Obsession in Death(92)

“That works. If you’ve got time, Feeney had this other angle. Geek angle,” she added, and laid out the search-and-match idea.

“All right, I’ll set it up. It won’t be quick.”

“He said the same.”

Alone, she started down the list. It made her feel better, just to touch base, to repeat the need for caution. Better yet, everyone she contacted was in for the night.

Really, who wanted to go out in the bitter the night before New Year’s Eve?

That’s the night she had to worry about, she decided. When so many she knew and cared about would be out at some party, some shindig.

She didn’t think her killer would take someone in public. But what better time to get into a target’s empty place, lie in wait?

If she didn’t have the suspect in a cage by the eve, she’d set up some sort of surveillance on potential targets’ houses, apartments.

“But you’re going for somebody tonight, aren’t you? You missed last night. You have to make up for it. You had to run twice now, and once from your… bestie,” she muttered, thinking of Mavis’s term. “Hard on a girl’s self-esteem. You need a win, and you need it bad.”

Considering, Eve brought ID shots on screen.

Not Mavis, she decided, studying the official shot where Mavis had opted for a cotton-candy-pink poof of hair and electric green eyes. Low probability on Mavis and her family.

Same with Peabody and McNab, with Feeney – who looked as if he’d slept in the dung-brown suit and industrial-beige shirt. Too risky, at this point, to go for a cop, so she included all the cops in her division.

The Miras – now, that was a worry. She could count on Mira to be smart and careful, but she’d put an attempt on them in the high probability range. Even without the link to law enforcement – and she was sure the killer had one – anyone who’d read Nadine’s book or seen the vid would know she had a particular link, personal and professional, with Dr. Charlotte Mira.

She also had an embarrassing little crush on Dennis Mira, but nobody knew about that. Mira would, Eve corrected, and felt foolish. Mira always knew.

But look at the guy, with his incredibly kind eyes and mussed-up hair and that absent smile that said he was thinking about something else altogether.

She considered contacting Mira again, impressing on her – again – that the killer might ditch the delivery guise now, go for a straight break-in using the master.

But the master wouldn’t work, Eve reminded herself, and going over it all again edged over into nagging.

Nadine, same deal. High probability – the connection between her and Nadine was well known. Nadine Furst was nobody’s fool, Eve thought, and had top-notch security on her building and her apartment.

Still, the memory of Nadine’s abduction, of the previous attempt on her life two years before, flashed.

It would flash for Nadine, too, Eve decided. She’d take no chances.

Reo? Another concern. If the killer knew details of Eve’s life – personal and professional – she’d know details of Reo’s. The APA was smart, but she wasn’t… tough. Not physically.

Morris? A hell of a lot smarter than a killer. Security decent, she mused, but not as good as it could be.

Louise and Charles. Good security on their home, but each of them worked, patients, clients. Anyone could walk into Louise’s clinic, where the security sucked. Or book a session with Charles. High probability again, but not tonight, she determined. Smarter to try at the clinic, or to pose as a client for Charles. Daytime hit there, most likely.

Unless the killer lured Louise out of the house, medical emergency. The clinic or her mobile medical service.

Shit.

And there was Trina. Not exactly a friend, more of a personal thorn in the side, but a connection. One who posed for official ID as if she wore a flaming tower on her head – fiery red with hot gold tips.

“And she can be stupid,” Eve mused.

She’d barely closed a case she’d caught because Trina had done the stupid.

An e-mail blast, Eve decided. That wasn’t like nagging, it was just putting it all down so everyone had it right in front of them.

She settled down to it, tried to think of a way to write it out that didn’t seem like nagging.

While she did, the killer poured out her own thoughts in words.



I’m hurt. In my body, in my heart, in my soul. I’d nearly forgotten this kind of pain. Not the bruises, ones I discovered after I’d gotten home, tried to calm myself with a warm bath. I never felt them, but must have gotten them from hips and elbows while running through the crowd on the street, or from carts and counters in the restaurant.



She chased me, as if she were the hunter and I some sort of prey.



When I saw her in front of Mavis’s building, for one instant – here then gone – I thought, I actually thought: Oh, at last, we can talk face-to-face, we can sit down, have a drink, talk and talk about our partnership.



Finally, she’ll tell me what I mean to her, how important I am to her instead of it always, always, ALWAYS, being me who tells her.



But I knew, in the instant after that instant, it was never to be. What I saw on her face wasn’t appreciation, wasn’t friendship. It was feral. Hunter. Prey.



I’ve been a fool, letting myself believe she cared about me, respected me, appreciated all I’ve done for her.