Divided in Death (In Death #18)(93)

"Look at the images, Peabody."

Peabody complied, and tapped the spoon gently on her teeth. "I see a resemblance, largely superficial, between the two images. Dallas, you put my image up there and do computer composites, you could make me look like Angelo. But don't, okay, 'cause I just ate."

"Still hung up on the variation of jawline and the ears?"

"If you tried to take this into court, they'd throw you out."

"Guess you're right. Computer, remove image two and replace with image three."

Peabody's brows knit when the split screen showed two images of Angelo. "I don't get it."

"Don't get what?"

"Why are you projecting two images of the same guy?"

"Am I? You sure they're the same guy? Maybe getting tossed around earlier's messed up my vision."

"You got Angelo up there side by side." Concerned, Peabody shifted to study Eve's face. "Look, if you don't want to go to the hospital, maybe you could call Louise. She'd make a house call for you."

"I don't want to bother the busy Dr. Dimatto. Let's just see what I... oh yeah, that's right. Here's what I meant to do. Computer, remove all replications from image three and display original."

Eve sat back with a very satisfied grin as Peabody dropped the spoon. "That's Bissel. That's Blair Bissel."

"It sure is, isn't it? You know, I'm thinking reports of his death have been largely exaggerated."

"I know you ran that theory, but I never thought you put real weight on it. The DNA, the prints, were Blair Bissel's. His own wife ID'd him."

"HSO training, several years on the job, even at a lower operative level, should give a guy the skills to doctor records, change his to his brother's. Add overkill, the blood, the gore, the fact that Ewing was shocked, and the fact that in all probability Carter Bissel had undergone some recent surgery to enhance his fairly strong family resemblance to his brother. Body weight was high for Blair's records, but not more than a lot of people lie about on official documents anyway. Nobody pays any attention to an extra ten or fifteen pounds."

"I skim ten off mine. I don't know why. It's a compulsion."

"We expect to see Blair Bissel, so we see him. Why should we question the identity of the victim?"

"But why would he go along with it? Carter? There wasn't any sign of force, no ligatures. How do you induce somebody to undergo surgery, change appearance?"

"Could've paid him. Money, sex-probably both. Let's screw with big brother and screw his girlfriend while we're at it. No love lost between the brothers."

"There's a wide gulf between no love lost and deliberately, coldly murdering your brother and your lover. If Kade was helping to set Carter up-"

"Then Blair planned to do her all along. Yeah, that's what I think. You want to fake your own death, do it in a big way. A vicious way that tosses the blood in your wife's face, at least initially, and gets rid of the monkey on your back and one of the people who knew you intimately enough to muck the deal. They'll say you were a cheat, a liar, a bastard. What do you care, you're dead."

"I have to think about this." Peabody pushed away from the desk to pace. "With this theory, Blair and Kade did a number on Carter outside the HSO directive."

"Maybe they started inside, probably did, but I figure they started coloring outside the lines at some point."

"As a solution for the blackmail."

"Partially. It's money, it's adventure, it's risk. All those fit their profiles. But they had bigger goals. Keep going."

"Crap. Blair was a liaison, doubling under HSO directive, as a liaison for Doomsday. Feeding them selected data for payment, and establishing himself as a source, a traitor, a free agent. Part of this cloak was his marriage to Reva Ewing, blueprinted by the HSO."

"Corporate espionage on one hand-a lucrative game, and with so much privatization of intel- and data-gathering sources over the last couple of decades, the HSO has to compete with civilian companies for revenue."

"Like Securecomp."

"Like that, and the dozens of others on and off planet they arranged for Blair to plant his listening posts. And think about this, Peabody. You always have to have a backup plan. You require plausible deniability. What contingency plan do you suppose the architects of this blueprint drew up in the event one of the sculptures was detected?"

Peabody stopped in front of the screens, studied the faces. "Blair Bissel, fall guy."

"You bet, and by association, Reva would fall with him and Securecomp is compromised. It could-and I think would-have been said that they'd worked together. After all, they were husband and wife."

"So they were building a frame after all."

"Contingencies. Blair'd been in the organization long enough for this to occur to him. And if not him, it occurred to Kade."

"So he took steps to protect himself?" Peabody shook her head. "Really big steps."

"Not only protection. Factor in the satisfaction of getting back at his blackmailing brother, Homeland-the people, the government who'd use and discard him if things went wrong. Then add a big shit-pile of money."

"From the technos? He makes a deal with them. Unauthorized information. Something big."