Celebrity in Death (In Death #34)(7)

With little choice once Peabody bolted, Eve signed off on another report. Since staring hard at her ’link didn’t cause it to signal that a psycho had just wiped out all the tourists on Fifth Avenue, she gave up and shut it down for the day.

It was just one evening, she reminded herself on the way down to the garage. The food would probably be good, and Peabody was right, there’d be plenty of people there she knew. It wasn’t as if she’d have to spend the whole time making small talk with strangers.

But it made her think about the Icoves, the father and son, the respected doctors who had played God in their underground lab. Creating human clones, she thought, dispatching those who weren’t perfect, duplicating others. Educating them, training them, enslaving them.

Until they’d both been murdered by their own creations.

After this dinner, she reminded herself, she’d be done. Except she’d already been told she had to go to the New York premiere. But after that she’d be done with the whole celebrity thing. And finally she’d be done with the Icove case.

How many of them were out there? she wondered. The clones, the Icove creations? She thought of the little girl and the baby she’d let go—or Roarke had let go—of Avril Icove—the three Avril Icoves, all married to the younger Icove.

Had they read Nadine’s book? Wherever they’d gone, were they paying attention to the never-quite-ending interest in how they’d come to be?

And she thought of what she and Roarke had left—no choice with the facility about to blow—in tubes and hives in the underground lab. The set, the hype, the actress in the long, black coat fixed the lives that had been created in, and had ended in that nightmare facility front and center in her mind.

Yeah, she wanted to be done with the Icove case.

She drove through the gates, rolled her shoulders back. One evening, she reminded herself as she saw the glory of home.

Next time she had a full evening free, and if the weather stayed mild, she and Roarke would have dinner on one of the terraces. Do the whole wine and candlelight thing. Maybe walk around the estate in the starlight.

She’d never thought of doing those things before Roarke, never wanted them. But now there was Roarke, and there was home. And there was a want to cherish both whenever she could.

She parked at the front of the house where it spread, where it rose up in its fanciful towers and turrets. Maybe the party wouldn’t last all that long. They could come home, take that walk in the starlight.

Absently she rubbed at the faint twinge in her arm as she got out of the car. The injuries she’d sustained in Dallas had healed—or close enough. But the memory of them … yes, there was a want to cherish when she could.

As she expected, Summerset—the skinny—and the cat—the fat—waited in the foyer.

“I see you were unable to formulate an excuse to miss tonight’s festivities.”

She didn’t much care for Roarke’s pain-in-her-ass majordomo knowing her that well. “There’s still time for murder. It could even be here and now.”

“There’s a message from Trina for you on the house ’link.”

Eve froze on the steps. Freezing was a natural byproduct of blood running cold. “If you let her into this house, there will be murder. Double homicide when I beat both of you to death with a brick.”

“She’s occupied downtown assisting Mavis and Peabody, and will be unable to get here for your hair and makeup before the event. However,” he continued as relief trickled through panic, “she’s left detailed instructions for you.”

“I know how to get ready for some stupid dinner,” Eve muttered as she stomped upstairs. “I don’t need detailed instructions.”

In the bedroom, she stripped off her jacket, her weapon harness. And scowled at the house ’link. “You think I don’t know how to take a damn shower and slap on some face junk?” she demanded of the cat, who’d followed her up. “I’ve done it before.”

More in the last couple years, she judged, than in most of the years before combined. But still.

But the cat stared at her with his bicolored eyes. She hissed, stomped to the ’link, and called up the message.

Just do what I tell you and you’ll be good to go. I’ll know if you screw this up, so don’t. Now, start with a long, steamy shower and the pomegranate scrub.

As Trina’s voice droned on and on, Eve sat on the side of the bed. There were a zillion steps, she calculated. Nobody in their right mind took all those steps just to clean up for a party.

And who the hell would know whether or not she scrubbed with pomegranate?

Trina might, she thought.

Anyway, a long, steamy shower sounded fine. No problem.

By the time she’d finished the shower, the scrub, the body lotion, the face brightener, and the hair product that looked and felt a little too much like snot to suit her, she gave murder a more in-depth consideration.

She smeared stuff on her eyes, brushed stuff on her cheeks, smeared dye on her lips, and cursed whoever had invented facial enhancements.

Enough was enough, she decided, and walked back into the bedroom just as Roarke walked in.

How come he didn’t need all the fuss and gunk to look so damn pretty? she wondered. Nothing Trina could come up with could improve on that face—that carved-by-benevolent-angels face, and the wickedly blue eyes, the perfectly etched mouth that smiled now as he saw her.