Kindred in Death (In Death #29)(102)

“But—”

“Focus on why we’re here.” She walked away from the door and the sound of weeping. “Feeney? Eyes on?”

“Eyes on,” he said through her earpiece. “Peabody’s right, you’re wrong. That’s all on that. Your man’s coming in. Whitney and his missus, the commissioner, some brass from Illegals. We’re getting deliveries, north side, pretty regular. Flowers, messengers, what I take are blowups of dead people. Couple stiffs carted into the basement.”

“Copy that. Keep me updated.” She waited until the elevator opened. “Commissioner Tibble, Commander, Mrs. Whitney. The MacMasterses are inside the suite for the family viewing.”

“We’ll wait.” Dark eyes hard, Tibble nodded. “Anything to report?”

“Not at this time, sir.”

“I hope your strategy justifies the beating we’re taking in the media.” He looked toward the closed doors. “And results in some closure for the captain and his wife.”

“We’ll take him if he shows, Commissioner, and I believe he will. Alternate plans are being formulated to apprehend him tomorrow if—”

“I don’t want to hear about alternate plans, Lieutenant. Your suspect is in custody this afternoon or the sketch is released.”

He turned and walked to the window at the end of the corridor.

“Your plan to make the investigation appear stalled has worked better than we could have anticipated,” Whitney told her. “We’re under a lot of pressure, Lieutenant.”

“Understood, sir.”

Whitney and his wife stepped away to speak to other arrivals.

“That’s not—”

Eve cut Peabody’s mutter off with a look. “Don’t say it’s unfair. I’m primary. I take the knock if there’s a knock coming. Check in with the rest of the team. We’re going to start filling up out here soon. I didn’t expect you to make it for this,” she said to Roarke.

“I adjusted a few things.” He glanced toward her commander, and the city’s top cop. “I’m glad I did, and might have some part in helping you finish this.”

“He’ll show. The probabilities say it, Mira says it, my gut says it. He’ll show, and we’ll box him in, take him down. Then while the department takes a short round of applause from the media god, I’ll have him in my box. And then . . .”

She stopped, took a couple of quiet breaths. “Okay. Okay. I’m a little pissed off.”

Roarke trailed a hand down her arm. “It looks good on you.”

“No room for that. No room. One set of prints on the playbill, no match in any database. We get him, we’ll match them, but it doesn’t help us get him.” She jammed her hands into the pockets of her black jacket. “Nadine and her amazing research team haven’t hit on any likelies on the security system clients.”

“I’ve got some ideas there I’m still working,” Roarke told her.

“Time’s running. It needs to be today.” She spotted Cates coming out of the adjoining parlor to speak to Whitney and his wife, then lead them, along with Tibble, inside.

“We’re green,” she announced.

She’d expected a large crowd—a lot of cops stopping to pay respects, and neighbors, Deena’s school friends, their families. But there were more than she’d anticipated.

She saw Jo Jennings and her family, the neighbor she’d spoken to on the morning of Deena’s murder. She saw cops she recognized, and many more she didn’t, but simply made as cops. Young, old, all in between. Dozens of teenagers mingled among the dress blues, the soft clothes.

More than one burst into tears and had to be led away while images of Deena played over the wall screen. Eve exchanged a look with Nadine across the room, but kept her distance.

She circled the room, again and again, studying faces, builds from different angles.

“Got another group approaching the main entrance,” Feeney said in her ear. “Eight—no nine—mixed male, female, age range about sixteen to eighteen. Hold on, hold on, another one’s moving in with them. Male, ball cap, shades, dark hair, right build. It’s . . . No, it’s not him.”

Whitney moved up beside her. “Students from Deena’s school were given permission to attend.” He answered Eve’s frustrated look with one of his own. “Jonah wasn’t aware Carol had arranged for it.”

“He hasn’t come in any of the entrances. We’d have made him. We’re only into the first hour.”

She watched Mira come in, then make her way through the crowd toward the grieving parents.

Too many cops, she thought, too many kids. She tracked staff as they offered little cups of water, thimble-sized cups of coffee or tea, or brought in yet more flowers.

The air in the room was overripe, a garden of grief.

People spilled onto the terrace, into both parlors, and their voices ebbed and flowed into a sea of sound. Through it she listened to team members report status through her earbud.

She started toward the terrace as much for some air as to do another sweep.

As she reached the doorway a crash had her whirling around. Screams, shouts exploded as the sea of sound became a sea of panic. She pushed, shoved her way through, shouting for status, status, and yanked out her communicator. In front of her, people went down in an avalanche of flailing bodies. A shove from behind pitched her violently forward, slam ming her down to her hands and knees. The communicator shot out of her fingers on impact, crunched under stampeding feet as she swore.