Vendetta in Death (In Death #49)(64)

He hunched at a computer, his thin black hair slicked back over his egg-shaped head. His spidery fingers crawled over keyboards, slid over touch screens as he rolled on his stool from tool to tool at his workstation.

He spotted Eve, gave her the gimlet eye. “We’re working on it. Your DB isn’t the only DB in the city. Plenty of live ones, too, need analysis.”

“How freaking hard is it to ID a substance sent to you hours ago—and flagged as priority?”

“Every other fricking substance comes in here’s flagged.”

He had a point, she knew, but she also knew how he operated. He was chief because he was damn good—and he was Dickhead because he liked squeezing out a little extra.

“Box seat, Mets game—if I get the results in the next sixty seconds.”

“Who wants to go to a game solo?”

“Two seats. Clock’s ticking.”

He smiled at her, and what she read in the smile just pissed her off. “You already have the results, you little weasel.”

“Now, now.” Still smiling, he patted his hands in the air. “I got ’em, and I was getting ’em refined when you came stalking in.”

He slid down the counter again, swiped another screen. “What Morris sent over’s scrapings of painted concrete.”

He tapped the screen again to bring up a bunch of figures and symbols only a nerd could translate. “So we work out the type and grade of concrete, the color and brand of the paint. Top grade, all around.”

“What does that mean?”

He gave her the gimlet eye, and the smug smile. “See, that’s what I’m going to tell you now that we got it. Means he dug those toenails into high-dollar painted concrete, not your cheap or mid-priced stuff like you’d perhaps see in some recreation center—but more country club–like. Skirt around a pool, say, or somebody’s finished-off fancy basement, a high-traffic lobby maybe. Perhaps an upscale apartment kitchen or john, like.”

“Okay.” Eve placed her bet on that fancy basement. Private. She’d add a bet for soundproofed. “I need more.”

“I’m working on it!” And indeed those spidery fingers got busy.

“We’re getting you a brand on the concrete. Yeah, yeah, see here—top grade. Six thousand psi, so you can eliminate big commercial buildings. You’d need a minimum of ten thousand psi there. So what you’ve got is most likely residential or a smaller building—like a duplex, a four-decker. Could be a pool skirt, garage floor, like that. It’s, there it is, it’s Mildock concrete. That’s not going to narrow it too much.”

He might be an irritating son of a bitch, Eve thought, but he knew his job inside and out.

“Keep going.”

“I’m gonna say, he dug in to get through the epoxy—epoxy, not paint.” He swiped, tapped, swiped. “Uh-huh, uh-huh. You’ve got nonslip additives here, so it’s going to be a floor, not a wall. It’s good stuff, like I said. Kreet-Seal brand. Their number EX-651, goes by Burnished Gold. Some waterproofing in there, so basement, kitchen, garage. Not likely around a pool, and not likely exterior. You’d want special epoxy for those heavy wet areas, and this isn’t.”

“Mildock six thousand psi concrete with Kreet-Seal Burnished Gold epoxy—nonslip, light waterproofing.”

“That’s it. It’ll have dings and scratches on it.”

“Yeah.” Maybe he’d earned those box seats. “Get me the written report.”

“You’re freaking welcome,” he called after her, shook his head, muttered, “Cops.”

Then checked his PPC for the next Mets home game.

“Do you want me to run this down?” Peabody asked Eve.

“I’ll get going on it. You play those angles—and cross-check the names. It’s easy enough from here to drop you back at Central or at home. Where do you want to work on this?”

“I’ll take home, and the quiet. Plus, we’re going down to Mavis’s for dinner—if we’re clear. I can bake something for dessert. Baking’s good play-the-angles time for me.”

“Whatever works.”

“I can walk from here, no problem. Pick up a couple things on the way home. It’s barely raining.”

“That works, too. If you hit anything, let me know.”

“Count on it. Hmm, spring shower. I think lemon meringue pie.”

As Eve got in the car, she wondered how anybody could think and bake at the same time. But apparently Peabody could manage it.

As she drove, she started a search on the in-dash on contractors who installed—she learned the term was poured—Mildock concrete floors.

She also learned there were a shitload of them who serviced the city.

She switched to the epoxy, got another shitload, narrowed it somewhat by filtering in the specific brand. From there she merged the two searches to see what companies both poured and painted.

She played with it in her head. Possible to do the whole job—pour the concrete, seal it up. Or possible to paint the seal on an existing floor.

Good news, she thought: They’d match the floor with the substance under the vic’s nails when they found the location.

Bad news: Finding the location from the type of concrete and sealer used on some sort of floor was going to be more luck than skill.