Origin in Death (In Death #21)(92)

"NYPSD. We never sleep."

"Neither do the defenders of the Fourth Estate, apparently. Did you catch my interview with Avril Icove today?"

"No, heard about it."

"Exclusive."

"What did you think of her?"

"Quiet, dignified elegance. Lovely in grief. A devoted mother. I liked her. Couldn't get much going on her personally as she insisted this interview deal with her father-in-law and husband, out of respect. But I'll dig down the next layers. I've got a three-part deal."

The last two of which she would never collect, Eve thought. But there would be compensation. Big-time.

She ran a scanner over Nadine. "Believe it or not, I did all that to protect you as much as me. I'm about to break Code Blue."

"Icove."

"You're going to want to sit while I outline my conditions- nonnegotiable. First, we never had this conversation. You're going to go home and get rid of the 'link you used to take my transmission. You never received the transmission."

"I know how to protect myself and a source."

"Just listen. You've already done extensive research on the Icoves- and connected them, independently, to Jonah Wilson and Eva Hannson Samuels, and from there to Brookhollow. Your police sources would not confirm or deny any of your research. You're going to make a trip to Brookhollow. You'll need that on your logs. You're going to connect the murder of Evelyn Samuels to those of the Icoves."

Nadine started scribbling. "That's the Academy's president. When was she murdered?"

"Find out. You're going to be curious and smart enough to run ID checks on the students and cross them with same on former students. In fact, you've already done that." Eve drew a sealed disc out of her pocket. "Get this in your log. Get your prints, only your prints on the disc."

"What's on it?"

"More than fifty student IDs that match-exactly match-former students' IDs. Falsified data. Make another copy, put it wherever you put data you want to protect from confiscation."

"What were the Icoves doing that required falsifying data on students?"

"Cloning them."

Nadine broke the tip of her pencil as her head snapped up. "You're serious."

"Since the Urban Wars."

"Sweet little Baby Jesus. Tell me you have proof."

"I not only have proof, I have three clones known as Avril Icove under house restriction."

Nadine goggled. "Well, f**k me sideways."

"I've had a long day, I'm too tired for sex games. Start writing, Nadine. When we're finished you go home, you make an electronic trail that'll verify you found this information. You burn those notes and make new ones. Get to Brookhollow and dig. You can contact me, and probably should, demanding confirmation or denial. I'll give you neither, and that's on record. I'll go to my superiors with the fact that you're sniffing this out. I have to. So sniff fast."

"I've already done a lot of the legwork, put some of this together. I didn't jump this far. I figured gene manipulation, designer babies, black-market fees."

"That's in there, too. Get it all. I've got a day, maybe a few hours more, before the whistle's blown and the government steps in. They'll cover it. Spin what they can't bury. So get it all, get it fast. I'm going to give you everything I can, then I'm walking out. I won't give you any more. I'm not doing you a favor," Eve added. "If you go out with this, you're going to take a lot of heat."

"I know how to handle heat." Nadine's eyes were razor sharp as she continued to write. "I'll be soaking in the rays while I blow this open."

It took an hour, another pot of the vicious coffee, and both of Nadine's notebooks.

When she left, Eve didn't trust her reflexes and put her vehicle back on auto. But she didn't sleep, didn't close her eyes. Once home, she moved from the car to the house like a sleepwalker.

Summerset was waiting for her. "God. Even vampires sleep sometime."

"There's been no sanctioned or unsanctioned hit on either Icove."

"Yeah, fine."

"But you knew that. Are you also aware there is purportedly a fee-based operation that offers young women, educated through Brookhollow College in New Hampshire, to clients for purposes of marriage, employment, or sexual demands?"

She struggled to focus her exhausted brain. "How did you get that?"

"There are sources still available to me that aren't available to you, and due to his relationship with you, that are less forthcoming with Roarke."

"And did these sources give proof of these purported activities?"

"No, but I consider them to be very reliable. Icove was associated with Brookhollow. One of Roarke Enterprises' jet-copters logged a route to that location today, where, it seems, the president of the institution was murdered. In the same manner both Icoves were murdered."

"You're a fount of information."

"I know how to do my job. I believe you know how to do yours. People aren't commodities. To use education as a mask, to use them as such is despicable. Your pursuit of the woman who, in all likelihood, struck back at that, is wrongheaded."

"Thanks for the tip."