Secrets in Death (In Death #45)(106)

“But it wouldn’t.” He picked up the coffee. “Not if it was a final amount she designated per individual, calculating just how much they might pay before balking or becoming angry or despairing enough to do as you wish they had at the start. Go to the authorities.”

“Okay, I was playing with that. She looked at the individual, calculated how much she could suck out of them, and/or how long she could so suck, before they started to waver. And/or again, she cut them loose when she sensed she was reaching that threshold.”

“Either/or,” he agreed. “It makes good business sense. Know when to settle and move on. From what I’m seeing, she had a head for it. Determine how much a target would pay per month, how long they would pay, and if and when they would reach their limit.”

“Maybe she miscalculated with one, and he hit his limit.”

“Which, logically, eliminates those with a red check mark from your suspect list.”

“Unless.” Calculating, she drank coffee. “One who she cut loose when he hit that threshold, or was, in her estimation, approaching it, is connected in some way to another target. Target A is now off the hook—but you’d simmer awhile, right? You’ve shelled out in the neighborhood of a half million or more to this conniving bitch. It’s a pisser. Then you find out Target B—maybe a friend, an associate, a relative—is being skinned, and the simmer goes to boil. It’s never going to stop, you think, never going to stop until she’s stopped.”

“Interesting, and logical.” He leaned toward her, tapped the side of her head. “Cop brain.”

“Yeah, and the cop brain says even the dead ones can’t be eliminated because someone connected to one of them might have found out, sought revenge. She knew the killer, I’m sure of that, but she knew a lot of people.

“I need a minute.”

She rose, paced, circled her board. Roarke took the minute with her, drank his coffee.

“It’s not going to be the data,” she decided. “It’s not going to be someone she used for information.”

“Why not?”

“When you reach the threshold there, you’re more likely to pack it in. Get yourself fired or transferred, find a way to be of less use to her. Not impossible you decide to kill her to end it, but she went for lower-level there, the easily intimidated, the rank and file most don’t notice. And I’m betting some of those she used enjoyed it. Like playing spy—and what’s the big deal? Wouldn’t surprise me to find out she fed the source now and then, too. Slip them a little cash, keep them going.”

She circled again. “She did that now and then—has it deducted as an expense. Like she deducted the expense of the two street LCs she paid to have sex with Bellami. Likely they knew he was drugged. Maybe they didn’t care, or maybe they thought that’s how he wanted it.”

“You’ll interview them.”

“Yeah, since she has their names listed. And the guy she blackmailed into dosing Bellami’s drink, I’ll do more than interview him.”

“Good news, blackmail days are over,” Roarke said, “bad news, you’re under arrest.”

“I’ll look forward to that.” Hands on her hips, she stared at her board, the faces. Shook her head. “Miscalculation on Mars’s part, maybe. Maybe, but she had a knack, like you said. She was damn good at this. The people she was bleeding? It’s upsetting, sure, it’s a pisser, yeah, but roughly eight thousand a month, a half million over a period of years? It’s no big. It doesn’t change their standard of living.”

“It’s insulting.”

“If it’s so insulting, you stop or you never start. She gave you a little nudge, and you slapped her back—and she stepped off. Because she read you right. If it’s so insulting, you tell her go ahead, try it. She’d have hit that a time or two and done just what she did with you. She stepped off.”

Eve walked back, dropped into her chair, blew out a breath. “Damn it.”

“You’re saying you don’t think her killer’s in this mass of books and ledgers.”

“Somewhere,” she muttered. “Somewhere. I just— It’s not clicking. Why kill her? Missy Lee had that right. You’d know the cops would come into it. You don’t know she’s got a secret place under another name. You’d have to figure the cops would find what we found, some sort of record, and we’d uncover your secret anyway. Killing her risks exposure, too.”

“Fight-or-flight’s not logical but instinctive. He snaps.”

“But he didn’t,” she insisted. “I went around this with Mira when she used that same term. He planned, he calculated, he timed, he prepared. This wasn’t a crime of passion, but of cold calculation. He’s not going to have been a target. I just don’t see it. But he’ll be connected to one. He’ll care about one. And he has to be close enough to know the target’s being exploited. A spouse, a relative, a friend, a trusted coworker. One who decided the target could weather the exposure of the secret if it came out, but shouldn’t bear the stress, the insult. He decided for them.”

Eve tapped a finger on one of the open books. “He’d handle it, take care of it, he’d clear it up.”

“Because that’s what he does?” Roarke prompted. “Handles things for this person? Takes care of this person?”