, the joy and the terror. “It’s what got him off. That connection. Being on top of her, cutting off her air, feeling her body convulse under him. Being able to see her face while she fought for air, while she lost the fight.

“Then he raided her kitchen for snack food.”

“He thinks he’s outwitting you.”

She brought herself back to the moment. “What?”

“He thinks he’s smarter than you, than the police. He has no idea how well you already know him, and how deeply you can go.”

“I know him,” she agreed. “But if I don’t find him today, I’ll be back in here tomorrow, and we’ll have this conversation over another body. He’s got a long list, Morris, and he’s not going to wait to feel what he felt with her again. This is the biggest rush of his life, and now he’s a man who loves his work.”

R
ather than wait for the report, Eve swung by the lab next. She didn’t need to consult with Dickhead—Berenski, the chief lab tech—so wound her way through the maze of glass-walled rooms to Harpo’s domain.

Harpo had changed her hair. She’d gone for the short, straight bowl, almost identical to what Peabody used to wear. But Harpo had opted for shimmering ice blue.

For reasons Eve would never be able to articulate or comprehend, it worked.

Harpo had tossed a white lab coat over a purple skin-suit, added a trio of dangling silver earrings to one ear and a series of tiny purple studs to run up the other.

She wore clear knee boots, which Eve assumed was a newly breaking style that showed off toes polished the same color as her hair and a foot tattoo—temp or permanent, who knew—in the shape of a long-legged bird.

Whatever her wardrobe choices, Eve had reason to know when it came to hair and fiber, Harpo ranked genius.

And right now, Harpo sat at her work counter, a sample of auburn hair in her scope, and its microscopic counterpart enhanced on her screen.

“Is that my vic’s?”

“Yo, Dallas.”

“Yo.”

“Recently color treated. I can give you the brand, the color name, and the products used to style if you need them.”

“Never hurts, but I don’t think it’s relevant. Dr. Mira thinks the killer took some.”

“Yeah, so you said on the command—request,” she amended with a toothy grin. “And props to Mira. Good eye. He took a hank five and a quarter inches in length, one-point-one inches in width. I can give you the exact number of hairs in the trophy, but it’s probably not relevant either.”

Maybe it was Harpo’s sass, or her smarts, but Eve felt her own lips curve. “No, but impressive.”

“I so totally am. It’s really nice hair. Healthy, clean. She didn’t overproduct or heat. Natural color’s brown, but she made a nice choice with this new hue.”

“She didn’t get to wear it very long.”

“Too bad, because it’s uptown. He didn’t snip, by the way. Hacked, sliced, sawed. Not scissors, not a razor.”

She did something that had the screen image revolving, and different colors popping out. “Sharp, jagged-edged blade. I’m still analyzing and reconstructing, but it’s looking like a one-sided blade about three and a half to three and three-quarters in length, about an inch across, an eighth of an inch deep. I think I can nail it down before I’m finished.”

“Just under legal limit for a pocket sticker.”

“It’s looking,” Harpo said with a head bob. “I’m not going to be able to tell you the brand. I can probably give you a list of possibles. Now if he’d stuck it in flesh, Morris could probably get close, or Birdman would punch it. He’s the master of sharps around here.”

“Good to know.”

“Sweepers sent in some fibers from the body, but you said no rush on them.”

“We know what he was wearing, and where he bought it. I needed to know if he took the trophy.”

“Definitely. My money-back guarantee on it.”

“And I could use the list of knives when you have it.”

“No prob. I’ll have Birdman take a look. He may be able to cut it down some.”

“Speaking of birds.” Eve glanced down at the one visible through the boot.

“You like? I crush on flamingos, but I’m not sure this is it. It’s a temp ’cause you gotta be sure.”

Eve couldn’t argue with that. “Thanks, Harpo. Good, quick work.”

“Our house specialty.”

She went back to it as Eve walked out.

T
wo steps into her bullpen, she stopped dead, pinned to the spot by Sanchez’s tie. She looked away from it, fearing, like staring at the sun, she might go blind.

It was the virulent color of an orange repeatedly exposed to excess radiation. On it floated searing yellow dots—unless they just floated in front of her eyes due to the five seconds she’d exposed her corneas.

“For God’s sake, Sanchez. What is that thing?”

“Retribution.” He glanced behind him, checked Jenkinson’s currently empty desk. “Don’t worry, boss, I’m not going to wear it out in the field. I mean, come on. I could blind people.”

“We’re people, too,” Baxter said behind the safety of his sunshades.

With a shake of her head she started toward Peabody’s desk, then changed her mind, signaled her partner to follow her. Maybe you didn’t have to actually look at it to go blind or start bleeding from the ears.

Her office was safer.

Peabody clumped after her. “The crib is a crap place to sleep. I feel like I rolled around on sticks and rocks all night.”

“I told McNab you weren’t supposed to have sex.”

“Ha-ha. As if you can even think about it in there. Plus he may be bony, but he’s got more padding than the cots up there. Anyway, I’m going to start calling the stores we ID’d, but in the meantime, I got a couple hits on items from the Reinhold apartment.”

“What and where?”

“I could think more clearly if I had real coffee.”

“For Christ’s sake get some then. What and where?”

“The crystal bowl, a shop just around the corner from the Grandline. The thing with that—oh
mama
!” she added after the first big gulp of caffeine laced with milk and sugar. “The thing with that is he didn’t think it was worth all that much. Pawnbroker had a good eye, played him. That’s my take from the way the guy danced around things when I pushed him on it.”

“Try for coherency or I’m taking that coffee and pouring what’s left over your head.”

“Right. I started making contacts, and when I hit this place the guy got nervous. I got the ‘didn’t see the alert until a few minutes ago’ bullshit, but he came clean mostly, I think, because he heard enough media reports on the murders to get edgy.”

“He hit that shop in the morning, not long after he hit the banks. About ten.”

“Yeah, right about ten, with the bowl and the diamond star earrings, the bangles in one of the suitcases. He grabbed the first offer of nine hundred on the bowl, and six hundred fifty on the earrings, three hundred and a quarter on the gold bangles. Turns out the bowl is worth about ten times what Reinhold took for it.”

“Small satisfaction on that. We need that evidence picked up.”

“I sent out Uniform Carmichael,” Peabody confirmed. “And right after I did, another shop contacted me. I don’t know, maybe the word went out or it was just good timing. Reinhold sold the rest of the jewelry there, got another twenty-two hundred for that, then another fifteen for the menorah, and twenty-six hundred for the silver—the flatware.”

“Adding to his pile.”

“Yeah, not a lot, but decent when you add it up. The second shop is in the same area, about five blocks from the hotel.”

“He kept it close in, easy for walking. But he went out of his comfort zone for the big-ticket items. The watches and the pearls.”

“I tagged Cardininni,” Peabody added. “She got the list from the neighbor. So she’s hooking up with Carmichael, and they’ll hit both shops to pick up the evidence.”

“That works,” Eve answered absently, her mind still on the route, the choices of liquidation sites. “He sold the bowl for a fraction of the worth, but he probably got more than he’d figured on.”

To confirm, Peabody pulled out her PPC, brought up her notes. “Kevin Quint—pawnbroker—stated: ‘I could see he didn’t know what he had, so I lowballed it to get a sense, you know? And he snapped up the first offer like some rube from Kansas or somewhere. I figured him to negotiate some, or whine how it was his dead old granny’s, but he just said,
Pay me
, like that. So I did.’”

“Almost a thousand for a stupid bowl—that’s what he thought. His lucky day. But when he gets more than he figured for all the rest, it’s a pattern even he can see so he picks a classier place for the pieces he knows have real value.”

“Trading up,” Peabody suggested.

“Exactly. Three generations in business, estate sales a specialty—and the sob story about his dead parents. It dawned on his stupid ass his parents had better stuff than he’d thought. It was all crap to him, just something to sell. He went to a higher-class place because he wanted to make sure he got all he could get.”