Origin in Death (In Death #21)(89)

He leaned over, kissed the top of her head.

"They've got a place to go already. Got a place to run already set up. Deena would have that nailed down. I could probably find it, sooner or later."

"Given enough time, I imagine so." Now he stroked her hair. "Is that what you want?"

"No." She reached back to take his hand. "Once they get sprung, I don't want to know where they are. Then I don't have to lie about it. I've got to get back to this."

He turned her, kissed her. "Let me know if you need me."

She worked them. Took them as a group, separated them. She tag-teamed them with Peabody. She let them sit alone, then hit them once more.

She was going by the book, right down the line. No one studying the record of the interview could claim it wasn't thorough or correct.

They never demanded a lawyer, not even when she fit them with homing bracelets. When she took them back to the Icove residence in the early hours of the morning, they showed considerable fatigue, but that same unruffled calm.

"Peabody, wait for the droids, will you? Get that set up." She left her partner in the foyer, moved the three women into the living area.

"You're not permitted to leave the premises. If you attempt to do so, your bracelets will send out a signal, and you'll be picked up and-due to the violation-brought into Central holding. Believe me, you'll be more comfortable here."

"How long do we have to stay?"

"Until such time as you're released from this restriction by the NYPSD or another authority." She glanced back to make certain Peabody was out of earshot, and still kept her voice low. "The record's off. Tell me where Deena is. If she kills again, it's not going to help anyone. You want this stopped, and I can help stop it. You want this public, and I've got a line on that."

"Your superiors, and any government authority that gets involved, won't want this public."

"I'm telling you I've got a line on it, but you're squeezing me. They'll block me out. They'll block me and my team and the department out. They'll scoop you up like hamsters, you and anyone else like you they can find, and put you in a f**king habitrail so they can study you. You'll be back to where you started."

"Why would you care what happens to us? We've killed."

So had she, Eve thought. To save herself, to escape the life someone else planned for her. To live her own.

"And you could've gotten out of this without taking lives. You could've gotten your kids and poofed. But you chose this way."

"It wasn't revenge." The one who spoke closed those strange and lovely lavender eyes. "It was liberty. For us, for our children, for all the others."

"They would never have stopped. They'd have made us again, replicated the children."

"I know. It's not my job to say whether or not you were justified, and I'm already going outside the lines. If you won't give me Deena, find a way to contact her. Tell her to stop, tell her to run. You're going to get most of what you're after. You've got my word."

"What of all the others, the students, the babies?"

Eve's eyes went flat and blank. "I can't save them all. Neither can you. But you can save more if you tell me where she is. If you tell me where the Icoves have their base of operations."

"We don't know. But..." The one who spoke looked at her twins, waited for their nod. "We'll find a way to contact her, and do what we can."

"You don't have much time," Eve told them, and left them alone.

Outside, the air was cold on her face, her hands. It made her think of winter, the long, dark months coming.

"I'll drive you home."

Peabody's tired face brightened. "Really? All the way downtown:"

"I need to think anyway."

"Think all you want." Peabody climbed into the car. "Gotta get ahold of my parents in the morning. Let them know we'll be delayed if we make it out there at all."

"When were you going?"

"Tomorrow afternoon." Peabody yawned, enormously. "Maybe beat the most insane of the holiday shuttle traffic."

"Go."

"Go where?"

"Go as planned."

Peabody stopped rubbing her exhausted eyes to blink. "Dallas, I can't just take off to go eat pie at this point of the investigation."

"I'm telling you that you can." Traffic was blissfully light. She avoided Broadway and its endless party, and drove through the canyons of her city nearly as alone as a lunar tech on the far side of the moon. "You've got plans, you're entitled to keep them. I'm stalling this," she said when Peabody opened her mouth again.

Peabody shut it, smiled smugly. "Yeah, I know. Just wanted you to say it. How much time you figure we can buy?"

"Not that much. But my partner's off with her face in the family pie. I got Roarke's relations zeroing in on us. People start scattering with turkey on the brain, they're harder to get in touch with, get balls rolling."

"Most federal offices are closed tomorrow, and through to Monday. Tibble knew that."

"Yeah. So maybe it slows things another few hours, maybe another day if God is good. He wants the same thing, so he'll make noises, but he'll stall, too."