Secrets in Death (In Death #45)(69)

“Getting me that file’s no skin off your ass, but I’ll damn well take a bite out of said ass if you keep fucking with me. One more thing? This communication has been recorded, as is SOP for my own case file. Dallas out.”

She broke communication. “Asshole.”

“He seemed remarkably uncooperative.”

She spun around in her chair to where Roarke leaned against her doorjamb. “Lazy is what he is. He doesn’t want to deal with the paperwork, and doesn’t seem to like New York.”

“He doesn’t like female rank,” Roarke corrected.

“Come on.”

“My take.” Roarke shrugged, stepping in to sit on the corner of her desk. “And young female rank—young, female New York rank—that just ices the cake for that type.”

“Just makes him a bigger asshole.”

“It does, doesn’t it?”

“I don’t care how big an asshole he is, as long as I get the case files. Progress in the e-world?”

“Considerable. Feeney’s sending you the data and a report. We’ve got more names, amounts, but she’s got books elsewhere. What she kept with her, at home, even at work, is sketchy. More of, in my opinion, a kind of pocket guide.”

“So we’re back to her having another place somewhere.”

“And I haven’t found any such place in the names she used for alternate accounts, or variations of them. Yet.”

She angled her head. “You’re having fun with it.”

“Why wouldn’t I? It’s a fine puzzle, isn’t it? And as it appears bodies won’t be piling up, the urgency is lessened.”

Eve turned back to the board. “You never know about those bodies.”

“Do you have any reason to think he’ll kill again? For what purpose?”

“No reason, but once you kill, the purpose can get murky. Hey, that went well! And now that I think about it, my landlord, neighbor, brother, ex-wife, really piss me off.”

“You’re a cynical soul, Lieutenant. Only one of the countless reasons I love you. And now.”

He rose, went to the door, shut it. “What is it?”

“What’s what?”

“What’s troubling you under it all?”

“I’ve got nearly twenty-four in on a case that happened under my nose. And I’m not feeling the wind at my back.”

“Under it all,” he repeated, cupping her chin in his hand. “I can see it.”

He always could, she thought and, with a shrug, wandered away to her narrow window. “Evil’s one of those words people toss around too much, or other people say people use too easily. But the fact is, there are a lot of degrees of evil. Plain, simple evil. Cops end up seeing pretty much every form of it. You take it down when you can, just like you take down the petty bullshit. Like the pair of street thieves Peabody and I collared today.”

“Which explains the bit of bruising on your jaw.”

“Head butt.” Absently, Eve rubbed at it. “I had to at least half admire her style. Not evil, but the potential’s always there, depending on circumstance. You could have turned evil. Me, too. The potential’s there,” she said as she shifted to look at him again.

“That may be. While I’ve done my share in cold blood, and more than my share of deeds the cop in you may understand and will never approve of. And still, I’ve looked at myself before and after you, and come to realize that as lost as I was before you, there were lines I couldn’t and wouldn’t cross. And you, Lieutenant?”

He studied her as she did him. “You? Your lines are, and have always been, closer and deeper than mine. There’s mean in you, just another of the countless reasons I adore you. But your potential for evil—and I agree that’s in all of us—is far, far outweighed by your absolute dedication to protecting and serving, not just people, but that amorphous goal of justice.”

“I can see myself before and after you, just as clearly. And I can see me doing the job I’m doing now. With this.” She gestured to the board. “And not letting myself feel what I’m feeling. Not admitting it to myself, much less anyone else.”

There it was, Roarke thought, the under it all. “What are you feeling?”

“Those degrees of evil. Mars? She’s on the scale. She doesn’t ring the bell, but she’s on the scale. She didn’t kill or rape or beat small children. She didn’t disembowel some stranger for kicks. I’ve seen worse. We’ve seen worse.”

He had to touch her now, just glide a hand down her back.

“And you’ve stood for dead higher on that scale than Mars. What troubles you?”

“Her victims, because that’s what they are, every one. We say marks—it’s an easier word, and even puts some of the blame on them. Well, some of it is on them, as they made a choice. But they’re still her victims. Some of them hit close to home, but it’s not even that.”

“How close?”

She scrubbed her hands over her face. “Annie Knight. You know who she is.”

“I do.”

“At thirteen she found out the good, loving woman she thought was her mother was her aunt, and her mother was a junkie whore. So the kid did the stupid, ran off to confront the junkie whore, and ended up stabbing a junkie john who tried, with the whore’s cooperation, to rape her.”