Delusion in Death (13 page)

“They killed families, Dallas, sick people, old people, doctors. They took the kids, unless they were nine or ten or teenagers. Then they killed them, too. There weren’t any kids in the bar.”

“I’ll explain the possible connection. Just set up the third board.” She handed over a folder with attached disc. “I need a few minutes. Nadine waylaid me.”

She sat at the conference table, pulled out her PPC to review her notes. Moments later, Mira came in.

“I’m early, I know, but I wanted to look over the …” She trailed off as she saw the boards. “That’s considerable progress.”

“It’s a hell of a lot more names, faces, possibles, and angles. I haven’t decided if that’s progress.”

“Motives. Money, power, jealousy, revenge.”

“Line up the usual suspects.”

“And religious fanaticism,” Mira added with fresh interest. “The Red Horse cult? They were broken before the end of the Urbans. Do you believe they’ve reformed?”

“I doubt it, but fanatics find like minds.”

“I don’t see the connection.”

“I’ll explain.”

“They were greatly feared for the few years they purged. I had friends in Europe, where they were most prevalent.”

“I’d like your opinion on this angle once I brief the team.” Her promise to Roarke gnawed at her. “I’d like some time today, if you have it.”

“I’ve cleared my day to focus on this. Any time you need.”

“Ah, this is mostly personal, so—”

“Of course.” Mira’s eyes met hers. “I’ll be available when you need me.”

Get it over with
, Eve told herself,
like a dose of nasty medicine
. “Maybe we could take a few minutes after the briefing. That way it’ll be off both our plates.”

“All right.”

They began to filter in, the detectives, the uniforms, the e-team. The room buzzed with voices, scraping chair legs, shuffling feet.

She took her place, waited a beat. “Before you each give your own reports, I’m going to give you a fresh overview. As you can see we’ve added a selection of persons of interest.”

She ran them through it, focusing on the twelve people who’d come up in the cross-match search.

“We’re going to add another factor to the scans. Connections to the Urban-era cult Red Horse, or any connection to cults or fringe religious or political groups. Peabody, give the team summary of Red Horse.”

“We didn’t have much out of them in New York,” Feeney commented when Peabody finished. “Had a couple hits, I remember they took credit for. They didn’t last long here. People fight back, and fight dirty when you go after their kids.”

“My source has verified that there were two incidents in Europe, credited to Red Horse. Cafés where the substance we’re dealing with—one with the same elements we’ve identified, and with the same results—was employed. The same substance,” she repeated,
“that the investigators identified. Before the government shut down the investigation, then closed and covered it. The cover-up included the apprehension of a suspect whose identity is unknown. Where he was taken is unknown. Whether he was executed, imprisoned or used to develop the substance or other chemical and biological weapons is unknown.”

She let the conversation on politics, cover-ups, the feds run its course.

“There’s a connection,” Eve continued. “And we need to find it. I trust Mira’s profile. This isn’t about politics or grand agendas. But the UNSUB has some connection to Red Horse or the cover-up or the original creator of the chemical.

“Feeney, I’d like to use Detective Callendar, and whoever you feel is your best in this area to dig for that connection. We need solid e-skills on this. Records were spottily kept during the Urbans.”

“You’ll work with Nickson,” Feeney told Callendar.

“I’m all over it.”

“Anything to add from EDD, Feeney?”

“We don’t have much, and nothing that adds at this point.”

“Baxter?”

“Stewart, Adam. You’ve got him up there. Sister, Amie Stewart’s one of the vics.”

“Trust fund babies.” Eve flipped through her list of victims. “She was in-house legal for Dynamo. And he’s currently unemployed, and borrowing heavily from the trust.”

“We got some of that,” Baxter continued. “Plus he buzzed. He’s got something going. He’s off, Dallas. And he was jittery, trying to pull off the grieving sib, comfort the parents. It didn’t play. We earmarked him, too.”

“Bring him in. Toast him some.”

He gave her two more, another of which crossed with hers.

She called on Jenkinson and Reineke, got four with three crosses.

“Prioritize the board, Peabody. Stewart, Adam—connect to Stewart, Amie. Berkowitz, Ivan—connect to Quinz, Cherie. Callaway, Lewis—connect to Cattery, Joseph. Burke, Analisa—connect to Burke, John. McBride, Sean, connect to Garrison, Paul. Add Lester, Devon, manager of the bar, and Lester, Christopher, his brother, a chemist.

“These are the next wave of interviews. Work them. Dig in for a connection to the Red Horse cult, the cover-up. I want their financials and electronics gone over in detail. Peabody and I will take the Lesters.”

She handed out other assignments, legwork, drone work, to uniforms, scheduled a briefing at four.

Whitney stood. “We’ll issue a statement to the media this morning, and hold a media conference at thirteen hundred. I’ll need you to meet with the liaison, Lieutenant, in an hour.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Handpick two more uniforms or detectives to assist in the search for sources of the chemicals and illegals. You’re cleared for it.”

“I’d like Detective Strong from Illegals, Commander, if she’s up for it.”

“Make it happen. You’ll need more to run the tip line after the media breaks this. One hour, Lieutenant.”

“Yes, sir. Get moving,” she told the team. “Peabody, contact Lester, Devon. Ask him to come in. Just a follow-up.”

“And the brother?”

“Not until Devon’s in the house. We’ll send a couple of stern-faced uniforms to bring him in. I need to reconnect with Morris, with Dickhead. And I want to go back to the scene. Get Devon in here
asap, and we’ll take him after I meet the liaison, shift to the brother, then go out in the field.”

“On it.”

Eve turned back to the board, started toward it.

“Eve.” Mira moved to her. “You have an hour now. Why don’t we go to my office?”

“I really should—” Get it over with, she reminded herself. “Sure. I’ll be there in five.”

7

Eve approached the dragon who guarded Mira’s office expecting her to sniff in disapproval and tell her to wait. Instead the woman spared Eve a brief nod.

“The doctor’s expecting you. Go right in.”

With no choice, no reasonable excuse, Eve stepped into Mira’s sunny, comfortable office.

“You’re very prompt.” Mira stood by her little AutoChef. “I’m just getting tea. Sit down, relax a minute.”

“I’m kind of pressed.”

“I know. I’m going to look over the data you sent me, and your notes, and see if I can be of any more help. But meanwhile …”

In her quiet, easy way, Mira handed Eve floral-scented tea in a delicate china cup, then took her own. She settled in one of her set of blue scoop-chairs, sipped in silence until Eve felt obligated to sit.

Shrinks, she thought, knew the value of silence, just like a cop in Interview.

“You look well,” Mira said conversationally. “How’s your arm?”

“It’s fine.” She rolled her shoulder, got a flash of pain memory. “I heal fast.”

“You’re a physical woman in excellent shape.”

“Meaning the body heals fast.”

Mira merely watched her with those quiet blue eyes. “How do you feel otherwise?”

“I’m good. I’m mostly good. That should be enough. Nobody gets through perfect. There’s always something, some ding, some cloud, some shit. And cops have more of all of that than most. So.”

“But you said this was personal, not work-related.”

“There’s not much distance between the two for me. Sometimes none at all. I’m okay with that, too. I’m good with that.”

Stalling, Mira thought. So reluctant to be here. “You’ve found a way to blend them very well. Will you tell me what’s troubling you?”

“It’s not me. It’s Roarke.”

“I see.”

“Look, I’ve always had vivid dreams.” Eve set the tea aside. She wasn’t in the mood to pretend to drink it. “Ever since I can remember. They’re not always pretty. Why would they be? Where I came from, what I do and see every day now. Maybe they were an escape when I was a kid. I could go somewhere else if I tried hard enough, and even if that place wasn’t all warm and cozy, it was better than the reality. And the nightmares, the flashbacks, with my father, I’d beaten them back. I’d worked through it. I’d finished it.”

Mira just waited her out, waited for the pause. “And now?”

“They’re not as bad as before, but okay, I’m having some issues since Dallas.”

Small wonder
, Mira thought, but nodded. “That manifest in nightmares?”

“Not as bad,” Eve insisted. “And I know I’m dreaming. I’m in it, but I know it’s not real. They’re nothing as bad as the one I had when I couldn’t get out, and I hurt Roarke. I won’t ever let that happen again.”

She couldn’t sit. How did people talk about internal horrors sitting down? Pushing up, she let herself move. “Maybe last night was a little more intense, but I’d had a damn vicious day. It’s not surprising I mixed it all together.”

“Mixed what together?”

“The bar, the victims, the whole mess of it.”

She told herself to stay calm, just report. Ordered herself to stay fucking calm.

“I can put myself in a scene. It’s part of being a cop. Seeing what happened, how, and maybe that takes you to why and who. I can see it, smell it, almost touch it. And Jesus, it was on my mind, wasn’t it?”

She heard it, that pissy bite in her tone, worked to smooth it out again. “So I went back to the bar, in my head, in the dream. But they were there, too. Stella, sitting at the bar. Her throat’s open, the way it was when McQueen finished her. When I found her on the floor of his place. She comes back first when I dream now, sometimes without him. She blames me, always blames me, just like she always did.”

“Do you?”

“I didn’t kill her.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

“He’d have killed her eventually. That was pattern for McQueen. Maybe I speeded it up.”

“How?”

“How?” Eve stopped, confused. “I caught her, arrested her. Hell, I put her in the hospital where I put the fear of God in her trying to get her to flip on McQueen.”

“Let me qualify.” With her elegant cup of fragrant tea perfectly balanced, Mira studied Eve. “You caught her and arrested her. Doing so, as she ran, involved a vehicular chase during which she wrecked the van—the van she and McQueen had used in their abduction of Melinda Jones and thirteen-year-old Darlie Morgansten. She put herself in the hospital, where you did your job—again—pressuring her to tell you where McQueen was holding the woman and the child. Is that accurate?”

“Yes.”

“Did you aid in her escape from the hospital? Help her kill the guard, injure the nurse? Did you help her steal a car so she could run to McQueen to warn him you were closing in?”

“Of course not, but—”

“Then how did you speed her death?”

Eve sat again. “It feels like I did. Maybe it’s not accurate. It just feels that way.”

“Do you feel that way, here and now?”

“You mean do I feel guilty or responsible? Not guilty,” Eve said. “Not when I look at it, step by step. Responsible, yeah, to an extent. The same as I’d be if she’d been anyone. I was in charge. I took her in, and I pushed her hard. But she was what she was, did what she did. I’m not responsible for that.”

“She’s not anyone. She was your biological mother.”

“I’m not responsible for that, either.”

“No.” Mira smiled, gently, and for the first time. “You’re not.”

“She didn’t know who I was. In reality. When she was alive and
looking right at me, she didn’t know who I was. I was just a fucking cop who’d screwed things up for her. But in the dreams, she knows.”

“Did you want her to recognize you, before she died?”

“No.”

“So sure?”

“Absolutely.” Saying it, knowing it was true, settled her a little. “I didn’t have a lot of time to think about it while it happened. Everything moved so fast, and it rocked me, I admit, when I saw her face-to-face. And I knew. If she’d known me, somehow, it would have been a living nightmare. She could, and I know would, have done everything to ruin me, to ruin Roarke. To try to extort money. My life would have been hell if she’d known me, and lived.”

She took a breath, a long one, as she understood more fully what traveled in her own head. “But there’s the fact she didn’t. She carried me inside her. Maybe she hated me for it, but she made me inside her, and at least for a few years, she lived with me. She must’ve fed me and changed me, at least sometimes. And she didn’t know me. I don’t know why she would, after so long, and I thank God she didn’t, even for a minute. So, I’m glad she didn’t, but I think she should have. It doesn’t make sense.”

“Of course it makes sense. You have her recognize you, in the dreams, and deal with her blame, her anger, her vitriol.”

“Why? She’s gone. She’s done. She can’t
do
anything to me now.”

“She abandoned you. You never had the chance to confront her, as the child she abused and left with another abuser. Nor, on that personal level, as the woman who survived it. What would you do, what would you say to her, if you could?”

“I’d want to know where she came from, what made her what she was. Is it just in the blood, or was she made—the way they wanted to make me—into something miserable. I’d want to know how she
could feel so much contempt for the child she made, something innocent and defenseless. Her answers don’t matter,” Eve added.

“No?” Mira arched her eyebrows. “Why not?”

“Because everything about her was a lie. Everything about her was self-serving so no matter what I asked, her answers would be shaded with that. Why would I believe her?”

“And still?”

“Okay, and still part of me—maybe a lot of me is sorry I didn’t get a chance to look her in the face, to ask those questions even if the answers didn’t matter. Then to tell her she’s nothing. She’s
nothing
.”