Naked in Death (In Death, #1)(39)

Elizabeth 's eyes went wide, then calmed again almost immediately. "I'd say you were taking an extraordinarily big wrong step."

"Because Roarke is incapable of murder?"

"No, I wouldn't say that." It was a relief to think of it, if only for a moment, in objective terms. "Incapable of a senseless act, yes. He might kill cold-bloodedly, but never the defenseless. He might kill, I wouldn't be surprised if he had. But would he do to anyone what was done to Sharon – before, during, after? No. Not Roarke."

"No," Richard echoed, and his hand searched for his wife's again. "Not Roarke."

Not Roarke, Eve thought again when she was back in her cab and headed for the underground. Why the hell hadn't he told her he'd met Sharon DeBlass as a favor to her mother? What else hadn't he told her?

Blackmail. Somehow she didn't see him as a victim of blackmail. He wouldn't give a damn what was said or broadcast about him. But the diary changed things and made blackmail a new and intriguing motive.

Just what had Sharon recorded about whom, and where were the goddamn diaries?





[page]CHAPTER NINE




"No problem reversing the tail," Feeney said as he shoveled in what passed for breakfast at the eatery at Cop Central. "I see him cue in on me. He's looking around for you, but there's plenty of bodies. So I get on the frigging plane."

Feeney washed down irradiated eggs with black bean coffee without a wince. "He gets on, too, but he sits up in First Class. When we get off, he's waiting, and that's when he knows you're not there." He jabbed at Eve with his fork. "He was pissed, makes a quick call. So I get behind him, trail him to the Regent Hotel. They don't like to tell you anything at the Regent. Flash your badge and they get all offended."

"And you explained, tactfully, about civic duty."

"Right." Feeney pushed his empty plate into the recycler slot, crushed his empty cup with his hand, and sent it to follow. "He made a couple of calls – one to East Washington, one to Virginia. Then he makes a local – to the chief."

"Shit."

"Yeah. Chief Simpson's pushing buttons for DeBlass, no question. Makes you wonder what buttons."

Before Eve could comment, her communicator beeped. She pulled it out and answered the call from her commander.

" Dallas, be in Testing. Twenty minutes."

"Sir, I'm meeting a snitch on the Colby matter at oh nine hundred."

"Reschedule." His voice was flat. "Twenty minutes."

Slowly, Dallas replaced her communicator. "I guess we know one of the buttons."

"Seems like DeBlass is taking a personal interest in you." Feeney studied her face. There wasn't a cop on the force who didn't despise Testing. "You going to handle it okay?"

"Yeah, sure. This is going to tie me up most of the day, Feeney. Do me a favor. Do a run on the banks in Manhattan. I need to know if Sharon DeBlass kept a safe deposit box. If you don't find anything there, spread out to the other boroughs."

"You got it."

The Testing section was riddled with long corridors, some glassed, some done in pale green walls that were supposed to be calming. Doctors and technicians wore white. The color of innocence and, of course, power. When she entered the first set of reinforced glass doors, the computer politely ordered her to surrender her weapon. Eve took it out of her holster, set it on the tray, and watched it slide away.

It made her feel naked even before she was directed into Testing Room 1-C and told to strip.

She laid her clothes on the bench provided and tried not to think about the techs watching her on their monitors or the machines with the nastily silent glide and their impersonal blinking lights.

The physical exam was easy. All she had to do was stand on the center mark in the tubelike room and watch the lights blip and flash as her internal organs and bones were checked for flaws.

Then she was permitted to don a blue jumpsuit and sit while a machine angled over to examine her eyes and ears. Another, snicking out from one of the wall slots, did a standard reflex test. For the personal touch, a technician entered to take a blood sample.

Please exit door marked Testing 2-C. Phase one is complete, Dallas, Lieutenant Eve.

In the adjoining room, Eve was instructed to lie on a padded table for the brain scan. Wouldn't want any cops out there with a brain tumor urging them to blast civilians, she thought wearily.

Eve watched the techs through the glass wall as the helmet was lowered onto her head.

Then the games began.

The bench adjusted to a sitting position and she was treated to virtual reality. The VR put her in a vehicle during a high-speed chase. Sounds exploded in her ears: the scream of sirens, the shouts of conflicting orders from the communicator on the dash. She could see that it was a standard police unit, fully charged. The control of the vehicle was hers, and she had to swerve and maneuver to avoid flattening a variety of pedestrians the VR hurled in her path.

In one part of her brain she was aware her vitals were being monitored: blood pressure, pulse, even the amount of sweat that crawled on her skin, the saliva that pooled and dried in her mouth. It was hot, almost unbearably hot. She narrowly missed a food transport that lumbered into her path.

She recognized her location. The old ports on the east side. She could smell them: water, bad fish, and old sweat. Transients wearing their uniform of blue coveralls were looking for a handout or a day's labor. She flew by a group of them jostling for position in front of a placement center.