Kindred in Death (In Death #29)(84)

“The wrong guy,” Peabody offered. “Like Trueheart said.”

“Yeah, a really wrong guy. And if he tells the kid how his mother was lost, murdered, because the cops screwed with her, why wouldn’t he believe it?”

“Because they didn’t?”

“That doesn’t matter. The kid’s already predisposed to believe it. He’s lived his whole life believing it, and wanting to even the score. He’s lived his whole life targeting marks, taking what he wants, living on the other side. And liking it. Planning out the ultimate con. Pauley let the woman take the fall for him, but that’s not what the kid hears. Pauley covered his ass on the night she was killed, but that’s not what the kid hears. When you keep hearing the same thing from the person who has the power—and Pauley had the power for years—you believe.”

Her father had held the power, Eve thought. He’d told her she was nothing, told her the police would put her in a dark hole and leave her there to rot. And for a long time, she’d believed him to the extent she was as terrified of the police, of anyone in the system as she was of the man who beat and raped her.

“Dallas?”

“It’s classic,” Eve concluded. “If you want to create something, someone, to obey, to believe, to become, you repeat, repeat. Punish or reward, that depends on your style, but you drill the message home. They killed your mother. They’re to blame. They need to pay.”

It struck like a hammer in the gut. “They, not he. It has to be they. The system, everyone who had a part in it. It’s the system he hates. Oh, goddamn it. We need a run, now, on every official connected to Irene Schultz’s arrest and incarceration. Her lawyer, the APA, the judge, the warden, the CS rep who removed the kid, the head of CS at the time, the foster home. We need whereabouts, family, family whereabouts.”

Peabody’s dark eyes went huge. “He’s going after someone else.”

“One cop isn’t enough.” Eve launched herself at her unit, ordered an immediate run. “He started it, but others are complicit. It’s their fault his mother went away, their fault she was murdered. Took her away from him, so he’s going to take something away from them. Frisco, the other cop, he went down. He’s out of play. Can’t punish the dead, can’t make the dead suffer.”

Peabody, already working it on her PPC, nodded. “Her lawyer’s still in the city, a partner in a law firm downtown. Divorced, one child. Male, age fifteen.”

“We inform, and get them covered. The APA’s in Denver now, married, two minor children. We contact, inform, inform local authorities.”

As she started down the line, her desk ’link signaled. She glanced, impatient, at the readout. Then her stomach sank.

“Dallas.”

Dispatch, Dallas, Lieutenant Eve.

Too late, Eve thought as she pulled up outside the SoHo loft. I’m too late. With Peabody she walked past the officers outside the building, and into the elevator.

“We’ll want all security, want to knock on all the doors. Contact Morris.”

“Already done. Dallas, I informed Whitney. He’s moved your media conference to sixteen hundred, and will keep a lid on this as long as possible.”

Eve stepped out of the elevator, into the living area. Upmarket, she thought. Wealthy bohemian. “Who owns it?”

“Delongi, Eric, and Stuben, Samuel. Mid-divorce. The loft is on the market, and currently untenanted.”

“Lieutenant.” One of the officers stepped to her. “No visible sign of break-in, no visible sign of struggle or theft. She’s in the bedroom. A real estate agent found her. He was showing the apartment to a couple of clients. My partner’s got them in the second bedroom.”

“Keep them sequestered. We’ll work the scene first.” She stopped at the kitchen, studied the single go-cup of coffee on the counter. “Was that here when you arrived?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Record and bag, Peabody.”

She moved on, stopped at the bedroom doorway.

Not a child this time, she thought as she studied the body. But young. Early twenties. Whose daughter was she?

“Victim is female,” she began for the record. “Early to mid-twenties. Privacy screens are engaged here, and throughout the living area.” She scanned the room. “There’s no sign of struggle. Victim appears to be fully dressed.”

With her hands and feet sealed, Eve entered to examine the body. “Ligature marks on ankles, facial bruising, bruising around the neck consistent with manual strangulation. ME to confirm.”

She crouched, angled herself to see the victim’s wrists. She expected to see police restraints, as with Deena, but this victim’s wrists were bound with some sort of colorful cord.

“Cording around wrists, deviation from Deena MacMasters’s homicide. Get the ID, TOD, Peabody.”

Blood on the sheets, she noted, consistent with violent rape. She hadn’t been a virgin, not likely, but she’d suffered the same pain and terror.

“Bruising on thighs and around genital area. No underwear. She’ll have been sodomized, too, and smothered, repeatedly. It’s not a f**king copycat. Why did he use cord instead of cuffs?

“Not a cop’s kid,” she concluded. “The cuffs were another symbol. What’s the cord symbolize?”