Abandoned in Death (In Death, #54)(68)

“Calculated risk. He’s got to make his point, doesn’t he? Either Mommy took him to places like this, or she should have.”

“He switched up the shades in the makeup,” Peabody pointed out.

“Yeah, I noticed that. Different nail color, different belly ball, different earrings. He’s got a supply.”

“Size small on the label on the top and the skirt. I didn’t recognize the brand. Labels were pretty faded out.”

“Old. Like the others. He’s got a supply there, too. Clothes, shoes, everything. He’s aware enough to understand he’d never hit the one he wants right off. And he’s prepared to keep trying until he does.”

“He could have grabbed another. Someone who hasn’t been reported yet.”

“Yeah. Contact Norman. Give him another hour, then bring him up to speed.”

“Mosebly checked a lot of boxes.” Peabody yawned, shook it off. “Somebody else will. Somebody’s going to check all of them.”

Eve turned into Central’s garage. “Roarke ran another search overnight, widening the potential properties. He damn well knows the area, and too well not to live here.”

She got out, headed for the elevator. One advantage to catching a case so early was the lack of bodies crowded in the car. While they rode up, she laid out her toilet theory.

“That’s good! He has to give some sort of bathroom privileges, and he wouldn’t want them together. Talking, pooling ideas on how to get away. Could use chemical toilets though, like some people take on camping trips.”

“Why would any sane human being want to sleep outside in some tent or pod?”

“We’d make our own graham crackers and chocolate and marshmallows, then make s’mores. It’s kind of fun, sitting around a campfire, eating s’mores and telling stories.”

“Stories about what fun it is to sit and sleep somewhere you’re lower on the food chain than the big-ass bear who decides you look tasty?”

“Well.”

“Or those fun stories about how something decides to slither into your tent while you’re sleeping and coil around your throat?” Eve cocked her eyebrows at Peabody. “Those stories?”

“We liked ghost stories when I was a kid and went camping.”

“You could tell them about the ghosts of the people who got eaten by bears or strangled by snakes because they thought it would be fun to sleep in a tent.”

“I could, but now I think I’ll never see the fun in camping again.”

“You’re better off. Hobe’s mother lives upstate, and her father in Ohio. I’ll take care of the notifications. Send a memo to the lab,” Eve continued as they turned into the bullpen. “I want priority on this. And one to Mira for a follow-up.”

In her office, Eve grabbed coffee. Considering the time, she thought she could wait a bit longer to tell Anna Hobe’s parents their daughter was dead.

She worked on the board and the book, wrote the report, and copied Mira to go along with the memo from Peabody.

Then she sat, studied the board again before she closed her eyes.

Had she looked so hard at Mosebly because she’d wanted him to fit? Or because he shared some traits with the killer—or how she’d built the killer?

Not the killer trait, but others.

The right age group, single, never married or attached. Only child. Estranged or a history of parental difficulty. Lived alone, private residence.

Could she add a good, responsible job? How did you buy or rent a private residence unless you had the money to pay for it, maintain it?

Inheritance?

She opened her eyes again.

“Did Mommy die and leave you a big house and a bunch of money?”

Could be, she considered. Could definitely be. But then why was he pissed?

Because under the obsession, the need, was rage. The kid inside was pissed.

And why the need to replace her with a woman in her twenties?

“Because that’s when it happened. Whatever the hell it was. Maybe she dumped you back then, or screwed up enough Child Services took you. Maybe she went to jail, or got sick, or died.”

Eve pushed up to pace. “If she died, why wait so long to be pissed? That one doesn’t fit. Except…”

She turned back to the board. “You’re fucking crazy. But you’ve got money, you’ve got means. Hell, maybe she pissed you off and you killed her, and that’s when the rest broke down. You just want her back. Back when you remember happier times.”

She shook her head again. “You don’t dress Mommy like that to remember happier times. You’re dressing her cheap, low-rent-hooker cheap. Maybe that’s what she was.”

Once again, she put her boots up, closed her eyes, and let it all sift through.

She heard Peabody’s clomp, heard her take a step away.

“Thinking, not sleeping.”

“Okay. I came to beg for a cup of coffee.”

Eve waved her in. “He’s going to be somewhere between sixty and seventy-five. I’m thinking on the lower side now. White male, or mixed race, as we have no data on the father. He lives alone, in a private residence, and likely has a solid job or career. He has a good intellect for a crazy son of a bitch, and skills. He’s precise, he’s neat, controlled, and a planner. You don’t see crazy son of a bitch or killer when you look at him. I’m betting no one who works with him or for him, none of his neighbors would describe him as a man with a temper. And I’m going back to what I wondered from the start.