Calculated in Death (In Death #36)(107)

When Roarke ended the conference, Eve hit the coffee. “God, I’m glad that part’s over. Talk, talk, talk.”

“Business is hell.”

“And you love the front seat in hell. Okay. I’m going to fine-tune my op. Where the hell am I going to carry a weapon in that damn dress?”

“I thought of that. Actually, it’s a little something I intended to give you for Christmas. You can have it now.”

He went into his office, came back with a box.

“What is it?”

The look he shot her was a perfect mix of amusement and exasperation. “Why do you always ask when you’ve only to take off the lid?”

She didn’t have a reasonable answer, so opened the box. “Oh, this is excellent.” She drew out the sleek holster.

“It’s worn on your thigh. Admittedly, not as easy a draw, but you’ll have a weapon on you, and no one will know.”

To test it, she stripped off her pants where she stood and strapped it on.

“Who knew I’d be giving myself a gift as well? That’s quite a look, Lieutenant.”

“My clutch piece will work. It’ll work.” She walked around the room to check the fit and feel. “Yeah, it’ll work just fine. Thank you.”

“Oh no, in this case, thank you.”

“I used you up, remember?”

“Yet strangely, seeing my bare-assed wife walk around with a holster on her thigh re-energizes me. Your bruising in that area, by the way, is more like a faded map of Mexico tonight. Olé.”

She laughed, unstrapped the holster, then pulled her pants back on. “It’s a really good present.”

“Merry Christmas.”

“I’ll test it out with my clutch piece tomorrow. I’ve got to be at Central by eighteen hundred.”

“Understood. Trina’s adjusted the schedule.”

“No!” The simple horror slapped her silly. “No, no, no. I don’t have time for that fuss.”

“You’ll be saved the time of fixing your hair and makeup, be able to talk the op through with Peabody, and be completely done before you go to Central. It’s efficient.”

“Fuck efficient,” she complained.

“Be brave, darling,” he said and patted her butt. “It’ll be over before you know it.”

It never was, she thought. But the bitch of it was suffering through it would give her more time to gear up.

The things she did for the job.

22

SHE SPENT HOURS PORING OVER THE THEATER’S blueprints, plugging holes where she found them, checking and rechecking possible routes, possible points of entry.

If he came in, he wouldn’t get out again.

And if he didn’t come in, she’d issued BOLOs and APBs, she’d sent his sketch, his ID, a written physical description to every transportation center, public and private, in the city. Despite the fact he didn’t hold a valid driver’s license, she did her best to cover vehicle rental agencies.

He could buy a vehicle, she considered. He could just take one of Alexander’s company cars. But short of putting up roadblocks on every bridge and tunnel, she couldn’t shut down New York in her pursuit of one man.

She weighed her options heavily on her own instincts and Mira’s profile.

He’d come for her.

She looked forward to it. The idea of the confrontation, of taking down a killer took her mind off—mostly—a Trina session.

She told herself that personal torture was hours off, then spent so much time on ’link conferences, coordinating theater and NYPSD security, taking updates from her commander, she lost track.

When Peabody came into her home office, Eve didn’t give it a thought. She’d asked her partner to come early to be briefed.

“Sorry I’m late.”

Eve’s head jerked up. “Late?” And her gaze shifted to the time. “You’re late. Why are you late?”

“Traffic’s insane. We figured since we had our fancy clothes to bring we’d take a cab instead of the subway. We hit jam after jam. We’ve still got time before Trina gets here to set up, and I’ve been monitoring all the memos going back and forth between you and the commander, you and the security head at the theater. You and everybody else. You’ve been at this all day.”

“We’ve got civilians to think of, plus the freaking media. We have to be prepared to take him down when he comes because we don’t want the civilians and media treated to a couple of dead or injured cops and the panic resulting therefrom.”

“I vote against that.”

“We also don’t want civilians hurt, our suspect to escape, or the media blasting NYPSD screwups.”

“Also vote nay.”

“So the best possible outcome is we spot him, then take him down quick and quiet.” Eve circled her neck, stiff from hours of work. “Which is very unlikely.”

“Why? You’ve covered and recovered, you’ve got Plans A through Z. We’re prepared.”

“And he’s big, he’s fast, and not above hurling a toddler.”

“I don’t think there’ll be any toddlers at the premiere.”

“He can bench-press three hundred,” Eve reminded her. “He could hurl both of us and barely break stride.”