Imitation in Death (In Death #17)(3)

Hot enough for ya? I know you've had a busy summer, and I've been admiring your work. I can think of no one on the police force of our fair city I'd rather have join me on what I hope will be a very intimate level.

Here is a sample of my work. What do you think? Looking forward to our continued association.

-----Jack

"I'll tell you what I think, Jack. I think you're a very sick f**k. Tag and bag," she ordered with a last glance down the alley. "Homicide."

Wooton's apartment was on the fourth floor of one of the housing structures thrown up as a temporary shelter for refugees and victim- of the Urban Wars. A number of them stood in the poorer, sections of the city, and were always slated for replacement.

The city dickered back and forth between tossing out the low-rent.. IC's, chemi-heads, and dealers along with the working poor and mowing down the shaky structures or revitalizing.

While they dickered, the buildings''decayed and nothing was done.

Eve expected nothing would be done until the dumps collapsed inward on their residents and the city fathers found themselves in the throes of a -class-action suit.

But until that time, it was the sort of place you expected to find a down-on-her-luck whore.

Her room was a hot little box with a stingy bump-out for a kitchen and a thin sliver for a bathroom. Her view was the wall of the identical building to the west.

Through the thin walls Eve could clearly hear the heroic snoring from the apartment next door.

Despite the circumstance, Jacie had kept her place clean, and had made some attempt at style. The furniture was cheap, but it was colorful. She hadn't been able to afford privacy screens, but there were frilly curtains at the windows. She'd left the bed pulled out of the convertible sofa, but it was made, and the sheets were good cotton. Possibly salvaged from better times, Eve thought.

She had a low-end desk 'link on a table, and a prefab dresser covered with the various tools of her trade: enhancements, scents, wigs, tawdry jewelry, temporary tattoos. The drawer and closet held work clothes primarily, but mixed in with the whore-wear were a couple of more conservative outfits Eve imagined she'd used for off-hours.

She found a supply of over-the-counter meds, including a half bottle of Sober-Up and a full, unopened bottle as backup. Which made sense with the two bottles of vodka and the bottle of home-brew in the kitchen.

She turned up no illegals, which caused her to assume Jacie had switched from chemicals to alcohol.

She opened the desk 'link and replayed the transmissions received and sent over the last three days. One to her counselor to request an upgrade in her license, one received and not answered or yet returned from the landlord regarding overdue rent, another made to an uptown body sculptor requesting rates.

No chats with pals, Eve mused.

She scrolled through, located the financials, and found Jacie's bookkeeping spare and efficient. Paid attention to her money,

Eve mused, did the job, banked the pay, and pumped most of it back into the business. Expenses were high for wardrobe, body treatments, hair and face work.

Used to looking good, Eve decided. Wanted to keep looking good. Self-esteem wrapped, around appearance, which was wrapped around sexual appeal, which was wrapped around selling yourself for enough money to maintain appearance.

A strange and sad cycle, in her opinion.

"She made a nice nest for herself in a very ugly. tree," Eve commented. "I've got no transmissions or any correspondence from anyone named Jack, or any one guy in particular for that matter. No marriage or cohabitation on record?"

"No, sir."

"We'll talk to her counselor, see if there's anybody she was close to, or had been close to. But I don't think we'll find him there."

"Dallas, it seems to me, what he did to her... it seems to me that it. was personal."

"Does, doesn't it?" She turned around, looked at the room again. Neat, girlie, with a desperate attempt at style. "I think it was very personal, but not specific to the victim. He killed a woman, and a woman who made her living from selling her body. That's the personal part. You not only kill her, but you hack :out the part of her that made that living. It's not hard to find a street LC in this area any tune of the night. You just have to choose your time and place. A sample of his work," she murmured. "That's all she was."

She walked to the window and, narrowing her eyes, visualized the street, the alley, the building just out of view. "He might have known her, or have seek her. Just as possible it was chance. But he was ready if chance presented itself. He had the weapon, he had the note written and sealed, and something---a case, a bag, a satchel, something to carry fresh clothes, or to store whatever he was wearing: He'd've been covered with her blood.

"She goes in the alley with him," Eve continued. "It's hot, it's late, business can't be very good. But here's a job, maybe one last job before she heads home. She's experienced, been in the life for two decades, but she doesn't make him as trouble. Maybe she's been drinking, or maybe he looked okay. And there's the fact that she's not used to street work, wouldn't have the instincts for it."

Too accustomed to the high life, Eve thought, to the sexual kinks of the wealthy and discreet. Coming down to Chinatown must've been like landing on Venus for her.

"She's up against the wall." Eve could see it, see it perfectly. The dark, spiked hair shimmering with silver, the come-on-big- boy red of the halter. "And she's thinking she needs the fee, to make the rent, or she hopes he hurries because her feet hurt Jesus, they had to be killing her in those shoes. She's tined, but she'll take one more mark before she calls it a night.