The In Death Collection 06-10 (73 page)

“The hell you did.” Eve engaged the computer, shot an image on-screen. The neat slice in
Spindler’s flesh dominated. “You’re telling me a street pony did that? Why the hell isn’t she raking in
seven figures a year at a health center? A john, maybe, but Spindler didn’t work the johns. How did he get to her? Why? Why
the hell did he take her kidneys?”

“I don’t know what’s in some lunatic killer’s mind, for Christ’s
sake.”

“That’s why I’m going to see to it you’re not working Homicide after
today.”

“Wait just a damn minute.” He was on his feet, eyeball to eyeball with her. Peabody gave
Feeney a quick glance to gauge his reaction and saw his thin, wicked grin. “You got no cause to go to my boss on this and
make trouble for me. I followed the book on this case.”

“Then your book’s missing a few pages.” Her voice was calm, deadly calm.
“You didn’t pursue organ replacement or disbursement centers. You didn’t do a run on surgeons, you never
attempted contact with black market sources on illegal organ transfer.”

“Why the hell would I?” His toes bumped hers as he leaned forward. “Some sicko
cut her open and took some souvenirs. Case closed. Who the hell gives a shit about some worn-out whore?”

“I do. And if you’re not out of my face in five seconds, I’ll write you
up.”

It took him three, with teeth grinding audibly, but he shifted away. “I did the job,” he said,
with the words bitten off sharp as darts. “You got no cause to poke into my caseload and give me grief.”

“You did a crappy job, Rosswell. And when one of your cases crosses one of mine, and I see just
how crappy a job you did, I’ve got plenty of cause. I’ve got a sidewalk
sleeper missing a heart.
My probability scan tells me the same one who opened him up did Spindler.”

“I heard you screwed up on that one.” He smiled now, panicked enough to challenge
her.

“Know Bowers, do you?” She smiled back, so fiercely he began to sweat again.

“She ain’t no fan of yours.”

“Now, that hurts, Rosswell. It really hurts my feelings. And when my feelings get hurt, I like to take it
out on somebody.” She leaned down. “Want it to be you?”

He licked his lips. If they’d been alone, he could have backed down easily. But there were two more
cops in the room. Two more mouths that could flap. “If you lay hands on me, I’ll file a complaint. Just like Bowers.
Being Whitney’s pet won’t save you from an IAB investigation then.”

Her hand curled into a fist. And, oh, she yearned to use it. But she only kept her eyes steady on his.
“Hear that, Feeney? Rosswell here’s going to tell teacher on me.”

“I can see you’re shaking in your boots over that, Dallas.” Cheerfully, Feeney moved
forward. “Let me punch this fat-assed fucker for you.”

“That’s real nice of you, Feeney, but let’s try to handle this like mature adults first.
Rosswell, you make me sick. Maybe you earned that badge years ago, but you don’t deserve it now. You don’t
deserve to work the shit and piss detail on body removal. And that’s just what it’s going to say in
my
report.
Meanwhile, you’re relieved as primary on the Spindler case. You’ll turn over all data and reports to my
aide.”

“I don’t do that unless I get it straight from my boss.” Saving face was paramount
now, but even his valiant attempt to sound disdainful fell far short. “I don’t work for you, Dallas, and your rank, your
rep, and all your husband’s money don’t mean squat to me.”

“So noted,” Eve said levelly. “Peabody, contact Captain Desevres at the one
six-two.”

“Yes, sir.”

She held her temper, but it cost her. The headache
turned up from simmer to boil,
and the knots in her stomach grew teeth. It helped a little to watch Rosswell sweat while she meticulously outlined the details, tore his
investigation into tattered shreds, and requested the transfer of the case, with all data and reports, to her.

Desevres asked for an hour to review the matter, but everyone knew that was for form’s sake.
Rosswell was out, and very likely soon to receive a much pithier dressing down from his own division head.

When she ended transmission, Eve gathered up files and discs. “You’re dismissed,
Detective.”

His face bone white with fury and frustration, he got to his feet. “Bowers had it right. I hope she
buries you.”

Eve glanced in his direction. “Detective Rosswell, you are dismissed. Peabody, contact Morris at the
ME’s office. He needs to be made aware of this connecting homicide. Feeney, can we light a fire under McNab? See what
he’s come up with?”

The embarrassment of being ignored washed color, ugly and red, back into Rosswell’s face. When
the door slammed behind him, Feeney flashed Eve a grin.

“You sure are making lots of new friends these days.”

“It’s my sparkling personality and wit. They can’t resist it. God, what an
ass.” But she sat, struggling to shrug off annoyance. “I’m going to check out the Canal Street Clinic. Spindler
used it for her health checks over the last twelve years. Maybe Snooks hit it a couple times. It’s a place to start. Peabody,
you’re with me.”

She took the elevator straight down to the garage level and had just stepped through the doors when Feeney
tagged her by communicator. “What have you got?”

“McNab hit on a chemi-head named Jasper Mott. Another heart theft, three months
back.”

“Three months? Who’s the primary? What are the leads?”

“It wasn’t NYPSD’s deal, Dallas. It was Chicago.”

“What?” The cold came shimmering back to her skin, the image of the long spider crack in
window glass.

“Chicago,” he repeated, eyes narrowing. “You okay?”

“Yeah, yeah.” But she stared down the long tube of the garage to where Peabody waited
patiently at their vehicle. “Can you get Peabody the name of the primary on it, the necessary data? I’ll have her contact
CPSD for the files and status.”

“Sure, no problem. Maybe you should eat something, kid. You look sick.”

“I’m fine. Tell McNab I said good work, and keep at it.”

“Trouble, sir?”

“No.” Eve crossed to her car, uncoded, and climbed in. “We got another one in
Chicago. Feeney’s going to send you the details. Put out a request to the primary and his division head for a copy of
appropriate data. Copy to the commander. Do it by the book, but do it fast.”

“Unlike some,” Peabody said primly, “I know all the pages. How come a jerk like
Rosswell makes detective?”

“Because life,” Eve said with feeling, “often sucks.”

Life definitely sucked for the patients at the Canal Street Clinic. The place was jammed with the suffering, the
hopeless, and the dying.

A woman with a battered face breast-fed an infant while a toddler sat at her feet and wailed. Someone
hacked wetly, monotonously. A half dozen street LCs sat glassy-eyed and bored, waiting for their regulation checkup to clear them for
the night’s work.

Eve waded her way through to the window where the nurse on duty manned a desk. “Enter your data
on the proper form,” she began, the edge of tedium flattening her voice. “Don’t forget your medical card
number, personal ID, and current address.”

For an answer, Eve took out her badge and held it up to the reinforced glass. “Who’s in
charge?”

The nurse’s eyes, gray and bored, flicked over the badge. “That would be Dr. Dimatto
today. She’s with a patient.”

“Is there an office back there, a private room?”

“If you want to call it that.” When Eve simply angled her head, the nurse, annoyed, released
the coded lock on the door.

With obvious reluctance, she shuffled in the lead down a short hallway. As they slipped through the door,
Peabody glanced over her shoulder. “I’ve never been in a place like this before.”

“Consider yourself lucky.” Eve had spent plenty of time in such places. A ward of the state
didn’t rate private health care or upscale clinics.

At the nurse’s gesture, she stepped into a box-sized room the doctors on rotation used for an
office. Two chairs, a desk barely bigger than a packing crate, and equipment, Eve mused, glancing at the computer system, even
worse than what she was reduced to using at Central.

The office didn’t boast a window, but someone had tried to brighten it up with a couple of art
posters and a struggling green vine in a chipped pot.

And there, on a wall shelf, tucked between a teetering stack of medical discs and a model of the human
body, was a small bouquet of paper flowers.

“Snooks,” Eve murmured. “He used this place.”

“Sir?”

“His flowers.” Eve picked them from the shelf. “He liked someone here enough to
give them, and someone cared enough to keep them. Peabody, we just got our connection.”

She was still holding the flowers when the door burst open. The woman who strode in was young, tiny, with
the white coat of her profession slung over a baggy sweater and faded jeans. Her hair was short and even more ragged that
Eve’s. Still, its honeycomb color set off the pretty rose-and-cream face.

Her eyes were the color of storms, and her voice was just as threatening.

“You’ve got three minutes. I’ve got patients waiting, and a badge doesn’t
mean dick in here.”

Eve arched a brow. The opening would have irritated
her under most circumstances,
but she noted the shadows of fatigue under the gray eyes and the stiffness of posture that was a defense against it.

She’d worked until exhaustion often enough to recognize the signs and sympathize with them.

“We sure are popular these days, Peabody. Dallas,” she said briefly. “Lieutenant,
Eve. I need data on a couple of patients.”

“Dimatto, Dr. Louise, and I don’t give data out on patients. Not to cops, not to anyone. So
if that’s all—”

“Dead patients,” Eve said as Louise spun toward the door again. “Murdered patients.
I’m Homicide.”

Turning back, Louise took a more careful look at Eve. She saw a lean body, a tough face, and tired eyes.
“You’re investigating a murder?”

“Murders. Two.” Watching Louise, she held out the paper flowers.
“Yours?”

“Yes. So . . .” She trailed off and concern washed over her face.
“Oh, not Snooks! Who would kill Snooks? He couldn’t have been more harmless.”

“He was your patient?”

“He wasn’t anyone’s patient, really.” She moved over to an ancient
AutoChef and programmed coffee. “We take a medi-van out once a week, do on-site treatments.” The machine made a
hissing sound, and swearing, Louise yanked the door open. Inside was a puddle of what appeared to be some offensive body fluid.
“Out of cups again,” she muttered and left the door swinging open as she turned back. “They keep cutting our
budget.”

“Tell me about it,” Eve said dryly.

With a half laugh, Louise ran her hands up over her face and into her hair. “I used to see Snooks
around when it was my rotation on the medi-van. I bribed him into a street exam one night about a month ago. It cost me ten credits to
find out he’d be dead of cancer in about six months without treatment. I tried to explain it all to him, but he just didn’t
care. He gave me the flowers and told me I was a nice girl.”

She let out a long sigh. “I don’t think anything was
wrong with his
mind—though I couldn’t bribe him into a psych. He just didn’t give a damn.”

“You have the records of the exam.”

“I can dig them up, but what’s the point? If he was murdered, cancer didn’t get
him.”

“I’d like them for my files,” Eve said. “And any records you have on Erin
Spindler. She got her health checks here.”

“Spindler?” Louise shook her head. “I don’t know if she was one of mine.
But if you want patient records, Lieutenant, you’re going to have to give me more data. How did they die?”

“During surgery, so to speak,” Eve said, and told her.

After the first shock leaped into Louise’s eyes, they went cool and flat. She waited, considered, then
shook her head. “I don’t know about Spindler, but I can tell you that there was nothing in Snooks worth harvesting,
not even for black market use.”

“Somebody took his heart, and they did a superior job of it. Who’s your top surgical
consult?”

“We don’t have outside consults,” Louise said wearily. “I’m it. So if
you want to take me in for interview or to charge me, you’ll just have to wait until I finish with my patients.”

Eve nearly smiled. “I’m not charging you, Doctor, at this time. Unless you’d like to
confess. To this.” From her bag, Eve took two stills, one of each victim, offered them.

Lips pursed, Louise studied them, breathed out slow. “Someone has magic hands,” she
murmured. “I’m good, but I’m not even close to this level of skill. To manage this in a sleeper’s crib,
for God’s sake. Under those conditions.” She shook her head, handed the stills back. “I can hate what those
hands did, Lieutenant, but I admire their ability.”

“Any opinion on whose hands they might be?”

“I don’t mingle with the gods professionally, and that’s what you’re looking
for here. One of the gods. I’ll have
Jan get you what you need. I have to get back to my
patients.”

But she paused, studying the flowers again. Something came into her eyes that was more than fatigue. It
might have been grief. “We’ve eradicated or learned to cure nearly every natural killer of human beings but one. Some
suffer and die before their time anyway because they’re too poor, too afraid, or too stubborn to seek help. But we keep
chipping away at that. Eventually, we’ll win.”

She looked back over at Eve. “I believe that. We’ll win on this front, but on yours,
Lieutenant, there’ll never be full victory. The natural predator of man will always be man. So I’ll keep treating the
bodies that others have sliced or hacked or pummelled, and you’ll keep cleaning up the waste.”

“I get my victories, Doctor. Every time I put a predator in a cage, I get my victory. And I’ll
get one for Snooks and Spindler. You can count on it.”

“I don’t count on anything anymore.” Louise walked out to where the hurt and the
hopeless waited.