Kindred in Death (In Death #29)(101)

“Excuse me. Is there any way I might help you?”

Eve looked at the sober face of the woman who stepped toward her.

“Security detail for the MacMasters family.” Eve pulled out her badge.

“Of course.” The woman consulted a mini e-board. “The MacMasters memorial service will be held in Suite two hundred. That’s the second floor. Would you like me to escort you?”

“I think we can find the second floor.”

“Of course.” Sarcasm slid off her well-oiled composure, as her eyes, her voice, continued to radiate an oddly efficient sympathy. “Nicholas Cates is managing that program. I’ll notify him of your arrival. Is there anything else I might help you with today?”

“No.”

Eve stepped into the elevator, called for the second floor.

“She was just creepy,” Peabody decided. “I know she’s supposed to be comforting or reassuring, but creepy is what she is with that whispering-in-the-graveyard voice. So’s this whole place creepy. It’s like the upscale death hotel.”

Considering, Eve pursed her lips. “I was thinking it’s more like an exclusive spa of death. They give corpses manicures in the basement.”

“Eeww.”

“Don’t say ‘eeww.’ It’s wussy.”

“Places like this make me feel wussy, especially now that I’m picturing some chatty death tech painting a DB’s fingernails.”

“Maybe Trina should work here.”

They stepped off into another wide corridor, with more rivers of marble, more elaborate banks of flowers. As they walked, Eve glanced into open doorways to see respectfully black-suited staff already setting up for services.

More flowers, she noted, wall screens activated to do test runs of vids or photos the family of the dead chose.

“Lieutenant Dallas.” A man with golden hair and an angelic face hurried toward her. He boasted the male version of the whispering-in-the-graveyard voice Peabody had coined. “I’m Nicholas Cates. My supervisor told me to expect you. I’m sorry I wasn’t downstairs to greet you. What can I do to help?”

“You can cancel the other services and viewings this morning, and keep everyone not directly connected to the MacMasters memorial off this floor.”

He smiled, sadly. “I’m afraid that’s just not possible.”

“So I’m told.”

“While we want to cooperate to the best of our ability, there are others, the departed and their loved ones, who must be considered.”

“Right. You’ve verified your internal security, and all staff members on site?”

“Of course. Everyone’s accounted for. We’ve accommodated your electronics teams. They’ll have use of my offices for the day.”

She moved past him, into the main room of the suite. As with the others, preparations had begun. She ignored the flowers, the laughing young face of the dead on the wall screen, in images on easels, the glossy white coffin draped in pink and purple flowers—bold blossoms on ice.

She checked the terraces, the parlors, the stairways, the restrooms, and the small meditation room across the corridor.

All exits would be covered by electronic eyes and warm bodies. She and Peabody had completed runs of every staff member, and secondary runs on every staff member assigned to duty that day. She would have plainclothes officers, including herself, mingling with the mourners. And all of them would be wired.

Every cop under her command had been briefed and rebriefed on operation procedure.

Nothing to do, she thought, but to do it.

20

THIRTY MINUTES BEFORE THE MEMORIAL, THE team in place, Eve watched the MacMasterses and a small group of others file off the elevator. She moved aside as Cates led them toward the suite for their private viewing.

But Carol MacMasters shook off her husband’s supporting arm and whirled on her.

“Why are you here?” she demanded. “Why aren’t you out there doing your job? Do you think we want you here, want your condolences? My baby is dead, and the monster who killed her is still out there. What good are you to us? What good are you?”

“Carol, stop. Stop now.”

“I won’t stop. I’ll never stop. It’s just another case to you, isn’t it? Just another file. What good are you? It’s all over the media that you have nothing. Nothing. What good are you?”

As she began to weep, the older man beside her pulled her to him. “Come on now, Carol, come on now. You need to sit down, you need to come with me.”

When he led her away, the others followed while MacMasters looked helplessly after them. “I apologize, Lieutenant.”

“Don’t.”

“She wouldn’t take a soother. She wouldn’t take anything to help her get through. I didn’t know she’d been watching the media reports until it was too late to stop her, and she’s too . . . too upset to understand. It’s partially my fault. In trying to comfort her I told her you’d have him before today. I know better. I hoped you would, but I . . .” He shook his head, turned into the room.

A moment later, Cates closed the double doors. Carol’s weeping battered against them like fists.

“She was wrong, Dallas,” Peabody said. “She was unfair.”

“Wrong maybe. Unfair’s a different thing.”