Obsession in Death (In Death #40)(18)

“Thanks.”

She had to think, so she closed herself in her office.

Routine first, she decided, and updated her murder board.

No suspects, no leads. No known connection between killer and victim – except for herself. No known motive – except for herself.

No known connection between herself and the killer, but there would be one. Even if that connection was only in the killer’s mind.

Clean, efficient kill. Emotionless, except for the written message. There was the emotion, the need. That communication.

Romanticized, Peabody had said. Romanticized didn’t necessarily mean romance – like sex, like the physical. Idealized.

And that took her back to the book, the vid.

She turned to her ’link to contact Nadine.

“I swore I wouldn’t do this!” Nadine’s usually camera-ready streaky blond hair blew free in a breeze. Fancy sunshades hid her eyes, green as a cat’s.

Eve saw the flash of sun off water, heard the lap of waves, the jingle of music and laughter.

She could all but smell the sunscreen and coconut.

“Where the hell are you?”

“I’m on the beach, on the lovely island of Nevis, where I took a gorgeous piece of eye candy entirely too young for me to ring in the new. Just got here this morning, and I swore I wouldn’t pick up my ’link, my comp, my anything but this lovely and refreshing mai tai. Several of these lovely and refreshing mai tais.”

“You’re on vacation.”

“I’m taking seven incredible days to do nothing but sit, have sex, drink many tropical drinks. It’s cold there, isn’t it? Cold and crowded and noisy. And here I am with warm island breezes, white sand, and my mai tai. But enough bragging – until I begin again. What’s going on?”

“It can wait.”

“Oh, no you don’t.” With a laugh, Nadine turned, smiled a sultry smile. “Bruno, darling, would you get me another?”

“Bruno? Seriously?”

“He’s built like a god, is a Viking in bed, and – not that it would matter considering those two attributes – can actually hold interesting and intelligent conversations. He’s twenty-eight, or will be next month. I’ve robbed the cradle, and I’m going to enjoy it while it lasts. Now, what’s up?”

“Leanore Bastwick.”

“The ice queen of criminal defense attorneys,” Nadine began, then her eyebrows shot up. “Whoa. Dead?”

“As in doornail. Whatever the hell that is.”

“That’s a story – but the team can handle it. I’m having sex with Bruno. Very shortly now.” But she tipped down her gold-tinted sunshades, and her eyes were foxy and keen behind them. “You’re primary.”

“Yeah. The killer left a message. For me.”

“You?” Now Nadine straightened, pulled off the sunshades, and the smug smile vanished. “A threat?”

“No. This is off the record, Nadine, we’re keeping the lid on it as long as we —”

“Shut up. ‘Off the record’ is enough. What sort of message?”

“What you could call fan mail, indicated he or she killed Bastwick because Bastwick wasn’t nice to me.”

“When was the last time you and Bastwick went a round? How was she killed? What exactly did this message say? When —”

“Nadine, throttle it back. I’m tagging you to work the angle of crazy person who’s got an obsession through the Icove stuff. The book, the vid. You get correspondence.”

“Sure, on both, and a lot of it.”

“We’re going to want to cross-reference yours with mine, see if we can pinpoint someone who’s contacted, or tried to contact, us both, who rings a bell for Mira. If you clear somebody who works for you to give us copies, we’ll work that. Just don’t tell them why.”

“Done. I want to see the message. Off the damn record, Dallas. I want to see it because it might ring for me. If there’s a connection, what it says, how it says it might set off a bell.”

It might, Eve considered. And when it was off the record Nadine was a vault. “All right. I’ll send it to you. Don’t share it with Bruno.”

“I’ll be sharing other things with Bruno. I’ll get you the correspondence, you get me the message. And Dallas, watch your back.”

“I intend to.”

She started to dive right back in, but heard footsteps. Male, she concluded, brisk. Resigned, she swiveled to face the door. “Yeah, what?” she said in answer to the knock.

Kyung, media liaison, opened the door. “Lieutenant, I’m sorry to interrupt.”

“Had to happen.”

“It did.” He stepped in, a tall, attractive man in a perfectly cut slate-gray suit. After one dubious glance at her visitor’s chair, he eased a hip onto the corner of her desk. “Commander Whitney filled me in.”

“Okay.”

“I’ll also be speaking with Dr. Mira, in the event there’s anything we should be handling from the psychological or profiling end for public consumption. And I’ve just spoken with Detective Peabody.”

“Okay again.” He wasn’t an *, she reminded herself. “I expected to have some tags from reporters, but I’m clear there so far.”