Creation in Death (In Death #25)(59)

“Or figured out how to use it, if your assimilation indicated it had merit.”

“Yes. If it has merit, I will use it. You know that if you know me.”

“I know that, yes.” He turned away, walked to her windows.

“There was a time I wouldn’t have had anyone to consult on a decision. There was a time,” she continued, “I wouldn’t have considered it necessary to take anyone’s thoughts or feelings into account in any decision I made. That’s not true anymore. When I’d thought it through, when I’d come up with ideas or options, I would have told you. I wouldn’t have moved forward without telling you.”

True enough, he told himself as he mastered his own fury and fear. That was all true enough, for both of them. And small, hard comfort.

“Still, you’ll move forward, if you believe you must, regardless of my thoughts and feelings.”

“Yes.”

He turned back. “I probably wouldn’t love you so much it all but chokes me if you were otherwise.”

She let out a breath. “I probably wouldn’t love you, et cetera, et cetera, if you didn’t understand I can’t be otherwise.”

“Well, then.”

“I’m sorry. I know it’s hard for you.”

“You do.” He crossed back. “Aye, you do, but you don’t understand the whole of it. How could you? Why should you?” He touched her cheek. “I wouldn’t have been so angry if it hadn’t taken me so bloody long to realize it wasn’t about me, but about you.”

“Not everything’s about you, ace.”

He smiled, as she’d meant him to, but his eyes stayed intense. “We’ll talk through, thoroughly, any plans you make to try to use this angle. To use yourself as bait.”

“Yes. My word on that.”

“All right, then. We need to go to bed. I’ll have my way on that, Lieutenant. It’s nearly two in the morning, and you’ll want to be up around five, I’d guess.”

“Yeah, okay. We’ll catch some sleep.”

She walked with him, but couldn’t stop the ball he’d launched from bouncing around in her mind. “It was shuffling around in my head,” she began. “The idea of me being a target. A lot of information and supposition was shuffling around in my head.”

“As I’ve marched along with you on this one for the past two days and three nights, I have a good understanding of how much is crowded in your head on this.”

“Yeah, but see—God, I’m becoming a woman even before the words come out of my mouth.”

“Please, you must be stopped.”

“I’m serious.” Mildly embarrassed by it, she shoved her hands in her pockets. “The way women just nibble and gnaw at something, just can’t let it alone. Any minute I’m going to start wondering which color lip dye works best with my complexion. Or my shoes.”

He laughed, shook his head. “I think we’re safe from that.”

“If I ever start going that way, put me down. Okay?”

“My pleasure.”

“But what I have to say, which is annoying, is that I don’t even know if it’s a viable angle. I’m not going to drop over to some guy’s house to plan a party for him or teach him the samba.”

“You often go to strangers’ houses to interview them or take statements.”

“Okay, yeah.” She pushed at her hair as they entered the bedroom. “But I’m rarely solo, and I’m logged, and Jesus, Roarke, I’m a cop. It wouldn’t be a snap for some old guy to get the drop on me.”

“Which makes you quite the challenge. That would be an added appeal.”

“And that’s shuffling around, too. But—”

“He might have targeted you instead of Ariel Greenfeld. If you’ve been in his sights the last few days—weeks, come to that—it could’ve been you he took today.”

“No, it couldn’t.” And this, she realized as she undressed, was why she was gnawing at this. He had to see, accept, and relax. “Think about it. I’ve barely had an hour alone in my own office since Friday night. Outside this house or Central, I’ve been with you or Peabody. Maybe you think he can get the drop on me, but is he going to get the drop on both of us, or on two cops?”

He stopped, studied her. The clenched fist in his gut relaxed fractionally. “You have a point. But you’re considering changing that.”

“Considering. If we go that route, and that’s still a major if, I’ll be wired, I’ll be protected. I’ll be armed.”

“I want a homing beacon on your vehicle.”

“There will be.”

“No, I want one on before we leave the grounds in the morning. I’ll see to it.”

Give and take, she reminded herself. Even when—maybe especially when—give and take was a pain in the ass. “Okay. But there go my plans to slip off and meet Pablo the pool boy for an hour of hot, sticky sex.”

“We all have to make sacrifices. Myself, I’ve had to reschedule my liaison with Vivien the French maid three times in the last couple of days.”

“Blows,” Eve said as they slipped into bed.

“She certainly does.”