Devoted in Death (In Death #41)(23)

“Stay that way. Peabody, with me.”

Eve swung on her coat as she headed to the glides and, remembering the vicious cold of the morning, pulled out the scarf Peabody had knitted her.

“The FBI are looking at Tennessee as the first,” she began. “I don’t buy that. It was too organized, too clean. Wouldn’t the first be sloppier, maybe even impulsive? How did they come to figure out killing – torturing and killing – was their deal?”

“Maybe somebody they knew the first time.” As they rode down, Peabody wound her mile-long scarf into some sort of complex and artistic looping knot around her neck. “Somebody they – or one of them anyway – was pissed at, or wanted something from.”

“More possible,” Eve agreed. “How did they team up? How long have they been together? And the first, add in possible defense or accident, another crime gone south. But somewhere in there, they found their romance.”

When they were close enough to keep it short, she switched from glide to elevator. “Are they from New York and coming home – or again one of them – or are they from out west, and looking for some fun in the big city? Not enough to see them yet. We don’t have enough to see them yet. But they’re not picking on the type of victim. It’s not just random, it also reads opportunity. The one prior to ours, a woman in her seventies, most likely taken from the parking lot of a small outdoor mall where she worked – out of range of the security cameras, then dumped two days later into a ravine six miles away. And we’ve got a twenty-year-old male who went missing from a rest-stop area in Pennsylvania, dumped two days later off the highway heading northeast.”

She got out, headed for her car. “Always a single vic, always alone, and what looks like opportunity rather than specific targets. The body dump some distance from kill zone, or most usually. Which means their hole is more likely Lower West than near the Mechanics Alley dump site.”

She got behind the wheel, backed out. “If Kuper hadn’t gotten out on Perry, if he’d had the cab take him all the way to the club, he’d probably be playing his cello and someone else would be dead.”

“They could still be heading north,” Peabody commented. “They’ve never hit anything as big or as urban as New York.”

“Exactly why it strikes as a destination.”

And look at them all, Eve thought as she drove. Millions of possible victims.

The LCs, the beggars, the unwary tourists, the executive hurrying to make a late meeting, his mind on business, the shopkeeper, shutting down for the night, the stripper heading home in the predawn dark.

Pick and choose, Eve thought, and the variety was endless.

She parked on Perry, thought about the neighborhood.

“Do me a favor. Contact Charles or Louise, they live pretty damn close, and Louise, especially, would come and go at odd hours and alone.” Doctors and cops, Eve thought, kept no hours. They kept all hours.

“I already did, after I saw the map.”

“Good thinking. The cab dropped him here. Perry and Greenwich. Three blocks to Christopher, and another block and a half on Christopher to the club. Somewhere on these four and a half blocks, they hit him.”

She began to walk, scanning, considering, trying to see it.

“He knows the area, comes down here a lot. It was cold, but clear. No wind to speak of, nothing spitting out of the sky. A nice frosty night for a brisk walk, clear out the opera, maybe, pull in the jazz.”

“It wouldn’t take more than five minutes to walk it,” Peabody pointed out.

“That’s all they needed.” She stopped. “Here. Look at that brownstone. Nobody cleared the snow off the walkway or the steps. All the privacy screens are down. What do you want to bet whoever lives there is away? Business trip, vacation.”

“Do you think they used this place? But like you said, the walk, the steps. If they took him in there, there’d be signs someone walked through the snow.”

“I don’t think they took him in there, I think they took him here. Park in front of this place. Yeah, other houses around, but no one directly. And it’s going on midnight, a cold, clear night in a settled neighborhood. I bet a lot of the lights were off in the neighboring houses. They have to take him fast, and quiet. Distract him with the female, the male moves in – that’s got to be it. Disable, restrain, transport. Let’s knock on doors.”

They tried the nearest neighbor, another dignified brownstone with a square of front courtyard that set it back from the sidewalk. They got the nanny, and after she electronically scanned their ID, eyeballed them herself, she admitted them as far as the front foyer.

“The kids are having their afternoon snack. If Justin knows there’s a cop around, he’ll get hyper. He loves cops vids and games. Is there a problem?”

“Nothing here. Just a few questions. The people next door? Are they away?”

“The Minnickers, yes.” The nanny, all five feet of her sniffed. “Don’t tell me somebody broke in there. They got enough security for the White House. Not what you call friendly people, either. Pretty snooty, not like my people. And that woman. She came over here getting all up in my face last summer because my little Rosie picked one of her flowers. It was coming right through the pickets, out to the sidewalk. What harm did it do for Rosie to have it? But what did my lady do, my lady has class. She had the florist take that woman a big arrangement. And didn’t even get a thanks for it. That’s what kind of people they are over there.”