Secrets in Death (In Death #45)(43)

Now those eyes fired hot. Another point in Trina’s favor, Eve conceded. Her absolute loyalty to a friend.

“I know that,” Eve said, to smooth her out a little. “I know that without a single shake.”

“Right. Okay.” Trina breathed out. “So. She said how she’d pay me for a vid of Mavis and Leonardo and Bella at home. When she saw that pissed me off, she tried saying she meant with their permission. But she didn’t.”

Listening, considering, Eve tolerated the buzzing at her eyebrows.

“Did she ever threaten you, Trina? I need it straight.”

“No.” Stopping her work for an instant, Trina swiped a hand over her heart. “Arrow straight there, solid. More she tried to be the girlfriend, you know what I’m saying? Dropped little digs about Nadine not appreciating me enough. How she’d pay me more on the side than I got here, working with Nadine. She worked you in to the conversation once or twice, just how she’d heard I did your hair for something, and wondered what it was like.”

She set the tool down, looked at Eve. “Cone of Silence. Absolute.”

No question, Eve thought. No question whatsoever, whatever the pain in the ass. “Appreciated.”

“Appreciated or not, that’s my line, get it? I don’t cross it. She finally got that. Maybe because I didn’t tell anybody any of the shit she tried to bribe out of me.”

“She stopped pushing you on it,” Eve prompted.

“Yeah. So she’d still come in when I was here, not every time, but enough, ask me to buff her up. She’d work her ’link instead of talking to me because she’d figured out I had nothing to say. You get that, too, people who think of you more like a droid.

“Close your eyes. It’s the eyes that say kick-ass on screen. I’d hear her talking to somebody, making an appointment,” Trina continued. “But sometimes it was the way, like ‘you’d better be there when I say, have what I want, or you’ll pay for it’—that kind of bitch tone.”

“Names.”

Trina hesitated, sighed hard. “I think one was Annie Knight.”

“She works here?”

“Hell no. Don’t you know anything that’s now? Jeezus-pleezus—sneezus! She’s queen of talk screen. Practically built Talk TV with her own self. Top-rated late-night talk show twelve years running. Maybe more than, who knows? Anyway, I think one of them might’ve been her. I tuned Larinda out until I heard her say the name, ’cause I really like Knight at Night. Okay, open your eyes and hold still.”

She came at Eve’s eyes with a wand. “None of that weird stuff. Like the red you’ve got on.”

“If I used color on your lashes, I’d go with a hint of green—pop top-shelf whiskey eyes, but this is for kick-ass, not for sexy. I know another she said was Wylee Stamford.”

Eve’s gaze shifted, had Trina pulling back the wand and cursing.

“Mets. Third baseman. Hit three-seven-five last season. That Wylee Stamford?”

Trina pressed her painted lips together in a satisfied smirk. “I guess you know something about something. He’s got one fine ass on him, that Wylee. Yeah, that’s who I’m saying she said. And she had that snake-hiss tone on her. Mostly otherwise she didn’t use names. It was honey, sweetcheeks, dickwad—depending on the mood. Hey, Peabody.”

“You’re getting makeup!” Two steps into the room, Peabody gawked.

“Not by choice.”

“You got your hair done!”

“I did not. She just—” Eve mimed snapping scissors.

“I want makeup!”

This exclamation slid straight into a whine.

“I got time. Nearly done with her.” Trina waved a finger toward a chair. “Take a seat.”

“This isn’t a day at the damn spa. Status,” Eve demanded.

“Mars’s office is fully secured. Warrant is with legal, and I’m told it should clear through within the next fifteen. I tracked down the reporter—a Mickey Bullion. He confirmed the tag came from someone in the bar, but is reluctant to name the source.”

As she spoke, Peabody moved in a little closer, to examine Trina’s work on Eve. Eve shoved her back again.

“It wasn’t hard to do a run,” Peabody added, unabashed, “and find out his brother was on our list of wits. I spoke with him—Randy Bullion—and he confirmed he’d contacted his brother after we released him. Mostly Bullion the reporter’s steamed he didn’t get the tag soon enough to break the story, and Seventy-Five got scooped. I don’t think there’s anything there, Dallas.”

Trina caught Eve’s chin in the vise of one hand.

“I don’t want the lip gunk.”

“It’ll balance the eyes,” Trina insisted. “Did I say it comes off if you don’t like it? Shut it a minute.”

Peabody’s shoulders raised up in a kind of self hug. “Oooh, I love this rosy lip on your palette!”

“Just mixed that for Nadine. It’d work on you. I think we go for a natural palette for you today—serious yet approachable cop.”

Though she kept Eve’s chin wedged, she switched brushes, swiped something over the cheeks, swiped something else. And something else until Eve visualized punching Trina in one of her black-and-red-lashed eyes.