Portrait in Death (In Death #16)(51)

And she would have to tell them he'd been found.

"Let me deal with this," she said and crossed to Nadine.

"I'd have contacted you," Nadine began, "but the station got the report of the body, and that cops were on scene. I had to figure one of those cops was you."

"Because?"

"Because I got another note, and more pictures. It came through my station unit at six a.m. He's a young man, Asian mix. Very slim, very attractive. Another student, I'd have to say, as the candid shot puts him at Juilliard. I recognized it. Who the hell is killing these kids, Dallas?"

Eve shook her head. "I'll give you a stand-up, here and now, Nadine. Then I'm going to ask you to send the crew away, give me the transmission, then come into Central. I have a stop to make, but I'll be in as soon as I can. I'm going to ask you not to talk to anyone about what you received this morning. I'll give you everything I can."

"Let's set it up." She signalled her crew. "Dallas, I'll do anything I can to help you stop him. But that doesn't mean I don't want the entire story, exclusive, once you have."

"I'll give you what I can when I can." A headache was waking up behind her eyes. "Let's get this done," she added with a glance at the time. "I'm on the clock."

***

Eve sat in the Sulu living area of their gracious uptown home at twenty after seven on a sticky summer morning, and watched two people dissolve under the shock of losing their only child.

"There could be a mistake." Lily Sulu, a tall, slender woman who'd passed her build onto her son, sat clasping her husband's hand. "Kenby hasn't come home, but there could be a mistake. He's only nineteen, you see. He's very smart, and very strong. There could be a mistake."

"I'm very sorry, Mrs. Sulu. There is no mistake. Your son was positively identified."

"But he's only nineteen."

"Lily." Chang Sulu's eyes were dark, as his son's had been dark. They glistened now as he stared at Eve, as tears slid down his cheeks. "How could this have happened to our son? Who would do this to our son? He harmed no one."

"I don't have the answers for you, but I will have. I need you to help me get those answers. When was the last time you saw Kenby?"

"Yesterday, in the morning. We had breakfast." Chang turned his head, and the look he sent his wife ripped at Eve's heart. "We had breakfast together, and you said: 'Finish your juice, Kenby. It's good for you.'"

Lily's face seemed to break apart. As tears flooded it, her body shook, and the sounds she made were more whimpers than wails.

"Is there someone I can call for you?" Eve asked.

"No. No." Chang held his wife and rocked, and now his gaze clung to Eve's face. "We had breakfast together," he repeated. "And he went to class. Early class. He is a dancer, like his mother. He left before seven. I left for work perhaps an hour later. I am an engineer with the Teckron firm. Lily is now a choreographer and is working on a play. She left home at the same time as myself."

"Where would Kenby go after his early class?"

"More classes. He had a full schedule at Juilliard. He would be there until five, then have some dinner before he went to work. He worked three nights a week at the Metropolitan Opera House, as an usher. We expected him home by midnight, perhaps twelve-thirty. We didn't worry. He's responsible. We went to bed. But Lily woke in the night, and the light we leave on for him was still lit. She checked, and when she saw he hadn't come home, woke me. We called his friends first, then we called the police."

"I'd like to have the name and addresses of his friends, his teachers, the people he worked with."

"Yes, I'll give them to you."

"Was he bothered by anyone? Did he tell you about anyone or anything that disturbed him?"

"No. He was a happy boy."

"Mr. Sulu, was Kenby photographed, professionally, in the last year?"

"You need a photograph?" Sulu continued to stroke his wife's hair. "You said you'd identified him."

"No, I don't need a photograph. It would help me to know if he was photographed."

"At the school." Lily turned her head, her ravaged face, toward Eve. "A few months ago, there were photographs taken of his ballet class. And again, there were photographs taken of the cast of the spring ballet. They performed Firebird."

"Do you know who took the photographs?"

"No, but I have copies of several that were taken."

"Can I have them? I'll see they're returned to you."

"If it will help. Lieutenant, we need to see our son."

"I know. I'll arrange that for you."

When Eve stepped out of the house again, she breathed in deep to try to clear the taste of grief out of her throat. And turning over the photograph of the lithe, lively Kenby with his cast mates, she tapped the name: Portography.

"Have Hastings picked up," she told Peabody.

***

He hadn't slept, but Roarke didn't consider sleep a current priority. Though he didn't have his wife's aversion to chemicals, he didn't feel the need for a pill to boost his energy. He was running on caffeine and nerves.