Concealed in Death (In Death #38)(54)

Eve’s eyes narrowed as he pointed at Linh Penbroke.

“Are you sure?”

“She is dressed like a bad girl, but she has good family. It shows. I remember her because she didn’t steal, and she paid for what this one, the bad one, took.”

“They were together? These two?”

“Late, near when I close.”

“Was this before or after the group next door left the building?”

“After, but not long. I know this because I thought I would not be troubled by this one again, but she came back. I tell her get out, and she gives me the rude finger. But the other girl pays, and she says, ‘Sorry,’ in our language. This is polite, it is respectful. I remember her. She is dead?”

“Yes, they both are.”

“She has good family?”

The polite girl, the good family, made a difference to him, Eve noted. And used it.

“Yes, she does. Good parents, a brother and a sister who looked for her, and hoped, all these years, to find her. She made a mistake, Mr. Pak, and shouldn’t have died for it. Was anyone with them?”

“I can’t say. I only remember they come in, before I close. I remember because this one gives me so much trouble, and this one is Korean, and is respectful.”

“Did they talk to each other? Do you remember anything they said, if they were meeting anyone, going somewhere?”

“Girls chattering is like birds.” He fluttered his fingers at his ears. “You hear only the notes.”

“Okay, how about the others? Did they come in here?”

“I can’t say,” he repeated. “They come in, go out. These two only I remember.”

“This one.” She tapped a finger on Shelby’s picture. “Who else did she come in with? Who did you see her hanging with?”

“Most times with little black girl, big”—he held out his hands to indicate a hefty build—“white girl. Skinny boy, too, brown boy. The black girl sings with a voice like . . .” He struggled, called out something in Korean to his now sulky counter boy.

“Angels.”

“Yes, like angels. But she steals. They all steal. Are they all dead?”

“I don’t know. Thanks for your help.”

“You’ll do what you said. More cop?”

“Yeah, I’ll do what I said.”

She walked out, strode over to the building, bypassed the police seal.

He’d connected two of the vics, the first two found together. Killed together? she speculated. One had been a resident, one hadn’t. One a girl of good family, the other from an abusive home who’d churned her way through the system.

But they’d been together before they died, and right next door to where they’d been hidden away.

She stepped inside. Just stood.

Linh hooks up with Shelby after The Sanctuary moves out. A runaway, looking for some excitement before she goes home, a street kid who knows where to find the excitement. And the two of them end up all the way back here.

Because the building was empty, Eve thought.

Street girl says to runaway: I’ve got a place you can flop. We can hang, we can party.

Easy enough to get in. Maybe street girl had keys or passcodes, or a way she’d found before to sneak in and out.

Maybe Shelby’s looking to score, Eve mused. Looking to barter the old bj for something good. Maybe Linh’s just a mark to her—a mark with money—or maybe not. Eve doubted either one of them lived long enough to decide.

Was the killer already here, or did he come in after? Was it a meet or just bad luck?

He had to know Shelby, at least, would come back. So he watched, waited. Arranged?

Were they the first? DeWinter’s magic might not be powerful enough for them to ever know which of the twelve died first, or last.

She heard the door behind her, turned, and pulled it open so an off-balance Peabody stumbled inside.

“Whoops. Hey.” Cheeks pink from the hike from the subway, Peabody held out a takeout sack. “Got you half a spicy turkey sub. I had the other half, and it’s pretty good. Hey, what happened?”

“About what?”

“About the bruise on your face.”

“Oh, that. Little tussle with a rabidly enthusiastic private security skirt. I won.”

“Congrats. I’ve got a med pack in my field kit.”

“It’s nothing.”

“Well, I’ve got it if you want it. You got a drink. Good, ’cause I forgot that, and they’re not lying about the spicy.”

“Thanks. Did you get anything else?”

“You wanted chips or something? Oh, oh, the notifications and interviews. Not a lot. First the aunt—LaRue Freeman.”

Peabody took out her notebook.

“I don’t think she knows anything. The kid didn’t live with her, but she filed the report when she found out—from her sister’s neighbor—the kid had run away again. Mostly she just sounded tired and resigned.”

“All right. I didn’t expect much there.”

“Carlie Bowen,” Peabody continued. “The sister was a little shaken, but it felt like she’d already resigned herself she wasn’t seeing Carlie alive again. They were tight, them-against-the-world kind of thing. She knew when Carlie poofed, something happened to her. The vic didn’t really have friends, couldn’t have anyone over, was embarrassed to hang when she’d have bruises or a busted lip half the time since she was in and out between foster and the home. She stayed with the sister every chance she got. Went to school, went to church, kept her head down.”