Abandoned in Death (In Death, #54)(53)

“You met him?”

“Stopped in for a drink a couple of times so I could, well, size him up some. We look out for each other here. We’re family. Didn’t like the look of him. He has user all over him. I’d hoped this trip with him would clear the haze. If he’s hurt her—”

“We don’t believe that’s the case. When did you last see or speak with her?”

“Ah … June third—the last day before she started her vacation. The team had wrapped up the Nordo campaign, so I was taking them out for a little unwind time, but she ducked out. She and the bar guy were due to leave the next morning and she wanted to finish packing. She said,” he continued with a smile. “Believe me, someone as organized as Mary Kate would have had everything in place. But she opted out. We all walked out together, a little after five, I think, and she peeled off at her subway station. She was lit up,” he added. “Just lit up.”

Mosebly let out a breath. “I wanted her to see him for what he was. Not that I didn’t want her to have a good time—she deserved one. But I wanted her to come back shed of him. And all this time. Dear God, Linny.”

“She’s smart and she’s strong. We’re going to find her.”

“We’d like to see her work area, and have a word with Alistar and Holly.”

“Of course. I’ll take you. She’s a pretty thing,” Mosebly said as he walked them out, headed for the stairs. “Young, pretty. I didn’t like the idea of her walking home, even just a few blocks, so late at night from that bar.”

“You knew about that, her routine?”

“I did.” He moved briskly down the stairs, a man in good physical shape who likely used them often. “She mentioned she enjoyed helping out at the bar, meeting people, having a little time with what’s-his-name.”

“Teegan Stone.”

“Right.” He moved through a maze of workstations and activity, paused at one. “I know Holly had a few things to say when it came out she didn’t stay the night, and he couldn’t be bothered to walk her home. But Mary Kate brushed that off. I don’t want to tell you how to do your job, but I’m going to tell you anyway. I think he’s a man who could hurt women as well as use them.”

“We’re looking at him, Mr. Mosebly.”

“All right, okay. This is Mary Kate’s work space. It reflects her.”

“Does it?”

“Organized, efficient, but not rigid.” He brushed his fingers over a paperweight that showed a cow jumping over a crescent moon.

Other than that and her D and C, there sat a placard that read:

WORK SMARTER.

BITCH LESS.



“Her motto. And, as you can see, she kept her area clean—another motto.”

“We’d like to have her comp and any devices in her desk taken in to EDD for analysis.”

“You’ll need to clear that with Linny—she’s the boss—but I can’t imagine her standing in your way. Let me round up Alistar and Holly for you. And if there’s anything else I can do, please let me know.”

“Appreciate it. Do you live close by?”

“Actually, I live downtown. Mary Kate and I often took the subway together. Just give me a minute.”

“Run him, Peabody,” Eve ordered when he walked away.

“Yeah, on that. He checks some boxes.”

They talked to coworkers, arranged for the electronics pickup, and left with a suspect on the list.

“He’s awfully invested in a coworker under his supervision who’s young enough to be his granddaughter.”

“And checks more boxes,” Peabody said as they settled into the car.

“Lives alone, a couple of blocks from Elder’s apartment. No marriages, no children. No criminal.”

“Tell me about his mother.”

“Getting there. Adalaide Mosebly, née Rowen, died last February at the age of a hundred and six. She’d been a resident/patient for the last sixteen years at the Suskind Home, on Long Island. That’s a retirement and elder care facility. Full medical care, including mental and emotional.

“Prior,” Peabody continued, “she was a homemaker and church secretary and helpmate—it says helpmate—to her husband, Reverend Elijah Mosebly—deceased November 2038. They lived in Kentucky until his death. Two years following that, she moved to New York—James Mosebly’s address.”

“She doesn’t sound like someone who’d dress up like our first victim. But Kentucky’s not all that far from Tennessee, where that spangly top came from. And maybe she lived a different kind of life before hooking up with the reverend. When did they hook up?”

“Married May 1985. Ah, so she’d have been about thirty. Could’ve lived a different sort of life in her twenties—which is where our victim falls, and the abductions.”

“Theory.” Eve played it out as she navigated traffic. “Little Jimmy loves Mommy. Mommy’s pretty strict—preacher’s wife. Maybe they even—what’s the expression?—use the rod, control the child.”

“Spare the rod, spoil the child. Either way, it’s nasty.”

“Maybe he blames Daddy for it, or maybe it’s just how life is. But sometime in there, he learns Mommy liked to dress up and party. How does he feel about that? Excited, appalled, interested? However he feels, she’s the center. Maybe she indulges him, spoils him—or the opposite, because some kids learn to love the boot when it’s all they get.”