Memory in Death (In Death #22)(99)

"No." And she felt it, even in the dream she knew was a dream, she felt the ache in her belly. "No,"

she said again, "it's different for you."

"But I can't get out."

"You will one day." She looked back through the glass, frowned. "Weren't there more presents a minute ago?"

"People steal." The child hooked the bloodied badge on her shirt. "People are just no damn good."

Eve woke with a hard jolt, the dream already fading. It was weird, she thought, to have dreams where you talked to yourself.

And the tree. She remembered the tree with the bodies draped like morbid tinsel. To comfort herself she turned, studied the tree in the window. She ran a hand over the sheet beside her, found it cool.

It didn't surprise her that Roarke was up before her, or that he'd been up long enough for the sheets to lose his warmth. But it did give her a shock to see that it was nearly eleven in the morning.

She started to roll out of her own side, and saw the blinking memo cube on the nightstand. She switched in on, heard his voice.

"Morning, darling Eve. I'm in the game room. Come play with me."

It made her smile. "Such a sap," she murmured.

She showered, dressed, grabbed coffee, then headed down. Proving, she decided, she was a sap, too.

He had the main screen engaged, and it gave her yet another jolt to see herself up there, in a pitched and bloody battle. Why she was wielding a sword instead of a blaster, she couldn't say.

He fought back-to-back with her, as he had, she remembered, in reality. And there was Peabody, wounded, but still game. But what the hell was her partner wearing?

More important, what was she wearing. It looked like some soft of leather deal more suited for S and M than swordplay.

Iced, she decided, when she lopped off her opponent's head. Moments later, Roarke dispatched his, and the comp announced he'd reached Level Eight.

"I'm good," she announced and crossed to him.

"You are. And so am I."

She nodded at the paused screen. "What's up with the outfits?"

"Feeney added costume options. I've had an entertaining hour fiddling with wardrobe as well as taking over most of Europe and North America. How'd you sleep?"

"Okay. Weird dream again. I can probably blame it on champagne, and the chocolate souffle I pigged out on at two in the morning."

"Why don't you stretch out here with me? This game's programmed for multiple players. You can try to invade my territories."

"Maybe later." She ran an absent hand over his hair. "I've got this dream on my brain. Sometimes they're supposed to mean stuff, right? There's something in there. I'm not asking the right question,"

she murmured. "What's the right question?"

Playtime, he decided, was over for now.

"Why don't we have a little brunch? You can talk it through."

"No, go ahead and play the game. I'm good with coffee."

"I slept in myself, didn't get up until about nine."

"Has anyone looked outside, checked to see if the world is still spinning on its axis?"

"At which time," he continued dryly, "I had a workout—I had souffle, too. Then, before I came down here to enjoy one of my gifts, I worked about an hour in my office."

She studied him over the rim of her cup. "You worked."

"I did."

"On Christmas morning."

"Guilty."

She lowered the cup, grinned hugely. "We're really sick people, aren't we?"

"I prefer thinking we're very healthy individuals who know what suits us best." He rose, lithe as a cat in black jeans and sweater. "And what would suit us, I believe, is something light, up in the solarium where we can lord it over the city while you talk through your latest weird dream."

"You know what I said last night?"

"Drunk or sober?"

"Either. I said I loved you. Still do."

They had fresh fruit at the top of the house, looking through the glass at a sky that decided to give New York a break and coast over it bright and blue.

She didn't argue with his notion that as it was Christmas they should have mimosas.

"You gave her—you, that is—your badge."

"I don't know why exactly. Mira'd probably have interpretations and all that shrink stuff. I guess it was what I wanted most. Or would, eventually, want most."

"The tree ornaments are easy enough."

"Yeah, even I can get that. They're dead, so they're mine. But Trudy wasn't up there."

"Because you haven't finished with her. You can't put her up with the others—I won't say 'aside'

because you never put them aside. You won't put her up until you've closed the case."

"This lawyer keeps showing up. She's not in it. I know she's not, but she's the one I talked to. Both times."

"She's the one you understand best, I'd say. She was up-front with you on her feelings toward Trudy, didn't quibble about them. And she fought back, eventually."

He offered her a raspberry. "She stood up, as you would."

"One of us. I knew it, or the kid did."