Leverage in Death: An Eve Dallas Novel (In Death #47)(106)

“Baxter, do you know anybody in the IRS with some punch who’s not an asshole?”

“I might know somebody.”

“Tag him.”

“Her.”

“Of course her. I want a jump on the slaps for those dark accounts. And given that he’s currently charged with conspiracy to murder, etc., etc., they might freeze everything. No access to funds until the IRS completes their investigation, blah, blah.”

“Could work.”

“I’ve got another button to push.”

*

*

While she pushed another button, Roarke worked with Feeney and Callendar.

“Fucker’s got enough electronics to open his own shop,” Feeney complained.

“That could make me like him, if he wasn’t a fucker.” Callendar jiggled while she worked.

“A fucker he is,” Roarke agreed, “but a smart enough one, or paranoid enough, to have filters and fail-safes on every bleeding thing. We’d do better with this in the lab, as even when we get through on something, the scanning and decoding from here will take hours—and that’s piece by piece.”

Feeney chugged out a breath. “You’re right on that. We’ll haul it down to Central.”

“My lab’s closer,” Roarke pointed out, which had Feeney rubbing his chin.

“You’re right on that, too. Still, we’ve got the portables he had with him to get through, and that shit pile from Silverman’s.”

“Split it up, Cap?”

Feeney grunted at Callendar. “Yeah, shit. I hate missing out on any of it, but that’s the way to do it. I’m going to have some boys head up, tag, and log all this and haul it to your lab. You take that, and my boy and I here will head to Central with the rest.”

“Girl, Feeney. I keep telling you, I’m a freaking girl.”

“Boy, girl, what’s the diff?

“Boy, penis. Girl, vagina.”

The tips of Feeney’s ears pinked. “Don’t start that. An e-man’s an e-man, whatever their works.”

Feeney pulled out his comm, walking away with his pink-tipped ears to start it rolling.

“I don’t mind being one of his boys,” Callendar told Roarke. “I just like to rag him, watch him get all hunchy.” She looked around the living area where they’d pulled out and set up all the electronics. “It’s a lot.”

“Less fun if it’s easy.”

“Straight up.” She offered her fist to bump. “Wonder if Dallas is having fun yet.”

Eve gulped coffee as she waited for the results from her button pushing. Losing time, she thought as she stared out her window, watched evening rolling toward night. All because some pricey lawyer with a sociopath for a client would play every trick in the hat, use every evasion on the field to get some sort of win.

Baxter came in, pointed at her AC, got her nod. “Good news first. My friend at the IRS is very, very interested in Iler, and is pushing the paperwork through the system, the legal areas to do just what you want. Freeze it all.”

“What’s the bad?”

“Singa just pulled the plug for the night. His client’s exhausted, requires his full eight hours of rest before resuming interview.”

“Goddamn it. I knew that was coming, but goddamn it.”

“The maybe good news in the bad? Singa didn’t look happy. In fact, he looked pretty seriously pissed off.”

“Not good enough.” Frustrated, she gave her desk a quick kick. “Right now, he’s pulling in his own investigators, and they’ll be all over trying to get data on Silverman. He’ll use, or try to use, everything he gets to deal down Iler. Silverman could be on his way to Argen-fucking-tina.”

“But you don’t think so.”

“No, I don’t think so. I think it’s a hell of a lot worse.”

She stared at her desk ’link, willing it to signal.

“Maybe, maybe I can break through. But if he’s got Iler locked for the night, I can’t break until morning. Eight hours. Fine. Not a second more. Go get Trueheart, go get something to eat or whatever. Go home. Keep in touch with the IRS skirt, let me know if that moves any. Be back here at four hundred. We’ll put him back in the box at oh-four-thirty.”

Baxter grinned. “That’s just nasty. I like it. Are you heading out, too?”

“Waiting for a tag back. If this works, we’ll break Iler by five hundred.” She looked back out at the dark. “I hope to Christ it’s soon enough.”

*

At least she didn’t have to deal with Summerset by the time she finally made it home. As Roarke had texted he’d tackle Iler’s electronics in his lab, she tossed her coat over the newel post, headed straight up.

There he was, full work mode. He’d changed into a black sweater, had the sleeves shoved up above his elbows. A strip of thin leather secured his hair back in a short tail.

She assumed there was logic and order in the line up of Iler’s many e-toys, just as she assumed the same about the codes, images, symbols rolling over Roarke’s multiple wall screens.

The cat found it all fascinating, or so it seemed, as he squatted on a stool and watched. He gave Eve a glance with his bicolored eyes when she walked in, then went back to his evening’s entertainment.